A few weeks ago I had the honour of being installed as president of the Toronto chapter and look forward to serving the membership for the next 12 months. I am fortunate to have the support of dedicated and hardworking board members including Pam Casey, Daniel Lee and Joy Shanfield, who are continuing to serve but in new positions, and Heather Ritchie, Melissa Troemel, Tylene Reaume and Sandra Craig who are new to the executive team. Please take the time to let us know your views on the chapter, the association and the sort of programmes and services that you would value. You can find information about us at the chapter’s web site: www.sla.org/chapter/ctor/about/executive.asp

I want to thank the outgoing executive board for their hard work over the past 18 months under the very capable guidance of Laura Knapp. Because of the change in SLA’s governance year, Laura and her team agreed to serve an extra six months. This is an example of the extraordinary dedication of this board since we were the host chapter for the 2005 SLA conference.

As your new chapter president I have three goals for this year. The first is to work with the other members of the executive board, the advisory board and the volunteer pool to develop programmes that will meet your professional development needs. We have lined up some excellent programmes for the first half of the year, beginning with the ever-popular joint social with CASLIS. Since we must now hold our AGM in December (as a result of the change in the governance year), we have moved the social to January. Our colleagues at CASLIS were very happy to accommodate this change and I hope that many of you will be able to attend this event. In February the chapter will be presenting an Emerging Technologies Vendor Roundtable that is being organized by Mark Schrutt, our Vendor Relations chair. March will see Sandy Iverson present a programme about e-journals, and Frances McManus will speak in April about developing a records classification plan. There will be at least one more event before the summer break. More information about upcoming programmes is available at our web site: www.sla.org/chapter/ctor

My second goal is encourage new members and students to join SLA and become involved in the association. This is part of our succession plan for the chapter. We have already begun to work on this initiative since our incoming executive includes several newer librarians. In addition, the chapter has student and faculty liaisons at FIS and FIMS who work to develop relationships between members of the chapter and the library schools.

My third goal is to develop and strengthen our relationships with the groups within the Toronto chapter. These groups include the Solo Librarians, the New Information Professionals, the Western Toronto group and the Kitchener-Waterloo-Guelph group. They represent some of the diverse interests in the chapter, and I encourage you to learn more about them over the course of the year.

Finally, I want to encourage you to join our volunteer pool. Volunteers do many things, including organizing a programme or social event, writing something for the Courier, or another task for the chapter. Each volunteer agrees to undertake one thing during the year. Please contact Sandra Craig, Events Coordinator, if you are interested in volunteering.

Happy New Year to each and every one of you!

Martha Foote

It’s hard to believe that we’re already a month into a new year and well into another long winter. The holiday season is traditionally a time for reflection, looking forward and making resolutions; this edition of the Courier is no exception as the Toronto Chapter welcomes a new executive and a brand new year. In this issue new president Martha Foote and president-elect Pam Casey give us the low-down on their respective goals and what members can expect in the upcoming year.

Also in this issue, Stephen Abrams, SLA President candidate, provides some professional and personal inspiration in his article Being Grateful For What We’ve Got and Wanting More.

We are also pleased to feature several articles by our student members, and the first in a new regular column profiling the careers and experiences of some of our newer members.

2006 is shaping up to be an exciting year for the SLA Toronto Chapter.

As always, we are continually looking for more of the great ideas, comments, thoughts, news that make up this newsletter. Contact us directly anytime for more information.

Heather Postill

Elizabeth Malak-McMullan

Happy New Year. I hope that the holiday time has brought everyone happiness and good cheer. Now that 2006 is upon us, it is time to start a brand new year with an overview of what SLA has been working on.

1. Gayle Gossen Appointed to Chair SLA Task Force
President Pam Rollo has completed appointments to six new task forces. Gayle Gossen, a past president (as Gayle Kiss) of the Toronto chapter, has been appointed to chair the Chapter Modeling Task Force. This task force will investigate what members love about chapters and how SLA can make chapter experience a rewarding one. It will investigate ways to make chapters agile and flexible, and will suggest a number of meeting models from which chapters can choose. Pam Casey of our chapter has also been asked to serve on this taskforce. Congratulations Gayle and Pam.

