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We are pleased to announce the Library 2.011 World-wide Virtual Conference, November 2 - 3, 2011.  The conference will be held online, in multiple time zones over the course of two days, and will be free to attend. The School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) at San José State University is the founding conference sponsor.

"The age of austerity has not been kind to libraries, and in many places they are the last ''storefront'' that still tries to put books into the hands of readers. Treating them like a captive market to be exploited is a huge - and potentially fatal - mistake on the part of publishers. If publishers wanted to get something truly valuable out of libraries, they could do no better than to help create a free, open alternative to Overdrive that gives them the data they need to compete with the e-book retailers and frees the libraries from their expensive circulation-management burdens."

Unfortunately, too many people consider libraries as mere rooms full of books and computers, and librarians as mere functionaries in charge of the rooms and their contents. When district leaders look for savings in a budget, too often they see the most important teacher in a school as the most expendable. California schools have seen a marked decrease in the number of teacher librarians in recent years. New York City has about 50% more schools than it did in 2002, but more than half of the district's libraries have closed in the past decade. In California, New York, and anywhere else cutting libraries, it's a classic example of a penny-wise, pound-foolish approach to budgeting: there's no shortage of evidence that libraries and librarians - both, together - have a strongly positive impact on student learning.

Our new infographic presents highlights of all of LRS's school library impact studies in an accessible and concise format. We hope this will be an effective tool for school library advocates!

And this is the true function of a library: it provides an atmosphere where ideas can be suspended long enough to permit rearrangement. Libraries are the petrie dish of intellect and the information stored there provides the agar of learning. But students themselves muster the work necessary to grow understanding.

Limitless Libraries is a cooperative program of Nashville Public Library and Metro Nashville Public Schools with the goal of improving school libraries, fostering resource sharing between the two institutions, and improving student access to learning materials.

Simply put participatory librarianship recasts library and library practice using the fundamental concept that knowledge is created through conversation. Libraries are in the knowledge business, therefore libraries are in the conversation business. Participatory librarians approach their work as facilitators of conversation. Be it in practice, policies, programs and/or tools, participatory librarians seek to enrich, capture, store and disseminate the conversations of their communities. Explore the information below, and throughout this site to learn more.

"It was the best times, it was the worst of times…." This famous observation by Charles Dickens is certainly applicable to the current status of school library programs and school librarians. On the one hand, some programs are valued and receive ongoing support from their communities. Led by competent, effective school librarians, programs such as those recognized as meeting the criteria of the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) National School Library Program of the Year Award, provide solid evidence of the positive impact of best practice on teaching and learning. On the other hand, the economic downturn, often combined with a lack of understanding or value for how school librarians and library programs contribute to student achievement, has led other communities to eliminate positions and to cut back, curtail, or get rid of once thriving programs.

Teacher Libranian resources for using Web 2.0 tools

This wiki was created for school library media specialists by Dr. Donna Baumbach and Dr. Judy Lee, University of Central Florida. The purpose is to provide information about some of the new web-based tools (Web 2.0) and how they can be used and are being used by school library media specialists and their students and teachers. Much of the information--including identifying a need for this kind of information--is the result of a survey conducted in 2008 of over 600 school library media specialists about their knowledge and use of web-based tools in library media programs.

helpful guidance/ ideas for developing a library procedures manual

What emerging trends are changing library services? What does the connected world of "continuous computing" mean for 21st Century libraries? The Hyperlinked Library MOOC offered by the School of Library and Information Science at San José State University provides a roadmap toward becoming a participatory, interactive, user-centered library.

What interests me is not just the explosion of the printed word but the inspirational library spaces created to curate them.

Hunt Library This isn't your childhood library. The Hunt Library at North Carolina State University is beautiful. The main floor looks more like a sleek Apple showroom than a stuffy library. And instead of a Genius Bar, there's an Ask Me alcove, where you can get help on everything from laptops to flash drives.

"Similar in structure to a literature-based library, the Ceramic Library loans out unique handmade cups made by thirteen nationally-known potters, for a period of seven days."

Ceramics on loan

With devices in hand, students are increasingly likely to enter the library not through a door, but through an app or a website. The ability to download textbooks and library books and retrieve information from databases means that the 1:1 device serves as an important access point to library materials. If

This Australian Library and Information Association is an important resource for our 5500 members, the media, government and everyone who believes in a strong network of library and information services for Australians. Here you will find news and facts about the library and information sector; career advice; training and professional development opportunities; campaigns and events and useful tools and templates. Jobs in the LIS sector.

Fascinating blog post on the future of libraries, drawing from works by Salman Rushdie and Jorge Luis Borges. This is a quick but satisfying read.

"At the recent Excellence in Learning Resources forum meeting in York we had a good discussion about the various eCollections libraries across the Yorkshire & Humber region currently provide for their learners. With so many libraries facing serious cutbacks, providing good quality eResources that don't put too much of a dent in the library budget is as important as ever."

Welcome to Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki. This wiki was created to be a one-stop shop for great ideas and information for all types of librarians. All over the world, librarians are developing successful programs and doing innovative things with technology that no one outside of their library knows about. There are lots of great blogs out there sharing information about the profession, but there is no one place where all of this information is collected and organized. That's what we're trying to do.