On 26 March, NSLA members joined the millions around the world conducting their business on screen, with Marie-Louise Ayres hosting the March meeting from the National Library of Australia. Also attending were Bill Macnaught and Rachel Esson from the National Library of New Zealand.
The meeting was dedicated primarily to responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, staff wellbeing, governance and logistics, and digital library services. More in-depth discussions on the future of library and information services education, collection development policies, web archiving, training around social issues in libraries, and New Zealand and Pacific collections, had to be deferred. Members nonetheless agreed on a number of agenda items to keep NSLA moving, set out below.
- Consultant Matt Finch will be engaged to work with the NSLA Chair, Deputy Chair and Executive Officer in drafting the next strategic plan for NSLA (2020-2024). This will come into effect from July 2020.
- The NSLA Office will expand in July 2020 to include the part-time position of Senior Adviser, Research & Policy. The position will begin as a twelve-month contract, working alongside the Executive Officer and Program Coordinator. Aimee Said was congratulated on her permanent appointment to the position of NSLA Program Coordinator in January.
- The most recent proposal for a subscription to Australian Standards will be rejected due to access conditions being restricted by the vendor to onsite-only. NSLA will continue to advocate for remote access, particularly given the current climate.
- NSLA will join the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC) as a full member with a three-year commitment, following the establishment of an Australasian office for DPC. This provides us with a formal opportunity to contribute to, and benefit from, international expertise in digital preservation and web archiving as we continue to improve systems and practice in our libraries.
- The annual public library statistics report will undergo changes with support from the NSLA Office, including review of statistical definitions to better reflect the current practice and contribution of public libraries, streamlining methodology for statistics collection and analysis, consistent report presentation and provision of raw data for analysis, and shorter turnaround time for reports.
