Crawford, 'Past New Orleans: What's Next?', LITA Newsletter v14n04
URL = http://hegel.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/serials/lita/lita-v14n04-crawford-past

[v14n4.editor litanews]
-------------
Letter from the Editor
Walt Crawford

Past New Orleans: What's Next?

Summer slows down a bit for LITA, as for many other groups. We recover
from the Annual Conference, take vacations, celebrate the completion
of terms and contemplate the beginning of new terms. By September,
with luck, enough energy returns to charge forward through the heart
of the year.
   If you've completed one set of professional activities, you may be
thinking about what comes next. This is a good time to consider the
possibilities, then plan for those that will benefit you and the field
the most. LITA depends on volunteers. Although LITA vice presidents
and committee chairs do sometimes recruit people based on knowledge of
other activities, more probably, you'll need to make your interests
known.
   As always, the best way to become active in LITA is through the In-
terest Groups. You can even start a new Interest Group (if one is
needed) by getting nine other LITA members involved. Interest Groups
provide most of LITA's formal programming and nearly all the informal
programmatic activities. You can't be appointed to an Interest Group
position, so go to the meetings, get involved, volunteer.
   For some outgoing Interest Group officers, the logical next step
may be a committee position. Committee positions certainly don't all
go to old IG hands or previous committee members; with rare excep-
tions, they do go to people who send in volunteer forms (in the next
LITA Newsletter) and know what they want to do. Don't expect that a
volunteer form will guarantee appointment; LITA has relatively few com-
mittees, some of which are quite popular, and the appointment process
can be complex and difficult. You may need to try several times before
an appropriate slot opens up. Your chances are better if you've been
attending the meetings of the committee you're interested in, and if
the chair knows that you're interested and would make a good member.
(All committee meetings are normally open to visitors except the four
Awards committees and the Nominating Committee. Other committees, and
the LITA Board, may hold closed partial sessions under certain very
limited circumstances, mostly having to do with personnel or other con-
fidential matters.)

A Special Opportunity

If you're an experienced editor or writer, and particularly if you
have a flair for desktop publishing and understand the significance of
deadlines, there's a particular opportunity you should consider. As
noted in "LITA News," LITA is recruiting candidates to edit the LITA
Newsletter from 1995 through 1997. This time, it's a completely open
race: I will not be applying for a fourth term as editor.
   The LITA Newsletter reaches every LITA member, personal and institu-
tional; that's almost 6,000 copies. Very few library publications
reach that large an audience. Editing the Newsletter will bring you in
contact with scores of interesting people from all areas of LITA;
you'll become more familiar with other ALA publications (if you're not
already); you'll probably become quite familiar with internal LITA op-
erations and the LITA budget. You also get to write editorials and
have considerable freedom in editing and producing the publication.
   I've enjoyed editing the LITA Newsletter enormously. In some ways,
it's been one of the most gratifying areas of my own professional ac-
tivity--and I'm sure I'll miss it. But by the end of 1994, it will
have been 37 issues and more than nine years. The membership deserves
new energy, fresh editorial perspectives, and some new ideas for the
LITA Newsletter. If you can provide those ideas and perspectives, do
consider applying for the editorship.
   In closing, one other note about "what's next?" I'm particularly
pleased to draw your attention to one of the Board Actions (elsewhere
in this issue): the Board approved holding a 4th LITA National Confer-
ence in Calendar 1996. More on that later.