Keeping up with trends in services and technology is an important part of working in a library. New knowledge and skills can be acquired through course work, reading, workshops, conferences, online training, and mentoring.

Parkland Regional Library provides professional development for library managers, staff, trustees, and other volunteers through Professional Development Days, regional and topical workshops, training videos and newsletters. Library staff and volunteers also have access to the professional development (PD) collection housed at PRL headquarters. All titles are catalogued and may be requested through Horizon or the online catalogue.

For information on upcoming workshops, see our event registration page. If you are attending two workshops on the same day, Parkland provides lunch.

Ask your consultant about topical workshops such as reference and reader's advisory, customer service, eLibrary, etc.

Additional learning opportunities beyond those offered by Parkland Regional Library

Various institutions and organizations offer training opportunities online, face to face, or through distance education. These range from free tutorials to full credit courses. Some are available on demand while others are offered only periodically.

The Partnership, a coalition of Canada's provincial library associations offers audio and web conferences through The Education Institute from September to June. Topics are diverse and timely; fees are reasonable.

ALA, the American Library Association, offers a broad range of eLearning opportunities including webinars, online workshops, and eCourses throughout the year. Topics cover everything from training library staff to ingerating the latest technological gadgets.

Booklist provides free webinars weekly throughout the year on collection development and reader's advisory topics. You can register to attend the live webinar or watch any of the archived webinars at no cost.

WebJunction offers free webinars on a regular basis. If you can't attend the live session, you can access the webinar recording in the archives.

Infopeople, the training arm of the California State Library, provides access to over 200 training events through archived webinars from library leaders. All podcasts and archived webinars are free.

TechSoup Canada has a Learning Centre which includes access to webinars, blogs and articles on technology topics for nonprofits.

Alberta Employment offers eLearning programs to increase awareness of health and safety policy in Alberta.