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January 2015 PLL E-News
In This Issue
Congratulations!
From the Chair
The Blogosphere and Beyond
2015 PLL Summit Theme Announced
PLL Members Opinion Sought
Time to Walk the Red Carpet
PLL Board Members: Favorite 2014 Books

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Congratulations!

Jean O'Grady's Dewey B Strategic blog was voted Best Legal Research/Writing Blog in the ABA Magazine Blawg 100 Poll, ABA Magazine, January 2015

 

FROM THE CHAIR
by Cheryl L. Niemeier, Bose McKinney & Evans LLP, Indianapolis, IN


 

The Law Library as Knowledge Cathedral


 

At one point in the TEDx Talk Collaboratories and Bubbles of Shush - How Libraries Are Transforming the speaker elegantly refers to libraries as knowledge cathedrals. I love that analogy! Libraries truly are the preservers of knowledge for their community and the interior and exterior physical spaces of many libraries resemble the beauty and majesty of cathedrals and thus should be revered.


 

But I digress, as the crux of the talk was about how libraries are transforming in multiple ways and becoming meeting places, thinking spots, places to store information, places of collaboration, digital repositories - truly a blurring of boundaries of what libraries are and do nowadays compared to the days of yesteryear, changing from solitary and singular repositories of the old days when one had to visit or at the very minimum request an inter-library loan of an item not owned by their own home library to today where digitization of many documents puts those items more readily into the hands of the masses via the virtual world of the Internet - truly the large-scale "democratization of information" is upon us.


 

Is your law library in the midst of transforming? Is it future-ready? If not, perhaps it's time to ask

How Does Your Law Firm Library Stack Up? 5 signs you are ready for the future. In my view, goal 4 may be the toughest of the 5 to achieve!


 

The Blogosphere and Beyond


 

Old and current day pictures juxtaposed against examples of what libraries will look like in the future are stark in What Will Become of the Library? How it Will Evolve as the World Goes Digital which posits that "A library without books was once unthinkable. Now it seems almost inevitable."

 

Having put over 100 books in the dumpster - ergo recycle bin in our office building - just this week, Jean O'Grady's post It Takes More Than a Dumpster to Build A Digital Law Library: 12 Critical Components For Digital Law Library Transformations reinforced the reality that many law libraries have been in the mode of going digital for some time now, albeit, some are more recent to the task than others. Jean lays out twelve key issues that must be addressed for the digital law library to be a success.

 

On the other hand, as pointed out in Clash in the Stacks, addressing these very issues has apparently led to rifts among library directors and their varied constituencies - students, partners, public library patrons, etc. - who may not always see eye-to-eye on on the issue of going digital, let alone when and what changes need to be made. The post however concludes that "...it's a matter of breaking free of the library being some irrelevant, old-fashioned thing that used to be important but isn't anymore. The way we get information has changed, but our need for information and our need for guides to that information continues."

2015 PLL Summit Theme Announced

 

Each year many PLL Members consider the PLL Summit to be a highlight of the AALL Annual Meeting.  Now in its sixth year, the Summit continues as a vehicle for examining the impact and opportunities presented by change. PLL Summit 2015: The Innovation Imperative will explore how librarians can help provide innovative solutions to the business challenges our organizations face in today's legal market.

 

Summit attendees will have the opportunity not only to learn about innovation in theory but also to practice innovation in action.  Our featured speaker Karl Ulrich, Vice Dean of Innovation at the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of business, will facilitate an innovation tournament during which attendees will participate in generating and evaluating ideas to solve a business problem. 

 

Additional presentations during the day will address the current state of the legal industry and the roles librarians play in our organizations, and will provide examples of innovative products and processes developed by information professionals to meet existing and evolving business needs of their clients.  

 

Please visit the 2015 Summit blog for more details and updates. 

 

Marcia Burris & Denise Pagh
Summit Co-Chairs

PLL Members Opinion Sought on the Second and Final PLL Name Change Survey

 

The PLL-SIS Board is seeking your opinion on the name change initiative in this second and final survey.

 

Please note that this is NOT a vote on the name change. Rather, the purpose of the survey is to determine the name that will appear on the PLL Bylaws ballot in March. That ballot will allow members to vote on the new name or to keep Private Law Libraries as our SIS name.

