Online Collaboration

Online Collaboration
Guest Post: Circulating E-Readers
January 31st, 2012 | Permalink | 1 Comment

In conjunction with this week’s webinar, Developing and Maintaining E-Reader Policies and Procedures for Libraries, we asked Robyn Truslow, Public Relations Coordinator at the Calvert Library in Prince Frederick, Maryland, to share a post with their approach to managing policies and procedures for circulating e-readers, including keeping up with changes and needed revisions to the processes.

Thank you Robyn!

The short answer is to create a small team that includes someone on the front line and someone who really knows the ins and outs of the devices and meet regularly to tweak as needed.

Let’s be honest…once you commit to a certain ereader to circulate, you sort of get stuck with that particular device. The Kindle and NOOKcolor were the two hottest ereaders when we got our grant so that’s what we bought. It would be too complicated to add each new hot device as it was introduced. Nor are there many libraries that can afford to add devices as they come out. MANY man-hours went into the processing of the first set of 72 devices…we are not anxious to add more even though we recognize that those particularly devices are hardly cutting edge anymore. So, stuck with the Kindle and NOOKcolor, the process of purchasing books and processing the devices for circulation doesn’t really change.

However, ebooks are still coming out for them so I guess we need to keep adding to them…or do we? So many people are getting their own devices now that it might make little sense to commit money to putting ebooks on OUR device rather than ebooks that customers can put on THEIR device. This internal debate has left us sort of just waiting on this issue. We had actually pre-ordered some titles when the devices first started circulating and it was a bit of a pain to get those titles loaded when they finally came out. Each ereader has an average of 100 titles on it already so do we really need more?

Our biggest policy/procedure is our User Agreement. Though some grumbled, we asked staff to read the whole thing to customers at each checkout. There is a good bit of training info in the agreement and possibly some off-putting “Do NOTs” but we felt it important to protect the devices. We also knew that new situations would arise that might require tweaking of the user agreement and therefore the NEW information would need to be communicated to a customer that may have checked out a device before the change. For instance, we have decided that we need to ask that customers not use/store the device in an environment with tobacco smoke. We also realized, 12 broken cables later, the need to train customers how to plug and unplug the device.

We have 12 differently themed sets of ereaders and at this point, two of the sets no longer regularly have holds on them. Perhaps it’s time to weed a few copies from each of those sets and make a new set for 2011-2012 bestsellers? Easy enough…we just create a new Barnes & Noble account, deregister a few of the less popular devices and re-register with the new account. OK, we’ll also have to change the barcode and property label and add a new record. And then there are software updates…do we pull the devices so we can run the update?

You don’t want a big team discussing these issues, just two or three people that have front-line and technical knowledge and the capacity to move forward with any decisions.
Celebrations, Online Collaboration
2011 Through the WebJunction Lens
January 3rd, 2012 | Permalink | Comment?
The days are getting noticeably longer in the Northwest, a welcome return of the light after a long period of leaving for and returning from work in the dark. It is also the time when a year’s worth of data comes to light as a reflection of what was accomplished in the previous twelve months. Although January 1^st is an arbitrary blip in the continuum of busy activity, it is illuminating to look back and bask a bit.

