For my part, I'd definitely like to see ARLIS become more active
regarding public policy--I think it's appropriate for ARLIS to respond
to a wide variety of legislation, as some other library associations do.
We could weigh in on issues such as privacy, intellectual freedom, or
respond to local in addition to national legislation.

I'm still fairly new to ARLIS, so don't have a clear picture of what the
Board's or Society's capacity regarding public policy issues is now or
might be in the future.  I've reviewed the Public Policy Committee's
annual reports (at
http://www.arlisna.org/organization/com/pubpol/index.html#archives ) for
the past few years and can see that the Committee has done a great job
of responding to the big legislative items that directly affect our
libraries, like copyright.  (So again, I can't imagine why altogether
disbanding the committee would be on the table).  But there's a lot more
that could be done, and I believe this is important work for both the
Society and um, society.  Being more active in this area this might or
might not change the role or scope of the Public Policy *Committee*,
since I suppose the Board itself could have such capacity.

Marc Gartler
Director of Library Services
Harrington College of Design
200 West Madison
Chicago, IL 60606
312.697.8021
[log in to unmask]
 
-----Original Message-----
From: ART LIBRARIES SOCIETY DISCUSSION LIST [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Falls, Sarah
Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2007 8:56 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARLIS-L] ARLIS Assessment Task Force Recommendations

Hi Marc and all: 
 
We used the Banff focus groups (a reflection of 10-15 individual
viewpoints) to formulate and direct the questions we then asked the
entire membership in the survey (about 400 participants.) I'm not
negating these initial viewpoints, but they were used as a "jumping off
point" for the survey. I think some of these issues you raise with the
Public Policy Committee may boil down again to communication. The point
of the matter is, many in the membership do not know what the Public
Policy Committee does or achieves (I don't.) New vehicles for
communication may allow committees a new life, opening them to new
members and increased interest from society members. The Assessment
report is not meant to take down committees overnight but make us all
reflect on how we help ARLIS evolve to be the best it can be through new
structure models and new modes of communication. That said, how do you
see the Public Policy Committee evolving to be a more effective part of
ARLIS-NA?
 
Sarah Falls

________________________________

From: ART LIBRARIES SOCIETY DISCUSSION LIST on behalf of Marc Gartler
Sent: Tue 4/10/2007 6:20 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARLIS-L] ARLIS Assessment Task Force Recommendations



I disagree with the recommendation to disband the Public Policy
Committee or "reconstitute it as an advisory committee."

 

Since disbanding the committee without such reconstitution is an option,
the survey has clearly been interpreted to mean that public policy
efforts are only weakly supported by the membership.  Though this is
possible, I find it hard to believe, especially since the Focus Groups
in Banff indicated that "In particular the work of the Professional
Development, Public Policy, Cataloging Advisory, Travel Awards,
Diversity, and Publications committees were cited as meeting the needs
of the Society."  (recommendations, page 15).

 

Since the survey merely asked "How well do these standing committees
meet the needs you perceive ARLIS/NA has?" I find it more plausible that
survey suggests that the Public Policy Committee isn't doing a great
job.  This could also mean that the membership wishes the PPC or the
Society to be more active in its public policy efforts.  The survey
question is open to interpretation, but the reading I've suggested is
consistent with the focus groups' results whereas the task force seems
to be ignoring those results.

 

At a minimum, the clear contradiction between the results of the focus
groups and the survey suggest that there ought to be a little more
discussion or research prior to accepting the task force's
recommendation to disband or reconstitute the committee.

 

Marc Gartler

Director of Library Services

Harrington College of Design

200 West Madison

Chicago, IL 60606

312.697.8021

[log in to unmask]

 

P.S. Full disclosure: I'm a member of the Public Policy Committee.

________________________________

From: ART LIBRARIES SOCIETY DISCUSSION LIST [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Lynda S. White
Sent: Monday, April 09, 2007 1:58 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: [ARLIS-L] ARLIS Assessment Task Force Recommendations

 

We need your feedback!

The ARLIS/NA Board and the Assessment Task Force want to move the
discussion of the restructuring plan to the ARLIS/NA email list, hoping
to foster broader discussion of the proposals before the conference.
Below is an abridged version of the recommendations. For more context,
you may want to refer to the report on the member's only website
(http://www.arlisna.org/arlismembers/assessment/recommendations.pdf)
before commenting on the list. Before and after organizational charts
are also available there. (Email [log in to unmask] if you've forgotten
the password.) The recommendations are based on your input from focus
groups, interviews, and last summer's survey.  We need to know if we got
it right.

Please take a look at the recommendations below and let us know your
thoughts so that we can make any needed adjustments before the
conference.

Groups wishing to discuss the recommendations with task force at the
conference should let me know ([log in to unmask]) as soon as possible
so that we can make arrangements.

If you haven't checked it out yet, there has been limited, but very
interesting, discussion on the blog
http://arlisna.org/arlismembers/blogs/.  


Sarah Falls
Kathleen List
Mark Pompelia
Rebecca Price
Lynda White, Chair


ARLIS/NA Assessment Task Force Report and Recommendations, 2006
Abridged ARLIS/NA Restructuring Recommendations, April 2007

Based on what the membership has told the Assessment Task Force in the
survey and focus groups, we recommend the following changes in the
ARLIS/NA structure:

DSRTs (Report, p.4-8)
-   Remove the current DSRT groups from the bylaws and policy manual
(some means to retain the historical record should be devised) and
replace them with informal "Interest Groups."
-   Groups should be allowed to arise spontaneously, designating
leadership in any manner they choose. 
-  They should be required to post notice of their existence on ARLIS-L
and the ARLIS/NA website so that others may participate; Interest Groups
should report their discussions to the entire membership using News and
Features to share news and activities.

