Mentor, Mentee, (CILIP) VLE

Mentor, Mentee 

I spent some time with one of my mentees yesterday - it was great to catch up with each other, and I gave her the Grand Tour of first our Library and then the rest of the Conservatoire.  After that, it was on to visit a neighbouring library - quite a busy few hours for my mentee!

VLE

Having jointly set the world of librarianship to rights yesterday, I decided that I had better set a good personal example too, so this afternoon I logged on to the CILIP website, and started using the e-portfolio to monitor my own professional development too.

CPD 2013

Although  it's based on Mahara like the portfolio side of the VLE (Virtual Learning Environment) that we use at work, I am still fumbling around the CILIP one a bit, so I haven't got far yet.  I must look at the screencasts that are there to help!  However, I've noted my key CPD activities for 2013, and it looks as though I was reasonably busy in that regard.  My next challenge is to work out whether I can create a new section for 2014, or just keep adding to the 2013 box and change the name of the box!

CPD 2014 - a Course and 4 Conferences!

I'm looking forward to logging my 2014 CPD, because I'm doing a short credit-rated postgraduate course entitled 'The Teaching Artist' as evening classes at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, from February to May.  I was lucky enough to get a Creative Scotland bursary towards the fees.  Now, I've given countless talks, lectures and seminars, but I've never really gone into the pedagogy behind teaching, so although it's a bit of a sudden gear-shift for me, it's certainly thought-provoking, and it's particularly interesting being in a small class of teaching artists, all of whom bring different backgrounds and performing arts to the discussion table.

The week after next, I'm flying down to Cambridge for part of the IAML(UK and Ireland) Annual Study Weekend, so it'll be nice to catch up with old friends, new trends, and join the Executive as a Committee member for the first time.  In my case, it's because I've agreed to convene a working group to initiate a new corporate website.  (I'm also practising what I preach: volunteer to get more involved in your sector!)  And I'm talking at the Academic Music Librarians' forum on the first afternoon, so I'll be killing two birds with one stone by talking about the Teaching Artist course!

There's a Musica Scotica conference in Aberdeen a couple of Saturdays later; and I'm off to give a paper at the International IAML conference in Antwerp in July - the first time I've 'been abroad' to give a conference paper, apart from one I gave in Dublin.  I know that Dublin is in Eire, still another country, but somehow it still feels more a Celtic neighbour, than truly 'abroad', so I am quite excited about spreading my wings further afield.

Finally, I heard yesterday morning that I'm one of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland delegates to an international conference that's coming to Glasgow in November: ELIA is the European League of Institutes of the Arts, and this will be the biennial international conference.   The conference theme is LOCATION/AESTHETICS, which might not sound like the kind of thing a librarian would be drawn to, but at the moment I am 60% librarian and 40% musicologist researcher, so believe me, I find this a very exciting theme indeed.  I can get very excited about discussions of nationality, nationalism, geographical borders and cultural perceptions of borders, so this conference might get me quite fired up!

CILIP Professional Knowledge and Skills Base, and Vitae Researcher Development Framework

A couple of years ago, I helped a research supervisor colleague plan some research skills training for doctoral students.  The framework was based on a handy diagram, available from the Vitae website.  (Vitae is a research support organisation, and their diagram is called the Vitae Researcher Development Framework.)

Now, here I am in my librarian capacity (and a CILIP mentor), looking at CILIP's new Professional Knowledge and Skills Base.  It's a great idea.  And guess what?  We have our own circle too, now!  Here's a brochure about it - you have to be a CILIP member to download the fuller document.

All about professional knowledge and skills in librarianship:-
http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/jobs-and-careers/professional-knowledge-and-skills-base

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A Question of Continuing Professional Development

August 2013

I see from my stats that this blog was visited yesterday, despite having been dormant for several months.  The fact that someone looks but finds nothing new, will never do! So, in case anyone else happens upon this blog, which I started when I was following the 23 Things initiative in 2012, I thought I'd just post an update.

Since completing 23 Things, my contract has changed. (The change is unconnected with 23 Things, I hasten to add.)  My working week has been modified, as I am currently 60:40 music librarian : postdoctoral researcher on an AHRC-funded project.  A new professional covers my non-library days.  Spending two days a week on music research is work, not specific, scheduled training, but it nonetheless develops my research skills, so you could argue it's a kind of Continuing Professional Development. 

