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Juice: Powering the Creative Economy, November 16-17 2007, Rockland/Camden Maine − Conference Report |
Juice: Powering the Creative Economy was a summit held at various locations in the Rockland and Camden townships. The events brought together business and creative professionals from across Maine to discuss ways that Maine’s creative class will boost the economy and make Maine a place for people worldwide to reside and bring their businesses.
There were two events especially for libraries at this Summit. First, on Friday the 15th, the Maine Library Association held it’s annual conference with a variety of mini-sessions that focused on ways in which Maine libraries could actively participate and strengthen Maine’s creative economy. The following Saturday there was a breakout session from the central Juice conference that also focused on libraries but was open to anyone with interests in how libraries affect Maine’s economy.
Friday the 15th: MLA Meeting
I attended two of the sessions at the MLA conference as well as the Juice session dedicated to libraries. The first session that I attended was called Community Outreach & Collaboration. This session highlighted two highly successful community programs facilitated by Maine libraries that have proven to be models of community outreach and collaboration. The first was the River Coalition/Old Town Public Library partnership, and the second was the Curtis Memorial Library/Parkview Adventist Medical Center/Mid Coast Hospital partnership.
The River Coalition and the Old Town Public Library have partnered on multiple programs for children and teens that focus on civic action, health, literacy and other topics. There are currently twelve ongoing programs collaboratively facilitated by the two organizations, including “Compulsive Readers’ Anonymous,” the Concerts in the Park Series, and the Youth Advisory Council. Through these collaborative endeavors, the Old Town Public Library has become a leader in its community and an invaluable resource for Old Town residents of all ages.
The Curtis Memorial Library/Parkview Adventist Medical Center/Mid Coast Hospital partnership provides easy access to high quality local, state and national health and wellness resources to residents within the townships of Lisbon Falls, Richmond, Dresden, Bowdoinham, Wiscasset, Freeport, Topsham, Brunswick, Bath, Harpswell and Georgetown. This is an extensive health information network that can be accessed through the public libraries in each of these towns.
After these spokespersons made their presentations, we did some activities to identify how our libraries may better our efforts to form partnerships and collaborate on programs within our own communities. I was the only academic librarian in attendance at this session (one of only three at the MLA conference itself), but nonetheless I felt I had a good example to share with the class in the form of the PTDL collection that is housed at Fogler Library. Not a single librarian in the room had heard of this resource and all were happy to have learned of it. I initially stated that I felt that the PTDL was in competition with some other rather entrenched organizations in Maine, such as the Maine Patent Program, which diminished the value of this resource. Attendees gave me several insightful tips for working with other Maine organizations that deal with patents or other intellectual property issues, as well as the business and technology communities, and offered help in spreading the word about the PTDL. I agreed to send brochures to anyone who left a business card with me and to follow up on some of their suggestions for collaborating with the suggested organizations.
The afternoon session that I attended was about marketing your library’s resources, facilitated by professional public relations specialist Nancy Marshall. We were given sample PR kits and lots of tips on identifying and marketing our libraries’ strongest collections and services. Once again I volunteered an example for the class, this time using the Maine Science Technology and Business Portal, and again not a single librarian in the room knew of it. I came away with a list of things to do to get the word out about this valuable resource, and many of the librarians offered to place links to the resource on their libraries’ websites.
Saturday the 16th: Juice Summit
Governor Baldacci was scheduled to speak at the opening session but was canceled for unknown reasons at the last minute. After brief welcoming remarks from the conference organizers, attendees broke out into mini-sessions. I only attended the one session on Maine Libraries and chose to return home afterward. By this time I already had an overwhelming “to do” list which will keep me busy for the months to come.
At the Maine’s Libraries session many interested and involved people ranging from town hall representatives from various locales, Friends of the Libraries members, and, of course, librarians and library workers gathered to discuss how Maine’s libraries serve as creative community centers. The objective of the meeting was to walk away with a plan of action to work toward over the coming year. The group decided to focus on resource sharing and establishing a State of Maine library card that could be used at any participating library. After much discussion there were enough volunteers to get this ball rolling. We ended the meeting with business card sharing, where I handed out at least 30 cards and collected almost as many. We agreed that we would each sign up to the MELIBS mailing list and continue our conversation and planning in that forum.
Conclusion
Three things about these events were surprising to me. First was that there were only three academic librarians in attendance (to my knowledge – I met just about everyone there). Second was that no one had heard of the PTDL or Maine SciTechBus portal (something I plan to vigorously address over the coming months by sending out brochures to every library that will accept them). Third, and by far the most surprising, was how well connected and how hard working the public librarians of Maine are. The folks that I met were an inspiration to me and I hope to maintain some of the relationships that I established. It is too easy when working in an academic setting to close ones self off from the rest of the world and forget about the daunting work that public librarians endure for their communities. I look forward to attending next year’s MLA meeting and Juice Summit in order to follow up on the work we have set out to do.Return to Martin Wallace's Page.
For more information, contact:
Martin Wallace
Science and Engineering Center
Patent and Trademark Depository
Raymond H. Fogler Library
Orono, Maine 04469-5729
Phone: 207-581-1678
Last Updated by: Martin Wallace: 01/25/2008
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