Working as a librarian at Webster University in St. Louis for 30 years, I have lived through massive changes in technology, librarian roles, and the expectations of our users. These changes generate huge amounts of stress for us, but ultimately everyone benefits as we evolve. I also have heard the phrase "the way we have always done things" too many times.
This year as we continue to experience the ebbs and flows of the pandemic and see how we have adapted to remain proactive and relevant in serving our users, I want to challenge us to embrace REINVENTION. While we hastily adapted our services in early 2020, many of us have not been able to take the time to process the last year and a half or to begin to reinvent ourselves, to thoughtfully reinvent our libraries, and to creatively reinvent our chapter.
As MCMLA members, are our needs different now? We are a smaller organization than we were a decade ago, and many of us have taken on more responsibilities in our day jobs. How can we streamline MCMLA to meet our needs with less work on everyone's part? How do we reinvent MCMLA?
My goals for the upcoming year include:
- Complete the work of the MCMLA Documents Task Force
- Ask the Bylaws committee to investigate changing the election requirements for the Chair position – currently we are required to have a minimum of two candidates on the ballot
- Convene a Task Force to create a new strategic plan
- Ask the MCMLA Annual Meeting Advisor to investigate alternatives to our traditional annual meetings
- Review the current MCMLA committee structure
- Begin a monthly Chair Chat
I'm honored to serve as Chair of MCMLA and look forward to working with you to reinvent this chapter to better serve us all.
