SLGS at CILIPS22
Category: Blog, Branches and Groups, Professional Development, SLG Scotland
June was a busy month for the SLG Scotland committee – not only did we have our end-of-term event with the Scottish Book Trust, we also sent SLGS Chair Shelagh Toonen and committee member Derek France to the CILIPS Annual Conference.
Here’s Derek with his impressions of the day, as well as the wonderful contributions from school librarians at our CILIPS22 session:
“It’s an odd experience, recognising someone from online meetings and then reintroducing yourself. This was the first time Shelagh Toonen (SLG Chair) and I had met in real life, and it was lovely to do so!
After a warm welcome from Sean McNamara, Amina Shah joined us on Zoom to announce the CILIPS Research Fund, making up to £10,000 available for researchers, practitioners, activists, students and other professionals for library advocacy.
Kate Robinson, the current CILIP President, officially opened the conference and introduced CILIP’s new 5-year Action Plan, focusing on four interrelated contexts, Sustainability, Digital Transformation, Equity & Social Justice and Leadership to shape an “ambitious vision for our whole community”. Kate invited delegates to submit their thoughts and ideas via the Ideas Platform on the CILIP website.
Our session was an SLG Scotland Committee collaborative effort, with members contributing ideas and presentations on how they collaborated, made connections, and used their creativity to rebuild their School Library. After introducing ourselves and emphasising the importance of School Libraries as a safe space to recover, flourish and explore, we asked delegates to discuss one positive example which illustrates collaboration, connections and creativity that helped them build up their library (see video below). I thoroughly enjoyed spending time at each table, meeting colleagues, sharing ideas and being inspired.
Up next was Read Woke South Ayrshire with Dr Fairweather presenting the concept behind their SLIF bid and its subsequent success. This was a fabulous example of how school librarians listen to student needs and work to engage them with empathetic and creative professionalism.
Unfortunately, after a delicious lunch spent with Shelagh and colleagues from South Ayrshire, I had to travel back to Edinburgh and missed the rest of the conference. The Twitter updates looked amazing and I cannot wait to watch the recordings. A huge thanks to Sean and Kirsten for delivering a highly successful and engaging conference!
See you all next year!”