ALA Midwinter Conference [Conference Report] Issues in Science and Technology Librarianship Winter 1999 DOI:10.5062/F4MP518G URLs in this document have been updated. Links enclosed in {curly brackets} have been changed. If a replacement link was located, the new URL was added and the link is active; if a new site could not be identified, the broken link was removed. Conference Reports ALA Midwinter Conference 1999 STS Continuing Education Committee Mary Markland markland@cedarnet.org The committee is beginning to plan for the Year 2000 Continuing Education Survey, which will be disseminated in a web version as well as via the STS-L listserv.  Committee members hope to share the results more widely than in past years.  It is hoped a committee member will be able to attend the ACRL Professional Development Committee meetings regularly.  Another project of this committee is the Collegial Counsel mentoring program.  The program needs to be marketed, and committee members plan to expand web access to program activities and to create an index by subject expertise. The committee hopes to distribute flyers at STS events to increase its visibility.  A web page is also being planned to provide links to science and technology continuing education opportunities outside of STS. Submitted by Mary Markland, Acting Chair STS Forum on Science and Technology Library Research JoAnn DeVries j-devr@maroon.tc.umn.edu Committee members selected the following research abstracts for presentation at the Forum program, Sunday, June 27,1999, 2:00 to 4:00 p.m.:  Veronica Calderhead, Implications of Chemistry Undergraduates Use of Full-text Electronic Journals;  Diana Farmer and Beth Turtle, Comparison of CCOD and Uncover Citation Services;  and Robert Noel and Richard Dominiak, Push Technology at Argonne National Laboratory. Decisions were made to emphasize the research aspects of papers by explicit statements in the "call for abstracts" and by requesting that speakers focus on defining terms, explaining methodology, and elaborating on implications of research projects.  Also, an editor from a prominent academic library journal will be in the audience to enhance the energy of the discussion period. Submitted by JoAnn DeVries (j-devr@maroon.tc.umn.edu)  STS Research Forum, Co-chair STS Publications Committee Meeting Highlights Janet Hughes jah19@psu.edu STS Council updates were given; committee members expressed concern about the from ALA To rearrange programs into tracks. Edward Lener and Heather Moberly agreed to become co-chairs, Ed for 1 year, and Heather for 2 years. Both will continue to serve as editors of the STS Signal newsletter. Teresa Berry, who has volunteered to join the committee, is willing to serve as listserv co-moderator. Gayle Baker will continue in her role as co-moderator. Katherine Whitley has agreed to become web editor. The Section's website Updates on ISTL, STS-L, and the STS Signal indicate that aside from a delay in mailing of the last issue of Signal, all seem to be working fine. ISTL had good response to the Albert Henderson article. Committee members discussed ACRL policy which prohibits publishing newsletters on the web prior to publishing the newsletters in print. Ideas were briefly reviewed regarding improving the web page and the status of ACRL allowing us to put real audio excerpts of programs on the web. Both will be addressed later. Respectfully submitted, Janet Hughes STS Publications Co-Chair STS 1999 Program Planning Committee Dawn Talbot dtalbot@ucsd.edu After reports from meetings of STS Council I and the ACRL Program Planners Committee, the group worked on finalizing plans for the STS Program at ALA Annual in New Orleans.  Three speakers have accepted the Committee's invitation to speak on June 28th on the topic, "The Future is Here: New Initiatives for Today's Sci-Tech Librarians".  The major business of the meeting centered around assigning tasks associated with the program including publicity, handout preparation, program evaluation, and creating a web page to promote the program. In an effort to encourage more discussion and less of the "talking heads" Format, the committee spent considerable time planning for ways to make the program session interactive.. Two discussion initiators were identified in addition to the three speakers; they are Rick Case, Enterprise Director for SPARC, and Dr. Susan Starr, Associate University Librarian, Sciences & Director, Biomedical Library, UCSD. The Discussion Initiators will open the discussion period by asking a probing question to which panel members and the audience may respond.  Questions from the audience will be directed to the panel with the help of the discussion initiators.  Questions can also be sent in advance of the program by way of the STS listserv (for information see the STS web page {http://aztec.lib.utk.edu/sts/programs/}). Roving floor moderators will facilitate questions from the floor. Submitted by Dawn Talbot, Committee Co-Chair We welcome your comments about this article.