Head Tale

The Canadian Library Association recently voted to wind down their operations so they can be re-born as a new “federation of associations” from across Canada and also to re-focus on what they do best (national voice for libraries = yes; conferences = not as much, especially when OLA is widely regarded as “the” Canadian library conference.)

Although I’d really pulled back on my involvement lately, I’ve gotten a lot from CLA over the years.

Here are a few of the main things that jump to mind…
– drove a van of students from London to attend the CLA conference in Ottawa in 2006 while I was in library school
– attended a couple other conferences after I started working at RPL (Montreal, Edmonton)
– represented public libraries on a committee to redesign the CLA web site
– won 2nd Place in CLA’s Student Essay contest back in 2006 (or was it 2007?)
– a FIMS alum donated a $50 CLA gift certificate when I won the Spirit of Librarianship Award
– did I co-chair the CLA Emerging Members group or am I completely mis-remembering that?  I think I was just heavily involved but not as a co-chair?
– was asked to present to the CLA Emerging Tech Group during the Montreal conference…