 

The PLL Board thanks you in advance for taking a few minutes to complete this short survey.

 

If you have not already completed the survey via direct emails sent to you please click here to access the survey or copy and paste the following link into your browser. https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/2HMWJ3G.

 

Don't delay! The survey will automatically close at 4 p.m. EST on Friday, January 23d.

 

It's Awards Season, Time to Walk the Red Carpet

 

Please consider nominating a fellow PLL colleague for one or both of the AALL Awards detailed below.

CALLING FOR 2015 AALL VOLUNTEER SERVICE AWARD NOMINATIONS

Do you know an unsung hero/heroine-volunteer in AALL? If you know an AALL member who has made a significant contribution to the work of AALL, but has not served on the AALL Executive Board or received any of the AALL awards for distinguished service,* please nominate them for the Volunteer Service Award!
 
Nominees can be recognized for:
� Volunteer service at annual meetings (Registration, Family Social Hour, Library Tours, etc.)
� Volunteer service with special projects (i.e. annual meeting service projects)
� Presenting educational programs at AALL Annual Meetings
� Chairing an SIS or serving as chapter president
� Chairing an AALL or SIS committee
� Representing AALL in an official capacity to an outside entity
� Active service as a member of an AALL or SIS committee

Application Information:
Download Volunteer Service Award Nomination Form; Submission of up to three letters of support is encouraged.

Deadline: February 1, 2015

Award Presentation: The award will be a plaque given in the name of the Association and presented during the AALL Annual Meeting.

*AALL Awards for distinguished service include:
o Marian Gould Gallagher Distinguished Service Award
o AALL Hall of Fame
o Joseph L. Andrews Legal Literature Award (aka Joseph L. Andrews Bibliographical Award)
o ALL-SIS Frederick Charles Hicks Award for Outstanding Contributions to Academic Law Librarianship
o CS-SIS Kenneth J. Hirsch Distinguished Service Award
o SCCLL-SIS Bethany J. Ochal Award for Distinguished Service to the Profession
o TS-SIS Renee D. Chapman Award for Outstanding Contributions in Technical Services Law Librarianship
 
 
CALLING FOR 2015 AALL EMERGING LEADER AWARD NOMINATIONS

The AALL Leadership Development Committee calls for nominations for the 2015 Emerging Leader Award. The award recognizes newer members in their first 10 years of law library experience who have already made significant contributions to the Association and/or to the profession and have demonstrated the potential for leadership and continuing service. The Emerging Leader Award is presented to the recipient at AALL Annual Meeting. It is given in the name of the Association and carries with it a $500 cash prize.
 
Nominations must be received by February 1, 2015, and the selection process will be completed by March 21, 2015. If you have any questions, please contact Michele Finerty, chair of the Leadership Development Committee.

PLL Board Members: Favorite 2014 Books

 

Cheryl Niemeier, Chair

Paper Love: Searching for the Girl My Grandfather Left Behind by Sarah Wildman - I've long been a fan of books about the Holocaust and now with so many memoirs and novels available my choices are nearly limitless. While listening to an NPR author interview segment on my way home from work one evening, I chanced upon an interview of the author of this book and kept repeating the title the rest of the drive home, lest I forget it. It is a riveting and true story of one woman's journey to find the lost love her grandfather left behind when he fled pre-World War II Europe. The Amazon.com review says it best - "years after her grandfather's death, journalist Sarah Wildman stumbled upon a cache of his letters in a file labeled "Correspondence: Patients A-G." What she found inside weren't dry medical histories; instead what was written opened a path into the destroyed world that was her family's prewar Vienna. One woman's letters stood out: those from Valy-Valerie Scheftel. Her grandfather's lover who had remained behind when he fled Europe six months after the Nazis annexed Austria." All-in-all the best kind of story - hard to put down and always ready and anxious to pick up again to see what would happen next!

 

Scott Bailey, Chair-elect 

The Together Book - "What do I have that needs a helper?

I have a wagon that just won't go..." are the opening lines of The Together Book, a Little Golden Book featuring classic Sesame Street characters from 1971. For those of you unfamiliar, the book presents a series of challenges involving stalwarts such as Big Bird facing situations where the solution to their problem is a critical missing piece provided by another character. Big Bird's wagon that "just won't go," for example, needs a wheel which is provided by a gleeful Grover who exclaims "Wheels are the Niftiest Things I Know!" It's not a far leap to see in these characters, law library professionals in general practicing our craft. Physical similarities to Sesame Street characters and all joking aside, we are innate collaborators and we share. Each of us brings resources to the other and build community through collaborative solutions. "Every day I need a helper. Every day you need one, too. There's so much we can do together...YOU HELP ME, AND I'LL HELP YOU!"

