Election Questions

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Welcome again to the election forum on the YALSA blog. Thanks Linda, Sarah, and Nick for your great answers to the first questions. Now, on to today’s questions:

Spreading the word about YALSA and library service to teens is an important task for the Division President. What training or mentoring have you done to spread the YA word to other professionals? Who has mentored or made a difference in your professional life?

YALSA is lucky to have members with a very wide variety of backgrounds and experiences, including brand new members and long-term members. What services do you feel YALSA provides that are particularly valuable for new members? Long-term members? What are your ideas for reaching those groups of members?

And finally, just for fun, what are some of your favorite YA books, authors and/or movies?

Sarah Debraski
YALSA President-Elect

Meet the YALSA Presidential Candidates

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Welcome back to Election Forum on the YALSA blog! For the past two years we have utilized our blog to help members get to know the candidates for the various YALSA offices a bit better. This has been such a great success that we’ll once again be posting questions for our candidates, beginning with questions for Sarah Flowers, Linda Braun, and Nick Buron, our candidates for YALSA Vice-President/President-Elect.
The outcome of the election will affect everyone, so please use this forum as a chance to learn about candidates running on the spring ballot.
I will be posting questions for the President-Elect category. This year bloggers will be posting additional questions to the Board, MAE and Printz Candidates! YALSA members are welcome to follow up on their responses with further questions.
We encourage lively discussion and debate as appropriate to the topic, but of course no personal comments or attacks will be allowed.

Polls for the ALA 2008 election open on March 17 and close on April 24 at 11:59 p.m. CST on!

Here is the first round of questions for Sarah, Linda, and Nick:

Tell us about your experience within YALSA and ALA, including what positions you have held in our Division and in the larger ALA structure.

Which positions were your favorites and why, and how did those experiences help you develop the important skills necessary to be YALSA President?

Sarah Debraski
YALSA President-Elect

Would you like be on a YALSA committee?

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Dear YALSA Members,

Spring is just around the corner and that means….appointments to process committees and juries! You can view the lists of committees and juries here. If you would like to be considered for an appointment to one of these committees you will need to fill out an online volunteer form. If you are currently on a committee and would like to be considered for reappointment to the committee, you will also need to fill out this form. When you fill out the form please try to provide some information that will indicate what committee would be a good match for you—do you have special skills or experiences? A desire to be on a particular committee? These are all good things to know when filling these committees.
Please submit your volunteer forms by March 1.
As always, thank you for your commitment to YALSA!
Sarah Debraski
YALSA President-Elect

Volunteer for an ALA Committee / Run for ALA Council

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Hello YALSA members,

Have you ever thought about participating on one of the “big ALA” committees? If you are interested in applying for an appointment to 2008-2009 ALA and Council committees the deadline is December 3. The form for this is available.

Have you ever thought about running for ALA Council? It’s not too late!! Under the ALA bylaws you may petition to run for an office.
Petitions for Council can be obtained from Lois Ann Gregory-Wood, Council Secretariat, ALA, 50 E. Huron, Chicago, IL 60611, Email: lgregory@ala.org, or during the 2008 Midwinter Meeting. Petitions require 25 signatures for names to be included on the 2008 ballot.
The 2008 election schedule is available

You can also learn more about ALACouncil.

Anyone w/ questions about running for ALA Council should contact: Lois Ann Gregory-Wood, ALA Council Secretariat, at lgregory@ala.org or 1/800-545-2433, Ext. 3204.
January 30, 2008 is the last day nominating petitions will be accepted for ALA officers and Council.

Sarah Cornish Debraski
YALSA President-Elect, 2007-2008

Volunteer for an ALA Committee

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Hello YALSA members!
So many of you already give time and energy to YALSA, but perhaps you would like to experience serving on an ALA Committee. The ALA Committee volunteer form is now available online:
https://cs.ala.org/rettig/volunteer.html
The deadline to fill out the form is Dec. 3. This is for an appointment that would begin at the close of Annual 08.

Thank you for considering this,
Sarah Cornish Debraski
YALSA President-Elect, 2007-2008

Volunteer for a YALSA Committee

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Welcome back to those of you who just attended the Annual Conference in Washington, D.C. I know I had a wonderful time seeing many familiar faces, as well as meeting lots of new-to-YALSA people. I hope you had the chance to do the same, and to attend some of our many programs.

In the very near future I will begin the process of appointing people to the YALSA selection committees, i.e. BBYA, PPYA, QP, etc. After that I will begin appointments to our many process committees. To be considered for appointment to a committee you must have a volunteer form on file. If you think did one but aren’t sure, did one last year, or have not yet done one, now is the time to get a nice new form submitted. You can find it here: http://www.ala.org/ala/yalsa/joinus/committeevolunteer.htm . Not sure what your options are for committees? YALSA’s webpage has all the information you need: http://www.ala.org/ala/yalsa/aboutyalsab/yalsacommittee.htm

I’m very excited about serving as your new Vice-President/President-Elect and welcome this new opportunity to connect with members!

Sarah Cornish Debraski

YALSA Vice-President/President-Elect 2007-2008