Also since completing 23 Things, I've signed up to be a CILIP Mentor for new library professionals embarking upon their Chartership training.  It's time to put something back into the profession.  I already have one shiny new mentee, with the prospect of a couple more.

The most recent formal training event I've attended was the Scottish Storytelling Workshop's Stagecraft Workshop: How to be the Social Glue.  It was basically about hosting an event - being the compere - as I thought it would be a good idea to brush up my presentation skills for non-academic audiences.  And why?  Because I've done various talks for special interest groups, and I had a book-launch of my own in April 2013!  My husband has since reflected, 'You basically used that book-launch as an excuse for a full-scale concert'.  He's half-right.  I was introduced by a senior manager, then gave an illustrated talk.  The performers were our students, a former colleague of mine, and me at the piano. 

For years, I've represented the Whittaker Library at SALCTG, the Scottish Academic Libraries Cooperative Training Group, and last summer I became Convenor of the group, so that's the last piece of news in my CPD update.  I'm not just updating myself, but helping develop other libraries' staff too.  I gave a pecha kucha presentation about SALCTG's aims and objectives, at a seminar earlier this summer.

It's possible that CILIP may have a new name soon.  The voting at the AGM will be whether to accept Information and Library Professionals UK: the Chartered Institute for the Knowledge Professions, as our new name.  I'll index this update under both the present name and the potential new one, to aid retrieval.  (Once a librarian, always a librarian?!) 

Things 8 and 9: Google Calendar and Evernote

My Choice!

I'm going to write a couple of sentences here, then get on with the day-job!  I must confess I'm feeling a little overwhelmed.  I do use Evernote - I love it.  So that leaves Google Calendar.  I have it on my android, and it's quite useful.  However,  

• I have my work calendar, which is web-accessible.  And I have the departmental calendar alongside it, ditto.  I use it at work.  I can consult it when I'm elsewhere so long as I have web access.
• I have my Palm calendar, which goes everywhere with me.  It's not web-accessible.  I can no longer back it up - it's incompatible with the new laptop. But it doesn't really matter.
• I have the family wall-planner.  There are columns for all five of us.
• I have the family Excel spreadsheet.
• And I have the Google calendar on my phone.
• I really don't want to synchronise my work calendar and my home life!  If I'm at home, please can I get on with being at home?  And if I'm at work, do I have to see my whole family's dental appointments, school trips and other comings and goings? No.  Not my way!
• In short, I don't want to have any more calendars to worry about, even if I can link them.

Here I shall depart, before I give the impression I'm a grumpy, frumpy old retrograde.

Thing 7: Getting involved professionally

This is an easy "thing" for me to write about, because I've always been professionally involved.

1. CILIP.  I got chartered (ALA) in the Library Association as soon as I'd put in the requisite amount of experience, and written my professional development report.  Actually, it wasn't nearly as difficult as some people would have you believe, so if anyone reading this is still working towards chartership, then my message to them is, 'Please don't worry about it!'.  I'm happy to be a sounding-board for anyone with any concerns about it.  Anyway, I've been a member ever since, and I also supervised my maternity cover's chartership.  Although it wasn't easy getting away to attend events when I had young children (I only had 3 months' maternity leave after the birth of each child), I tried to keep active at arm's length, and I did write a couple of articles for Personnel Training and Development, in 2001.  I've nearly always subscribed to more groups than the minimum two, though my choices have changed from time to time.  More recently, I submitted my Fellowship application a couple of years ago.
2. IAML (UK and Irl).  I joined IAML at the same time as I joined CILIP - as a librarianship postgrad at College of Librarianship Wales, Aberystwyth.  Within a year, I was working as a music librarian in South Tyneside, and at that stage I became IAML (UK and Irl)'s Newsletter Editor and Brio Reviews Editor.  This meant trips to London for Exec meetings - which I managed until the kids came along.  If you begin to see a theme emerging, I'm afraid it's that people without children inevitably get more involved in group activities and committees, whilst full-time working mothers with three young children tend to get less involved!  I was Brio Reviews Editor from 1989-1992, but withdrew slightly from involvement in professional organisations while the kids were young; there was a dip in my conference attendances, although I did get away to day-events from time to time.  More recently I've written for the Newsletter and Brio, spoken at a couple of conferences, and written a review and a paper for Fontes (the international organisation).
3. Locally, I've represented the RSAMD (now the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, since our namechange) at SALCTG (Scottish Academic Libraries Cooperative Training Group) for many years, and I've just become Convenor of that group.  It's good to be involved in something local, where you get to meet people with similar interests over an extended period of time. 
4. For quite a while I also represented RSAMD at the SCURL Disabilities Group, addressing access issues for disabled readers, but the group has disbanded now.  (I gave a paper and published an article for that, too.)
5. In 2002, I found three nineteenth century Dundonian flute manuscripts after a library refurbishment.  You might ask why I'm mentioning this here: it's because it marked the reawakening of my interest in musicological research.   In one sense, it is coincidental that this marked the start of my youngest son's school career - in another, it's perhaps just as well!  From 2004-9 I studied part-time for a PhD, alongside my full-time job.  This has led to a lot of networking in musicological circles, particularly the Royal Musical Association.  I'm currently on the Council for that, too.  I've attended RMA research students' conferences, and published a paper in the RMA Research Chronicle.  I'm also a member of the international specialist Eighteenth Century Scottish Studies Society - I've written a paper and a couple of book reviews for them, too - and I attend Musica Scotica conferences locally in Glasgow.  More presentations and another published paper.
6. I now lurk on Twitter, which is a great way of keeping abreast of professional concerns.  More so for librarianship than musicology, I have to say.  Maybe I'm just not following the right Twitter trends.  It's more vital to my day-to-day existence that I keep up with librarianship stuff.  I haven't given up on the research - indeed, I have a book at the publishers' right now - but I earn my daily crust as a librarian.

