14 Jul 17 Information on the New ALA Connect

The ALA is always looking for ways to enhance your experience as a member and active participant. Our commitment is to provide you with tools that enhance communication, education and the ability to continue to build your online community of like-minded professionals.

As you may already know, ALA Connect is our online space where official ALA groups work together. It’s also ALA’s online community platform where users (aka communities of interest) within the library profession can connect, learn, express and engage on a variety of topics.

Coming Soon – NEW ALA Connect

The NEW ALA Connect platform is being upgraded to a new and more flexible system that will be powered by Higher Logic. Please be aware that not all the features shown will be available upon initial release but may be offered in future upgrades.

A great new feature is that Divisions and Round Tables will now have their own branded space to communicate, search and collaborate. Some of the other new features will include: a more stable platform, a more uniform system that will be easier for us to maintain, and additions such as badging and ribbons.

What’s Happening and When?

In order to maintain the integrity of your information within our current system and transfer it to the new system, we will have to prevent new information input for a period of time, which we will refer to as a “Gray-Out” period.

Here is a current timetable of the system upgrade:

• Effective EOB Thursday, August 10th, the current Connect will be locked out for logins for all users. This will help us to prevent new posts while we move the data from the current system into the NEW ALA Connect.
• Only public content will be able to be viewed during this time and users will not be able to make any edits or new posts to the system.
• This “Gray-Out” period will be in effect until the upgrade is complete and the new site is launched, planned for August 31, 2017.

Communications and Training
Starting next week and throughout the “Gray-Out” period, expect weekly updates and reminders that will include links to video shorts of new features as well as quick how-to’s of common tasks in the new system.  We will also be sending emails with the same tips and a link to the corresponding video.
These will include information on the new and improved functionality, features that will be going away, and a sneak peek of what’s coming in future phases of the NEW ALA Connect implementation.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Pam Akins at pakins@ala.org.