PAM Board Meeting
June 14, 2009
Present: Holly Flynn, Michiko Tanaka, Kathy Wolcott, Emily Poworoznek, Sally Bosken, Arun Sanutti, Robert Fowler, Julie Arendt, Parker Ladwig, Bob Michaelson, Ruth Kneale, Zari Kamarei, Donna Cromer, Liz Bryson, Molly White, Elaine Adams, Donna Thompson
Zari called meeting to order and everyone introduced him/herself.
Zari announced that Karen Andrews and Lisa Johnson had both worked very hard on fundraising for the Division but we unable to come because of budget issues. Everyone thanked them for their work.
Agenda was approved with minor corrections.
Elections: Need Chair-Elect and Treasurer for Fall 2009. Parker suggests making nominations before the annual SLA meeting in the future like the Sci-Tech Division has done. Molly suggests changing the election time. Question was raised if this would have to be a procedural change. A vote and a procedural manual change may need to take place. Nominating Committee needs another member. Currently Molly White and Barbara Kern are on the Committee. Zari and Emily will work on this.
Alignment Project: Zari spoke about the SLA alignment project. A name change for SLA has been proposed again. The purpose is to bring clarity and unity to the core values of the Association. The firm of Fleishmann-Hiller has been hired to research this. Hope to come up with a name that reflects the inherent value of profession. Fleishmann-Hiller will ask SLA members for input. Zari said that a lot of jargon was thrown out but no concrete plans have yet been made. Emily stated a portal will be put up for users/providers to get input for this. There seems to be a lot of support for getting rid of the "special libraries" name. More about changing labels than changing the organization. Ruth stated that changing image does not necessarily mean getting rid of the word librarian. Maybe a discussion can be started on PAMNET. Some starting points would be helpful. Committee chairs will be asked to come up with talking points. Liz suggests that we have telecons and videoconferences also. Will there be a blog about this for SLA members?
Changes to the Practices Manual: The changes brought about by SLA's restructuring of the "year" have not yet been entered into the Manual. Responsibilities and duties of the Chair need to be modified. Parker and Kris Fowler have started to look at the Practices Manual for needed changes. Liz suggests adding more people to do different parts of the manual. Ruth puts forth the idea of making the practices manual a wiki. Networking group could take advantage of SLA's wiki. Julie reminded us that parts of the wiki would have to be password protected or otherwise locked. Parker volunteers to look into platform migration. There should be an overlap of time of the members of each committee to provide for a smooth transition. This needs to be further discussed by the PAM Board.
Treasurer report: Ruth reported that PAM has total equity of $21,000. All sponsors contributed this year but not to the extent that they had in the past. Transfer of funds to LISA VI has happened. We will not be spending $5,000 since out International Membership winner cannot get a visa to attend SLA.
Newcomers' luncheon: Parker reported that we had 10 newcomers at the luncheon.
PAM Website update: Julie noted that SLA has a place to post slides from the conference.
Cataloging Report: Robert Announces that a cataloging presentation titled “RDA and the Future of Cataloging: What You Need to Know” would be presented by Dr. Barbara Tillett and others on Tuesday of the Conference. RDA (Resource Description and Access) is the standard which will replace the long-lived Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules 2nd Edition (“AACR2”). RDA is scheduled to be published near the end of 2009. Robert attempted to answer questions from several Board members regarding RDA.
Membership Report: Arun reports that membership has increased by ~20.
Hospitality Report: Sally reports that there were 28 people at the Early Bird dinner and 22 at the newcomers' lunch. Encourages people to attend the Open House tonight. Zari thanks Sally for all of her hard work.
Emily thanks Zari and Parker. Zari suggests that Emily make use of the RT moderators, treasurer, hospitality chair as a sort of subcommittee for planning next year's conference. Zari feels that keeping everyone informed throughout the whole process helped her. Emily hopes that both old and new members will work together.
Public Relations Report: Certificates for sponsors will be prepared and distributed to the booths. Joe Murphy (unable to attend because of budget cuts) thinks that the social networking committee should combine with the public relations committee. Joe is updating Facebook and Twitter with info about the meeting.
Mentoring Subcommittee: Michiko reports that the subcommitee needs new person. Four winners given IOP sponsorship to attend SLA.
Archive update: Holly says that SLA will now let us store things on CD instead of just on paper.
Awards Committee: Elaine announced that we would have two awards given at the PAM Business breakfast this year. She also says that the requirements for "framing" of the awards need to be updated in the Practices Manual.
Publishers' Liasions update: Liz Bryson reports that OSA will host a meeting tomorrow where Deborah Kalb will speak and then open up the floor to discussion. Jeff Bond will chair the Publishers' liasion committee next year. Marsha Bishop will take over as the PASP liasion.
International Membership award winner, Adefunke (Nike) Olanike Alabi was not able to get a visa to attend SLA meeting. Discussion of whether or not it was because she was trying to get a visa to come from Africa (this has been problematic in the past) or if it was because of her wanting to bring her infant with her. She is thankful for being recognized. She has asked whether or not she could come next year instead. The board discussed this but thought that we couldn't set this precedent. Zari will contact SLA legal liasion to try to find out what we might be able to do to better our chances of having visas approved. Also we discussed changing the wording of the announcement for the award that winning the award does not necessarily guarantee a trip to SLA. Emily suggests that we try to come up with networking opportunities for Nike.
Emily motioned to adjourn the meeting. Parker seconded. Meeting adjourned
at 3:08 p.m.
