Minutes Board Meeting 9-26-2020 retreat

​Massachusetts School Library Association  Executive Board meeting Retreat September 26, 2019 9:00 AM - 12:00 PM
Virtual Meeting
Attending:
Jennifer Dimmick, Secretary
Patsy Divver, Co-Director Metrowest Region
Maria D’Orsi, Co-Director Metrowest Region
Deeth Ellis, Advocacy Co-Chair
Barb Fecteau, Co-Director Northeast Region
Michelle Fontaine, Treasurer
Sarah Forfa, Co-Director West Region
Wendy Garland, Awards
Alida Hanson, Professional Learning
Laura Harrington, Co-Director Northeast Region
Emily Kristofek, Office Manager
Kathy Lowe, Executive Director Emeritus
Laura Luker, President
Ingrid Mayyasi, Awards
April Mazza - MLS
Claudia Palframan, Co-Director West Region 
Greg Pronevitz, Director of Outreach
Katherine Steiger, Forum Co-Editor
Reba Tierney, Forum Co-Editor
Georgina Trebbe, Advocacy
Carrie Tucker, Past President
Morgan Van Clief, Co-Director Boston Region
Jen Varney, President Elect
Alix Waznick, Professional Learning

Details of meeting content can be found on the agenda (created by Laura Luker using Slides Mania).
Call to order 9:16 Laura Luker

Housekeeping
Jamboard ice-breaker - What was one win you’ve had so far this school year? Reba Tierney motioned to approve the reports and minutes of the June minutes, Kat Steiger seconded and all in favor. Deeth Ellis motioned to approve the proposed policy language changes (see agenda for detail), Patsy Divver seconded and all in favor. Reminder to all board members to familiarize themselves with the Board handbook. 

Votes: Alida Hanson described a proposed new budget line item for Whova - to use for our first virtual conference. Whova is like Sched, but has additional features for communication and social interaction (e.g., streams/chat rooms, etc.) The cost for the platform is $1,299 plus potential additional modules. It needs to be integrated with a video conference platform -- we will use Google Meet. We won’t have other conference costs like facility rental, food. Would likely not use Sched with this, perhaps a spreadsheet would suffice. Other organizations of our size have used this service for their virtual conferences. Other services Alida explored were much more expensive. Alix Woznick noted that the Northeast Media Literacy Association is using Whova this fall. Deeth Ellis suggested reaching out to someone who has used it for a reference. Morgan VanClief suggested Remo as an alternative to Whova. She will explore why an organization she knows opted to use Remo instead of Whova. A task force was formed to evaluate Whova, Remo and other options for the virtual conference, since no financial commitment has to be made until February: Alida Hanson, Jen Varney, Kat Steiger, Alix Woznick, Morgan VanClief and Deeth Ellis volunteered; Alida will email the team. Board changes this year: Carrie Tucker, past President is proposed Director Southeast Region; Deeth Ellis proposes moving from Advocacy to Co-Director Boston Region. Kat Steiger motioned to approve these new board appointments, Patsy Divver seconded, and all in favor. Jen Varney motioned to approve updated Board meeting dates (see agenda), having changed the May date to avoid Ramadan, Maria D’Orsi seconded and all in favor.

Reports and Updates Treasurer’s Report: Michelle Fontaine and Jen Varney
FY21 budget needs a second vote. Working to merge Quickbooks accounts after maintaining two in the past. Kat Steiger motioned to approve the FY21 budget, Deeth Ellis seconded, and all approved.

Conference update: Alida Hanson, Alix Woznick and Plan B Team
Theme: “School Librarians at the Crossroads: Be the Hero of Your Own Journey.” 
Looking for a fun, uplifting theme that incorporates topics members said in survey are important. We hit on the theme of fantasy. Once we identified the theme, the committee mood improved. It lends itself to many opportunities, games, themes, etc., but can also incorporate more serious topics that members want to see included in the conference. We’re going to motivate, have fun and geek out over what we love to do. We will be the heroes of our own journey.  Currently looking at speakers and respective fees.  Looking at 2-day conference Sun/Mon March 21/22.  Haven’t decided on pricing. ALA set floor at $65 so we’re looking at very low cost. We want serious sessions, members to be able to present, etc.  Reba Tierney suggested we use theme to treat it almost like a comicon with games, costumes, etc.  2020 conference cancelation update: the board was fortunate to get some pro-bono legal advice and assistance that enabled us to successfully postpone the Sheraton until 2022. The Texas Library Association has a great YouTube and social media presence for their conference so we’re hoping to learn from them. 