The Chapter Modeling Task Force has created a blog to solicit ideas from the membership. Your contribution is welcome. For more information please go to http://sla-divisions.typepad.com/slachaptermodeling/

Here is a listing of the other task forces and their chairs:

• Alliances & Partners – Anne Caputo & Willem Noorlander
• Executive Growth – Pamela Clark
• New Visions – Amy Disch
• Recognition – Bill Fisher
• Research Now – Robyn Frank

Two previous task forces are continuing:

• Professional Value – Ethel Salonen
• Natural Disasters – Dave Robertson

2. Daniel Lee Appointed to SLA Task Force
Daniel Lee, who is presently serving as Public Relations Chair of the Toronto chapter, has been appointed to the New Visions Task Force. This task force, chaired by Amy Disch, will identify the environmental conditions that are impacting new entrants to the profession. It will concentrate on the future challenges to the profession and investigate the factors that place certain people at the vanguard of the profession. The emphasis here is on skills and not necessarily technology. The task force will make recommendations for recruiting and retaining new entrants to the profession and the association. Those of us who have been fortunate to work with Daniel know that he will bring very good ideas and dedication to this task force. Congratulations!

3. Janice Lachance Appointed to IFLA Panel
The International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) is conducting a review of its business processes, particularly relating to advocacy. Secretary General Peter Johan Lor has appointed SLA Executive Director Janice R. Lachance to sit on the panel that will review and comment on the report before it is presented to the IFLA Governing Board.

4. Check this out at Click University!
Were you unable to attend some of the CE sessions at Conference? Whether you were unable to attend the conference, or there were too many excellent sessions going on at the same time, here is your chance to take advantage of some of the best sessions. Cost $149 per session.

• Making It Count – Communicating the Value of Special Libraries & Information Centers – Eileen Abels and Lisl Zach
• How to Make Fear User-Friendly – Michael Clarkson
• Digital Library Collections and Services – Roy Tennant

5. Upcoming Learning Opportunities
Even Monkeys Fall from Trees: Strategies for Effective Leadership

SLA Leadership Summit
January 18 – 21, 2006
Houston, TX USA

Start 2006 by honing your leadership skills at the SLA Leadership Summit at the Hyatt Regency Houston in Houston, Texas USA, January 18 – 21, 2006. Join information professionals from multiple geographic areas and disciplines in a journey you won’t soon forget.

This unique leadership development program will provide both substantive content AND time for individual reflection. Seize this opportunity to step back from your day-to-day routine and engage in group learning and skill-building exercises guaranteed to push your thinking and advance your leadership skills.

6. Member Profiles
Information Outlook® is planning a series of articles that will profile an information professional in every issue, starting in January or February.

We’re looking for people who are doing interesting work — or who might have something interesting in his or her background. For example, the June 2005 issue of the magazine featured info pro who also owns a bookstore in Toronto.

The only restrictions: They should have interesting stories to tell, and they must be SLA members.

You probably know people who would make a good profile in Information Outlook. If you do, SLA’s publications director, John T. Adams III, wants to hear from you. You can e-mail him at jadams@sla.org. Include a sentence or two about why you think we should write about why you are suggesting them — plus their contact information.

7. SLA Salary Calculator
SLA’s latest salary calculator is now available.

The salary calculator is available online for those of you who purchased the 2005 SLA Annual Salary Survey & Workplace Study. Usernames and passwords were emailed to survey purchasers on Monday, 5 December. (If you bought the survey but haven’t received your username or password, please check your email spam filter.)

SLA has developed the interactive Salary Calculator to analyze salaries based on characteristics such as responsibility, title, budget size, experience, employees supervised, and location. The online tool provides more ways of slicing the information than a two-dimensional analysis in printed form. First set up in 2004, the calculator has been found to be a valuable addition to the annual salary survey. If you have questions, please contact Carolyn Sosnowski.

8. Award Nomination Deadline
The deadline for 2006 SLA Awards & Honors nominations is four weeks away – Wednesday, 4 January. This year, you can submit nominations online, rather than mailing them. For the 58th consecutive year, SLA is seeking its “information stars” – information professionals who have exhibited stellar performance – for the 2006 Class of SLA Awards & Honors Recipients. Here’s how it works:

