
There are a several professional development opportunities coming up this fall! Librarians in the north Texas area may want to take advantage of any or all of the following:
Friday, October 17 – Library Expo
This annual event for school librarians takes place in Plano ISD and is coordinated jointly by Plano’s Learning Media Services department and Richardson ISD’s Library Media Services. This year’s theme is Discover the 21st Century Library and the keynote speaker will be John Canuel, Director of Library
Services for Jeffco Public Schools in Colorado. In addition to the keynote, there are always great breakout sessions presented by local librarians, a vendor exhibit — and, as if that isn’t enough — there is great shopping to be had afterwards at the Willowbend Mall across the street! (wink, wink)
More information is available at the Library Expo web site. The event is free for librarians, but they do ask that you register so they will know how many people to expect. Registration begins online September 15, 2008.
Saturday, October 18 – TLA District 5 Fall Meeting
TLA District 5 will host its annual Fall Meeting October 18, 2008 at El Centro College in downtown Dallas. It looks like there are several programs of interest to school librarians, many of which focus on web 2.0 technologies. Online registration is available at the TLA website.
Saturday, November 1, 2008 – Children’s and Young Adult Book Festival
This annual event is held at Sam Houston State University each year. It is often worth the overnight trip to Huntsville to hear the nationally-known authors that will be speaking and autographing their books. Since it is a smaller venue, librarians actually have a chance to visit with the authors a little more. Featured authors this year are: Kathy Appelt, John Green (Looking for Alaska), Patrick Jones, and David Small. Between author sessions there are workshop programs presented by area librarians. Visit the SHSU web site for more information.
Saturday and Sunday, November 1-2, 2008 – Texas Book Festival
If you’re in the mood for a bigger event with more authors, the Texas Book Festival in Austin will meet those needs. Check out the list of authors expected to attend and get more information here.
Image citation: Playing in the autumn leaves, uploaded on October 20, 2007 by [Northeast Photography] and used under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license.