YALSA President

Linda Braun is YALSA’s 2009-2010 president. Her theme is Risky Business. Linda spoke about her theme:

The theme was developed with guidance from the Presidential Advisory Task Force and will make it possible for YALSA to demonstrate how taking risks at the division and board level, and in teen services in general, helps guarantee high-quality library services to teens.

The Risky Business theme provides opportunities for the YALSA Board of Directors to demonstrate their ability to help the division move forward through risk-taking. The board has shown their ability to take risks when at Midwinter 2009 it was decided to move some committees to interest group and discussion group status. The board will no doubt continue to demonstrate their risk-taking abilities as they consider funding of projects and decisions related to selected lists, teen advocacy, and so on. To support the Board taking on risk, during the 2009-2010 year YALSA will look into training for board members on how to be effective risk takers.

The Risky Business theme strongly supports all areas of YALSA’s strategic plan because it provides opportunities to:

demonstrate how to take risks as a teen library advocate,
garner membership involvement through solicitation of risk stories and providing opportunities for member risk taking,
support research on how risk plays a role in teen lives and in teen library services,
promote learning about how to be a successful risk taker in order to provide high quality library service to teens,
market YALSA as an organization that is willing to take risks in order to produce products and services that meet member needs.

Throughout the year we will develop content that highlights the ways that YALSA, librarians, and teens manage risk in order to be effective. The content developed will be a part of the YALSA blog and YALSA-TV, and might also include new projects, such as the Readers’ Choice list, expanded support for discussion and interest groups, and expanded online offerings for continuing education and virtual conference programming.

At Annual 2010, YALSA, with ALA Editions, will publish a new book titled Risky Business: Effectively Taking and Managing Risk in Library Services to Teens. The book will be co-authored by myself, Jack Martin, and Connie Urquhart. Publication of the volume will coincide with the culmination of the theme of my presidential year.

See a gallery of YALSA's past presidents. (Flash 8 required).