 

Emily Florio, Treasurer

Like many other people this year, I read The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt.  While the length of the book is a bit daunting, I can assure you that it goes quickly and never drags on.  The book follows Theo Decker through the serious trials and tribulations of his sad and unsettled upbringing and crazy unbalanced adulthood.  The book is filled with art, friendship, family, mystery and intrigue and should be on everyone's to read lists.

 

Saskia Mehlhorn, Board Member

 What if?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe. Not a book that can/should be read in one sitting, this is one of those books that gives fact based answers on VERY hypothetical questions. It is a hysterical read yet very informative.

 

Nancy Rine, Secretary

Still Life With Breadcrumbs by Anna Quindlen.  I've been a fan of Anna Quindlen since she was a columnist for the New York Times and have read, and enjoyed, most of her novels.  She writes with beautiful simplicity,  empathy and insight about ordinary things.  And she tells a good story.  Her latest novel is about a woman, a once famous photographer, who starts a new life, driven by circumstances rather than choice.  It's a book about getting older and the possibility of achieving new, unexpected success any age.   It's about living the life that you create for yourself.  I confess that coming-of-age books no longer interest me, but coming-of-middle-age, that's something else.....

 

Jean O'Grady, Past Chair

Island of Vice: Theodore Roosevelt's Doomed Quest to Clean Up Sin-Loving New York by Richard  Zacks - This  book tells a true ripping tale of a little known footnote in the history of New York City and an embarrassing chapter in Teddy Roosevelt's life. NYC  has historically had a higher level of tolerance for vice than many cities in the US. After all it was founded by the Dutch not the Puritans. Ironically one of its late 19th century Dutch Brahmins, Theodore Roosevelt during his term as NYC Police Commissioner led an ill-fated  crusade against alcohol. I am a fan of Teddy Roosevelt and I have read most of the major biographies of his life. All of these books  focused on describing Roosevelt's corruption fighting term as NYC Police Commissioner. He caught the public imagination by cruising the streets of  New York after midnight --- checking to see if policemen were at their posts, awake and sober. None of these biographies provided any serious treatment of the Roosevelt's decision to enforce the Sunday no-drinking law which was enacted in the rural New York State capital of Albany. The book contains a colorful cast of characters Reverend Parkhurst, Lincoln Steffens, Jacob Riis, Williams Jennings Bryant, Little Egypt, George Washington "honest graft" Plunkett and other Tammany Hall figures and vice fighting clergy. No surprise, the law didn't affect rich New Yorkers who were allowed to drink on Sunday in their  private clubs. Inventive Irish and German bar owners studied the loopholes and attempted to evade the law by turning their saloons into private clubs, restaurants ( where the same sandwich would be set in front of every patron)  or hotels ( by putting a bed in a closet). The book recounts a tale of  unintended consequences. Enforcement of the "Sunday blue law" made criminals of ordinary citizens, increased vice and  corruption and almost cost Roosevelt his political career.

 

Marcia Burris, Board Member

The Confidence Code by Katty Kay & Claire Shipman

HarperCollins 2014 - The Atlantic published an intriguing article in May 2014, "The Confidence Gap" which discussed evidence that women are held back professionally by a lack of confidence more than by lack of ability. While the article is very interesting on its own, it is actually excerpted from Kay & Shipman's book The Confidence Code, which explores what confidence is, how it affects our success, and how we get it. To answer these questions the authors present evidence from the varying perspectives of social studies, brain chemistry and genetics, childhood development, and wonderful anecdotes from the lives of successful women in sports, business and politics.   It turns out male and female brains really are wired differently, but the impact is not what you may think!   Along with the science, which is made very accessible even for less scientifically inclined readers, the book offer insights into why individuals vary so much in their confidence levels and how parents can help instill confidence in their children (hint: don't help so much!) and tips for gradually improving your own confidence. While the tips aren't really new, the fascinating scientific information presented makes the book well worth the read.