Hello GameRT members,
As ALA Annual 2015 wraps up and my term as President of the GameRT begins I wanted to send out a quick introduction to everyone along with a promise of future communications.
First, I want to be sure that we all pause to recognize the incredible efforts of Diane Robson in her three-year tenure as President of the RT. Diane remained dedicated through a comedy of circumstances that placed her into a triple term of leadership. I am incredibly grateful that even though some rest would be well-deserved and fully understood, Diane is continuing to work on IGD and other programs for the RT. Leaders like Diane who give selflessly of their time and energy are the only way that membership organizations like ALA can thrive. At the board meeting, we recognized her for her work and gave her an entirely inadequate gift of some very nice candles. I wanted to share this with the larger RT in the hopes that you would join me in thanking Diane for everything she has done and continues to do for all of us!
A little bit about me: I am the Director of the School Library System for the Genesee Valley Educational Partnership, an educational services agency (BOCES) in Western New York between Rochester and Buffalo. We serve the school libraries of 22 small, rural school districts with a total student population of about 20,000. Working alongside my amazing colleague (and the new VP of the GameRT) Brian Mayer, we have coordinated a game library for the Genesee Valley SLS since about 2007. More recently I have started an external venture, Play Play Learn, to help spread the good word about board games in libraries and classrooms. To help share the successes we have seen, I also wrote a series of books on Teaching Through Games published earlier this year by Rosen Publishing.
Over the next couple weeks, I will be gathering reports from the various committees and programs of the RT to share out with members via an upcoming newsletter. GameRT had an amazing conference, and there is a great deal for us to celebrate! ALAPlay was huge, especially the new UnPub (un-published games brought in by designers/authors to share and gain feedback) organized by Brian. The booth, along with our two guest publishers, was a hopping place daily and the gaming lounge tables were consistently busy. Programming was a huge hit as well...stay tuned for executive summaries and handouts.
This upcoming newsletter will be the first of a quarterly publication from GameRT to help you, the members, stay up on new programs, resources, and ideas around gaming in libraries. If you have a library program, favorite game, best practice recommendation, or anything else you want to share in the newsletter, please let me know (chris@playplaylearn.com). I am happy to help with editing. The current plan is to publish a newsletter following Annual and Midwinter as well as two smaller update issues in between the conferences to maintain communication.
Thank you for your membership, and whatever level of volunteer support you are able to contribute to the success of this RT. Our membership numbers continue to grow – even as some other RTs decline. Please do let me know what I can do in my year of member-leadership to help meet your needs and advance the mission of the RT.