WebJunction shines because of the participation and contributions from the library community. Whether you’re a registered member, a webinar attendee, a social networked follower or a visitor to the site, you a part of the numbers that add up to another busy and successful year.
- 341,123 unique visitors came to the website to view 2,991,000 pages.
- 11,587 people joined as new members in 2011, and 3,455 subscribed to Crossroads e-newsletter.
- 7376 people attended one or more of the 32 webinars we hosted plus the August online conference on Trends in Library Training and Learning 2011. Registration and attendance for the 2-day conference was the highest ever for a live WebJunction event.
- 4,993 members enrolled in 16,836 courses, and completed 7,277 of them.
- Library staff used TechAtlas to inventory 16,594 new computers.
- Plus, there are now 2, 270 followers of WebJunction’s Twitter feed, where we posted 1,937 tweets of news and information about libraries.
- 1276 Facebook users are hanging out with us at Facebook.com/WebJunctionNews.
- There’s been a lot of conversation on our LinkedIn WebJunction group, where 1954 members engage each other on a variety of current topics; there’s even a sub-group with 364 members focusing on Social Media use in libraries.
- Project Compass focused its second year of effort on helping public library staff augment their services to the unemployed, delivering 54 full-day, in-person workshops to 1,242 frontline staff in 11 of the highest unemployment states; 38 workshops or presentations in other states reached 703 staff; and 339 from 22 states people participated in two online workshops.
  One participant summed up her workshop experience: “I have been in the workforce for 32 years and have been to various seminars. This by far was the best and most helpful one I’ve attended.”
As the online learning place for library staff, we strive to offer quality courses and current content. We happily share the credit with all of you who have contributed your knowledge to enhance the body of information housed on WebJunction.
- We did some weeding and trimming in our course catalog to keep it relevant and findable.
- 550 new documents were published by WebJunction staff, our partners, and members of the WebJunction community. Highlights from our partners include:
  - North Carolina’s Ereader Petting Zoo collection of documents on how to help staff get started with ereaders;
  - Illinois’ Business & Libraries: Working Together information on staff training workshops and other resources to help libraries support small business in their communities;
  - Washington’s Volunteer Engagement Strategies for Libraries materials from the Carla Lehn workshop series Transforming Life After 50.
- Our 32 webinar topics covered a wide range of topics, including:
  - The Entrepreneurial Librarian – Running the business of your library
  - Cataloging as Collaborative Librarianship
  - Developing Online Patron Tutorials
  - Putting the Public Back in Public Libraries: Community-Led Libraries
  - Creating a Web Presence for Every Library
  - Teaming Up with Teens @ Your Library
  - And many more
- The Workforce Resources community of practice grew so big, we had to divide it into sub-topics. For the second year in a row, this was the most visited topic page on WebJunction.
As budgets tighten and the world gets flatter, it becomes ever more important to form new partnerships and solidify existing ones. At WebJunction, we value these relationships highly.
- Texas became our newest state library agency partner this year. We look forward to welcoming more partners in the coming year.
- We had a very successful collaboration with the ALA Learning Round Table to plan, promote, host and present the online conference.
- Other programming partnerships included ALA TechSource, YALSA and ARSL.
Perhaps the most significant and exciting growth around our office is the WebJunction kids.

We celebrated the one-year birthday of Veronica Rose Hill Briggs. We welcomed the arrival of Shepard Russell (Gesinger) Turnbull and Coco Marie Maddison. We await the imminent arrival of TBD (Van Noord) Peterson. And we continue to enjoy the adventures of Loren and Clara Peterson.
Conferences, Online Collaboration, Online Learning
Library 2.011 Worldwide Virtual Conference
October 25th, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?

One more week until the Library 2.011 worldwide virtual conference on November 2 – 4, 2011. The conference will be held *around the clock* online, in multiple time zones over the course of two days and it’s free! Thank you to the School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) at San José State University, the conference founding sponsor, and to conference co-chairs Sandy Hirsh and Steve Hargadon for hosting this amazing opportunity!

The Library 2.011 conference is a unique chance to participate in a global conversation on the current and future state of libraries. Subject strands include the changing roles of libraries and librarians, the increasing impact of digital media and the e-book revolution, open educational resources, digital literacy, shifts from information consumption to production (Web 2.0), multimedia and gaming spaces, libraries as community centers, the growth of individualized and self-paced learning, the library as the center of new learning models, understanding users in the digital age, assessing service delivery, and defining leadership and information professional careers in a networked and changing world.

The conference schedule is now online, with all 160+ sessions, and an individual hour-by-hour schedule calendar for all 36 time zones. Start on the Sessions and Schedule page, scroll down and click on your time zone, and browse the amazing line-up. The festivities start on Wednesday morning and last into the wee hours of the night on Thursday. Links to the live virtual rooms will be available when the conference starts. Session proposals are available to browse to help you decide which time of the day or night to join in. Hope to see you there!

View conference page »

Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Patron Training, Staff Training, WJ Online Conference

WebJunction/Learning RT Online Conference 2011 Revisited

August 26th, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?

Thank you again to all who joined us in early August for Trends in Library Training and Learning Online Conference brought to you in collaboration with the ALA Learning Round Table. We’re excited to bring you this information about the library staff who registered or attended the event and to remind you that all recordings of presentations and associated resources are now available on WebJunction.

