ALA Sponsors Tech Boot Camp

By Lauren Barack -- School Library Journal, 7/1/2006

The American Library Association (ALA) is getting serious about technology. Hence the name of their latest professional development foray, the Web 2.0 “Boot Camp.” The program, which ended in early June, was led by library professionals Jenny Levine and Michael Stephens (below), who guided 50 participants through the crash course on blogs, podcasts, and wikis.

“I didn’t think the ALA would do it,” says Levine, a librarian and tech guru at the Metropolitan Library System, just outside Chicago. “They seemed a little behind on understanding the technologies.”

The Otter Group, an educational service that runs online courses, approached Levine and Stephens to teach the class and asked ALA to pick up some of the cost, says Levine. ALA handpicked the 50 students—who ranged from a public librarian to a media coordinator from North Carolina. It was critical that no one who took the virtual class would feel they had to use the new skills in their job, she says. “We just wanted them to see that these were useful tools,” says Levine.

The skill set of those enrolled ran the gamut. “There were people who were blogging currently to those who had never even written a post,” says Stephens, who will join the faculty in library and information science at Dominican University this fall.

For their final projects, Boot Camp attendees were encouraged to create something—a blog, wiki, or simply a Word document—that ALA could then use to contribute to its online community. Levine likes to encourage people to try something—even if they believe they might fail. “It’s the gamer’s ethos,” she says. “If you fail, you just start over until you find the right combination.”

What does Levine wish for her 50 new graduates? She hopes they’ll keep playing with their new tools until they find the right voice and format for themselves—and then pass it along, she says.