Canadian Association of Law Libraries Annual Reports
The Canadian Association of Law Libraries (CALL) is holding its annual conference in Windsor starting this weekend.
Many of the association's committees and special interest groups (SIGs) have published their annual reports in preparation for the event.
Here are some highlights.
1) Courthouse and Law Society Libraries SIG
Its annual report is on the CALL website.
2) Academic Law Libraries SIG
This SIG has organized a preconference workshop proposal on U.S. legal research. During the year, it continued the Academic SIG Facebook Group and its newsletter. The newsletter is released three times a year, and the Facebook Group is updated with a new item approximately once every two weeks. The newsletters can be found on the SIG webpage.
3) Copyright Committee
CALL participated in the federal Copyright Consultations in July/August 2009 on Bill C-61, which died on the order paper when Parliament was prorogued.
A copy of CALL's submission is available online on the consultations website.
On the committee's to do list for 2010-2011:
Once again the committee had a busy and productive year with meetings held to cover general vendor related issues and meetings that focused on our usage statistics initiative.
The committee's major ongoing initiative is to advocate for usage statistics reporting standards for our legal information vendors. The work this past year has focused on identifying most desired elements we would like to see available in usage statistic reports.
There have been several strides toward achieving this goal. VLC members identified the information vendors that offer electronic legal material and should be targeted for standard usage reporting. The committee members have also identified all of the requirments that we see as necessary in a usage report, as well as identified which features are met by existing systems.
As the issue of usage reports is universal to law libraries, we have opened lines of communication with our BIALL (British and Irish) and AALL (American) vendor related committee colleagues. A collection of reading material on Usage Statistics has also been added to our committee page.
Since the 2009 Conference, the Vendor Liaison Committee has achieved a number of objectives:
The committee launched a Leadership Learning Series, starting with a pre-conference session in 2008, A Law Library Leadership Institute. This was followed by a 2009 conference session: Making Some Room: Strategies that Turn New Staff into New Leaders. The 'next in a series' follow-up this year will be a conference session: Inspiring Leaders. The committee had decided that a full scale pre-conference workshop each year might be too heavy in the leadership area – so would target for one every 3 years or so, with a continuing series of workshops in between.
This was the first full year for the mentoring program, which kicked off at the 2009 conference. Plans are in place for mentors and mentees to meet at the 2010 conference, and for an evaluation of the year to take place.
This past year also saw the launch of a continuing education initiative. With input from the Executive, it was decided that 4 or 5 webinars could be held each year, on a variety of topics, with a variety of presenters. The first webinar will be held in May, following the CALL conference; publicity for the webinar will occur at the conference.
6) Committee to Promote Research
At the May 2009 conference, the tenth annual Research Grant was awarded to Mary Hemmings for her project, "Legal Visual Semiotics: 18th Century Satirical Prints as Primary Sources."
During the year, Kirsten Wurmann, 2007 Research Grant recipient, published the results from her project, "Public Legal Education Bibliography", in (2009) 34:5 Canadian Law Library Review 232. Nancy McCormack and Nicole Eva published "If You Could Do It All Again: Job Satisfaction and Law Library Workers in Canada" in (2009) 34:5 Canadian Law Library Review 241 - the results of their research supported by the 2008 Research Grant.
Publications of Research Grant recipients and other research by CALL/ACBD members are listed on the Research Databank webpage
The committee advertised for the 2010 Research Grant, but did not receive any applications that met the criteria for the grant. Thus, as in the past, the committee will conduct another competition with applications due October 15, 2010. This year, due to budget constraints, the Executive allotted $2,000 for the Research Grant instead of the usual $5,000.
7) KF Modified Committee
The KF Modified classification schedule continues to be updated on a quarterly basis with 87 new pages issued last year. Due to some time constraints the 2nd and 3rd quarter updates were issued simultaneously this year. This delay facilitated the completion of the revised KF Modified form tables (completed and issued in the 3rd quarter). In addition a new optional expansion for KF385.ZB5 which enhances the classification area on Quebec civil law was issued in the 4th quarter update.
