Every August and March our library staff development committee hosts staff development activities throughout the week. Our August activities are always held between the end of the summer II semester and the beginning of the fall semester, as this is a time that least impacts our students. Also, since we are only open 8am-5pm this week, no one is working the night shift and has to miss anything due to their work schedule.
This week's activities opened with a visit from our counterparts at NCCU - North Carolina Central University. Like us, they are part of the UNC system of 17 institutions across the state, only they are one of the bigger institutions located in the NC Triangle. I thoroughly enjoy meeting people that have a similar job function as I from other institutions, especially related institutions that also share some of the same state and institutional guidelines as myself. I wish we had known further in advance that they were coming and/or had some idea of what they were interested in visiting us to talk about. After they received a brief tour of the library from our interim dean, they and a number of our librarians met in our electronic classroom (which always feels like the ice planet Hoth.) We had a good discussion, and I enjoyed getting to meet the visiting library folk. However, I think it would have been much more effective if we could have met in smaller groups with just our counterparts from the other institutions in order to focus our time effectively on those issues that are most pertinent to our realms of experience. (I never need to discuss cataloging - in fact I am pretty sure I am allergic to it.) I missed out on the networking lunch since they opted for Fuller's and I just can't stand the smell of barbeque. However, I was very pleased to meet Sunny Jackson, the circulation assistant from NCCU, whom I felt I had quite a bit in common with and who I look forward to networking with more in the future.
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