TLA Annual Assembly

There is no general meeting for the Transforming Texas Libraries Task Force at the 2008 Annual Assembly per se. Following are some Annual Assembly activities:

Julie Todaro, chair of this task force, will lead a discussion of "Transforming Texas Libraries: Ideas for Transforming Your Own Community" on Tuesday, July 8 from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. All Annual Assembly attendees are encouraged to participate in this "train the trainer" session to learn how to conduct their own version of the visioning summit. Julie has developed a series of tools and training materials for a new wiki (http://transformingtxlibraries.pbwiki.org). Please contribute your own stories, ideas, and experiences to ensure that this wiki becomes an ongoing virtual "idea lab" for all to use.

On Monday, July 7 a small working group of task force members will flesh out the final report. If you are interested in volunteering for the full day, please let me know.

The Steering Committee will meet on Wednesday, July 9 at 8:30 a.m.

In terms of establishing an infrastructure for statewide change, TLA will also be focusing on own structure so that we can better lead change in the state. Annual Assembly will be the kick-off of an exciting new TLA strategic planning process chaired by Joyce Baumbach. Joyce's task force is asking individuals as well as unit and committee officers to contribute ideas to the following questions:

• What are the most important statewide activities to undertake to effect a statewide transformation of libraries for their constituents?
• What do librarians need to help them transform their libraries for their constituents?
• How can TLA lead the transformative process for their constituents?
• How can librarians begin to transform our professional culture?
• How should TLA be organized to focused on issues facing libraries?

Just this week, the 2008 class of TALL Texans created their own vision for Texas libraries. In the next few weeks, we'll be linking their vision to the Transforming Texas Libraries wiki.

Transforming Program at TLA Annual Conference

TLA is making the 2008 Second General Session program with speakers Roy Tennant, Joe Janes, Karen Schneider, and Stephen Abram available on the TLA website. This extraordinary panel really stimulated thinking about the transformational process; and with the speakers' permission, we are disseminating this valuable content. You can find a six-minute excerpt of their presentation at http://www.txla.org/conference/conf.html or can contact Randy May (randym|at|txla|dot|org) for instructions for downloading the full 80 MB file.