Tom Kaun, library media teacher from California, is the IASL information literacy special interest group coordinator (SIG-IL). Tom is keen to hear from IASL members and those interested in information literacy who would like to contribute to making the SIG-IL web page a lively and dynamic resource.
In addition to checking out the IASL SIG web page you might like to check the Information Literacy Weblog.
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) published its latest PISA survey on 4 December 2007.
This global study involving more than 400,000 15-year-olds in 57 countries provides the latest report card on each countries progress in providing a world-class education sytem.
The Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) has released PISA 2006 national reports on how Australian students compare.
The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) has recently released the results of the first longitudinal survey, School Libraries Count!
The survey, conducted in early 2007, gathered data in a number of areas, such as library staff, collections, technology, class visits, and budgets. AASL will be using the data to develop tools to help library media specialists advocate at the local, state and national level.
I’m sure the data will assist in the effective lobbying for the Strengthening Kids Interest in Learning & Libraries (SKILLS) Act.
A colleague and IASL member, Judy O’Connell, has alerted me to the annual international Edublog Awards.
Message from Judy – “Take a close look at each of the blog categories, and find some good reads to inspire your professional learning in 2008…..I have been very honoured to find my blog Heyjude shortlisted for the category Best Library/Librarian blog. Check all the blogs nominated for this category and maybe cast a vote for the only IASL teacher librarian to make the list! (blush).”
Voting in all categories closes on December 6. However, the full shortlisted groups will remain as a handy reference in the future.
Judy, thanks for the information and we wish you well – hope lots of IASL folk vote for your blog 
The theme of the 37th IASL Conference is: World Class Learning and Literacy through School Libraries
Sub-themes:
1. Digital Literacy — For example, digital libraries, digital resources related to reading, specialized strategies and techniques for “reading” online text, images and multimedia.
2. Building a Community of Readers — For example, book clubs, literature circles, collaborative reading projects.
3. Strategies for Building Literacy Skills in School Libraries — For example, How can the school librarian use his/her library curriculum and instruction to develop reading and literacy skills among students? What reading and literacy skills can be”taught” in school libraries by school librarians? What are best practices for teaching these skills?
4. Support Reading Instruction — For example, how school libraries can provide resources for classroom teachers and staff support for literacy initiatives throughout the school, including collection development, literacy libraries, reader’s advisory, reading incentive programs.
5. Research Forum — For example, scholarly research about school libraries. Researchers are encouraged to discuss their research methodologies as well as the results.
Four types of presentations will be offered in this conference:
Professional papers:
Papers that describe and discuss the presenter’s work in relation to theory and/or practice.
International Research Forum Presentations:
Papers that describe the presenter’s research, either completed or on-going, in relation to the conference theme.
Workshops/Demonstrations: Presentations that feature one or more persons working with a group to help them develop skills in a specific teaching or research technique.
Poster Sessions: Description of practice or theory presented visually. Presenters are required to be present for a specific period of time in order to answer questions.
All proposals will be independently reviewed before acceptance. The Review Panel for the International Research Forum will be drawn from IASL members worldwide.
Criteria for Selection:
Relevance to conference themes
Clarity of description
Intellectual significance
Relevance to audience
Originality
All proposals must be in English and submitted by 15 January 2008.
The online submission facility is now available.
The call for papers for the IFLA conference in Quebec, Canada is currently open.
The Information Literacy and Academic and Research Libraries Sections theme is Return on investment: Learners’ outcomes in information literacy. Do they really learn?
The Information Technology Section theme is Enabling access to the global library – Small is beautiful: Distributed deployment of library services for small and special libraries.
The Library Theory and Research Section theme is Theoretical approaches to research on libraries as space and place.