• 9 November 2005 – Call for Nominations is disseminated.
• 4 January 2006 – Nominations in 13 of 14 categories are due.
• 17 January – Awards Committee meets in Houston prior to Leadership Summit; makes selections in 12 of 14 categories.
• Diversity Leadership Development Program (DLDP) Committee meets and makes selections.
• Late January-Early February – President Pam Rollo notifies individual winners.
• Early-Mid February – SLA Press Release announces 2006 Awards & Honors Recipients
• 6 May – Nominations for Student & Academic Relations Committee (SARC) Merit Awards (Chapter/Division and Student Group) are due; committee subsequently meets and makes selections.
• 11 June – Awards & Honors Recipients are honored at Opening General Session of SLA 2006 in Baltimore, Maryland.
• 13 June – Recipients are celebrated at Awards & Honors Reception aboard U.S.S. Constellation anchored in Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. (Ticketed event – $50)
• Detailed info regarding categories, criteria, and eligibility is available
  at www.sla.org/awards.
• For the first time, nominations can be submitted via the Internet. Simply complete the electronic nomination form available at www.sla.org/awards; attach supporting documentation; and click “Submit.”

Separate nomination forms are required for DLDP and SARC.

Group Meetings
The Toronto Solo Librarians got off to a good start this fall with 3 meetings. The Downtown Lunch Group (approximately 10 – 12 people) met in October at our new location – a big “thank you” to Kolette Taber of The Canadian Health & Life Insurance Association (CLHIA) for organizing meeting space for us.

There were several new faces at our first meeting and we spent some time getting to know each other and then identifying key issues that face us. It turned out that a number of Solos have concerns regarding licensing of databases and our next lunch meeting was dedicated to this topic.

In November the Downtown Lunch Solos met to further discuss licensing and database renewals. The following problems were identified:

• significant lack of reps and/or access to them;
• various billing issues;
• although Pay As You Go was often preferred, it did not always provide full access;
• lack of Canadian content in Dialog;
• clause in contracts (non-disclosure) forbidding discussing billing/rates with colleagues at other companies for comparison purposes.

It was decided that there was enough interest to start talking about the possibility of forming a consortium initially to discuss news database licenses. To that end we agreed to have a guest in to talk to us about their own consortium-forming efforts.

This was a busy meeting as we also had our Chapter President-Elect, Martha Foote, sit in on our meeting and the EBSCO rep, Sandy Iverson, kindly made herself available to answer questions.

In January we will be having Mary Reynolds and Claire Lysnes of AlphaPlus talk to us about their efforts at forming a consortium. This meeting has already attracted the attention of a broader range of SLA members and we will be welcoming several non-Solos to our event.

Meanwhile, a small group of the “Northern” Solos (those who live, work or just pass through northern Toronto and the GTA) got together for dinner in Woodbridge where we discussed useful listservs (did you know there is a new SLA Engineering & Technology list?), good and bad InMagic support services (rave reviews for AndOrNot out of Vancouver) and the difficulty of finding good database reps who stick around (where have all the Lexis reps gone?).

Future Plans
The Downtown Lunch Solos hope to meet on the following dates (some of which may change):

January 9 – Speakers from AlphaPlus on Consortiums
February 13 – Discussion on Wellness in the Workplace
March 27 – Best Practices for Media Monitoring Discussion
April 24 – TBD
May 29 – Final meeting before the summer – Discussion of Accomplishments & Goals

The Northern Solos will try another dinner early in March. Watch for announcements on the Chapter listserv.

If you have suggestions for future meetings, or wish to join us, please get in touch with me at (clintonresearch@yahoo.ca).

Finally, my term as Chair of the Solo Librarians Committee came to an end in December. I will continue to Chair this Committee at least until the summer but if there is anyone out there who would be interested in taking over, please let me know. If you are not sure what is involved but would like to “test the waters”, I would be more than willing to Co-Chair with you until you are comfortable. The position is not terribly time consuming and provides an opportunity to meet a lot of interesting people.

New Members
We are always looking for solo colleagues with whom to connect. So pass this issue of Courier around and bring a fellow solo to an event happening near you!

I look forward to seeing all of you again in the New Year.

Gillian Clinton is the principal of Clinton Research. Her company provides information research, knowledge management and library services to corporations or individuals on an as-needed basis. She can be reached at clintonresearch@yahoo.ca or 416-218-9038.

The Toronto Chapter of the Special Libraries Association held its 2005 Annual General Meeting Thursday, December 8 at the Ontario Club in downtown Toronto.

The official business got underway with Laura Knapp ending her 16 month term by awarding Heather Wilson with ‘Member of the Year’ in recognition of her outstanding work at this past summer’s SLA conference in Toronto. Martha Foote officially took office as President and the new 2006 Executive Board was voted in.

