ALA 2009 Part I

I have been debating on whether or not to blog my first ALA conference or not...partly because I feel I'm not a great writer and partly because I felt I probably couldn't do the conference justice. Then, I started thinking that I wanted to remember the sessions that I attended, and I wanted to always have documentation of my first ALA experience. I'm not sure if anyone will ever read this, but the following is part one of a series of blog entries detailing events from July 11-14 of 2009.

I attended the ALA conference with two other graduate student classmates of mine: Malissa and Patricia...both fabulous people. Our itinerary (complements of moi) put us in Chicago on the evening of July 10th. Once checking into our hotel (the Hyatt of Lombard, IL and a story in and of itself), we ventured to the Museum of Science and Industry to check out the Harry Potter exhibition. While I was excited about this exhibit, I was a tad disappointed with the overall concept. In my mind I was thinking more set props and the like, but it turned out to be more clothing and wardrobe. The signs seen at each "station" were a little redundant as well if you are one that has read the books and seen the movies. It was still neat, just not what I was expecting.

Day two had us up at 5am in order to beat traffic (even though it was a Saturday) and make it to our 8am sessions on time. We were geared up and ready to learn (although later in the week, the exhibits took a strong hold of us and we just couldn't stop!) with 3 sessions on the books. We each split up to venture to our respective rooms (they being more YA oriented and me being more technology driven).

Enter...8am Digital Libraries Showcase
Emily Gore of Clemson University: Clemson, SC spoke about what her university has done to create a digital library work-space. The following was part of her presentation:

• Scanning Center | One must keep in mind the budget of the department, as well as the staffing and expertise of those that will be working with the equipment. Consider what items the department will be scanning in order to purchase the right equipment. Ask the question about outsourcing...how much outsourcing does the department want to be involved with?
• Outsourcing Debate | It's important to only work with reputable vendors. Also, keep in mind that when outsourcing, things such as weather have a say in when and how materials move.
  
• Inhouse Debate | The disadvantage of doing EVERYTHING inhouse is the larger investment of time and money. It is also difficult to set prices per scan for statistical purposes. 
• Clemson University | They had 100K to work with with one full-time librarian and part-time students helping with the digitization process. A full-time scanning technician is also on staff and there has been re purposing of internal staff as well. Clemson also had to rethink the equipment being purchased based on their space (ceiling height, windows, etc...).
• Clemson University Workstations | They are equipped with both Mac and PC platforms with CONTENTdm (OCLC) being their cms. Each workstation is provided with dual side-by-side monitors that enable better comparisons when entering metadata information. Task lighting is also in place to give true coloring to the items.
• Clemson University File Storage | Clemson uses RAID as their storage back-up system, along with LOCKSS (for more digital preservation tools) and MetaArchive for a community-based approach to digital preservation.
• Clemson University's Scanner Equipment | The favorite scanner for Clemson is the Epson Expression 10000XL. This bad boy has all the bells and whistles and batch scanning capabilities that make for a successful scanning center in any University setting. Clemson also uses the Kodak Creo and iQ3 scanners but unfortunately they have experienced software upgrade troubleshooting problems.
  

Overall, I was intrigued by the presentation and wanted to see some scanning in action.

I decided to leave early and head next door to the Technology in the Developing World session. The following are notes from this discussion:

• http://laptop.org/en/ | One Laptop Per Child | Children in remote locations now have the opportunity to have ownership of their laptops. There are currently 1 million laptops aroudn the world, but the future of this program is varying from country to country.
  
• www.inveneo.org | "connecting those who need it most." Partners to bring wireless capabilities to places such as Rowanda, in order to create Refugee Education Centers. 
• www.research4life.org | Another partner in the OLPC project.

The idea of this project is for children to have technology/internet access, both at school and at home in order to spread literacy to family members. Each individual country organizes training and partners with deployment groups. Unfortunately, there are some instances where a top-down approach is had, where total reliance must be on the government of the country. Peru is currently the most government run project.
The flickr group for OLPC is:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/onelaptop/pool/
 
More to come from the rest of Day 1...