Sometimes, I feel I haven't made much progress professionally, having been in the same job 24 years.  But looking at this lot, I certainly haven't stagnated.  That's something I can be proud of, I suppose!

Thing 4 (better late than never)

Thing 4: Current Awareness, RSS feeds and Storify

Right, this is my teabreak - it'll have to be a quick Thing!  (My wifi is down at home, so it's now or never.  A whole blog on the android would be a footer, to say the least.  "Foo-ter": Scottish for "fiddly".)

Twitter.  Ah yes, Twitter.  I've got a couple of hundred followers, so I'm fairly au-fait with Twitter, but you're never too old to learn, so I learned about lists, and following other people's.  If I follow you - watch out.  I now know where to find your LISTS!  (I'm @Karenmca, by the way.  Yes, I was gratified to get there early enough to snaffle it!)

RSS feeds.  Now, I must confess I get a bit confused with RSS feeds.  However, I've made a policy decision: from now on, I'll only use the Google one.  It's far too confusing using more than one of them!  I did set up a couple of feeds to fulfil the Thing requirements, though.

And then we come to Storify.  I wrote a story in my lunchbreak, and here it is:-

Musings on Creativity  It's a book-review of a book we recently acquired, The Fiddletree, by Otis A. Tomas.  But I won't tell you about it here - you'll have to visit my Storify story.  It's quite easy to use, and I can see myself using it again.  It's rather like blogging one-off blogs, I suppose.  Fun.

Thing 1. Start a blog (Karenmca ticks the box)

Thing 1: Create your own blog, write about what you hope to get out of the programme.

I'm doing this for professional development.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I'm into professional development in a big way.  I did my Music PhD part-time from 2004-2009.  Then I became an FCLIP and an FSA Scot.  I had a go at learning Gaelic (well, I do work at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where we do a Scottish music degree), but my efforts weren't very successful.  And I've just submitted my first book manuscript, which I suspect is going to be a significant learning experience.  However, that develops me as a musicologist rather than developing my library skills as such.  So - here I am.

I already blog and tweet fairly intensively.  Whittaker Live is the Whittaker Library's performing arts blog.  True Imaginary Friends is my book project blog, and I used to write PseudoSupermum until I realised that really, it was impossible!  (The concept, not the blog.)

More recently, I had a go at using social media and crowdsourcing for a small-scale research project earlier this year: Crowdsourcing the Celtic Bard - I did it in preparation for my talk at the IAML (UK and Irl) Annual Study Weekend in Cardiff last month.  I'll put some links up later, but I need to get on with my librarianly day right now.  Back later ...

Introducing the Music and Academic Services Librarian

My name's Karen McAulay, and I am Music and Academic Services Librarian at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.  Our Library is called the Whittaker Library (after an early Principal), and I have been blogging as 'Whittaker Live ' for over a decade.  As such, I share performing arts links for our staff and students here.  From time to time I assume the persona of 'Whittaker' himself.

The blog you're looking at right now is my new CPD (continuing professional development) blog, which I've started as part of the CPD23 initiative.  You'll find out more about me in due course.  Do come back to see how I'm getting on!