PLA 2010 Conference: Balmy Day, Packed House in Portland
Public Library Association - PLA 2010 - Annual Conference - Portland
By Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 03/24/2010
- Unusual day for Portland
- Gates to develop public access standards
- Kristof challenges, inspires
An enthusiastic audience gathered today at the Public Library Association (PLA) conference in Portland, OR, first for a lively performance by singer-songwriter Natalie Merchant, then a sober yet inspiring address by Opening General Session keynoter Nicholas Kristof, the New York Times columnist.
While no attendance numbers have been released, the attendance was such that the Merchant/Kristof events required an overflow room.
It was an unusually balmy day for Portland, but the challenges facing public libraries could not be washed away by sunshine. PLA President Sari Feldman, in her introduction, alluded to the “critical time for all of us at public libraries” and American Library Association Camila Alire reminded attendees of her Frontline Advocacy initiative.
Gates: new public access standards
Citing a report to be released Friday on the increasing importance of public libraries in providing Internet access, Jill Nishi of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation said that, despite struggles for budgets and to replace equipment, “We believe the outlook for public libraries is promising.”
She cited the capacity of local libraries to secure grants in Gates’s Opportunity Online grant program, and the “unprecedented” federal push to provide broadband access, including the federal recognition of libraries as critical access points.
Nishi said Gates will work to develop a set of national Public Access Technology Standards and to support libraries via in-depth training. She said Gates would continue to help amplify the value of public libraries through research and advocacy.
Implied but not stated is that Gates does not plan additional hardware investments for libraries.
Enter Kristof
Feldman introduced Kristof as “our collective moral conscience” and he did not disappoint, citing stories from his recent book Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide, written with his wife, Sheryl WuDunn, to back up his claim that rights for women constitute the century’s moral crusade.
First, of course, Kristof (a native of Yamhill, OR) managed the obligatory library reference, recalling that, “as a child I pretty much lived in libraries” and suggesting that, given the unusual weather, “God loves librarians, too.”
An article he wrote on a Chinese girl too poor to go to school generated numerous small donations, and one gift by wire of $10,000—or so he thought. Only after Kristof promised the money to the girl’s village to educate other girls did he learn that it was a bank error. A call to the bank nudged them into making their error into a donation.
“That became a fascinating experiment of what happens when you do invest in girls’ education,” he said. “This village was truly transformed in ways that others were not.”
“Women and girls aren't the problem” of global poverty, he said. “They are the solution.” He said that men in poor families worldwide spend 20% of their income on such things as alcohol, tobacco, and prostitution, but only 2% on education for girls.
Small changes, bit impact
Investments in maternal health also have huge payoffs; he described the fate of an Ethiopian woman with a fistula left by her village to die. Over three days, she crawled 30 miles to get help and, after surgery, began helping in the hospital, lifting herself from illiteracy to a nursing career.
He told the story of a Ugandan girl named Beatrice Bira, heroine of a children’s book called Beatrice's Goat, who, thanks to a modest donation, began a path to college.
Engaging change
Kristof acknowledged that people might find causes he embraces depressing. What strikes him most, amid the terrible things he’s seen, are “the extraordinary local people,” aid workers, and activists who are pushing for change.
And he acknowledged that “there's a real debate about whether aid is effective. Some of that skepticism, frankly, is warranted... but everybody's who's traveled to the developing world has also seen lots of Beatrice Biras.”
And, he reminded the audience, aid may not always be good for the recipient, but it almost certainly has a beneficial impact on the giver—another reason for Americans to recognize their good fortune and act responsibly.
He got a standing ovation.
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