The promotion of KF Modified remains on the forefront of the Committee’s agenda.
Two additional enhancements have been completed and are under review: Nationality & Citizenship; Immigration.
The next areas scheduled for updating and improvement are: Indians. Native Peoples. Aboriginals. Inuit, and Labour Law. Future areas under consideration include: Taxation; Environmental Law; Access to Information/Privacy; and Internet law. The Committee hopes to continue to make progress on all of these initiatives in the coming year.
8) Oral History Project
The CALL/ACBD Oral History Project was established to conduct interviews with founding members and others instrumental in the association’s creation, in order to capture its history as it approaches its 50th anniversary. Six oral histories have been completed to date, and the following material deposited in the association archives, housed at the University of Manitoba Archives and Special Collections:
Many of the association's committees and special interest groups (SIGs) have published their annual reports in preparation for the event.
Here are some highlights.
1) Courthouse and Law Society Libraries SIG
Its annual report is on the CALL website.
2) Academic Law Libraries SIG
This SIG has organized a preconference workshop proposal on U.S. legal research. During the year, it continued the Academic SIG Facebook Group and its newsletter. The newsletter is released three times a year, and the Facebook Group is updated with a new item approximately once every two weeks. The newsletters can be found on the SIG webpage.
3) Copyright Committee
CALL participated in the federal Copyright Consultations in July/August 2009 on Bill C-61, which died on the order paper when Parliament was prorogued.
A copy of CALL's submission is available online on the consultations website.
On the committee's to do list for 2010-2011:
- Monitor Bills; and developments in Copyright law as they may pertain to Law Libraries
Once again the committee had a busy and productive year with meetings held to cover general vendor related issues and meetings that focused on our usage statistics initiative.
The committee's major ongoing initiative is to advocate for usage statistics reporting standards for our legal information vendors. The work this past year has focused on identifying most desired elements we would like to see available in usage statistic reports.
There have been several strides toward achieving this goal. VLC members identified the information vendors that offer electronic legal material and should be targeted for standard usage reporting. The committee members have also identified all of the requirments that we see as necessary in a usage report, as well as identified which features are met by existing systems.
As the issue of usage reports is universal to law libraries, we have opened lines of communication with our BIALL (British and Irish) and AALL (American) vendor related committee colleagues. A collection of reading material on Usage Statistics has also been added to our committee page.
Since the 2009 Conference, the Vendor Liaison Committee has achieved a number of objectives:
- Continued our annual communication with the membership about price increases
- Prepared and posted guidelines: Using CALL-L for vendor issues. The message re-educates about our critical path document: Librarian-Vendor Relations Best Practices checklist, which has been updated with some additional resources from Toronto Association of Law Libraries Publisher Liaison Committee.
- Posted several information pieces to the VLC Committee Page including:
Annual Report 2009
Pricing Trends 2010
Report on the Vendor Demo Presentations CALL 2009
Financial outlook CALL libraries March 2009 - Continued gathering financial outlook data for Canadian Law Libraries
- Sent reminders to publishers about the CALL- VLC code of good practices for loose-leaf publications
The committee launched a Leadership Learning Series, starting with a pre-conference session in 2008, A Law Library Leadership Institute. This was followed by a 2009 conference session: Making Some Room: Strategies that Turn New Staff into New Leaders. The 'next in a series' follow-up this year will be a conference session: Inspiring Leaders. The committee had decided that a full scale pre-conference workshop each year might be too heavy in the leadership area – so would target for one every 3 years or so, with a continuing series of workshops in between.
This was the first full year for the mentoring program, which kicked off at the 2009 conference. Plans are in place for mentors and mentees to meet at the 2010 conference, and for an evaluation of the year to take place.
