Brian C. Gray, Case Western Reserve University
The ALAO 2015 Conference Planning Committee is excited to announce the location, date, and theme for next’s year annual conference. On Friday, November 20, 2015, we will be meeting at the NorthPointe Hotel and Conference Center in Lewis Center, OH (north of Columbus in the Polaris area). There may be a pre-conference workshop on Thursday – to be determined. The theme will be “Cultivating Leadership: Preparing Academic Libraries for the Future.”
Julia Chance Gustafson, The College of Wooster; Professional Development Committee Chair
After the July 2014 ALAO Board approval of a 2-year pilot ALAO Mentoring Program (www.alaoweb.org/Mentor), the ALAO Professional Development Committee debuted the program with a poster at the ALAO Annual Conference. 
Registrations have been pouring in. Registration closes today, December 12; participants will be matched and notified by mid-January 2015. We are truly excited to see the number of registrants who have signed up and look forward to hearing participants’ responses when we send out our first round of assessment forms to all mentors and mentees. Since this is a 2-year pilot, you can expect to see at least one more official registrations in about a year, so stay tuned!
Diane Schrecker, Ashland University
Kaylin Tristano, Brown Mackie College
Want more ALAO conversation during the 12 long months between annual conferences? Session tweets revealed the only thing more popular than our #tweetalao buttons was discussion regarding a monthly Twitter chat. Join us for #TweetALAO, a brand new Twitter chat inspired by Engaging Tweets: Twitter as a Personal Learning Network at #ALAO2014.
Diane Schrecker (@dschrecker) and 
Kaolin Tristano (@theleastshrew) will moderate monthly discussions on a wide variety of topics of interest to all academic library professionals, with special consideration for Ohio librarians. Our first chat will be Wednesday, January 21 at 8:00 pm. We will be talking about libraries, the New Year / New Term. To participate, just follow the hash-tag #TweetALAO via Twitter or Tubs.
We look forward to chatting with you!
Eileen Theodore-Shusta, Ohio University; Diversity Committee Chair
Stephanie Dawson Everett
The Diversity Committee is pleased to announce that Stephanie Dawson Everett was awarded the ALAO Diversity Scholarship for 2014/15 at last month’s annual conference. Ms Dawson Everett is the Manager of Marketing and Communications at the University of Akron, and is pursuing her Master’s degree at Kent State University. She writes in her application: “I work on a campus in an urban setting and thus we have a diverse student population in relation to age, socio-economic status and ethnic background. In addition to our students, we are also within walking distance of a homeless shelter and on a daily basis we have several community patrons that will spend their daylight hours with us. The mix of students and community patrons can be very interesting and sometimes challenging and there are people on campus who disagree with the library’s policy of serving all of our community, specifically those from the homeless shelter. However, we [at the University of Akron] have a commitment to serve all patrons and by doing so benefit not only the community patrons but students as well by exposing them to “real life” and diversity in our community. It’s a small way that we are upholding the Bill of Rights and Diversity Standards.”
New committee members needed
The Diversity Committee has a few vacant seats left for this year. We’re looking for someone willing to commit to a one year appointment, until next summer (which is really only six months!) Please contact Eileen Theodore-Shusta theodore@ohio.edu if you are interested in serving. More information: www.alaoweb.org/committees/diversity/
Information about the 2015 elections will be distributed in the near future, with an official call for nominations. The online Procedures Manual gives information about the election process www.alaoweb.org/procmanual/policies.html#elections and full descriptions of the responsibilities and terms of service for elected officers. Please review the information if you are considering nominating yourself or a colleague. Self-nominations and nominations of others are equally welcome. More information: Betsy Blankenship, Past President and Nominations Committee Chair, blankenship.5@osu.edu
Kathleen Baril, Ohio Northern University
Jessica Grim, Oberlin College; CMIG Co-chairs
We hope you were able to join us at the annual conference for a wonderful panel discussion about working with faculty in collection development. We want to thank our panel members: LuAnn Boris, Julie Deardorff, Laura Kinner and Debra Oswald for sharing their experiences with us.
Interested in sharing what you are doing at your institution in collection development?
