Connexscions Volume III Issue 02 Jan - May 2007 - WKWSCI Home

CrossingOver theBoundariesBy Isabel TanLIS professors and professionalsat the conference.Library and Information Science professionals have awealth of unique local expertise and exciting innovationsavailable in the Asian region, and no longer needto rely on the West for ideas and leadership. That wasone important lesson of The Asia-Pacific Conferenceon Library & Information Education & Practice (A-LIEP 2006) held at NTU in mid-2006. The conferencewas organised by (then) SCI’s Division of InformationStudies in collaboration with the Department ofInformation Science, University of Malaya, and NTULibrary.A-LIEP 2006 had the following aims:• to foster collaboration and cooperation among informationstudies schools in Asia;• to advance information studies education in Asia;and• to provide leadership and play a facilitator role inthe Asian region while raising its profile.The conference was an exciting gathering of 217 LIS(Library and Information Science) professors and professionalsfrom 20 countries. The participants rangedfrom heads of library schools, library directors andresearchers to graduate students who were presentingtheir first international papers. Keynote speakers whoshared their views at the conference included Dr N.Varaprasad, Chief Executive of the National LibraryBoard, who presented his vision of the 21st Centurylibrary service. Dr Peter Keen, Shaw FoundationProfessor at NTU, meanwhile, explained the new conceptof knowledge mobilisation and why it is more importantthan knowledge management.The conference reflected a growing awareness of theneed for more networking, dialogue and collaborationamong LIS educators and researchers in the Asia-Pacific region, who have perhaps sometimes beenunaware of valuable developments, innovations andexpertise within the region itself. Each country inPhoto courtesy of Dr Chris KhooAsia-Pacific has its own history of LIS education andresearch, shaped by socio-economic, political and culturalfactors, and therefore exhibiting a wide variety ofcharacters, flavours and areas of strength. It is hopedthe conference will stimulate greater collaboration andcooperation in the region as well as globally.To promote resource sharing among LIS educatorsand researchers, a Web portal for LIS education calledLibrary & Information Science Education in Asia(LISEA) is being developed, moderated by WKWSCIAssociate Professor, Dr Chris Khoo, who played a keyrole in running the A-LIEP 2006 conference. “Thanksto everyone who played a part to make this conferenceso successful,” said Dr Khoo. “I am also currentlyworking with professors and colleagues in other countriesto develop an accreditation system for informationstudies education in Asia.”Dr Khoo is a firm believer that new-age libraries haveto be multi-talented. To lead by example, he got togetherwith a few colleagues to showcase their musicalflair by performing a short recital to entertain the conferencedelegates during their official banquet held atThe Pod, National Library Board.To further promote innovation and best practices ininformation services and systems, Dr Khoo is also runninga three-month research project with Ms Fan Fan,an exchange student from China’s Peking University.The project aims to analyse and compare Western andChina classification systems in selected subject areas.With WKWSCI’s Division of Information Studiesgaining more exposure in the Asia-Pacific region, moremajor international conferences are definitely in thepipeline. Dr Khoo said, “The A-LIEP conference isbecoming an annual affair with Taiwan organising thesecond staging in November 2007, and Japan slated tohold the third A-LIEP conference in 2008.”CONNEXSCIONS23