ALAO-SSIG Program Planning Meeting
January 23, 2004
Otterbein College

The winter meeting of the ALAO-SSIG was called to order by chair John Burke at 10:15 AM on January 23, 2004 in the library at Otterbein College. There were 8 members in attendance including: John Burke, Angie Lorensen, Gaynelle Predmore, Becca Griffith, Joy Ramos, Amy Pickenpaugh, Doug Morrison, and Mary Ayres.

Welcome & Announcements

John extended his thanks to Amy for setting up the meeting, providing directions and signage, and for the food.

Spring Workshop

With hard work from Doug, the ALAO-SSIG spring workshop will be held at Ohio Wesleyan University on Monday, May 24, 2004 with our keynote speaker being Carol Brey-Casiano, ALA President-Elect. She has agreed to speak for a couple of hours and will include her biography, the role of support staff in ALA, national support staff initiatives, pay equity, and how she will handle these items during her term. She will also stay for a question and answer period. Hopefully with this kind of speaker, SSIG will be able to attract support staff from libraries other than academic only.

After a long discussion involving the jungle and tigers, the group decided on a theme: "ALA…Support Staff…The Here and the Now."

The group laid out a schedule of events for the workshop, which also includes two short breakout sessions. The schedule is as follows:

8:30 – 9:00 AM Registration
9:00 – 9:15 AM Welcome
9:15 – 10:00 AM Speech Part I
10:15 – 11:00 AM Speech Part II
11:15 – 12:00 PM Q & A Session
12:15 – 1:30 PM Lunch, Networking, Business Meeting, Election
1:30 – 1:45 PM Clarification Time
2:00 – 3:00 PM Afternoon Breakouts
3:30 PM Goodies, Evaluations, Go Home

Suggestion was made to contact Betsy Blankenship to see what goodies ALAO may have to give to the participants.

Doug brought up the issue of cost to the SSIG to host Carol. He suggested that we ask regionals to pick up some cost, possibly travel costs. Therefore, if we could get the regionals to pick up the cost of the flight, SSIG would be responsible for Carol's hotel, meals, and all transportation while in Ohio. As far as the hotel goes, it was agreed that a room should be reserved for both Sunday and Monday night at the Delaware Inn. We would also need a volunteer to pick her up at the airport and provide transportation to the hotel, as well as a trip back to the airport when she departs.

What about an honorarium? Will she want an honorarium? Suggestions were given to make her an honorary member of ALAO, and that we should give her some kind of Ohio goodie bag to commemorate her trip.

As far as we know, it will cost $20 per person for lunch and $50 for the lunch room, however, we need to talk to Judy to get specifics regarding the cost for rooms. Last year a total of 91 individuals attended the three workshops, with 50 at OWU. Considering these numbers, we should plan space for 100, but expect 75. We will need 2 areas for breakouts that will hold 50 people each and one area for the speaker that will hold 100.

Estimate on Costs for 100 attendees:

• $2100 for lunch
• $150 for hotel for Carol.
• $.375 for mileage for whoever drives Carol
.
• Unknown cost for breaks and continental breakfast

It will cost approximately $3000 to hold the workshop and make sure Carol is taken care of. With the registration fee set at $50, we will need approximately 60 people to break even. John will get a budget proposal together, approve it, and send it on to the treasurer.

LUNCH

 

Spring Workshop (Continued) – Breakout sessions

Possible topics for breakout sessions suggested through brainstorming:

• You have issues with what?
• Customer service
• Anger management
• Student workers
• Performance Evaluations
• Getting organized/being more productive
• It's more than a job/getting involved
• Having fun @ the library (game show)
• Humor
• Money issues
• Change
• Reclassification 101
• Support staff survey @ your library
• Tips & Tricks with the Ellsion machine
• Ohio literature/authors/historical person(s)
• Geneaology
• Safety
• Meeting management
• Dealing with Disruptive People
• Getting involved within and outside the job description
• Dealing @ work
• Morale issues/ Free/low cost morale boosting ideas
• Carolyn Brodie – Children/ YA literature
• Ask Louie

Doug suggested talking to other interest groups to ask for suggestions and or help with the workshop. John said that he would ask.

Support Staff Surveys

John reported that the surveys are not quite done yet, but will be sent out via liaisons list. The survey is designed to find out whom we serve and what they want. Suggestions were made to include questions about experience and area of job, financial backing from the university, if interested in workshops and if they will attend, if support staff is willing to stay overnight. John will get a draft together and share it with the SSIG via list serv.

OLSSI Session

Should we host a session? We are willing, but what do we do? Report from OLSSI says that it doesn't seem as though inviting professional groups will work this year, possibly next year.

2003/2004 Outstanding Awards

John thanked everyone for all of their help at annual conference. John sent the names of the 2003 winners to the national competitions. He sent both names into Library Mosaics, and used the original nomination letters in quotation marks and added that they were the winners from Ohio. Only Pat's name was submitted to Library Journal because they only have a support staff award.

In preparation for the 2004 awards, John has already put all of the information up on the website, with a deadline of July 30, 2004. There is still a need to publicize, check to make sure that OVAL will sponsor workshops next year, and get a committee together to review nominations when needed.

Website Update

For the most part the website is up-to-date, minus the minutes from Annual Conference and a few other things. John will make a general announcement to notify everyone of the updates.

Other Items – For the Good of the Order

A former SSIG member, Lisa Simons is working towards her MLS degree.

Gaynelle mentioned that our numbers are dwindling and we need to push for more members.

John promised to send out an email about the workshop as soon as possible.

Doug mentioned that ALAO has promised a donation of $1500 for OLSSI. He suggested that we may want to earmark $200 of that money for an OLSSI Scholarship.

Next meeting will be held on March 19, 2004 at 10:00 AM at the Northwest Ohio Regional Book Depository in Perrysburg, OH.