The Board has some exciting news to share with everyone!
This year began with a bang as we were the host chapter for the SLA Leadership Summit in Dallas this past February. We had a wonderful turnout for the event and over 30 chapter volunteers. A huge THANK YOU to all that were involved to make the Summit a success! As a chapter we received many wonderful compliments from Headquarters and the attendees.
Some great news this year….we will be hosting some excellent FREE webinars for our members, starting in March. If you have some ideas for topics, please contact Mary Ann Husling, our Education Chair at MaryAnn.Huslig@utsouthwestern.edu.
To help us with those webinars, we have a new sponsor ReadyTalk. ReadyTalk will be delivering, hosting and recording our webinars. More on ReadyTalk can be found on our new website at http://texas.sla.org/2013/02/readytalk-sponsors-free-webinars. I would also like to introduce Plunkett Research, LTD as another major sponsor for our chapter. They are a Texas based business, and more information can be found at http://texas.sla.org/2013/02/plunkett-sponsors-texas-sla/. A warm welcome to both sponsors! Watch for announcements for upcoming webinars as we introduce their products and services to you. If you know of a potential sponsor, please contact April Kessler, Vendor Relations Chair at akessler@austin.utexas.edu.
The Executive Board and Advisory Board are hard at work developing some new concepts for our members. Our theme this year will be “Discovering the AHA Moment”. We will be concentrating on:
- Expanding our membership;
- Providing quarterly educational webinars;
- Reaching out to students;
- Working on e-archiving materials;
- Coordinating field trips to the Presidential libraries; and
- Developing a fantastic annual fall meeting.
If you have not met our Board members, here are their names and titles:
Executive Board
Ben Toon, President-Elect
April Kessler, Past President
Michael Smith, Secretary
Katie Cargill, Treasurer
Emily Kan, Communications Director
Margaret Carroll, Director-At-Large
Wendy Lyon, Director-At-Large
Advisory Board
Innocent Awasom, Membership Chair
April Kessler, Vendor Relations Chair
Mary Ann Huslig, Education Chair
Beth Thomsett-Scott, Professional Development Chair
Jane Bitter, Public Policy Liaison
Megan Rush, Discussion List Manager
Stacee Millangue, Webmaster
Contact information can be found on our Texas Chapter Website at http://texas.sla.org. Please feel free to sign up for RSS feeds to stay current with any changes and additions to the site. Stacee Millangue, our webmaster, has been updating the website on a continuous basis.
Mark your calendars now for our Texas Chapter Meeting on Friday, Nov. 1st at the Goodwill Industries in Austin, TX. We are looking for 4-5 volunteers to help develop and coordinate this event. If you would like to donate a few hours of your time, please contact me off list. We will still be offering this one day event at a very small cost to our members. The cost includes breakfast, lunch and all sessions.
Did you know Texas has three Presidential Libraries? We will be hosting and coordinating Saturday tours for these libraries beginning in April. Plans are to visit the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum in Austin and Lady Bird Johnson’s Wildflower Center. Next on the agenda will be George W. Bush’s library in Dallas in August, co-hosted by DALL, and travel to College Station in the Fall to visit the George Bush Presidential Library.
Volunteers are needed to help coordinate some evening get-togethers a few times a year in the Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, and Far North Dallas areas. Sandy Parker, a new member, has volunteered to organize the Austin gatherings. For additional details, please contact Ben Toon, President-Elect, at bentoontx@gmail.com.
We are also looking for an archivist to help index our electronic materials. The time anticipated for this position is about 5 hours a month for the first couple of months and then tapers off to around 1 hour each month.
A shout out of thanks to Innocent Awasom, Membership Chair, and Megan Rush, Discussion List Manager, for updating our listserv! We now can use the listserv as our major communications tool to keep our members current on all our events and news.
Along the lines of communications, don’t forget to join our LinkedIn group at http://www.linkedin.com/groups?home=&gid=159906&trk=anet_ug_hm&goback=%2Egna_159906. If you like to use Twitter, we have a Twitter account: https://twitter.com/sla_ctx. Handle: @sla_ctx. Coming in the Fall…Facebook! Additionally, Emily Kan, our Communications Director, and Megan Rush, will be developing a social media plan and process for our membership.
This is the year that the Texas Legislation is in session and Jane Bitter, our Public Policy Liaison, will be keeping you updated on all library related issues. Look for more announcements in the coming months.
In July we will be having an open online conference call for all members. Please watch for May details, and if you have a topic you would like the Board to discuss, please contact Michael Smith, our Secretary at michaelsmith@library.tamu.edu.
And, to keep us on budget is our new treasurer, Katie Cargill. Katie is new to the Texas Chapter and has been working with the Board and Headquarters to ensure our future finances.
As you can see we have a busy year ahead of us and the Board hopes you will enjoy the benefits of your membership, participate, and invite others to join!
Best,
Barbara Fullerton