The 2006 SLA Toronto Chapter Executive:

President – Martha Foote

President-Elect – Pam Casey

Secretary – Tylene Reaume

Treasurer – Joy Shanfield

Public Relations – Daniel Lee

Director – Heather Ritchie

Membership Chair – Melissa Troemel

Events Coordinator – Sandra Craig

This year’s AGM featured Dave Pollard, author of the blog “How to Save the World” who spoke on Social Networking and how it is changing Knowledge Management. While traditional KM has been more about know-what collection, Social Networking is about know-who collection. Mr. Pollard examined several steps information professionals can take to promote Social Networking within their organizations: these include utilizing Weblogs, Expertise Finders and Collaboration tools. He also profiled the latest Social Networking Agents such as Del.icio.us, Flickr and DodgeBall. You can check out more from Dave at http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/

2005 : A look back


The first official programme presented by the new “West” programming group was held the morning of Thursday, September 29th at the Oakville Central Public Library on Navy Street in Oakville, ON. Kirsti MacAulay, Principal Ergonomics Consultant, Options Incorporated presented the session on Office Ergonomics. Kirsti was an excellent presenter and provided very informative handouts to go along with her talk. The presentation covered the specific ergonomic concepts that apply to office workers including a review of a self-assessment checklist to teach each employee how to set up their workstations based on recognized ergonomic guidelines. Other topics covered were injury mechanism and common RSI’s; prevention of RSI’s through proper workstation setup; how to set up an ergonomically correct workstation (chair, monitor, keyboard, work organization); other prevention strategies; and/or successful ergonomic interventions. Organizer: Jeannie An

The second programme was a SLA Virtual Learning Series presentation on “Negotiating – Part 1: The Art Of Negotiating Anything” (replay of April 2005 Webinar). This meeting was an early evening/dinner session held Thursday, October 20th at the Xerox Research Centre of Canada, Speakman Drive, Mississauga, ON. In this workshop, attorney and consultant to the information services industry Jennifer R. Pitarresi outlined the basic tenets in the art of negotiating and provided pointers to increase your bargaining power in virtually any situation. Organizer: Carolyne Sidey

November’s meeting was held Wednesday November 23th. This was also an early evening/dinner session held at the Oakville Central Public Library. Drawing the biggest crowd yet was Helen Katz presenting her session “Business Research for the “Non-Business” Librarian”. This programme was a survey, in laymen’s terms, of current and essential Canadian business and financial information. Attendees learned about current Canadian business and finance resources for their collection and how to navigate financial statements and annual reports. Organizer: Susan Salhia

The final session of 2005 was a Members’ Roundtable held Tuesday December 13th at the Xerox Research Centre of Canada. The attendees were asked to submit a few of their favourite work-related websites and a couple “cool” personal favourites. These were worked into a presentation in which the submitters of a site gave the group a quick live overview of its features and uses. Everyone in attendance learned about new resources and found it a very valuable session. After the meeting we met at the Glenerin Inn for our annual Christmas lunch. Organizers: Susan Salhia and Jeannie An

2006 : A look forward

In 2006 we are planning sessions alternate months instead of the 2005 schedule of monthly. We will continue to alternate evenings and mornings, and may even throw in an afternoon. If you have recommendations for programmes, locations, events “west” of Toronto, let us know. In February 2006 a morning session is planned in late February in conjunction with the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency Library in Mississauga. Details will be available shortly. An evening meeting will be held early April at the Oakville Public Library and a morning session is planned in late May (tentatively at McMaster University).

Carolyne Sidey is the co-chair of the SLA Toronto West Programming Committee. She can be reached at csidey@xrcc.xeroxlabs.com

Gayle Gossen, a past president (as Gayle Kiss) of the Toronto chapter, has been appointed to chair the SLA Chapter Modeling Task Force

Pam Casey, currently President-Elect, will be serving on the SLA Chapter Modeling Task Force.

Daniel Lee, Public Relations Chair of the Toronto chapter, has been appointed to the New Visions Task Force.

People on the Move will be a regular column highlighting the achievements of our members and help keep us all in touch. Please share your career changes, retirements, life changes, volunteer work.

