Calling all abstracts

Visit the abstracts page at the conference website to find out about the abstracts submission process for the 2008 LIANZA conference. The programme team is keen to receive abstracts on a wide range of topics and from presenters who can think of innovative ways to engage an audience. And so session times have been increased to allow an unhurried presentation and more space for questions and discussion.

There is a choice of format types: oral presentations, workshops, panel discussions, and hands-on computer sessions. Intending presenters are asked to state their primary audience and broad topic areas. This is to help conference goers make good choices about the sessions they attend.

Poropitia - Outside the box is a conference at which both the content and how it's presented should deliver something beyond the obvious. Submissions are due on 2 May. The abstract review and selection process will take place during May-June. Successful authors will be notified by the end of June. The review team will then read the full papers so that presenters receive feedback and advice before the conference itself.

Give it a think!

• Do you want to present? Know someone who should? Nudge them into action.
• A topic you want to learn more about? Keep visiting the blog and add comments so that you are helping to shape the conference programme.

Ideas for presentations, workshops, panel discussions - some of these have been blogged before, others have been mentioned recently. These are topics people want to hear about.

• The social context: libraries and legal compliance ... accessing and using legal information. Official information. Public Records legislation. What do we need to know and why?
  Online social networking and collaboration: how's it being used at work (and maybe for work).
• Getting the best out of the relationship with the IT team: what across-team approaches maximise our effectiveness?
• Training >> learning and development. What are the trends? Where are the gaps? What does the research tell us?
• Knowledge management: alive and well? dead? dying? Someone want to arrange a panel discussion with audience involvement?
• Blogs, wikis, et al. and e-citizenship. What's the scope?
• Marketing - internally, to your manager ... to the executive. What works? Why?
• Writing to impress. Telling your library's story succinctly and complellingly.
• Libraries contributing to community outcomes. What are the challenges for measuring success?
• Story times: what have you tried and evaluated for success? Library-parent relationships.
• Your experience of working outside the sector or overseas ... what are the learnings others need to hear?
  

Do plan for a full-on conference: 3.5 days from Sunday 2 - Wednesday 5 November. More details over the next week or so will convince you that Poropitia-in-full is where you'll want to be.

Update from the Programme team

Thanks to those who have posted to the blog over the last few days - if you haven't taken a look for a while, zip through the comments and see the ideas coming forward. Others emailed to us include:

• hybrid library models - what's the potential, what has worked, what are the learnings?
• copyright and rights management - what are the myths and what are the facts? What do libraries need to know?
• making contact with research communities
• service development using web 2.0
• maintaining registration - how will it support or change professional development?

Keep blogging....

Thinking about the programme

We are receiving a lot of suggestions for conference content and formats. Suggestions emailed in have included:

• research on learning: implications for libraries
• presentation or panel involving authors
• masterclass sessions from experts in fields connected to - but outside - libraries: like this idea? any thoughts as to what you and your colleagues could see such sessions covering? A waiata masterclass, for instance?
• accessing and managing publicly available stats - how are these used to good effect? case studies?
• strategies for employment retention - understanding who is working in libraries and what'll motivate a diverse range of people to stay
• customers designing library services and spaces ... Where, how? first steps?
  

Any of these spark? Feel welcome to add to the list. And check out the comments left on the posts below.