A total of 1965 people registered or attended the event and 1082 logged in for at least one of the sessions. Many of those who logged in were doing so in order for staff in their library to join a Viewing Party. See the long list of Viewing Parties!. A special thank you to you viewing party hosts, and sorry if we didn’t get you on the list.

Also a special thanks to our sponsoring WebJunction Partner States who brought over 889 registrants and 500 attendees to the conference and who continue to support the networking and collaboration critical to the success of WebJunction’s online learning!

Many others are represented in the list of top 20 participating states:

Florida	106
Illinois	87
Texas	86
Virginia	83
California	77
Pennsylvania	76
North Carolina	76
Minnesota	71
Washington	69
New York	64
Georgia	56
Colorado	51
Maryland	49
Ohio	48
Tennessee	45
Indiana	42
Arizona	41
Kentucky	40
Kansas	37
Wisconsin	35

And 90 participants represent these cities and countries around the globe:

Aberdeenshire	Monterrey
Alexandria	Namibia
Amsterdam	New South Wales
Argyrioy	New Zealand
Asachi	Pacific Islands
Auckland	Poland
Australia	Poornima
Bremen	Puerto Rico
Bulgaria	Reykjavik
Cambridge	Rio Grande do Sul
Dublin	Singapore
Ethiopian	South Pacific
Frankfurt	Southern Queensland
Hong Kong	Surrey
India	Tasmania
Indonesia	Thammasat
Istanbul	Trieste
Korea	Sydney
Lahore	Victoria
Makaia	Wetaskiwin
Manila

Here’s the breakdown of the many library types represented:
library type breakdown

As you can see from the broad representation across the globe and across the types of libraries you work in, the topics presented are indeed universal. From brain development to instructional design, from creating videos to creating community, the presentations were top-notch and inspirational. Betha provides an excellent summary of the 2 days in her post, Two-day online conference was a brain booster on the Learning Round Table Blog and you can view all the live-blogging we did here on BlogJunction. And be sure to check out the tweet archive for #learntrends!

I’d like to personally thank all of the planners (especially Sharon and Mary Beth from the LearningRT!), presenters, emcees, producers, viewing party hosts and all other participants, for joining the conference and for contributing to the success of WebJunction’s third online conference! I look forward to connecting with all of you in future online events.

Conference home »

collections, Library Services, Online Collaboration, Workforce Resources
Leading the workforce step by practical step
July 21st, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?
With the national unemployment rate inching upwards for the last three months, it looks like job seekers will continue to head for the nearest library for guidance. We know that libraries across the country have put tremendous energy into helping unemployed and underemployed patrons find their way through the demands of the 21^st century job market. Through Project Compass, we are building a Workforce Resources knowledge base of strategies, solutions and case studies.

There are so many patron demands to be met and so many ideas to explore that it can be overwhelming. Sometimes you just have to put one foot in front of the other and take the next step. That’s why we are pulling just a few good Practical Tips to Help Job Seekers to the surface of the Job Seekers sub-topic. (Look for the short list in the lower left rail.) We will refresh the list periodically.

We’re pulling these tips from a growing reservoir of practical ideas resulting from Project Compass’ reach through its workshops and programs. If you have sipped from the short list and are eager for more, here are 3 sources:
- 60 (plus) Ways Libraries Can Help Job Seekers: these ideas were all generated by Project Compass trainers working in a handful of the most economically hard-hit states.
- 56 Things you (your library) can do for workforce renewal: many of the ideas in the “60-plus” document, but presented in PowerPoint slides and organized by themes.
- Online Workshop #1 Resource Summary: through their lively exchanges in the forums, participants in the first Project Compass online workshop contributed a host of ideas and resources to address basic computer skills training and to meet the needs of job seekers.
The good ideas keep flowing Project Compass-way. Look for the summary from workshop #2 in early August—it’s focused on support for entrepreneurs and financial literacy. We’re also getting great survey feedback from over 1000 library staff who have participated in f2f workshops. Stay tuned.
Online Collaboration, WebJunction service
Simpler discussion forums on WebJunction
July 19th, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?
The results of our 2011 member survey sent us a message loud and clear: users of WebJunction greatly appreciate how much information the website contains, its breadth and depth and variety. However, users do want the information to be presented more simply, with less clutter, less text, fewer links to click, and fewer hoops to jump. We hear you, and will be focusing on making those improvements throughout the rest of the year.

