CONNECT Planning Committee Minutes for December 2010

Date:  December 7, 2010

Location:  Belle Isle Library

Committee Members: Angela Thornton – ED (chair), Barbara Beasley (WA), Barbara Johnson (BI), Clyde Herrod (CAT), Kim Edwards (DN), Daniel Fields (BE), Susan Hutchins (DC)

Goals for CONNECT:

• To serve as a platform for librarians in MLS to voice questions and concerns
• To facilitate a learning and sharing environment for such issues as professional development, trends in libraries, customer service, legislative issues, etc.
• To foster a sense of comraderie between the librarians at MLS

CONNECT for staff:

• Meetings will be held quarterly each calendar year: March, June, September, and December
• Locations should plan to send 2-3 librarians to each CONNECT session and should include different people each time; extensions should plan to send staff to at least one meeting per year
• CONNECT committee members will make a fair attempt to list topics for the year so that librarians can attend a session that will be of the most benefit to them
• Any electronic files or handouts from the meeting will be shared with staff members who could not attend via library managers, intranet, a Facebook page, or some as yet undetermined method
• MLO’s will be kept updated on progress of the planning committee and outcomes of sessions during monthly MLO meetings; Angela and Barbara will report

Communicating with CONNECT participants:

• CONNECT Planning Committee encourages all questions, concerns, and suggestions by MLS librarians at any time; phone calls, face to face conversations, emails or interoffice mail to individual members is encouraged; additionally, surveys and other forms of soliciting input may be used by committee members throughout the course of the year
• The possibility of a CONNECT email will be researched that will be accessible by all Planning Committee members; if possible, this will be announced when it is ready
• The possibility of a Facebook page for MLS librarians will be investigated and announced if it becomes available; this will serve as a more immediate connection among MLS librarians during the downtime between quarterly CONNECT sessions.

The first CONNECT meeting is scheduled for March 22nd from 2pm-4pm. The topic and location are as yet undetermined.

The next Planning Committee meeting will be January 25th at BI at 2pm.