Education and Training Section

Colleagues from around the world are invited to submit an abstract for consideration for the SET Open Session.

The IFLA Section for Education and Training (SET) seeks papers for its Open Session on the topic New digital directions and library education: sustaining library education programs. This topic has been chosen in accordance with the main theme of the conference, Open access to knowledge: promoting sustainable progress. A separate call for papers has been issued for the Section's satellite session and for a joint SET session with the IFLA E-learning special interest group on Understanding the value of ePortfolios to reflect on and present learning and professional development.

We are particularly keen to have papers and perspectives from LIS educators, practitioners and students and from a wide range of library sectors (e.g. public, academic, school, special). Papers must be original and could cover issues like:

• The impact of new information technologies : reconceptualizing, and/or globalizing library education?
• Library education in iSchools
• Pedagogy for online/virtual library education and training
• Employability of graduates in the digital library world
• Interdisciplinarity, synergies and/or convergences of digital archives, libraries and museums in library education

Language of the session:
The paper should be in one of the IFLA official languages. It is hoped that simultaneous interpretation will be available for this session, but we strongly recommend that the presentation slides are in English, even if the presentation is delivered in one of the other official languages.

Important dates and information:
Proposals for papers must be submitted by: 31 December 2009. The proposal should clearly indicate the session it is for and include a title, an abstract of no more than 300 words, plus a brief speaker biography. All proposals will be evaluated by a refereeing committee representing the IFLA Section of Education and Training: Dr. Gillian Hallam, Professor S.B. Ghosh, Mouna Benslimane, Mai Poldaas, Chihfeng Lin, Dr. Kerry Smith.

Please email your proposals to: Dr Kerry Smith (Australia), k.smith@curtin.edu.au

Successful candidates will be notified by 28 February 2010 and must supply the full paper by 16 April 2010 to allow time for the review of papers and preparation of translations. Details on the format and length of the final paper will be emailed to those candidates whose abstracts are accepted.

Please note

All expenses, including registration for the conference, travel, accommodation etc., are the responsibility of the authors/presenters. No financial support can be provided by IFLA, but a special invitation can be issued to authors/presenters if that is required.  Some national professional associations may be able to help fund certain expenses, and a small number of grants for conference attendance may be available.