I just spent the past few days in Hartford, CT attending the New England Library Association Annual Conference. This was my first time attending and I really enjoyed myself. Besides attending sessions and meeting with people, I served as a guest blogger on the conference blog (my posts are here, here, here, and here).

This was my second library-related conference, although it was my first NELA conference.  I attended a few interesting sessions such as Introduction to Evolutionary Feng Shui and  Looking Good on a Budget: Principles of Design for the Artistically Challenged (low-cost ways to design attractive brochures and flyers) and programs such as the Drop-In Resume Review (for getting sound resume advice from hiring managers) and the gaming room (where attendees can play video games (i.e. Guitar Hero)  on a variety of consoles and discuss their use in libraries). As a video game fan, my favorite part of the conference was without a doubt the gaming room. I must have spent a good 45 minutes there trying to get the rhythm to play “Rock Band” properly. At least I know what I want for Christmas this year.

I also had a chance to do some networking. The Syracuse University iSchool was at the exhibit fair and I enjoyed talking with the staff manning the booth. They invited to me to an alumni networking event at the local watering hole and I had a great time meeting some of the local alumni. I’m seriously leaning towards putting in an application as a transfer student for Fall 2010. Even though I truly enjoy Wayne State’s program, money is a concern for me, so I’m still keeping my eyes open for scholarships and Syracuse has some very generous ones. Ideally, I’d like to have my entire LIS education paid for without having to take out loans, but we’ll see. I also got to meet some other interesting folks who encouraged me to apply for the prestigious Spectrum Scholarship program, so that’s another thing for my to-do list.

Overall, the conference was well-organized with a variety of activities for just about anybody (presentations, panel discussions, banquets, impromptu networking events with refreshments). I’ll admit that I didn’t take advantage of the networking events like I planned to, but I did get to meet a few new people and solidify existing connections. All in all, I enjoyed myself and had a great time. I’m SO looking forward to my next library conference (ALA Midwinter Conference in Boston, MA).