-   Groups should be freed of reporting to the Board unless they have an
issue needing Board attention or wish to provide feedback and advice to
the Board; they could propose projects to the Board and request funding
for those projects through the Special Funding process.
-   Additional server space should be provided to accommodate technology
for groups to communicate in whichever manner works best for that group.

Executive Board (Report, p. 8-9)
-   Convert the five regional representative positions to functional
positions with responsibility for specific committees, including
appointing the chairs: 
  >  Chapters Coordinator: Chapters Council (see below) 
  >  Development/Marketing: Development Committee
  >  Education: Professional Development (& Education Task Force), SEI
  >  Communication (including oversight of technology needs):
Publications Committee, including all editors, the ARLIS-L moderator,
and Website editor
  >  Conference Planning: Conference Planning Advisory Committee
  >  These positions could be incorporated into the Bylaws in a flexible
manner so that they can be changed by the Board as Society needs change.
That is, the Bylaws should specify only that there will be five
functional board officers with committees reporting to them; it should
not name each officer or functional area.
-   The remaining board officers would be responsible for and appoint
chairs for the following committees:
  >  Past President: Cataloging Advisory, Standards
  >  Secretary: Membership Committee
  >  Treasurer: Finance Committee 
  >  President: Awards Committee (subcommittees would continue to report
to the umbrella awards chair), Nominating Committee
  >  Vice-President: Interest Groups
-   Remove manual recording of the minutes from the Secretary' duties.
This would allow the Secretary to participate in Board deliberations.  
-   The Nominating Committee will need to look for operational skills in
addition to geographic diversity. 
-  The Nominating Committee should ensure that at least ONE member of
every Board is from Canada. 
-  Institute a Chapters Council, consisting of chapter officers, of
which the Chapters Coordinator would be chair. The Chapters Coordinator
would also be responsible for the Chapters listserv and any other means
of communication among chapters and with the Board; for coordinating and
setting the agenda for meetings of the Council; for orienting the
Council to ARLIS/NA policies and procedures.

Committees (Report, p. 9-10)
-   The Board should continue to appoint special task forces to carry
out finite tasks but an end point should be specified in each charge.
-   The Board could appoint advisory committees as needed that would be
"on call" to advise the Board on specific topics as issues arise-to take
the temperature of the membership.
-   The Board should ensure that committees have the resources to
communicate their actions to the membership, perhaps through brief
quarterly reports to News and Features, their own page on the ARLIS/NA
website, emails to the listserv, blogs, or a combination of these and
other means.
-   Cataloging Advisory should be maintained as a standing committee;
its charge is already clear and strong, and ARLIS/NA members feel that
it accomplishes its goals.  
-   Standards should be maintained as a standing committee; its charge
should be clarified and strengthened.
-   The Diversity Forum should become an Interest Group, which would
allow it to continue to provide advice to the Board concerning diversity
issues.
-   International Relations and Public Policy should either be disbanded
or be reconstituted as advisory committees.
-   All committees should be reviewed periodically for overlap and
effectiveness.

Liaisons (Report, p. 10-11)
-   Each liaison position should be reconsidered and re-justified,
defining its relationship to affiliated societies; determine a charge
and expected outcomes for the positions that remain, posting these
duties on the website and adding the concept of Liaisons to the Bylaws
and Policy Manual.
-   Determine how these liaisons should communicate with the membership,
perhaps via ARLIS-L, space on the ARLIS/NA website, and through News and
Features.

User Groups (Report, p. 11-12)
-   User Group Meetings should not conflict with conference sessions and
all-conference events.
-   ARLIS/NA should continue to provide self-scheduled meeting space for
those groups that are not sponsored by vendors, particularly for open
source products.
-   Membership sponsored groups can be offered communication
technologies through headquarters; vendor groups should provide their
own technologies and communication paths.
-   Vendor sponsored meetings should continue to be listed in the
conference program, but vendors should provide the meeting space, or
alternatively, ARLIS/NA might consider providing vendor meeting space in
return for conference sponsorship.


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Lynda S. White, Associate Director
Management Information Services
562 Alderman Library
PO Box 400114
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA   22904
(434)924-3240 / [log in to unmask]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
That which is measured is done.
                             --Mark Warner
                               Governor of Virginia, 2002-2006 

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__________________________________________________________________
Mail submissions to [log in to unmask]
For information about joining ARLIS/NA see:
        http://www.arlisna.org/join.html
Send administrative matters (file requests, subscription requests, etc)
        to [log in to unmask]
ARLIS-L Archives and subscription maintenance:
       http://lsv.uky.edu/archives/arlis-l.html
Questions may be addressed to list owner (Judy Dyki) at:
[log in to unmask]

__________________________________________________________________
Mail submissions to [log in to unmask]
For information about joining ARLIS/NA see:
        http://www.arlisna.org/join.html
Send administrative matters (file requests, subscription requests, etc)
        to [log in to unmask]
ARLIS-L Archives and subscription maintenance:
       http://lsv.uky.edu/archives/arlis-l.html
Questions may be addressed to list owner (Judy Dyki) at: [log in to unmask]