Submit your news to Anna Fredericks – AFrederick@cpsa.com

Irina Ovis is a first-year student in the Master of Information Studies program at the Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto. She is a Certified Human Resources Professional and works as a Human Resources Generalist at the Canada Lands Company. She also works part-time as an Information Desk Assistant in the Business Information Centre at the Joseph L. Rotman School of Management. She is interested in corporate librarianship. Irina is a self-described news junkie, Francophile, and cook.

After graduating from the University of Western Ontario, Michael Russell worked in the Communications, Culture and Information Technology Department at the University of Toronto at Mississauga, where he helped launch a new credit course, Introduction to Scholarly Research. In 2005, he worked for an Ottawa-based Human Resources firm, HRSG, and earned an Essential Skills Profiling certificate in Saskatoon. In January 2006, he will start work on a Board-wide learning resources project for the Windsor-Essex Catholic District School Board. Michael has recently completed the Canadian Securities Course, and is still on the prowl for a publisher for his first novel, tentatively titled Divorce Recourse.

Lawrence Stewart is a first-year student at the Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto. He has degrees in Asian Studies and in Fine Arts from the University of Windsor, and taught English in Japan for six years. Prior to coming to FIS, he worked in the Reference Department at the Art Gallery of Windsor. Lawrence enjoys film and tries to attend as many Toronto film festivals as his schedule allows. He also makes time to study capoeira and to work on his art portfolio.

Norah Xiao is a first year student in the Master of Information Studies at the Faculty of Information Studies, University of Toronto. She has a Master of Science degree from Queen’s University, and worked as a Teaching/Research Assistant and Lab Technician at the University of Toronto at Mississauga. Currently, she works part time as a Library Assistant in the Library and Information Centre at National Bank Financial. In her spare time, Norah enjoys cooking, swimming and shopping. She maintains a personal web page at http://norahxiao.dyndns.org

Jennifer Burns is the Information Specialist at the Bank of Montreal’s Institute for Learning in Toronto, where she provides library services, research assistance and bibliographic instruction to employees of BMO Financial Group. She graduated from the Faculty of Information Studies at the University of Toronto in 2004, and recently completed the Mastering Web Searching course at the Professional Learning Centre. An avid urban historian, Jennifer documents Toronto’s built heritage on her website, Local Ruins (http://www.jenniferburns.net/home.htm).

I am writing this piece as we prepare for the holiday season. Being a long time member of the SLA Toronto Chapter and past chapter president, I know you’ll grant me the time to be thoughtful in print.

This has been difficult year.

It started with the epic tsunami in Asia – unbelievable destruction in such an unbelievably short period of time. It seems amazing that it has been just a year since thousands of lives were lost, whole communities wiped off the face of the earth and hundreds of libraries destroyed.

The world continues to be at war, primarily in the Middle East, but in too many other places too. I travel often and find myself choked up all too often by entire families escorting their brave sons and daughters, dressed in camouflage fatigues, past my check-in line through the airport and on to events unknown in the Gulf.

Too many hurricanes ran through the ‘other’ Gulf Region this year. Again, too many homes and families were hurt. Entire libraries were wiped out (You can see a map of the ones we have identified that are gone here – www.libraryndp.info/special_katrina.html) and whole communities were forced to start over.

Floods in the Northeast again hurt communities and our neighbors. Once again, people rebuilt their lives, their communities and their libraries. Tornadoes in the Midwest pushed through and Mother Nature tried to triumph again.

A massive earthquake in Pakistan strikes as the Western World starts suffering donation fatigue.

This has been a difficult year.

I’ve been proud of my peers’ reactions to the needs of the tsunami victims. A CLA fund that I initiated collected funds in the 5 figure range that were deployed through our partnerships with IFLA to ensure the money gets into the neediest hands and makes a difference.

I have also been proud of my work colleagues this year too. Before the hurricanes hit they were calling libraries that had been hit in previous years to ask them what would have helped them most. Rather than just assuming we asked. What a librarian thing to do – making informed decisions! As a result we set up programs that made a difference. Besides offering special off-site back-ups at no charge, we moved truckloads of computers and wireless networks into the Gulf region and set up centers for citizens whose libraries were gone. I am especially proud that some of those libraries were not clients – they just needed help and my colleagues delivered it.

I am proud of my professional colleagues. There were those libraries that moved their bookmobiles into the affected regions to reduce the boredom of refugees housed in sports stadiums. I admire those libraries that sent people to help others find their missing relatives through the net. All of the volunteers who aided people in need and provided library cards to non-residents with temporary ID who had been evacuated to their towns trumped the risk of losing a book or two.

