Home  Clara Bohrer

PLA PRESIDENT-ELECT TO FOCUS ON MOVING ASSOCIATION FORWARD

FROM: KATHLEEN HUGHES, PLA MANAGER, COMMUNICATIONS
312-280-4028
JUNE 2003

Clara Nalli Bohrer, Director of the West Bloomfield Township (Michigan) Public Library, said she will focus on leading the association forward in completing strategic plan initiatives - particularly in the areas of training and knowledge transfer, emergent literacy, and recruitment - during her term as president of the Public Library Association, which begins in July 2004. "I look forward to my term as PLA President, and all of the challenges and opportunities that it presents, in addition I hope to effect an increase in continuing education opportunities for our members on a regional basis and/or an electronic basis," said the incoming vice-president.

Bohrer has been an active American Library Association (ALA) member since 1980, and has served on the Board of Directors for both the Public Library Association (PLA) and the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC). She currently serves as the chair of the PLA 2004 National Conference Committee, to be held in Seattle, Washington, February 24-28, 2004. In addition, she has chaired a number of committees for ALA, PLA, and ALSC. These include the ALA Standards Committee, 1989-91; the PLA President's Events Committee, which she chaired from 1997-99; the 1998 PLA National Conference Program Committee; the PLA Conference Program Coordinating Committee, 1994-97; the PLA/ALSC Committee on Output Measures for Children's Services, 1989-92; and the PLA Services to Children Committee, 1985-88. Bohrer has also served as a member of several other association committees.

Along with her ALA responsibilities, Bohrer is active in a number of other professional groups, including the Urban Libraries Council. She served on the Board of Directors and as President of the Michigan Library Association, and on the Board of Directors for the Greater West Bloomfield Chamber of Commerce and she is currently President-elect of the West Bloomfield Chapter of Optimist International. She is also an experienced speaker and workshop organizer. In the past, she has planned and coordinated programming (as program chairperson) for the 1998 PLA National Conference, as well as seminars for the "Building" workshops held during PLA's Spring Symposiums in 1999 and in 2001. Most recently, Bohrer was a speaker on "Creating an Environment that Promotes Emergent Literacy" at the "Building the Perfect Library workshop," which was one of the five sessions offered during PLA's 2003 Spring Symposium, held March 6-8, 2003, in Chicago.

Bohrer received a B.A. in Education from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor in 1973, an M.S.L.S. from Wayne State University in 1976, and a Master of Arts in Education from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, in 1984. PLA is a division of the American Library Association. For more information, please phone 1-800-545-2433, ext. 5PLA.

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