1. Voice of the CALA-Sponsored
ALA Emerging Leaders
Chris Kyauk, Librarian, San Leandro Public Library, 2012
Class of ALA Emerging Leaders
Mingyan Li, Librarian, Harper College, 2010 Class of ALA
Emerging Leaders
Min Tong, Reference/Instruction Librarian, University of
Central Florida, 2011 Class of ALA Emerging Leaders
Ning Zou, Instruction Coordinator, Dominican University,
2010 Class of ALA Emerging Leaders
3. EL Experience
2010 EL Class
Project Title "CALA Twenty-first Century
Librarian Seminar Series "
2011 EL Class
Project Title "Library Websites Usability"
2012 EL Class
Project Title "Project 40/40: A Celebration of
CALA's 40th Anniversary"
4. EL Experience
2010 EL Class
Project Title "CALA Twenty-first Century
Librarian Seminar Series "
5. EL Experience
• Rich learning experience
• Positive team work experience
• Valuable community-based approach
• Great support and encouragement from
the organization
• Networking throughout the organization
7. EL Experience
• Great learning opportunity(from the
inside) about ALA
• Excellent venue for brushing up on
teamwork skills
• Wonderful platform for learning from
reputable leaders as well as from peers
• Additional motivator for me to give back to
the organization
8. EL Experience
2012 EL Class
Project Title "Project 40/40: A Celebration of
CALA's 40th Anniversary"
I am thinking perhaps we can have a little bit more fun by having a simple activity. We could ask each participant to write a word when they think about the topic or CALA or the profession as a whole. At the end we could ask them if they have a new word or a new understanding of the word they jot down... (I know our session is short and if you could think about a better suitable activity, feel free to replace this one).
Introduction: who we are and what our job responsibilities, etc.
Mingyan Li
Min Tong, Reference/Instruction Librarian, University of Central
Florida
Ning Zou, Instruction Coordinator, Dominican University
EL experience, Ning and Mingyan,
Mingyan and I were part of the 2010 Emerging Leader group. Our project is to redesign the CALA Twenty-first century librarian seminar series. We had worked with three other non-CALA members who were interested in web development on this project.
Ning's experience:
Chris' experience: I was part of the 2012 Emerging Leader group, working on a project to celebrate CALA's 40th anniversary. We sought forty quotes from library leaders and created presentations from them to be used at the 2012 ALA Annual conference.
EL experience, Min Tong
EL experience, Ning and Mingyan,
Mingyan and I were part of the 2010 Emerging Leader group. Our project is to redesign the CALA Twenty-first century librarian seminar series. We had worked with three other non-CALA members who were interested in web development on this project.
Ning's experience:
rich learning experience
a well-organized program with multiple instruction modes including presentations, videos, interactive group discussion and activities.
great resources for future leadership development (videos from TED talk, I've been using it in my teaching and professional growth). Literature on leadership skills, webinars from ALA leaders.
Positive teamwork experience:
everyone is responsible on the tasks. Each of us took a leadership role on the project (reference to the project document, the Web 2.0 section I was in charge of)
good professional friendship: on facebook and keep in touch with after the EL program
learned tremendously on team dynamics through the project (strengthened my skills in leadership, time management, organization and communication)
Valuable community-based approach (EL group is an ALA leadership community to me include librarians who have similar professional goals and hunger for learning more on leadership skills)
Support and encouragement from the organization and beyond
Support from other ALA sections
Support from Lisa Zhao how was our CALA mentor on the project. She offered us an overview of the project as well as helpful advice on piecing things together. Prompt response to our inquiries all the way through.
Chris: The 2012 project was an outreach-oriented project. It was an amazing chance for my team members and myself to connect with forty of the most engaged leaders in CALA and ALA. It was basically a chance for CALA to show the breadth and depth of its members.
EL experience, Min Tong
EL experience, Min
Overall it's a rewarding experience for me.
Great learning opportunity(from the inside) about ALA
This program is focused on helping new librarians to get familiar with the organizational structure of ALA and to get involved in ALA divisions, roundtables, or even the ALA Council.
