This has been a busy week.
The ALIA Education and Workforce Summit was held on 28 March in Melbourne, and I'll provide more information next week. Some of the outcomes included the need to focus on strategies for recruiting to the library sector, the need for university educators to meet together and the need for employers and educators to meet together.
The first post-Mullarvey Universities Australia (UA) meeting for copyright officers was held last Monday, in the shadow of John Mullarvey (the former chief executive), as we discussed the new agreement signed with the Copyright Agency Ltd at the end of 2007. The substantial interest in the cost of the deal enhanced interest and engagement with the issue, to put matters politely. I am a member of the four-person expert group set up by UA to think about the next agreement, in 2010.
Research metrics and nice research databases are one thing all Australian universities are thinking about; Swinburne is convening a group looking at integration of repository data with research data. On Tuesday we had a chat to colleagues from the University of New South Wales and the University of Newcastle on how we could achieve some better consistency in the forms of names of researchers. Others are interested in these issues - usual suspects like Thomson Scientific (producers of the Web of Knowledge database) and Elsevier (Scopus), as well as the National Library's People Australia program, currently in planning.
Thomson Scientific held another of their citation awards sessions, along with a Research Day, at the National Press Club on Wednesday, followed by a widely-reported address by Alan Robson, president of the Group of Eight universities.
CAUL is always interesting and worthwhile, because university libraries are very similar to each other, and the meeting is an opportunity for the rest of us to learn from those of the 47 (New Zealand is included) who are out ahead. Just a matter of finding them. CAUL met in Sydney on Thursday and Friday, and its papers are available online in great detail. There was heaps of interest - for example, a great presentation from Felicity McGregor on the Wollongong library cadet program for new graduates.
No blogs this week either - I'm heading off to the woods and water to walk around a bit. I'll give alliteration a rest, among other things.
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