From: Answers | EdAlliance
To: oztl_net@oztlnet.com
Sent: Tuesday, 21 August 2012 10:33 AM
Subject: [OZTL_NET] FW: What do we want in a national professional association?

Georgia –

You are very brave for coming out and asking these vital questions. I’m guessing that your inbox might have a few angry responses in it this morning, and I truly hope some encouraging ones also.

Asking questions in public of your national association is essential to good organisational development. I suspect that many are asking these very same questions of themselves or amongst their teams during the past few days.

The contentions you make are important debate points. These are the things that a national organisation needs to do to actually lead. ASLA might very well be doing these things or the things it feels the most important or what can be achieved within the funding it has.

I suspect the most controversial contention in your writing is the idea that ASLA might be (or should be) replaced by ALIA. The reality is that no one person or organisation actually makes that choice. It’s the members and their responses that actually make the choice. Members respond to the work of the organisation or don’t respond through perceived irrelevance.

So yes, right now the School Library Profession – including Heads of Library, Library Technicians, Library Officers and Teacher Librarians – does need a national association more than ever, but only if that association does the things it’s members want it to do. I can’t imagine there are many
people that want to see ASLA fragment, or see a public fight between SLAQ and ASLA or any other entity.

I suspect that most people want to see a clear, professional, transparent and conciliatory response from all sides of the fence. Then an agreement on a way forward that actually clearly defines the objectives of state bodes, national bodies and the members of all.

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David Linke
Director
EdAlliance