Please consider submitting a proposal for our spring workshop at the State Library on Monday, May 18, 2015. We are looking for presentations covering any of the following topics:
1. Management, selection and weeding in an electronic environment.
Presentations in this topic area might focus on single title selection practice, weeding of electronic collections, evaluation of use statistics, citation analysis and deselection criteria for ebooks or journals.
2. Marketing the library’s collections.
Presentations in this topic area could cover innovative ways to market the library’s collections both print and electronic to your campus community (faculty, staff and students), marketing to particular user groups (i.e. international students) and using vendor-supplied material.
3. Nontraditional “acquisitions” purchasing.
Presentations in this topic area might include funding for digitization, purchasing datasets, library as publisher and covering author fees. Proposals may address emerging trends, report on recent research, or demonstrate new services, projects, and tools. Each session will last 45 minutes. Please include time for questions following your presentation.
Proposals will be selected by blind review and should be submitted to cleary.110@osu.edu by January 15, 2015. Please include a title, the presenters names, a primary contact and an abstract (approximately 250 words).
Kathleen Pickens, Cincinnati State University
Carrie Girton, Miami University; DLIG co-chairs
Conference News: It was good to see so many people at the annual conference last month! The DLIG-sponsored session “Rethinking our LibGuides to Engage Our Students: Easy DIY LibGuide Usability Testing and Redesign That Works” presented by Wright State librarians Terese DeSimio and Ximena Chrisagis, was an engaging session with almost 100 people in attendance. Also, thank you to everyone who stopped by our booth and chatted. We are excited to have more volunteers and will be in touch soon. Continue reading
Sara Klink, Stark State College
Melissa Bauer, Kent State University, Stark campus; IIG co-chairs
The Instruction Interest Group is excited to begin working on programming for the upcoming year. We have recently formed our new planning committee and look forward to welcoming back a few committee members from last year and getting to know our new members! Additionally, we are still moving forward with our instruction blog and are still accepting guest posts. Blog topics we are looking for include:
Interested parties may submit proposals at this google form: docs.google.com/forms/d/1ncWdHPW_9-Wx9xhGSaOwJE4Hi0x0vQorgk0SVcuMGBI/viewform
Please keep an eye out for details about upcoming Instruction Interest Group programming!
A final tip: Don’t overlook this new version of the ACRL Scholarly Communication Tool Kit: acrl.ala.org/scholcomm/
Save the Date! The SSIG will hold its spring workshop on May 20, 2014. Details follow:
Wed May 20, 2015 10am – 3:30pm
Ohio University Lancaster Branch, 1570 Granville Pike, Lancaster, OH 43130
More info:
Myra Justus, myra.justus@cincinnatistate.edu 513-569-4690
Sean Redefer, redefers@ohio.edu, 740-593-0320″
Katy Mathuews, Shawnee State University; Membership Chair
Everyone is still buzzing about this year’s ALAO Annual Conference held on November 14, 2014 in Sandusky, OH at the Kalahari Resort. We were happy to announce 80 new, active members have joined since the 2013 Annual Conference! A warm welcome to all the new members!
During the Membership Chair’s Report at the conference, we reported 343 active members. This is proof of our wonderful, vibrant, active community. However, inactive memberships were 444. As you’re telling your colleagues about the enriching experience you had at this year’s conference, encourage them to renew their lapsed membership or to join for the first time.
Membership table at the Annual Conference
Membership entitles you to many benefits and connects you to an extensive, yet intimate, network of library colleagues. Membership affords you a discounted conference registration fee and access to online conference materials. Additionally, members are eligible for research grants, continuing education grants, and legislative advocacy awards. Membership dues also support a diversity scholarship, grants that fund student and support staff presenters at the annual conference, and special recognition awards. In the coming year, over $10,000 is expected to be awarded via these initiatives. An exciting new benefit is the ALAO Mentoring Program (www.alaoweb.org/Mentor), sponsored by the Professional Development Committee. This time of year is also a great opportunity to introduce full-time students pursuing a Master degree in Library and Information Science to a professional organization. ALAO extends free membership to such students, with 40 active student members already involved. What a wonderful way to enhance the scholarly experience with the robust networking and learning experiences of ALAO! Please contact Katy Mathuews, Membership Chair, at kmathuews@shawnee.edu for more information.
ALAO Newsletter 