This past year also saw the launch of a continuing education initiative. With input from the Executive, it was decided that 4 or 5 webinars could be held each year, on a variety of topics, with a variety of presenters. The first webinar will be held in May, following the CALL conference; publicity for the webinar will occur at the conference.
6) Committee to Promote Research
At the May 2009 conference, the tenth annual Research Grant was awarded to Mary Hemmings for her project, "Legal Visual Semiotics: 18th Century Satirical Prints as Primary Sources."
During the year, Kirsten Wurmann, 2007 Research Grant recipient, published the results from her project, "Public Legal Education Bibliography", in (2009) 34:5 Canadian Law Library Review 232. Nancy McCormack and Nicole Eva published "If You Could Do It All Again: Job Satisfaction and Law Library Workers in Canada" in (2009) 34:5 Canadian Law Library Review 241 - the results of their research supported by the 2008 Research Grant.
Publications of Research Grant recipients and other research by CALL/ACBD members are listed on the Research Databank webpage
The committee advertised for the 2010 Research Grant, but did not receive any applications that met the criteria for the grant. Thus, as in the past, the committee will conduct another competition with applications due October 15, 2010. This year, due to budget constraints, the Executive allotted $2,000 for the Research Grant instead of the usual $5,000.
7) KF Modified Committee
The KF Modified classification schedule continues to be updated on a quarterly basis with 87 new pages issued last year. Due to some time constraints the 2nd and 3rd quarter updates were issued simultaneously this year. This delay facilitated the completion of the revised KF Modified form tables (completed and issued in the 3rd quarter). In addition a new optional expansion for KF385.ZB5 which enhances the classification area on Quebec civil law was issued in the 4th quarter update.
The promotion of KF Modified remains on the forefront of the Committee’s agenda.
- The KF Modified Blog was launched in December 2009 and serves as a place to disseminate and gather information about KF Modified and legal classification.
- "KF Modified and the Classification of Canadian Common Law" was published in v. 34, no. 5 of the Canadian Law Library Review.
- The Committee is considering a name change that will broaden the scope of KF Modified for use in any common law library. This will be discussed at the next Committee meeting in Windsor.
Two additional enhancements have been completed and are under review: Nationality & Citizenship; Immigration.
The next areas scheduled for updating and improvement are: Indians. Native Peoples. Aboriginals. Inuit, and Labour Law. Future areas under consideration include: Taxation; Environmental Law; Access to Information/Privacy; and Internet law. The Committee hopes to continue to make progress on all of these initiatives in the coming year.
8) Oral History Project
The CALL/ACBD Oral History Project was established to conduct interviews with founding members and others instrumental in the association’s creation, in order to capture its history as it approaches its 50th anniversary. Six oral histories have been completed to date, and the following material deposited in the association archives, housed at the University of Manitoba Archives and Special Collections:
- Marianne Scott, President 1963-1969 - 3 tapes (closed); edited transcript (2008, 78 p. plus index)
- Margaret A. Banks, Treasurer, 1964 -1966; Constitution & Procedural Adviser; CALL/ACBD Historian - 2 tapes (closed); 1 diskette; 2 transcripts (1987, 151 p.; original deposited in the Ontario Archives: 1 edited transcript, 2005, 62 p.)
- Shih-Sheng Hu, Treasurer, 1966-1969 - 3 tapes; edited transcript (2006, 64 p.)
- Roger Jacobs, President, CALL/ACBD, 1971-1973; President, AALL, 1981-1982 - 2 tapes; edited transcript (2006, 89 p.)
- Viola A. Bird, President, AALL, 1971-1972; author, Law Library Resources in Canada (1975) - 1 tape; 2 edited transcripts (1 electronic) (2005, 39 p.)
- Pamela Hardisty, President, CALL/ACBD 1975-1977 - 1 CD; edited transcript (2009, 29 p.)
An oral history with Guy Tanguay, President, 1973-1975, is due to be completed this spring. One additional history is planned for 2010.
Labels: annual reports, conferences, law libraries
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