Inquiry into School Libraries and Teacher Librarians in Australian Schools

On 13 May 2010 Warwick Cathro and I appeared at the public hearing for the Inquiry into school libraries and teacher librarians in Australian schools by the House of Representatives Education and Training Committee.

The concept of a national purchasing group for Australian libraries for electronic resources, Electronic Resources Australia (ERA), was of great interest to the Committee.

Our submission to the Inquiry pointed out the benefits of a national approach for students across Australia. Currently 8.8 million Australian have access to quality electronic resources through their libraries thanks to their participation in ERA – primarily public and school libraries.

We also pointed to the importance of public, state and national libraries in supporting students and teachers.

Many others have raised the importance of a national approach for resources for schools and I think that the Committee is very interested in exploring the concept. They expressed particular interest in ensuring equitable access to information and also the importance of regional/rural access.

The ERA submission and the transcript of the public hearings are available from the Inquiry website.

Roxanne Missingham
Chair, ERA Executive Committee

World Book Digital Libraries - new product

Libraries can now subscribe to World Book Digital Libraries through ERA.  This new online product consisting of Living Green; Early Peoples; and Inventions and Discoveries offers an online, interactive complement to World Book's most popular print reference sets. Each library features all the content from the print set as well as videos and animations, interactive activities, curriculum correlations, and links to encyclopedia content.

Key features include:

• Easy-to-read content that helps students understand core curriculum topics.
• Translation tool generates content in 30 languages.
• Text-to-speech feature allows students to hear text read aloud.
• Video tutorials and animations help visual learners grasp difficult concepts.
• Interactive flash activities engage students in the topics.
• Printable worksheets for classrooms.
• Correlations to Australian state curriculum standards.

More information can be accessed via the ERA website.

2010-2011 Pricing

The 2010-2011 pricing has now been confirmed through the ERA product poll.

Libraries can opt-in at any time for either Australian financial or calendar year subscriptions through ERA. Note that you can opt in at any stage during the year regardless of whether you completed the product poll - it's never too late to take up an ERA subscription!

2010 ERA Membership Forum

The minutes, papers and presentations from the ERA Membership Forum held on 12 February 2010 are available on the 2010 Membership Forum page on the ERA website.

Link to Trove discussion paper

Apologies, in the last issue the link to the discussion paper dealing with the user authentication aspects of the planned expansion to Trove to encompass journal articles and licensed e-resources was incorrect.  You can access this paper on the  NLA's wiki on Trove.

Key Dates to Remember

1 July - Financial year subscription cycle commences