CLA President’s talk & lunch
Well, this week the president of the CLA came to McGill to give a lunchtime talk for the students at SIS. Fortunately, we had a very good turn out this year (around 40) which was MUCH better then last year, so that was good to see. I’m on the CLA McGill student group exec, and while I didn’t have much of a hand in organising this particular event, its always nice to see a lot of students come to events that we’ve planned (especially after these very busy speakers have come all the way to talk to us). I must say, the group of first years that started in September are way more involved than those in my year! (And its a good thing too, because between the department and the 5 main student groups, I think there are about 3 days that don’t have anything scheduled between now and the middle of March!)
As far as the talk on Tuesday, I found Ken Roberts to be a very interesting speaker. He jumped around to different topics quite a bit, so at first I wasn’t entirely sure what to think, but it ended up being a very inspiring talk. He gave us some examples of how his passion for librarianship and how utilising the most current technology available had changed his (and his family’s) life. He also talked about library management and how achieving a ‘transformational organisation’ should be the goal of a manager. These organisations are constantly changing and evolving, and the best ones are able to make the need for job safety and security work with the need for change. He mentioned that this comes from knowing there will be a role for you to play in the organisation, even if what you do in your job changes.
Roberts also brought a Sony eReader with him and passed it around for the students to look at. I won’t say much about this part of the talk, since my friend Graham, over at The Inspired Library School Student blogged about this part in more detail. As for the eReader, I had never seen one in person before, so that was interesting. It was a bit heavier then I was expecting, but I’d still love to buy one. However, at this point I just can’t afford it (FAR too many student loans). Though what I’d REALLY want in an eReader is something that you can store pdf files (eg, journal articles) and then be able to write/highlight on them with a stylus, in addition to having e-books. That would have been fabulous for my university career! Something like this would be awesome, except its even more out of my price range then the Sony…
After the talk, a few other members of the CLA student group exec went to lunch at Thomson House with Mr. Roberts and Dr. Bouthillier (the director of the SIS department at McGill). That was interesting as well, as we talked a lot about getting hired in libraries and moving up through the ranks to various managerial positions. The cover letter tips were especially helpful, as I’m starting to look at applying for jobs! All in all, it was a great talk/lunch!