Excellent venue for brushing up on teamwork skills
I'm sure you all remember the old good or bad (depending on your own individual experience) days when you needed to work with your library school classmates on various group projects, well, most of the EL program is really about learning to work with a group from a distance and work with colleagues in a completely different library setting and area of specialization than yours. So, it's a good learning experience for me to brush up on my teamwork skills.
Wonderful platform for learning from reputable leaders as well as from peers
The 2011 class was fortunate to have Maureen Sullivan and Peter Bromberg as the facilitators for the two full day long workshops , and we had guest speakers including the founder for the EL program, Leslie Burger, and Keith Miachel Fiels, and other great library leaders.
The actual work with my team taught me more than any book, article, talk, and discussion about leading and being led effectively,efficiently, and gracefully.
Additional motivator for me to give back to the organization
Giving back to CALA has always been one of my career goals, ever since the day I joined the association 6 years ago. Being sponsored by CALA for the EL program logically gave me more reasons and motivations to contribute back to the organization in whatever little way I could. My another gain out of the program, which I didn't spell it out here on the slide, for lack of space, was that it helped me get over my self-consciousness and boosted my confidence as a leader, which eventually better equipped me to give back to CALA.
EL experience, Min Tong
EL experience, Min
Overall it's a rewarding experience for me.
Great learning opportunity(from the inside) about ALA
This program is focused on helping new librarians to get familiar with the organizational structure of ALA and to get involved in ALA divisions, roundtables, or even the ALA Council.
Excellent venue for brushing up on teamwork skills
I'm sure you all remember the old good or bad (depending on your own individual experience) days when you needed to work with your library school classmates on various group projects, well, most of the EL program is really about learning to work with a group from a distance and work with colleagues in a completely different library setting and area of specialization than yours. So, it's a good learning experience for me to brush up on my teamwork skills.
Wonderful platform for learning from reputable leaders as well as from peers
The 2011 class was fortunate to have Maureen Sullivan and Peter Bromberg as the facilitators for the two full day long workshops , and we had guest speakers including the founder for the EL program, Leslie Burger, and Keith Miachel Fiels, and other great library leaders.
The actual work with my team taught me more than any book, article, talk, and discussion about leading and being led effectively,efficiently, and gracefully.
Additional motivator for me to give back to the organization
Giving back to CALA has always been one of my career goals, ever since the day I joined the association 6 years ago. Being sponsored by CALA for the EL program logically gave me more reasons and motivations to contribute back to the organization in whatever little way I could. My another gain out of the program, which I didn't spell it out here on the slide, for lack of space, was that it helped me get over my self-consciousness and boosted my confidence as a leader, which eventually better equipped me to give back to CALA.
We could list our past and current roles in CALA here:
Ning:
First impression about the organization:
Became a CALA member in 2003 while in the SLIS program at IUB. My first CALA mentor, Wenling Liu and _____ (sorry have to ask Wenling for her name as I lost contact with her).
First CALA Midwest meeting in bloomington 2005 (Haipeng Li, Lisa Zhao, Li Fu, etc. great librarians, mentors and friends)
Life member and more leadership roles
Advice to librarianship career beginners: professional development, positive energy, always look out for opportunities, in particular, Chinese culture related (sometimes it may beyond our profession!) : Words from Ning: Trust, Balance and Egolessness
Min:
Joined CALA as a life member since I started my first librarian job
My first "official" CALA mentor: Junwen Pan, and numerous other non-official mentors and role models I look upto, such as Jing Liu at UBC, Canada, where I went to for my LIS degree, Shali Zhang, Haipeng Li, Lisa Zhao, and of course Dr. Lee Hwa-wei, etc.
Advice to new librarians: get over self- consciousness (if you have any like I did); serve with passion and vision; you really have more potential than you THINK you have (remember we are taught to to be humble in our culture even when we were still in our mother's wombs, so humility is in our genes :)
Chris:
Joined CALA as a Spectrum Scholar in library school. CALA has always been a source of support for me in my professional career, and as such I have sought to give back through work on committees such as the Membership, scholarship, and constitution/bylaws committees.
