Category Archives: Events

European Information Literacy Conference

ECIL is an annual conference initiated by the Department of Information Management of Hacettepe University and the Department of Information and Communication Sciences of Zagreb University. It is organized and hosted by a different European partner each year.

ECIL 2015 conference will be organized by the Institute of Information Studies of Tallinn University and held from 19-22 October 2015, at Tallinn University, Tallinn, Estonia. It is under the patronage of UNESCO and IFLA. The theme is “Information Literacy in the Green Society.”

For details, go to http://ecil2015.ilconf.org/

Banned Book Week Sept. 27-Oct. 3

Banned Books Week is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read. Typically held during the last week of September, it highlights the value of free and open access to information. Banned Books Week brings together the entire book community –- librarians, booksellers, publishers, journalists, teachers, and readers of all types –- in shared support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.

By focusing on efforts across the country to remove or restrict access to books, Banned Books Week draws national attention to the harms of censorship. Check out the frequently challenged books section to explore the issues and controversies around book challenges and book banning. The books featured during Banned Books Week have all been targeted with removal or restrictions in libraries and schools. While books have been and continue to be banned, part of the Banned Books Week celebration is the fact that, in a majority of cases, the books have remained available. This happens only thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, students, and community members who stand up and speak out for the freedom to read.

For more information on getting involved with Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read, please see Ideas and Resources. You can also contact the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom at 1-800-545-2433, ext. 4220, or [email protected].

International School Library Month

International School Library Month is fast approaching and may be celebrated for the whole month of October or for any time span within that month that suits a school or library. The theme this year is: The school library rocks.

International projects that are underway for 2015 are the ISLM Bookmark Project where schools exchange bookmarks and make contact with children in other countries and the ISLM Skype Project. Many school libraries will choose to have local or national celebrations, promoting the value libraries bring to the lives of children through reading, information literacy, transmission of cultural heritage and engagement with the community.

Ideas for how school libraries have celebrated internationally last year may be found on the IASL website on the ISLM 2014 Projects page. Reports came in from Croatia, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Seychelles, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain and Ukraine. It would be great to see even more countries reporting on their celebrations in 2015. Please send ISLM reports to the IASL Secretariat by 15 November, 2015.

IASL is very grateful to their ISLM Coordinator, Marie O’Brien, for all her work in facilitating the projects and celebrations, and IASL wish all school libraries a wonderful time of celebration in October.

2016 Picturebook Symposium CFP

1ST Bi-Annual Marantz Picturebook Research Symposium

July 24-26, 2016
Kent State University, Kent, Ohio

Keynote: Will Hillenbrand, Children’s Book Author and Illustrator

CALL FOR PROPOSALS

“The Picturebook as an Art Object:”
Honoring the life and work of Dr. Kenneth A. Marantz

According to Dr. Kenneth A. Marantz, professor of art education at the Ohio State University from 1971 to 1991, picturebooks (spelled as one word by Dr. Marantz) are “such rich repositories of visual art, so readily available compared with the resources housed in galleries and museums, that I believe we must take the fullest advantage of them.” For many young children, picturebooks represent their first exposure to culture—to art, and to literature — in one perfect package. For older children, picturebooks are a useful tool for addressing controversial or difficult subject matter. For all, the aesthetic relationship with picturebooks can create life-long connections.

Dr. Kenneth A. Marantz and his wife Sylvia Marantz have graciously funded a biannual scholarly picturebook research symposium to be organized and hosted by the Kent State University’s School of Library and Information Science. In this first Marantz Picturebook Research Symposium, to be held July 24-26, 2016, we honor Ken Marantz’s life work around the picturebook.

Children’s book author and illustrator Will Hillenbrand will deliver a keynote address. Hillenbrand, who studied under Ken Marantz, received the 2012 Parents’ Choice Silver Honor award for his illustrations in Bear in Love. Other accolades include a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators;  Notable Book Award from the American Library Association for the first picture book he illustrated, Traveling to Tondo; and Children’s Choice Awards from the International Reading Association for Sam Sunday and the Mystery at the Ocean Beach Hotel and The House That Drac Built.

This call for proposals seeks original, interdisciplinary research in areas related to picturebooks, especially centered around Dr. Marantz’s concept of the picturebook as an art object.

Presentation Formats:  The Committee especially encourages presentations and research in the following formats:

1.     Twenty-minute presentations followed by 10 minutes of discussion

2.     Panel submissions comprised of three 20-minute presentations followed by 20 minutes of discussion (or four 15-minute presentations followed by 15 minutes of discussion)

3.     Posters

Submissions must be submitted on the appropriate form (insert link) and must include the following in order to be considered:

·      Title and up to 5 keywords

·      Description of type of proposal you are submitting (poster/paper/panel)

·      Names and contact information of all contributors

·      An abstract of no more than 350 words of your proposed poster or presentation.

