Dear all,
With regard to the partner membership proposal: I don’t want to nag, but I
believe that the membership is entitled to the full and correct information.
The membership software was chosen after the partner membership proposal was
submitted and discussed. The decision for the new software was taken without
consulting the VP responsible for the membership and without taken the proposal
into account, which is regrettable. However, I’ve looked into the options of
this software and think that with some creativity the obstacles can be overcome.
It is correct that there are 2 associations in Zone A that have a partner
membership contract. It has taken a very long time to finalize the discussions
regarding this proposal, hindering finding more associations in other Zones to
jump in. But, I’m confident it will not be difficult to find more associations
for this partnership proposal as soon as they receive the correct information
and are invited to do so.
If the (new) VP Associations Operations wishes some help or guidance in this,
he or she can always contact me. I’m very willing to help.
Kind regards,
Lourense
Van: iasl-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:iasl-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] Namens Chris ;
& Elizabeth Greef
Verzonden: zaterdag 20 augustus 2016 10:33
Aan: IASL <iasl@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Onderwerp: [IASL] Re Thoughts / Ideas re IASL
Dear colleagues,
I have been making my way to Japan and have only read tonight the exchanges in
response to Simao's excellent post on thoughts and ideas for IASL.
We do need lots of creative ideas, energy and participation as Maria Jose
Vitorino alluded to. Please use this conference time to discuss and share
face-to-face and also within our own countries afterwards to make IASL better
and serve our profession and students better.
I'd like to make comments on some of points raised….
MEMBERSHIP NUMBERS, INFORMATION AND ACCESS
I was certain that the information about membership was in one of the annual
reports on the website, either the President's, VP Association Operations or
the Secretariat's. I checked tonight and it is not. I do think we need
transparency within the membership and this information should be available
readily to members but on a confidential basis in the same way as the financial
statements. We can bring this up at the Board meeting to add to the annual
reports.
The Secretariat has actually been in the process of creating infographics
relating to membership; these may be helpful and interesting.
Although some feel we should have everything open and available on the website,
there do need to be genuine benefits to membership. For example, the whole
professional development library is a benefit of membership as are the country
profiles. However, every item of most use to developing nations is freely
available. If there are no extra benefits to membership, will we continue to
have enough members to sustain an association?
PARTNER MEMBERSHIP
Regarding partner membership as Lourense raised, this idea appeared to have
great potential. However, it has been very difficult to manage in the way we
would wish within our membership software. This, I believe, has been the
greatest stumbling block. Also the idea was to have one association from Zone
A, Zone B and Zone C in the trial. Instead we ended up with two Zone A
countries only.
Also as mentioned with associations, where there are three nominated members,
this relies on these members disseminating IASL information within their
association, and sometimes translating it. This can be problematic.
FUNDS
IASL does not have great funds at its disposal. As mentioned previously there
is a new sponsorship approach and we have developed a memorandum of
understanding and approached people in the hope of having a more comfortable
pool of funds. This is still underway and we hope that there may be some
takers. We do a lot with little money, with the efforts of volunteers who
largely fund themselves and with goodwill. We realise that membership fees can
be a struggle for people to pay.
The needs are so great we can never do enough. We can only do as much and as
well as we can with what we have. That said, we can do a great deal through
working together and believing in each other, that we are working for a common
goal.
I look forward to the conference in Tokyo and thinking together about how we
can move forward with effective school libraries and school library education
around the world.
Kind regards,
Elizabeth Greef
