Benefits of Membership

Join Core


As we dedicate our careers to keeping libraries strong, it’s important to find a community to support your professional journey.

Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures is a community of library workers in the core functions of leadership and management, metadata and collections, and technology.

The Core community focuses on cultivating and celebrating the collective expertise of library workers through community building, advocacy, and learning.

At some phases of your career, you will need Core. At other phases, Core will need you.

For and by members, Core delivers mentoring, learning, networking, and leadership opportunities across library types and experience levels. We support each other through collective challenges by building and sustaining a more equitable and accessible future, one Core member at a time.


Do you work in one or more of the following Core library roles?

We invite you to join our Core community today to connect with peers and colleagues who can help you in your job and career.

Have questions or want to talk through taking your next step? Contact us directly or sign up for office hours.

Leadership and Management

  • Administration
  • Assessment
  • Buildings and Operations
  • Human Resources

Metadata and Collections

  • Acquisitions
  • Cataloging
  • Collection Management
  • Electronic and Continuing Resources
  • Preservation

Technology

  • Coding/Development
  • Digital Libraries
  • Emerging Trends
  • Linked Data
  • Systems Administration
  • Web Services

Benefits of Personal Membership

Find Community

  • Build professional networks and ties to advance the goals of your profession
  • Build collective capacity to address increasingly complex and interrelated challenges
  • Participate in mentoring programs for student members and new professionals
  • Advance advocacy programs for core functions at the regional, state, and federal levels
  • Find Your Core - see all the ways you can connect and do things in Core

Enhance Your Career

  • An archive of free recordings of past webinars and conference programs
  • Free access to our e-Forums and archived content of past webinar recordings
  • Discounts on high-quality continuing education webinars and courses
  • Discounts on online and in-person Core special events and preconferences
  • Discounts on all Core publications, including resource guides, monographs, and three diverse journals

Share Expertise

  • Free membership in specialized interest groups and sections
  • Opportunities to contribute your expertise in a meaningful way through participation on committees, presenting webinars and courses, authoring publications, and more
  • Share experience and build lasting methods for workforce development with the ALA, Library of Congress, OCLC, and other organizations as a representative from Core
  • Be featured as a guest contributor for our blog, Core News

Benefits of Organizational/Corporate Membership

Partner with Core and become an Organizational Member to unlock access to valuable professional resources to help your staff.

Benefits of Organizational/Corporate membership include:

  • Discounts for group registrations for Core online courses, webinars, and preconferences
  • Discounts on Core publications

Please note: Your organization must be an organizational member of the American Library Association (ALA) to join Core. The membership rate listed above does not include the price of ALA organizational membership. View Information about ALA organizational dues.


Annual Dues

  • Regular member: $70
  • International member: $40
  • Non-salaried member: $40 (furloughed, unemployed, retired, or earning less than $30K per year) 
  • Support Staff: $40
  • Student member: $30 (plus student members of Core receive free registration for all webinars)
  • Organizational member: $200 (does not include personal membership benefits for organization’s staff)

Please note: You must be a member of the American Library Association (ALA) to join Core. Membership rates listed above do not include the price of ALA membership.

Learn more about ALA dues or contact ALA Member and Customer Services at 1-800-545-2433. Staff will answer your questions and help you select the right membership type to get started. You can then join any of Core  sections or interest groups (or all of them) for free.

There are two ways you can join Core:

  1. Join online.
  2. Call the ALA Member and Customer Services team at 1-800-545-2433.

If you have questions regarding membership dues or becoming a member, please contact the ALA Member and Customer Services team at customerservice@ala.org or 1-800-545-2433. Staff are available to assist you Monday–Friday, 8:30am – 4:30pm Central Time.