Last week (16/17th May) the CILIP Cymru/Wales annual conference took place in Cardiff at the Radisson Blu hotel.  Several members of the CLIC staff development group were there to take part, help out behind scenes, and give a presenation.  For some of us the conference activities started on the Wednesday evening when we held a ‘fringe’ social event at Las Iguanas inviting CLIC members and conference attendees to join us for food and cocktails.  We were joined by some of the CILIP Cymru committee, and later on by some conference goers.  A nice way to set proceedings off.

The title of the conference was ‘Rising to the challenge’ with a thematic look at partnership and collaboration, and over two days we were treated to many different examples of such collaborations – both within and between different sectors.  From public library examples in Edinburgh and Nottingham, to academic collaborations in Gloucestershire and Cumbria, and a long lived health library partnership in Wales.

Of course the theme of the conference was right up our street and embodies what CLIC aims to achieve, so on the first day we presented in a session about regional partnerships and collaborations, alongside LINC y Gogledd (a North Wales Libraries Partnership). You can see the CLIC presentation here.

Attending the conference meant we also got to hear talks from the CEO of CILIP – Annie Mauger, in conjunction with Rebecca Davies (Pro Vice-chancellor, University of Aberystwyth); and from Phil Bradley, the President of CILIP who rounded up the conference at the end of the second day.

The Welsh Minister for Culture and Sport, John Griffiths, AM also spoke briefly to the conference, before opening the trade exhibition.

At the conference dinner the Welsh Librarian of the Year awards took place, and we would like to congratulate Lori Havard of Swansea University for winning the academic sector librarian award, and the overall Welsh librarian award, and Bethan Hughes from Denbighshire for winning the public librarian award.

We are already looking forward to next year’s conference, although as the location is yet to be decided it may not be on our doorstep next time.  For now, however, we also want to thank the organisers for all their hard work in providing us with a great conference.