I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that we started the simplification by paring down the home page to the most popular content. Our next target has been the discussion boards. When we relaunched the new version of WebJunction.org in 2008, we experimented with decentralizing the forums so that there was a separate board for each topic, scattered throughout the website. The idea was that visitors to the website would be looking for resources on a topic, navigate there, and then explore the variety of content formats to get the answers they need, including forums. It may have been an interesting concept, but forum software was not built to be used that way, and we stretched the feature beyond its practical capacity. Visitors have had a hard time finding the discussions and, more importantly, keeping up with the activity there.

So, we have consolidated most of the discussion forums to three main areas:
If you click any of the three tabs on the top WebJunction menu for those areas, you will see the related discussions right on the page. No need to drill down any further for subtopics.

We also took the opportunity to do some weeding of the boards, which have been accumulating content since 2004. We moved only those threads with recent activity (basically, posts in 2011) to their new location. We archived the older threads.

There are some additional places you will find discussion forums:
- Workforce Resources – these threads related to serving job seekers and the unemployment have been kept as a stand-alone topic for the time being, while our Project Compass work is still in full swing
- Group pages – the discussions hosted by member groups are still on those pages
- Getting Started – forum for support using WebJunction
- State Library Partner discussions – forums that are hosted on the state-specific versions of WebJunction have not been moved.
Library Services, Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Staff Training
Second (free) online workshop from Project Compass
June 20th, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?

Project Compass offers its second free online workshop, Libraries Supporting Small Business and Financial Health. This workshop explores the potential for libraries to help move their communities from surviving to thriving by supporting local entrepreneurs and by helping patrons increase their personal financial skills. Looking beyond the immediate needs of job seekers, discover other approaches to supporting the workforce in your community and growing their capacity to succeed in the 21st century.

The program will kick off with a live webinar on July 12, and will be followed by four weeks of self-paced reading assignments, facilitated discussions and peer networking. Read the full description.

Or go straight to registration, which is open to all until filled. Participation in the first workshop is not required.

If you are participating in workshop #1, you are welcome to register for this second workshop. The content and discussion topics will investigate different pathways to workforce renewal.

Project Compass is funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).
Library Services, Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Staff Training, Workforce Resources
Libraries at the Core of Workforce Recovery: Free Online Workshop
May 11th, 2011 | Permalink | Comment?

Libraries continue to be a pivot point in their communities as we move from recession toward recovery. No matter where your library is on the spectrum of providing services to the un(der)employed, this free online workshop from Project Compass will build your knowledge and confidence to deliver programs and services that will keep the workforce in your community moving forward in the 21st century. The workshop will cover how libraries can respond to the basic needs of patrons impacted by the weak economy and to the specific needs of job seekers. It kicks off with a live webinar on June 1, and will be followed by four weeks of self-paced reading assignments and discussions.

Read the full description.

Or go straight to registration, which is open to all until filled.

Project Compass is funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).
Online Collaboration
Nominate the future member-leaders of the OCLC cooperative
December 6th, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?
We are passing along this timely announcement from the OCLC Americas Regional Council:

“You are invited to nominate those you would like to see shape the future of the OCLC cooperative. Remember, all staff of OCLC member organizations may submit nominations for OCLC Global Council Delegates and OCLC Americas Regional Council Executive Committee positions. All staff of OCLC member organizations may also run for office.

The Americas Regional Council Nominating Committee is currently seeking nominations for 16 OCLC Global Council Delegates.

We are also seeking nominations for six ARC Executive Committee Member positions. The ARC Executive Committee is your regional membership leadership team:
- Vice Chair/Chair-Elect
- Secretary
- Four Members-at-Large
Please complete the online nomination form by 10 December 2010.
You will need to provide your OCLC symbol to submit your nominations.”

Learn more at http://www.oclc.org/councils/americas/nominations/
Online Collaboration
Learning guru gives Google Reader Play tip
December 2nd, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?