Advocacy and outreach: Greg Pronevitz, Georgina Trebbe & Deeth Ellis

​Outreach: Greg Pronevitz asked MBLC if they would include school library representation on their Public Relations Advisory Committee, a group that will advise the MBLC as they develop their three-year marketing plan in addition to providing input on statewide campaigns for things like ebooks, databases, etc. Georgina Trebbe volunteered to join the committee. Greg will reach out to MBLC to make the introductions. 

Other:  There will likely be another virtual legislative day this spring, but no firm date yet.  The Beacon (Massachusetts Municipal Association online journal) published an article in July, “Libraries innovate through COVID emergency, seek funding support,” describing library activities during the pandemic, including the Virtual School Librarian. Greg worked with Laura Luker, Jennifer Harris, MLA Legislative Committee Chair, and Greg Peverill-Conti and Adam Zand fromwww.librarylandproject.com to submit. Looking for a successor for Greg’s position.

Virtual School Librarian: Georgina Trebbe Decided to remove the ask a librarian a question element since it was underutilized and used more often by administrators vs. students. Needs subcommittee help to beef up the VSL.

MSLA Advocacy Request Form:
Deeth Ellis Current form focuses on school librarians who need advocacy assistance because their jobs are being changed, eliminated or threatened. However, there now appears to be a new threat during the pandemic: reassignment of librarians to other teaching roles in the school. Consequently Deeth proposes to change the advocacy page to have a form to fill out to record these kinds of changes to people’s positions. She noted that we need to solicit more people to fill out the form so we can build data on this new phenomenon and threat. Discussion ensued about turning this into a survey instead of just a form that people have to seek out. Decision: re-publicize the form on the listserv and in job-alike zooms; consider building a formal survey and conducting action research on this topic.

Awards updates: Wendy Garland The Awards Committee met over the summer and is planning a similar sharing out of award winners like last year, making it a virtual celebration. Would like to talk to the conference committee about including it as a piece of the conference. With Jarrett Krosoczka as speaker, perhaps we could leverage his participation with the awards ceremony. Laura Luker noted that in addition to awards we should plan to recognize the job alike zoom organizers for their commitment over the summer and beyond.

MSLA’s Antiracism Work (see jamboard): prompt: Add thoughts here about MSLA's reimagining of Outreach/Advocacy/Diversity. Dream big. Suggest people who might be great!

This time is an opportunity to re-imagine what we are trying to accomplish. How can we use our “teacher voice” for good.  Review Survey data from annual meeting and check out the Padlet! Discussion ensued.  Acknowledge that everyone is in a different place in their journey of understanding of all of the related issues.  Particularly challenging that our profession is so overwhelmingly white and female. How do we diversify our profession? Greg Pronevitz noted that MBLC, MLS and MLA are all working on this -- perhaps we could collaborate? Group WeHere is a group for librarians of color (but not specifically school), might be a good information source in the future. What we’ve done so far: ongoing legislative work to promote equity and access. Still necessary to get school library representation at DESE so that we can provide more non-traditional paths to certification (e.g., paras who can prepare portfolios).  Georgina Trebbe suggested that we need to play the long game -- inspire our students of color to think about librarianship as a profession.  Michelle Fontaine suggested book Cultivating Genius.  Morgan Van Clief suggested that we think a lot about the diversity of the speakers we include at our conferences and PD.  Starting MSLA cohort of Project READY (reimagining equity and access for diversity) For youth serving librarians. Includes lots of eye-opening, discussion prompts, videos, resources, connections, books, etc. Laura Luker will email listserv to gauge interest.  #disrupttexts - decolonizing the curriculum initiative. MLS course offers PDPs, so we should recruit ELA and History teachers to take this course with us. Dismantling Racism Workbook for organizations: we will entertain these questions at our next board meeting (see agenda link and jamboard question)

Action Plans -- try to work with your committee to create action plans in time for the next meeting. It might help to review last year’s action plan for reference.
See Resources page for great stuff.

Wrap up: Barb Fecteau agreed to create themed cocktail/mocktail for conference. Asked others to submit ideas to keep it fun!

Respectfully submitted,
Jennifer Dimmick