I’m really thrilled to announce that this year at the Public Library Association Conference, I’ll be presenting on two topics.

First, I’ll be presenting with Katie Salo, Angie Manfredi, and Andrea Sowers on the topic of teen programming. This will be a standard program session, but attendees will walk away not only with ideas to try for teen programming in the library (including on passive programming), but I think between the four of us, you’ll get a sense that not everything will be successful and that is okay.

Today I got news that my ConverStation — a fancy word for a Conversation Starter — with Sophie Brookover was accepted, as well. We’ll be talking about “new adult” fiction. It will not be a rehash of our ALA conversation, though some topics will lend themselves to discussion. Part of this is because “new adult” is a rapidly changing topic and we’ve been thinking and talking about this for months now. The other reason is that Sophie and I, along with Liz Burns, have authored an article to be published early next year in The Horn Book Magazine on the topic, and while working through the topic in print, we’ve had some real “ah ha” moments.

I’m excited to not only be able to have both of these opportunities, but because PLA is a much smaller, more focused conference than ALA is, I’m eager for really valuable discussion both about these topics and others. There’s also something really satisfying in being able to present with some of your core professional colleagues on topics you talk about privately on a regular basis. It’s never about the being on stage and presenting — it’s about the discussions that come after with other people who give you a lot more food for thought.