Marianne Lenox posted to the ALA Learning Round Table blog yesterday about how she and her colleagues at Huntsville-Madison County Public Library are enhancing their learning at this week’s Serving the 21st-Century Patron conference. In true 21st-century fashion, several staff are gathered together with their laptops in hand, participating in both the chat in the web conference room as well as on Twitter, sharing snacks, and stimulating intersession conversation with projected feeds from Google Reader Play.

Read Marianne’s full post (which includes more tips about Reader Play): http://alalearning.org/2010/12/01/learning-vicariously-with-google-reader-play/
Online Collaboration
And the award goes to…our WebJunction Partners!
November 23rd, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?

Once a year we take time out of our busy schedule to formally survey and then acknowledge our WebJunction Community Partner administrators. This year we asked partners two questions:

1) What 1-3 programmatic efforts using WebJunction are you most proud of this year?

2) Which partner(s) do you look to for advice/consultation/guidance as you plan your WebJunction programming and why?

The responses we collected from our partners were fantastic reminders of all the work that has gone into their programming and state partnership over the last year. We were energized by the work that has gone on and wanted to share with you the broad array of accomplishments achieved by our community partners. Hold on to your hats… a LOT has been going on in 2010!

Course Usage
WJ Idaho: Effective and broad reaching course marketing
WJ Indiana: Certification program
WJ Iowa: Public Library Management and Course of the Month online programs
WJ Pennsylvania: Epic end of year course sale and member engagement
WJ Washington: Fantastic end of year course efforts and marketing

Course Creation
WJ Georgia: GALILEO (Georgia’s Virtual Library) courses available in WebJunction Georgia’s course catalog
WJ Illinois: Brand New Course: There will always be Storytellers in all WebJunction course catalogs
WJ Pennsylvania: 3 new Access PA courses in WebJunction Pennsylvania’s course catalog

Content Creation
WJ Connecticut: Using Library Statistics to Make the Case For Your Library – Online!
WJ Idaho: Implementation of groups, including ID_Teen Read Week 2010. See more!
WJ Illinois: ILEAD U statewide library leadership skills focused on addressing local community needs
WJ Indiana: Jobs in IN libraries managing an up to date list of library jobs in the state of Indiana
WJ Kansas: 2010 KLA Virtual Conference and 23 Things Kansas
WJ Minnesota: brand new content – Public Libraries & Access to Justice
WJ Missouri: A great use of RSS home page feeds
WJ Ohio: a commitment to add 3 new pieces of content per month and LSTA spotlights
WJ Pennsylvania: Self-directed Reading on Leadership Topics and Legal Resources
WJ Rhode Island: Active groups including RI Children’s Services

Programming
WJ Arizona: Implementation of a new live online library leadership institute: ALIVE!
WJ Georgia: Blended learning efforts with Pat Wagner and Wednesday Webinars
WJ Idaho: Statewide workshop efforts focused on learning more about WebJunction Idaho service
WJ Iowa: Public Library Management Discussion
WJ Kansas: A series of programs focused on librarians and Everyday Ethics
WJ Minnesota: Super Tweeter including contributions to #libs4jobs hashtag
WJ North Carolina: ARSL Scholarships group NC Stars and outreach to library directors
WJ Ohio: Financial Literacy and Choose to Read Ohio

Online Conference and Webinars
WJ Arizona: Involvement in our February Online Conference with Building Digital Community: Arizona Memory Project
WJ Connecticut: Douglas Lord’s content, discussions and programming around Services to Older Adults, including webinar in April
WJ Florida: Highest attendance and webinars presented: Re-tooling Frontline Staff with E-government Resources and Hurricane Preparedness & Response for Florida Public Libraries Project
WJ Georgia: Involvement in our February Online Conference with Learning When There’s No Time (or Money) to Learn
WJ Indiana: Involvement in our February Online Conference with Funding for Broadband: Indiana & Beyond
WJ Iowa: Sharing Karen Burns with us so that we can learn from Iowa Small Libraries Online Conference and her contributions to PLA AND in an encore webinar presentation: Expanding Your World Through Web Conferencing
WJ Kansas: Again, 2010 KLA Virtual Conference and presentations and contributions to Group: Online Conferencing. And also presenter recruitment, eg: Jim Minges for The Rural Library Trustee: Roles, Responsibilities and Relationships
WJ North Carolina: An Introduction to Digital Preservation
WJ Washington: Involvement in our February Online Conference with Helping Washington Libraries in Hard Times

