To: Our Colleagues in the Library Community

From: Brooke Sheldon, Director
School of Information Resources and Library Science
University of Arizona

February 3, 2003

ACTIONS YOU CAN TAKE NOW TO SUPPORT SIRLS

I want to begin by thanking you once again for your outpouring of support for SIRLS through your letters, messages and phone calls. This has been a great help to us in convincing University Administration of our importance to the Arizona library community and beyond. Although we are still in the process of securing our future, we remain confident that SIRLS will endure and emerge stronger from this crisis.

Many of you have asked what else you can do to help SIRLS through this difficult time and in the longer term. In response to your inquiries I am offering here a broad range of actions for your consideration that could be taken by libraries, library organizations or individuals. These are concrete ways you can help ensure that SIRLS continues to provide you with well-trained, committed staff.

1. Help Us Raise Money

In addition to basic operating funds, SIRLS needs money to provide financial support for students, increase course offerings through the use of adjunct faculty, keep the technology used to train students from being outdated, and provide enrichment programs, speakers and events for students and the library community at large. You can help in the following ways:

• Help our newly revitalized Alumni Association raise funds from SIRLS grads and other library supporters in Arizona.

• Ask your Friends or other support groups to donate some portion of their gifts to support scholarship in general or specifically to support continuing Knowledge River, our initiative to recruit Hispanics and Native Americans to librarianship.

• Consider developing one or more paid internships for students to help libraries recruit new staff, help students get front-line experience, and assist in mitigating the increased costs of their education.

• Work with us to identify and cultivate potential individual and organizational donors.

• Support our SAVE SIRLS drive to establish an endowed chair as a way to increase the number of faculty.

2. Help Us Create SIRLS’ Future

• As SIRLS develops new ways to sustain itself, there will be many opportunities for the field to contribute their ideas and skills to its growth.

• Let the University know that you support the fee increases necessary to make SIRLS self-sustaining.

• Volunteer for consideration as adjunct faculty, or if you are an administrator, make staff time available to perform this valuable service. SIRLS needs to tap into more of you with the qualifications and experience to teach courses.

• Help us recruit excellent students from the range of backgrounds and interests that reflect the needs and concerns of Arizona’s population.

• Join us, as the opportunities present themselves in finding ways to solidify the Masters program, develop an undergraduate program that suits Arzona’s growing need for information professionals, revitalize the Ph.D. program and explore new post-Masters options that will create new areas of specialization.

3. Share Your Creativity with SIRLS on Ways We Can Work Together

We know we have not exhausted the many ways we can collaborate to make a stronger SIRLS and a stronger Arizona library community. We invite you, as always to share your ideas with us and to let us know how we are doing.