Our intrepid events team organizes webinars to grow your skills, online panel discussions to keep your mind sharp, and networking calls to keep you connected.
Programming is curated by METRO staff and our interest groups. Registration is required for participation in our workshops, meetups, and symposia.
Please review our Code of Conduct. Also, see our Statement on Viewpoints and details on Interpreter Services.
Current and Upcoming Events
Displaying results 1 - 7 of 7
(In-Person) Building a Digitization Rack, Part II: NTSC Broadcast-Level Digitization Station
Workshop
In this workshop, XFR Collective members will teach participants about the basic structure of the analog broadcast signal (including luminosity, chrominance, and hue). Then, they will learn how to isolate and track these different parts of the signal using vectorscopes and waveform monitors and how to adjust them with a time base corrector. Finally, participants will combine their knowledge of the structure of the broadcast signal and monitoring equipment to calibrate their equipment using a set of standard SMPTE color bars so they can be sure to digitize tapes within the legal broadcast range.
Attendees can expect to:
Understand basic aspects of the broadcast image like luminosity, chrominance, hue, saturation, frame vs. field, and minimum and maximum black and light levels
How to use equipment like waveform monitors, vectorscopes, and time base correctors to monitor and stabilize aspects of the broadcast image
Use SMPTE color bars to calibrate the equipment involved
What we offer is a little technical and fills in the gaps between people who work with physical media collections and people who don't know what a Hi8mm tape is.
Fees for this workshop are $20 for METRO members and $40 for non-members. Registration is capped at 10 people.
This workshop will be led by Kelly Haydon and Chris Nicols.
About Our Instructors:
Kelly Haydon (she/her) is the media archivist at Human Rights Watch. She has managed video and audio archival projects for CUNY-TV, NYU Special Collections, and Bay Area Video Coalition (now BAVC Media). She holds degrees from NYU’s Moving Image Archiving and Preservation Program and School of Visual Arts.
Chris Nicols is a multimedia archivist who currently works as a Film Archivist at the New York City Municipal Archives. He holds a Masters degree from NYU, and previously worked at Storycorps, the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee and the Miami-Dade College Wolfson Archive. He specializes in digitizing and managing collections of historical and documentary analog moving image material.
Restorative Library Work: Designing A Field We Want To Work In
Online/Virtual Event
Scholars such as Twana Hodge, Fobazi Ettarh, and Kaetrena Davis Kendrick have helped us understand how standard everyday library work puts you at risk for secondary trauma, compassion fatigue, and burnout. They have pointed out how vocational awe perpetuates stories of how library workers overcome adversity through resilience, grit, or doing more with less, which causes you to ignore your boundaries and needs.
Toxic leadership, present in too many of our institutions, fuels low morale, which is an increasingly significant issue across both public and academic libraries, especially so for people of color. In this talk, we will learn how insights from environmental psychology, contemplative science, and design can help us imagine and experience a new, subtly radical way of working—one that helps us imagine and live in a more human and humane library field.
At this workshop facilitated by Beck Tench, you will:
Learn about recent scholarship on burnout and low morale in the library field
Discover things you can do right away to experience a more restorative way of working
Consider how to hold individual restorative practices alongside larger systemic issues
Please review our Code of Conduct, our Statement on Viewpoints, and details on Interpreter Services.
Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, June / Queer Incarceration: Then & Now
Online/Virtual Event
Want to learn more about prison abolition? Looking to explore the role of information in the prison industrial complex? Excited to discuss ways we can collectively offer resources to address violence caused by mass incarceration? Join the club (literally!). The Prison Library Support Network is collaborating with METRO in 2023 to host Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, which will meet quarterly on the second Monday of the month at 7:30pm.
While the group's facilitators (and host) are affiliated with libraries, you do not need to be a librarian or information professional to attend this group. We invite you to join with kids, double task with your dinner, have your camera on OR off, engage with the materials, and contribute to the discussion however you feel comfortable. Do not feel pressure to read, listen to, or watch everything listed! This is a casual space.
In June, the discussion will focus on the historical and current experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals both in and recently out of prison:
The Women’s House of Detention: A Queer History of a Forgotten Prison, by Hugh Ryan (available at BPL, NYPL, QPL, and Bold Type Books
Incarcerated LGBTQ Americans find little to no support system upon release (PBS News Hour video, 9 min)
Please review our Code of Conduct, our Statement on Viewpoints, and details on Interpreter Services.
The Business of Publishing: Designing a Workshop for Professional-Level Graduate Students
Online/Virtual Event
Do you work with students who would like to publish? Three librarians who developed a 90-minute workshop to strengthen students’ knowledge and confidence in finding publishing platforms for their work will share examples of those activities in this workshop, and then examine the results of their assessment from participants. Join us to learn how to conduct a version of this workshop at your home institutions.
Attendees can expect to:
Identify issues of educational equity related to publishing, and how library-sponsored programming can help to support and close these gaps
Understand the contents of the publishing workshops, as well as the broader challenges of designing educational programming for a disciplinarily diverse group of students with a range of learning goals
Be able to discuss an approach to assessing the success of the workshops and iterating the content of programming in an ongoing series
About our presenters:
Michelle Wilson is the Head of Open Scholarship Services at the UMD Libraries. Prior to joining Maryland, Michelle was the Digital Publishing Librarian at Columbia University and an Associate Editor in the Reference department at Oxford University Press.
