December 2006 - Illinois Library Association

Sally
in
Libraryland
Sally Decker Smith, Indian Trails Public Library District, Wheeling
ILA Reporter – December 2006
18
By
the time you read this, the 2006 ILA Annual Conference
will be a fond memory. As I’m writing, though, it was last
week and I’m still processing much of what happened
there! It was — as always — a pleasure to connect with
new and old friends, and to learn a lot.
The evening events were both remarkable, and I’ve already
informed my husband that we’re taking follow-up field
trips to both venues, although without the wonderful food
and wine and library colleagues, I’m afraid they won’t be
quite the same!
It was great to see my director, Tamiye Meehan, being all
presidential, and presiding with élan. It was also great to see
Dianne Harmon’s radiating glee at not having to preside!
And with a couple of significant exceptions, the weather —
and the view — was glorious. I will be at a conference at
the end of October that’s at a combined conference center
and indoor water park, but I’d rather look at the Chicago
skyline any day.
After one vendor told me he wanted to talk to me about
my last column, I spent some of my time in the exhibits
area hiding behind people taller than I (which, if you’ve
seen me, you know is nearly everyone over the age of
twelve). I would have thought that by now everyone in
the state who cared would have already seen the display
program Ted Swigon and I do, but a roomful of people
demonstrated the error of my thinking, and the foresight
of the committee when they asked us to do it again!
But far and away the most memorable aspect of a memorable
conference was meeting with the Intellectual Freedom
Committee, of which I am honored to be a member.
Every committee experience I have had in ILA has been
professionally satisfying and personally enjoyable, but this
one seems likely to take the cake! With Rose Chenoweth
as chair, this disparate group of people (go to www.ila.org
and look at the Handbook of Organization for the list of
all the committee members) came together for a meeting
that was hugely productive. Even for a morning person like
me, a 7:30 A.M. meeting forty miles away was a challenge,
but thanks largely to a 6:00 A.M. ride from Doris Wagner,
a board member of ours who happened to be going
downtown for another almost-as-early meeting, I managed
to get there in time. And a benefit of such an early meeting
was that we were able to go to breakfast together afterwards
and continue getting to know each other.
Here’s the result of that hugely productive meeting. Get this!
Coming soon to a location…well, I can’t promise near you,
because many of our systems are pretty big, but certainly a
location nearer you than the other end of the state, will be
training on intellectual freedom. Last year, ILA committed
to providing training for library-related people of all sorts
throughout the state, and this committee will be the means
to that end.