Project Compass
WJ Connecticut: CT Jobs Conference
WJ Florida: Superstar Project Compass Summit participants Nancy Fredericks and Juliet Douglas http://www.webjunction.org/workforce-resources/-/articles/content/94111089
WJ Georgia: Super host of the Atlanta Project Compass Summit
WJ Illinois: Small Business Association project showcase with Project Compass and Joe Natale’s participation in the Group: Libraries and Business Community Connections and Karen Egan at Project Compass in Portland.
WJ Maine: Maine Answers Tough Times
WJ Minnesota: Upcoming 2011 webinar series with MELSA on workforce recovery issues
WJ North Carolina: Project Compass Partner – without this partnership this could never have happened!
WJ Rhode Island: Project Compass Summit hosts and letter of support for second year.

New Partners:
WJ Florida: WebJunction’s very first Custom Course Catalog!
WJ Missouri: building out their new membership, use of their events calendar and blog
WJ North Carolina: building out their new membership, use of their events calendar and stellar launch marketing
WJ Pennsylvania: building out their new membership, use of their events calendar and blog and statewide collaboration

Special Mention:
WJ Connecticut: broad team involvement
WJ Florida: first to launch a custom catalog
WJ Indiana: Evergreen self-paced course
WJ Iowa: custom catalog
WJ Maine: providing the new ARSL president – Sonja Plummer-Morgan
WJ Missouri: most survey responses to this partner survey
WJ Ohio: leading session around content development
WJ Washington: WJ advisory committee role model

Shining Stars – peer awards nominated by state library partners

Illinois: Lisa Barnhart & Dawne Tortorella – We turn to Illinois to look at new ideas for programming. WJ Illinois is always the first to figure out the technical aspects of WJ releases and are always willing to share. I look to Illinois because of LibraryU. Taxonomy, content organization. I borrow all of their ideas – they are fantastic.

Kansas: Cindi Hickey – We always look to Kansas to see what they are doing on their site. I get inspired by the blended learning opportunities created by WebJunction Kansas.

Idaho: Shirley Biladeau – For her great examples of WebJunction Idaho workshops and how to get the word out. She is truly an inspiration.

Georgia: Pat Carterette – Pat has provided such inspiration, guidance and leadership. Her creativity has pointed me in new directions.
Library Services, Online Collaboration, Webinar, WJ Online Conference
Battledecks at WebJunction’s 2nd Online Conference
November 2nd, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?
We’re gearing up for our 2-day online conference in December focused on Serving the 21st Century Patron and in addition to hosting 7 sessions with 11 outstanding presenters we’re experimenting with Battledecks. Peter Bromberg provides a nice definition of Battledecks on this Learning RT blogpost:

Battledecks is a fun improv exercise that challenges contestants to deliver a presentation on the fly using an unknown slidedeck containing random (and often hilarious) slides. The contestants are judged on their ability to create a coherent presentation that incorporates the slide content smoothly. Laughs and getting through all of the slides on time are a plus.

We’re excited to be bringing you an online version of Battledecks to wrap up the conference with some interesting twists:
- There will be 5 contestants in the competition, each provided with 5 minutes to complete their impromptu presentation.
- YOU, the audience will judge their performance based on a set of scoring categories.
- All will surely be entertained and inspired by the experience!
We look forward to seeing you at the conference, for as few or as many of the sessions as you’re able to attend and as always, archives will be made available.

See conference details and registration »
groups, Online Collaboration
Have you checked out groups on WebJunction lately?
October 26th, 2010 | Permalink | 1 Comment
I’ve been putting Facebook’s new groups functionality through its paces this week for a non-work-related writing project. What I have noticed is that the improvements they have introduced are very similar to those we added to WebJunction groups functionality this summer. Since it occurred in July, you may have missed our announcement about it:
To help WebJunction members stay better connected around topics of shared interest, we’ve just rolled out some improvements to how Groups function. Those of you who are members or creators of groups on WebJunction should have received an email explaining some of these updates, but here’s the scoop for all.

Email notifications. For any group you join or currently belong to, you can now elect to receive an email alert when
- new members join the group
- new documents are added
- new discussion threads are started.
You can choose to receive these alerts hourly, daily, weekly–or not at all.