Caro Bratnober is the Public Services Librarian at the Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary at Columbia University. They provide library instruction and reference services to students, faculty, and staff – her library and archival work is informed by her research in gender and sexuality studies, (dis)ability studies, ethics and religious studies, along with digital-media and information-literacy studies.
Kae Bara Kratcha is the Social Work & Professional Studies Librarian at Columbia University Libraries. They received their MLS from Queens College CUNY and their MA in Oral History from Columbia University, and their research interests include queer and trans oral history, information literacy instruction, and critical librarianship.
Please review our Code of Conduct, our Statement on Viewpoints, and details on Interpreter Services.
Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, September / Life on Parole
Online/Virtual Event
Want to learn more about prison abolition? Looking to explore the role of information in the prison industrial complex? Excited to discuss ways we can collectively offer resources to address violence caused by mass incarceration? Join the club (literally!). The Prison Library Support Network is collaborating with METRO in 2023 to host Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, which will meet quarterly on the second Monday of the month at 7:30pm.
While the group's facilitators (and host) are affiliated with libraries, you do not need to be a librarian or information professional to attend this group. We invite you to join with kids, double task with your dinner, have your camera on OR off, engage with the materials, and contribute to the discussion however you feel comfortable. Do not feel pressure to read, listen to, or watch everything listed! This is a casual space.
In September, the discussion will focus on the concept of parole and its far-reaching impacts after individuals have been released from prison:
Life on Parole (Frontline documentary, 53 min)
Parole in New York: Broken, Costly and Unjust (Article from New Yorkers United for Justice)
Why Illinois Needs a Parole System (zine)
Please review our Code of Conduct, our Statement on Viewpoints, and details on Interpreter Services.
Rest, Reset, and Re-Engage: Centering EDI in the New Normal
Symposium
Save the date! And apply to present. Registration for this event opens in August.
Rest, Reset, and Re-engage: Centering EDI in the New Normal
A symposium by Brooklyn Public Library and Metropolitan New York Library Council
Hosted by BPL's Brooklyn Heights Branch and Brooklyn Center for History
When it comes to working on issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion – particularly in libraries and archives, where staff members are persistently 80% white – it can feel as though we are engaged in a sisyphean task. As many of us are well aware, anti-racist practice in these spaces is imperative, and yet we are all prone to fatigue when it feels as though we are not making as much progress as we would like. It is necessary at times like this to take a break, come together with our colleagues, and figure out how we might retool and re-energize so that this important work can continue.
When we come together around these topics, we may just discover that there are many ways to go about achieving our goals of promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion in our work. The planning team at METRO Library Council and Brooklyn Public Library invite you to submit a presentation proposal that outlines the tools, resources, and strategies you use for staying engaged in EDI work for as long as it takes. We are especially interested in hearing how we can lift one another up during times of struggle.
Apply here to showcase your work through hands-on workshops, breakout discussions, slides-based presentations, or any other modality you can think of. We offer session lengths of 15, 30, 45, and 60 minutes. Here are a few ideas to get you started. We welcome your creativity:
Strategies for sustaining energy and involvement in EDI work, even across periods of burnout and disengagement
Practical tips on moving yourself and others up the career ladder in libraries, archives, and related organizations
Examples of how you’ve centered marginalized communities and perspectives in library and archival work (e.g. collections, exhibits, programs, providing support to your colleagues in taking on increasing responsibilities, et cetera (the sky is the limit!))
Proposals will be accepted through midnight on Monday, July 10, and we will be in touch with you regarding your presentation status by Tuesday, August 8.
Thank you for applying! Here is that link again.
Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, December / Nickel and Dimed: The Prison Commissary
Online/Virtual Event
Want to learn more about prison abolition? Looking to explore the role of information in the prison industrial complex? Excited to discuss ways we can collectively offer resources to address violence caused by mass incarceration? Join the club (literally!). The Prison Library Support Network is collaborating with METRO in 2023 to host Abolitionist Futures: A PLSN Discussion Group, which will meet quarterly on the second Monday of the month at 7:30pm.
While the group's facilitators (and host) are affiliated with libraries, you do not need to be a librarian or information professional to attend this group. We invite you to join with kids, double task with your dinner, have your camera on OR off, engage with the materials, and contribute to the discussion however you feel comfortable. Do not feel pressure to read, listen to, or watch everything listed! This is a casual space.
The final discussion of the year will look at the day-to-day price tags incarcerated folks face when accessing prison commissaries and other essential services on the inside:
PLSN Presents: What Is a Prison Commissary? (PLSN's Instagram)
The Whole Shabang (Ear Hustle podcast, 46 min)
Optional:
The Company Store: A Deeper Look at Prison Commissaries (Report from the Prison Policy Initiative)
Please review our Code of Conduct, our Statement on Viewpoints, and details on Interpreter Services.