Coming of Age in the Silicon Valley: San Andreas Chapter Celebrates Anniversary - Special Libraries Association - Brief Article

Information Outlook, Dec, 2000

Born as a spin-off of the San Francisco Bay Region Chapter, the San Andreas Chapter celebrated its twentieth anniversary in September. With an original membership tally of 94, today, that number is around 500. Current chapter president Lucy Steelman hosted the evening, while long time chapter members reminisced and shared professional and personal anecdotes. Present were chapter members, past presidents, and Blanche Woolls, Dean of the San Jose State University Library School. Bill Fisher, past president, and Richard Hulser, visiting from the East Coast, were on hand to celebrate and spread the word that they are both running for national SLA President. Held on the grounds of Sun Microsystems in Santa Clara, the evening was replete with a surprise singing telegram courtesy of the San Francisco Chapter. Event planners also posted a San Andreas Chapter chronology of important people and events over the last twenty years.

For many of us in the Silicon Valley, technology trends have impacted heavily upon our jobs. We have been forced to quickly re-train ourselves, learn a new language, increase our skill sets, seek out new jobs and titles, while often re-training our clientele. As a myriad of new opportunities has opened up, we have seen our colleagues enter new career paths such as web design/development, taxonomy, knowledge management, training and usability.

Particularly in the Silicon Valley, indeed this time of phenomenal wealth and discovery has equipped us with a myriad of resources, yet has challenged us to deal with much much more.