Group administration: If you have created a group, you have now been designated as Group Admin. This role gives you the power to
- edit your group (e.g., title or description)
- remove members from your group
- send an email to everyone in your group
- delete your group.
Groups directory: This new directory lists all of the groups created on that particular WebJunction site, in alphabetical order and including the description and number of members in the group. If you use a state-specific version of WebJunction, you will want to check out both the directory on that site and the central WebJunction site. When signed into WebJunction, you can join or create a new group right from the directory. The directory also features the most recently created groups and spotlights a particular group to check out. You can still use search to find groups, regardless of where they were created, but we hope you enjoy browsing the directory.

The Groups User Guide has been updated to include the most current instructions for how to create, join, and manage groups. If you encounter any issues with groups, please contact support@webjunction.org.

With these new enhancements, we expect we’ll see even more innovative uses of the groups feature. We look forward to seeing you connect and collaborate using these free tools made available to all in libraryland.
I gotta say, for both WebJunction and Facebook, this is pretty cool. Before, it was difficult to know when something happened on your group unless you remembered to go look at the page. Now, you get an email. Before, you couldn’t easily send a message to everyone in the group: you had to compose a message by hand in your email program; now, you can send one out with little effort. And, it was hard to find groups before, since they don’t appear in the navigation menus. Now there is a whole page dedicated to a directory of groups (plus you can use Search to find them too). Finally, as a group administrator, you are now better equipped to manage the content and members of your group page.

Granted, this is really complex functionality and we haven’t gotten it all figured out (ahem, nor has Facebook, I must say!). But, for your library-related group projects, we’d love you to try creating a WebJunction group to bring everyone and their content together on the same page. We’ve seen some great examples of groups in action, but with 62,000 members, we think there is room for more!

For more tips on how to use groups and other features of WebJunction, I’d like to suggest you view the archived webinar How to Make the Most of WebJunction, during which Jennifer and I take you on a tour of the site through the eyes of a librarian working on readers advisory.
Online Collaboration
Helping Libraries Use Articulate to Build Great E-Learning
September 22nd, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?

In July 2010 we completed a 6 month learning cohort program called Course Creation Gurus. This was an effort to learn how to use the Rapid E-Learning tool Articulate Presenter. We gathered together twice a month to share instructional design concepts and practical approaches for using this software to create meaningful self-paced courses for libraries. Today, Articulate shared the story of this program through their blog Word of Mouth. I hope you have a chance to read this post as they did a great job capturing our program and the great work and collaboration that came out of it!
Online Collaboration, Webinar
Real Library Solutions Using Competencies: Event and Archive
September 14th, 2010 | Permalink | Comment?

Many of us in the library community have been working on and with competencies, especially in the last couple years. And WebJunction has and continues to encourage and promote this work since over and over again we’ve seen first hand how they can save money, time and produce better results for your career, your library and your community. And we’re happy to share another such (free) opportunity with you now.

We’ve collected two of the leading competency experts working in libraries today to share a collection of stories and case studies this Thursday in a live web event you are invited to attend. The stories shared will highlight the practical value and flexibility competencies can bring. But the event isn’t just about telling the stories alone. There will also be plenty of interaction and time for your questions and ideas as well.

And after the event takes place the archive will live on as part of the substantial work we (libraries, attendees and WebJunction) have done in regard to competencies and libraries. So attend live this Thursday and join in, or be sure to check out the archive later. It’s definitely worth a piece of your busy day.

To register for the live event, go HERE.

Additionally, the archive, with links to the slides, session chat and other competency resources lives HERE.

PS- We’re using the hash tag #libcomp for this and other competency related work, so please use it too if you’ll be tweeting about the event. Thanks!

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Celebrations, Online Collaboration

Conferences, Online Collaboration, Online Learning

Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Patron Training, Staff Training, WJ Online Conference

collections, Library Services, Online Collaboration, Workforce Resources

Online Collaboration, WebJunction service

Library Services, Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Staff Training

Library Services, Online Collaboration, Online Learning, Staff Training, Workforce Resources

Library Services, Online Collaboration, Webinar, WJ Online Conference

groups, Online Collaboration

Online Collaboration, Webinar