Association of College & Research Libraries

                                      ACRL Chapter Annual Report Form

 

This report should be written by the Chapter President and cover the months of September through August.

 

Send to:

 

ACRL Executive Director

50 E. Huron St.

Chicago, IL 60611

 

Please also add this report to the Chapter's web site.

 

Chapter Name:
NJ ACRL

 

Chapter President: 
Julie Still

 

President's Address:
Paul Robeson Library

Rutgers University

300 North Fourth Street

Camden, New Jersey 08102

 

President's E-mail:

still@camden.rutgers.edu

 

Chapter's Officers' Terms begin in and end in:
July 1, 2003 through June 30, 2004

 

Number of ACRL National Chapter Members:

As of June 30, 2003 – 127 members of NJLA were affiliated with the College and Univeristy Section; 41 members were additionally members of ACRL national.

 

Dates of meetings and programs in coming year:
NJ ACRL holds monthly meetings, usually on the second Friday of the month.

 

The Technology, Research, and User Education Committees are finalizing plans for forums and symposiums the Fall 2003 and Spring 2004.

 

NJ ACRL will be sponsoring a program at the New Jersey Library Association Annual Spring Conference in April 2004.  We have already set our luncheon speaker and are working on a project that would reach out to undergraduates as a recruitment measure.

 

State in which Chapter is incorporated:
New Jersey

Affiliated with other organization (please be specific)

NJ ACRL is affiliated with the New Jersey Library Association.  Our official title is NJLA College and University Section/NJ ACRL

 

Each ACRL unit is asked to address the following issues in order for ACRL to assess how it is making progress on the strategic plan. Please provide a short summary of the Chapter's activities for the following issues.

 

1. How has the Chapter facilitated professional development activities?


NJ ACRL co-sponsored the VALE (Virtual Academic Library Environment) Conference in January 2003 which was very well received and plan to do so again this January. 

 

NJ ACRL also sponsors annual awards for Distinguished Service, Outstanding Research, and Innovative Technologies which are presented at the NJLA Annual Spring Conference.

 

2. How has the Chapter influenced legislative activities regarding information policy or higher education at the state, regional, or national level?

 

The Legislation Committee Chair, Louis Rodriguez has actively tracked and reported on national and local issues affecting libraries and information professionals and has supplied regular alerts and update to our members through professional “listservs” in the state of New Jersey.                      

 

NJ ACRL officers were invited to a reception to meet the Governor.  We hope this invitation will be extended this year as well.

 

3.  How has the Chapter contributed to ACRL membership recruitment activities?

For three years running, NJ ACRL has sponsored a job shadowing program.  Through this program library students can visit an academic library and work with professionals.  One goal of the program is to heighten student awareness of professional associations such as ACRL.  This has also led to informal mentoring when students have contacted the librarians they shadowed at later dates for professional advice.  In the past the job shadowing program was advertised only to Rutgers students.  This year it was opened to library programs at selected schools in Pennsylvania and New York also.

 

          

4.  Has the Chapter undertaken any special efforts this year?

 

We worked with the library at Farleigh Dickinson University to issue a call for papers on Visions 2010:  The Future of Libraries.  Several papers were submitted and Farleigh Dickinson awarded cash prizes for the winners.  As a follow up an article about the project appeared in DLib and one of the papers has been expanded into a conference presentation.  At least one other is being reworked into a journal article.