Chartership Chat: Evaluative Statement

This was the first Chartership chat I managed to attend, previous ones I was working and had a family birthday. I was especially keen to participate in this one because I am currently writing my evaluative statement. This post is going to look at how I managed with the chat rather than what the chat was about, as this has already been blogged (Thanks to Katy Stoddard) and the chat archived (Thanks to Jo Alcock). I don't want to duplicate.

I found it quite difficult to keep up at first, I think this was because of how I use Twitter. I don't have a Twitter manager, I just use Twitter as is. I am considering using a manager but haven't got round to sussing out the best one (needs to work with Android, if anyone has any suggestions). I ended up having 2 Twitter pages open because the search results page doesn't have a compose a Tweet box, so I had my Home page open for this - going back and forth between these didn't help me in trying to keep up.

I thought initially that an hour might be difficult to fill but actually it went very quickly and Tina Reynolds did a great job of keeping the conversation moving forward. After the chat had finished, I was tired, I don't know if this was because of the fast pace of the conversation, normally I follow in my own time rather than real time, or whether it was the way I was following it.

I really enjoyed particpating and getting useful tips and ideas from others who are doing or will be doing Chartership. I look forward to the next chat on 12th April about mentor/mentee relationships.

A Match Made in Heaven

This was the first event hosted by the newly formed Northern Academic and Research Libraries Group (ARLG) and was about 'building an academic and research library service fit for the future'. The speakers were Annie Mauger (CILIP Chief Executive), Liz Jolly (Director of Library and Information Services, Teesside University) and Anne Rowlands (CoFHE Chair).

Annie spoke about what CILIP have been doing and where they are going, so remodernising, sorting out finances and making CILIP relevant to it's stakeholders, who are predominently academic and research librarians now. Advocacy is top of the agenda, having been the most mentioned topic in the member's consultation and Annie is certainly doing that with public libraries been the priority at the moment and the intention of educating Ministers as to the scope of libraries - a cross sector profession.

Liz talked about CPD and it's importance, how we need to embrace change and keep our skills relevant to demonstrate our worth and ensure our skills are valued. She used Teesside University as a case study, where she has implemented a scheme where any librarian doing Chartership gets their CILIP membership paid for for 2 years, their registration and portfolio submission fees are paid for, time is given to allow completion, candidates are accepted to go on relevant courses and there is an in house support group. Mentors are also found for Candidates from within the University Library. Having been able to demonstrate value for money, the University embrace and support the scheme.

Anne discussed the merger between CoFHE and UCRG, which lead to the forming of ARLG. It was the pilot project as far as SIG mergers went and Anne and Amanda (UCRG chair) spent a lot of time asking CILIP questions about various aspects, some that even they couldn't answer. The formation of ARLG has proved to be a learning curve for all groups involved including CILIP and probably isn't finished yet. Currently there is a call for people to apply for national committee and the local groups are starting to get together, which no doubt will throw up a lot more unanswered questions. There is a joint UCRG / CoFHE North East meeting next month where how we will proceed will be looked at.

Reflective practice

Well it sounds very simple in theory but it isn't. I've heard a great deal about it over the last few months, I've registered to Charter earlier this year so reflective practice is becoming a very big part of my life, I've been to the CDG NE reflective practice workshop and now there is this Thing!


Do - Review - Plan or What? - So what? - Now what?


I can do the do / what and the Plan / Now what bits fine.


The Review / So what bit is where it gets complicated for me, I can state what happened and make comments about whether it was useful to me. I then start to justify my comments because So what? implies to me that I need to. Yet if you look at the Evaluate it points mentioned in Thing 5 (and these were the same points given at the CDG NE event) none of them ask for justification. They are just asking for opinion.


The evaluate it points are:
What did you learn?
What did you enjoy?
What worked well?
What, if anything, went wrong?
What would you change?
What (potential) impact could this have in your workplace?


So this is where I get confused - do I justify my comments or not? I am reflecting, it is my opinion so I would say I can't be wrong even if you disagree with me. I don't feel very comfortable with that though because I want you to know the reason behind my opinion, it might help you understand my position.


Regardless of this, I am plodding along with it with the hope that I will get better at it and eventually be good at it. I have tried to reflect quickly so that I don't lose the gut reaction, follow the evaluate it points (possibly not as strictly as you should) and my blog, in addition to being something I've been asked to do as part of cpd23, is also giving me good experience at trying to write reflectively. I haven't gone back to do any critical evaluation yet, that will be started in the next few weeks I hope, I have at least got lots of information to be critical about.

First blog post

Ok, so this is my first blog and first post. I've set it up because my Chartership mentor recommended it as a good way of recording what i'm doing and help develop reflective writing skills. Also I have seen e-mails about cpd23, which looks like a very good thing to take part in to help increase IT skills. It was mentioned in my Chartership workshop too. I already have Facebook, Twitter and Delicious accounts (and much to my surprise this morning a gmail account!) and feel as though i've just dipped my toes into Web 2.0, hopefully this experience will help me upskill in this area. Last week I was at the CoFHE Conference, which has encouraged me to do this and try something new.