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VIDEO CONTEST

The American Library Association-Allied Professional Association (ALA-APA) is currently holding a contest to write a guide to accompany “Working @ Your Library: For Love or Money,” a new advocacy video produced by ALA-APA. Interested parties will use the video and guide to augment related presentations during meetings and conferences with colleagues, managers, trustees, and others who are in a role to affect the salaries of library workers. Participation is free and the winner will receive a $250 prize-donation to a school or library.

Contestants will write a short (three to four page) guide showing people who use the video how to customize their presentations by type of library, geographic region, etc., and how to advocate for better salaries for library workers. The "Advocating for Better Salaries and Pay Equity Toolkit," one of the many resources that may be used to create the guide, is available at www.ala-apa.org/toolkit.pdf.

The video demonstrates the importance of library workers, examines how they are often not compensated fairly for their work, and describes what must be done to improve salaries. “In just a few minutes this film shows some of the many jobs librarians are doing and explains why they deserve to earn a lot more money than they do,” said Steve Fesenmaier, West Virginia Library Commission State Data Coordinator.

Entering the contest is easy:

CONTACT ALA-APA to register for the contest and to request the video: working @ your library: for Love or Money? [50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611-2795; 1-800-545-2433, ext. 2424; jgrady@ala.org]

WATCH the ten-minute video—or better yet, get a group together to watch it with you.

WRITE a short guide for use with the video (3–4 pages maximum). Design suggestions are appreciated but not required.

SUBMIT your guide to ALA-APA via e-mail (MS Word preferred) by January 31, 2005.

Act quickly! The contest is open to the first 20 individuals or groups who register.

Founded in 2001, the ALA-Allied Professional Association (ALA-APA) is a nonprofit organization chartered in the State of Illinois for the purpose of promoting “the mutual professional interests of librarians and other library workers.” The ALA-APA is a companion organization to the American Library Association (ALA).