Minutes

1. Approval of Minutes from last meeting deferred until August 24.

2. Agenda was adopted.

3. The ARLD presence on the MLA Web Page- demonstration (Deb): Mockup of new pages distributed showing buttons and navigation. Much more professional than old site. Buttons: Change "Dialogues" to "Meetings" and remove Wiki. Add "Membership"?

4. Report from Elections Committee (Robin).

Committee recommended slate of candidates (distributed). Reviewed "To Do" list. Ballots will be mailed to ARLD list. We need to establish a separate email account where ballots can be sent. Whoever counts the ballots needs to check voters against ARLD member list to ensure that only members' votes count. Robin will arrange for the establishment of a separate email account for ballot-receipting, and will have a student count the ballots.

Robin will draft email ballot and will include statement reminding recipients that only ballots from ARLD members will be counted.

Email will be sent approx. Aug. 1, due Aug. 17.

[Suggestion that in future the Elections Committee be chaired by ARLD Board Past-chair rather than incoming chair].

5. Bylaws Revision (Jim and Robin)

Discussed changes/issues. Suggest clarifying Executive Committee composition (vs. Board) in Article V. Section I. Jim and Robin will draft another revision incorporating agreed-upon changes, for submission to MLA. Acronym Appendix can be added at some later date.

6. Report from Awards Committee. Nominations discussed and finalist determined. Awards Committee will draft revised eligibility requirements for next year. Chair will notify awardee and arrange for their attendance at the MLA banquet.

7. MLA Annual Conference – programming, moderators, business meeting, awards ceremony etc. (Robin).

Robin distributed lists of programs ARLD is sponsoring and co-sponsoring. We sponsor 11 programs, need to assign moderators for 10. We are co-sponsoring 11 programs with other MLA divisions; they will provide moderators. Great program this year, nice mix of institutions and topics.

Moderator assignments and checklist of moderator duties will be discussed at the August meeting.

Discussion of conference update handout. ARLD will not have a table, as very little recruitment comes of this effort.

Business meeting Wed evening from 6:00-7:00, followed by MLA Business meeting/happy hour. Jim will do a mockup of Business meeting agenda for discussion at August board meeting.

Comment: Why is there no Student rate for conference? There is a Wed only and a Thurs only rate but no Friday only rate, or student rate.

Need to track down the ARLD banner – check with Karen D?

Need to send to ARLD listserv the list of ARLD programs at MLA (Robin will send to Kristen for distribution to the listserv).

Evaluations were done by MLA last year. Jim will check with MLA to see who is handling this.

Information literacy survey meeting at MLA? Julie K wants to arrange a survey of students entering college to find out who has information literacy skills entering college, then do a post-ed survey to assess whether skills increase in college. Wants to have a meeting with secondary and postsecondary institution reps to discuss survey and participants' involvement. Jim will contact Julie K. for more information about our role in arranging this.

8. News from: ACRL and MLA Conference? MLA Board meeting? Other meetings attended?

ALA Conference, Jim, Robin, and Linda attended. Jim went to the ACRL Chapter Council meeting (42 reps, 14 came) and gave a report. Several chapters are doing very little. We are one of the more active along w/CA and New England.

MLA Board meeting report: Conference programs for MLA Annual have been sent out. Communications Committee spoke. There is an entry on Wikipedia for MLA. Discussed social networking ideas – LibraryThing, a blog, etc. MLA Board is doing everything on a volunteer basis, in the absence of a Director. Resolution supporting ALA's position on the freedom to read/security letters issue.

Other conference reports: Robin reported on Gaming conference in Madison and ALA Games Symposium in Chicago. Events included how to run gaming events in your library, how to archive games, games research, etc. Lynne reported on Aleph users conference in Spearfish, SD. Jim went to reference futurist session at ALA, also heard from cultural anthropologist who studies librarians as a "tribe".

9. Legislative report (Gretchen). She is learning a lot about budgeting at the state level. Bill DeJohn discussed possibility of adding to ELM. Many issues are public libraries-focused. Consensus is that libraries did relatively well this year.

10. Other: Karen D. gave Jim documents from her tenure with ARLD. MN Historical Society has MLA (including ARLD) documents through 2000, so this should about cover ARLD history.

11. Recruitment letter revisited (Lynne) – Letter to be sent to library grad schools (Library School director and Distance Ed. Coordinator) with attached brochures inviting students to join MLA (and thus ARLD). Distribution was delayed by MLA staffing changes.

Robin suggests sending in Jan. 2008 because if students join now they will have to renew in five months. Discussed revisions to brochure (new quotes needed from academic library members) and letter. Jim will check with MLA about letter since board chair would need to be the signatory.

Board resolution to thank Victoria Peters for all of her many contributions to the ARLD Board over the past four years, especially planning ARLD Day and for organizing the ARLD sessions at the MLA Annual Conference.

12. Next Meeting

August 24, 2:00-5:00 (Gretchen on vacation; Kristen may not be able to attend).

Sept. 21, 2:00-5:00 (Melissa out)

October meeting at MLA Annual

Present: Robin Ewing, Jim Newsome, Melissa Prescott, Kristen Clark, Gretchen Pyle, Deb Bergeron, Lynne Weber, Linda Eells