ALA Liaison to American Association for the Advancement of Science. Annual Report, 2013
The AAAS 2013 Annual Meeting took place in Boston, February 14-18. The theme “Beauty and Benefits of Science” inspired some remarkable plenary lectures, offered free to the general public, including a highly entertaining talk from Nathan Myhrvold, general editor of Modernist Cuisine, his six-volume manifesto on the science of cooking. AAAS reported that attendees (expected to reach 10,000) came from 60 countries, including scientists, journalists, writers, educators, and other “science enthusiasts.” The content of sessions covered every conceivable aspect of science, from breaking research news to science policy, science publishing and scientific literacy, and career advice for individuals at every level. More: www.aaas.org/meetings/2013/
As in the previous year, I worked with Kiki Forsythe, Senior Publisher Relations Specialist for Science, and Nicole (Nikki) Maylett of AAAS conference services to award sponsored registrations for the Annual Meeting to 30 librarians. There were over 50 enthusiastic responses to the first call for registration applications on ACRL STS-L, and the process of getting to just 30 sponsorships was rather protracted.
Alan Leshner, AAAS Chief Executive Officer chaired the meeting for all AAAS Affiliates. There are more than 261 affiliated organizations, serving more than 10,000 million members; this session was attended by fewer than 60 individuals, and much of the focus was on government funding and priorities for scientific research. I developed and moderated a session by librarians, for librarians (open to all attendees), that drew on the conference theme. Colleagues from Denison University, Science Librarian Moriana Garcia and Art Librarian Shannon Robinson, presented information on their initiative to use the library as a bridge between science and art. Tod Colegrove, Head of DeLaMare Science and Engineering Library, Univ of Nevada, followed with his presentation “Bridging STEM to STEAM in the Academic Library.” Their presentations sparked lively conversation among the 36 librarians and AAAS publications staff attending the session.
Joining Kiki Frosyth at the session were Keith Layson and Ryan Rexroth of AAAS Publisher Relations. They are very interested in extending the subscription reach of Science Translational Medicine, the newest AAAS peer-reviewed journal. To that end, all three were present at ACRL National Meeting also, where they hosted a luncheon for at least 40 librarians, featuring a presentation by Dr. Bernard Munos (a translational medicine specialist) on "Mountains of Knowledge and Dearth of Innovation." AAAS maintains a Librarian Portal on sciencemag.org, including links to this and other conference presentations. The librarians’ presentations at the AAAS Annual Meeting will be posted on that portal soon.
http://www.sciencemag.org/site/help/librarians/
The 2014 Annual AAAS Meeting will be held February 13-17 in Chicago, with the theme “Meeting Global Challenges: Discovery and Innovation.” AAAS Publisher Relations will again sponsor attendance by librarians. More information on the conference: http://www.aaas.org/meetings/2014/program/theme.shtml
Respectfully submitted,
Alison Ricker
Oberlin College
Updated: May 23, 2013