At this time of year it is important to remember that I am thankful for my own health. I’ll never forget the holiday season I spent in hospital learning to walk again and calming the fears of my friends and family. This is the ninth year that I have remained cancer free and healthy. I am thankful for my family. Without my wife Stephanie I would never be able to achieve the goals that I have set for myself, my family and my profession. Without my son Zachary and daughter Sydney I’d have too few people challenging me and my views or giving me hope for the next generation. I treasure my friends and colleagues. I could not have developed and grown as a person or as a professional without them. I hope I’ve been one-half the friend and colleague to them as they’ve been to me.

That said, and these blessings aside, I am still not satisfied. I want more! I don’t want to seem ungrateful but things are just not good enough in this world and I know that libraries and information professionals can make a difference – a BIG difference. I suppose that’s why we have the tradition of following up the holiday season, when we recognize our blessings, with New Year’s where we make our list of resolutions of what we want for the future.

My 2006 New Year’s Wish List

1. Focus: If we want our profession to achieve something great, then we have to do it with a laser-like focus. We are a rich, intelligent, diverse and multi-hued profession and have a valid and supportable interest in just about everything. However, my dream for 2006 is that we discover the will within us to focus on a single major project that will benefit us all.
2. Recognition: Libraries radiate throughout the knowledge ecology and make a difference. I’d like more important people to notice this! Let’s work on getting someone who values us to be a highly visible champion. We need to move beyond ourselves and develop and implement an advocacy program about the role, value and impact of special librarians and information professionals. If we fail at this one thing, we do risk losing everything altogether.
3. Confidence: Let’s find the confidence to speak as a profession with authority, confidence and energy. Let’s do this now. Now! Let’s not study it loooonnnggg and haaarrrddd. Let’s not take it literally and study something to death. The death of our profession isn’t our goal!! We need to have the confidence of our convictions and take action – sustainable action. If every member positioned themselves to each tell just five positive springboard stories in 2006 to five people who matter, our world would change. 50,000 stories will move minds. Imagine!
4. Balance: Let’s balance all of the needs of every type of specialized librarianship. Our differences are small and our common needs are great. Let’s find the middle ground that lets us work more strongly together. We’re all in this boat together and no one part of special librarianship can point to another and say their side of the boat is sinking. Let’s sacrifice our pedantic conversations about our titles, our profession’s name, how relevant we are. Talking amongst ourselves is just sound and fury.
5. Learning: Let’s learn anew. Let’s learn new modes of learning. Let’s actively seek new technologies and become more expert at them. Let’s create compelling content. Let’s collaborate on a whole new scale. It’s time to use our investments of the past decade in the SLA website, our discussion lists, CLICK University, and more in our own cause. It’s not just about networking and sharing information, it’s about achieving our more visionary dreams for success.
6. Trust and Respect: We need to respect each other more. We need to build better teams and more sustainable effort. We are a smart profession with strong critical thinking skills. We need to ensure that we don’t devolve that critical thinking strength into random criticism. We need to have faith in our cause. We need to be an incubator of success.
7. Risk: Let’s take this risk. Small risk, small reward. Our need is great, we won’t get to where we want and need to be without taking some calculated more sizeable risks.

We can reach a new plateau. We can prove our value to those we work with, work for and get our funds from. We can achieve greatness. By the end of 2006 I want more employers to know that librarians rock. I don’t want anyone to say that they are having trouble finding a position as information professionals. I don’t want anyone denying that there is a librarian shortage. I want employers fighting over the best and recruiting. I want employers that closed their libraries to fail (or become quite ill and cure themselves by hiring a librarian – grin). I want employers with great libraries to succeed and blame their librarians. That’s how I would measure our success.

May this holiday season bring you friends, family, health, peace, tolerance and understanding. Let’s hope 2006 bring us the wisdom to treasure it and the energy and commitment to make the world a better place.

Stephen Abram, MLS is a candidate for SLA President. He is Vice President, Innovation for SirsiDynix. He is an SLA Fellow and the past president of the Ontario Library Association, the SLA Toronto Chapter and the immediate past president of the Canadian Library Association. In June 2003 he was awarded SLA’s John Cotton Dana Award. Stephen would love to hear from you at stephen.abram@sirsidynix.com.