Hello, my name is Paula Robinson, and I am a graduate student at the University of South Florida in the Library & Information Science Department. I did a Fieldwork last semester under the guidance of Kathleen de la Pena McCook with the Pinellas Talking Book Library. The Library Director, Marilyn Stevenson, and I created a Friends of the Library group for this library. We presented a poster session at the Florida Library Association Conference in the Spring of 2001 and received a great deal of interest.

Marilyn Stevenson is a member of ASCLA and has sent in material to do a panel presentation that would address Friends groups for "special" types of libraries. We would like to have 3 - 4 different library types - Talking Book, Law, University/Academic, and Museum - to show that there are more Friends groups than those associated with public libraries. We would like to provide information on how to form one, the benefits of starting a group, and the results of the ones we have (programs/services they have added to our libraries).

If you, or someone at your library would be interested in participating in this panel representing a Museum or Art Library, please let me know. Each speaker would present for ~15-20 minutes and then there would be a Q & A session with participants. We would really appreciate your contribution to this session at the ALA Annual Conference in Atlanta.