·      In the case of a panel submission, an abstract should accompany each of the papers that will be included.

·      Information about any special equipment requirements (beyond a laptop and projector, which will be provided)

Prospective participants should submit abstracts that report on recent research and scholarship. Contributions to this call for papers may not have been previously published, and all research methodologies from all disciplines are welcomed.

Deadlines:

January 15, 2016:  Deadline to submit abstracts

March 1, 2016:  Notification of acceptance. Once selected, presenters are responsible for their own expenses related to the conference, including but not limited to registration fees, lodging, transportation and meals. Students are encouraged to participate.

Possible topics, as related to the conference theme, include (but are not limited to):

  • Picturebooks and aesthetics
  • “Reading” picturebooks: The influence of art and text on early literacy
  • Picturebooks, aesthetics, and the imagination
  • Playing with picturebooks
  • Cultural constructions of picturebooks
  • Picturebooks and digital formats
  • Reaching diverse readers via picturebooks
  •  Historical perspectives on picturebooks

Proceedings:  There will not be proceedings for this conference; however, selected papers may be included in a special issue of a journal or an edited collection. Details will be provided as they become available.

For more information, please contact Dr. Marianne Martens ([email protected]) or Michelle Baldini ([email protected]).

2016 Multicultural literature for children conference CFP

The Virginia Hamilton Conference on Multicultural Literature for Children celebrates its 32nd year in 2016 by exploring the role of multicultural literature in celebrating diversity in poetry prose and pictures. Nearly 200 writers, illustrators, librarians, teachers, students and scholars will gather for this inspiring, informative event, scheduled for April 7-8th, 2016 at Kent State University. Keynote speakers for 2016 include renowned author Nikki Grimes winner of this year’s Virginia Hamilton Literary Award; Margarita Engle, the first Latino author to receive the Newbery Honor award.

The conference board is currently accepting proposals for workshops for the 2016 conference. The deadline for proposals is Sept. 30, 2015. Please submit proposals using the form on the conference website: http://bit.ly/ProposalForm-VHC2016

Literacy Day Action

Call to Action: International Literacy Day

“Literacy is a bridge from misery to hope. It is a tool for daily life in modern society. It is a bulwark against poverty, and a building block of development, an essential complement to investments in roads, dams, clinics and factories. Literacy is a platform for democratization, and a vehicle for the promotion of cultural and national identity. Especially for girls and women, it is an agent of family health and nutrition. For everyone, everywhere, literacy is, along with education in general, a basic human right…. Literacy is, finally, the road to human progress and the means through which every man, woman and child can realize his or her full potential.”
– Kofi Annan

IFLA, the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions, together with the International Publishers Association (IPA), the International Authors Forum (IAF) and the Reading & Writing Foundation (RWF) has put together a joint statement on literacy and reading which calls on United Nations Member States to support the Sustainable Development Goals by implementing coherent and appropriately resourced national comprehensive literacy strategies.

Read: Joint Statement on Literacy and Reading

On International Literacy Day, 8 September 2015,we would like to ask the United Nations Member States to go further in their ambitions to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all as stated in the Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, Goal 4.

In 2011, the adult illiterate population was estimated at 773.5 million. This poses a challenge for the success of all the Sustainable Development Goals, therefore is vital that libraries, authors and publishers are made central to improving literacy across the board and ensuring that no one is left behind.

For this reason we call on the United Nations Member States to:

  • Support coherent and appropriately resourced national comprehensive literacy strategies;
  • Recognize libraries as  central in supporting literacy activities for everyone at any level of education;
  • Ensure every human being has access to books and literacy programmes by 2030 by making libraries, publishers and authors central to these strategies and ensuring no one is left behind;
  • Support, defend and promote intellectual freedom as defined in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

For more information on these issues please visit IFLA, Libraries and Development.

Literacy Day September 8

International Literacy Day is being celebrated across the world on 8 September, with this year’s theme being Literacy and Sustainable Societies.  School libraries play an important part in the development of literacy by through their services and access to resources. Please help promote the ILD, and the role of school libraries.

See also IFLA’s Call to Action: International Literacy Day http://www.ifla.org/node/9861

 UNESCO International Literacy Day http://www.unesco.org/new/en/unesco/events/prizes-and-celebrations/celebrations/international-days/literacy-day#.Ve7r4v0Vh48

and the many other resources available on International Literacy Day