About Us

The Purpose of the Library Leadership Council

Reports to the Instruction Commission

LLC is one of the seven councils that report to the Instruction Commission (IC), which is composed of the Vice Presidents of Instruction at all WA CTCs. LLC documents its work via annual or biennial work plans which align with the goals of the IC and with those of the WACTC president’s group. Refer to LLC’s By-Laws for the council’s official purpose, objectives, structure, and more.

Provides a Meeting Space for CTC Libraries

One of the vital purposes of LLC is to serve as a meeting space for CTC library leaders, providing space for discussion, problem-solving, and professional connection and camaraderie. CTC libraries in Washington vary in size, funding, and regional culture which creates different challenges for library leaders. These leaders often use LLC as a sounding board to share ideas and troubleshoot issues.


The LLC By-Laws provide the official purpose for the group, as well as outline specific objectives. In addition to the official by-law objectives, LLC also:

  • Provides professional development trainings to its members and to the wider library community. It often collaborates with other councils, like the eLearning Council, in planning and delivering these trainings.

  • Facilitates and manages grants. Examples include the Assessment in Action (AiA) LSTA grant and the Library as Open Education Leader (LOEL) LSTA grant, among others.

  • Serves as a peer network and community, including an active listserv and website.

  • Serves as a collegiate resource and research hub. Members share out on research and projects being conducted on their respective campuses so that others may benefit.

LLC’s work plan, its history, and fulfillment

LLC documents its work via annual or biennial work plans which align with the goals of the Instruction Commission’s work plan. LLC has been creating strategic-type plans, now called work plans, since its inception. LLC’s current digital archive captures work plans dating to the 2013-14 academic year. As it is able to acquire older work or strategic plans, the council will include those in this folder.


LLC’s work plan has, most often, been created on an annual basis. However, most recently, it has shifted to a 2-year plan to allow for more time to reach its work plan goals, as well as align with the Instruction Commission’s shift to a 2-year work plan. When creating its work plan, LLC intentionally aligns its goals and strategies with those of IC’s work plan. Members form work groups to tackle the strategies and formulate deliverables. The LLC work plan is also informed by the WACTC president’s work plan goals. All LLC work plans can be found on LLC’s shared drive.


In addition to aligning with IC’s work plan, the real hope of LLC’s work plan and its work groups is to create actionable change. It does this through collective efforts surrounding projects such as the Assessment in Action (AiA) LSTA grant, the creation of the WACTC Library Consortium, the Libraries as Leaders of Open Education (LOEL) LSTA grant, and the Anti-Racist Practices in Libraries project funded by the Washington State Library. These projects provide a framework for individual colleges as they work towards improving structures, workflows, and creating a greater understanding around challenging issues. This actionable change at the institution level results in LLC moving the needle on issues that align with LLC’s values and, ultimately, help LLC provide better recommendations to SBCTC that impact its policy and decision-making.

Relationships

Relationship to ELC

LLC shares a similar governing body to eLearning Leadership Council and has one official LLC representative. Additionally, there is one unofficial representative from LLC to eLC. LLC and eLC occasionally hold joint quarterly meetings and work plans often overlap.


Both Councils are supported by SBCTC’s Educational Technology and Open Education department. See the WACTC organizational chart.

Liaisons

Members of LLC serve as representatives on other committees and councils, and members of those committees and councils also serve as representatives for LLC. These groups are provided the opportunity to share reports at each LLC meeting. See the Liaisons list on the LLC website for more information.

Infrastructure

In addition to its relationship with SBCTC and IC, LLC oversees some of the shared infrastructure between the colleges.

The Washington Community and Technical College Library Consortium (WACTCLC)

The mission of the WACTCLC is as follows: works cooperatively to achieve common goals, greater efficiencies, and enhanced access to evolving content, services, and technology to enable our patrons to further their education, enhance their workplace skills, more fully function in today's global society, and

enrich and enjoy their daily lives.


The WACTCLC was established in July, 2016 with oversight from the LLC following capacity and knowledge development needs in a mass migration to the Alma ILS from multiple legacy systems. Though the WACTCLC’s priorities include supporting Alma within the SBCTC libraries, it is also present to address and facilitate other content, services, and technology conversations and concerns.


The WACTCLC includes representation on its governance committee from the LLC, including a liaison from the LLC. Staff from the WACTCLC reports updates to the LLC during quarterly LLC meetings.

Fiscal Responsibilities and Relationships

Historically, the LLC has managed multiple fiscal situations concerning some or all members of the LLC. From 2016 to Summer 2021, voluntary college libraries of the LLC were appointed to serve as fiscal agent for the Ex Libris contract (concerning the majority of the colleges within the CTC system).


The LLC also has an appointed representative on the Washington State Library’s Statewide Database Licensing (SDL) project that facilitates contracts with specific database vendors. The purpose of this representative is to provide a CTC/academic perspective alongside peers from other traditional library types.