ALA offers special

Contacts: Larra Clark/Macey Morales
ALA Media Relations
312-280-5043/4393
For Immediate Release
June 7, 2006

ALA offers special "drive in" rate for


Monday, June 26, during Annual Conference

(CHICAGO) With a banner day planned at the Morial Convention Center, the American Library Association (ALA) is offering a special one-day rate for Monday, June 26, during the Annual Conference in New Orleans (June 22-28). Members may attend for $99, and non-members will pay $125.
Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday will be at the regular rate.

Library staff and other educators may drive in to the city, visit hundreds of exhibits on the show floor and attend dozens of programs starting at 8 a.m. Among the major events planned for the day are:

  • Chris Anderson, editor-in-chief of
    Wired magazine, will speak at 10:30 a.m. He also will sign copies of his forthcoming book "The Long Tail" at the Hyperion booth in the conference exhibits area immediately after the program ends at noon. The book discusses how our economy and culture is shifting from mass markets to million of niches.



  • School Libraries Work: Rebuilding for Learning, a national town hall meeting sponsored by the American Association of School Librarians and Scholastic, will be held from 1:30 to 3 p.m. First Lady Laura Bush has been invited to keynote the session, and Lester Holt, anchor of NBC News Weekend Today, will moderate. Panelists scheduled to speak include: Norman Francis, Ph.D., president, Xavier University; Keith Curry Lance, Ph.D., director, Library Research Service-Colorado State Library; Wayne V. Rodolfich, Ph.D., superintendent, Pascagoula (Miss.) Schools; J. Linda Williams, AASL president and local recipients of the Laura Bush Foundation grants.

  • Anderson Cooper, journalist and author of the new book "Dispatches from the Edge: A Memoir of War, Disasters, and Survival" (HarperCollins Publishers), will keynote the Public Library Association President's Program and Awards Presentation at 5 p.m.
    Traveling to some of the world's most dangerous places and finding scenes almost too shocking to watch, Cooper shares his front-row view of unforgettable events from the destruction of the tsunami in South Asia to the hunger crisis in Niger to the deadly Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.

For a separate fee ($29 in advance, $35 on-site), attendees also may attend the Michael L. Printz Program and Reception. Printz Award winner John Green ("Looking for Alaska") and honor book authors Margo Lanagan ("Black Juice"), Markus Zusak ("I Am the Messenger"), Elizabeth Partridge ("John Lennon: All I Want Is the Truth, a Photographic Biography") and Marilyn Nelson ("AWreath for Emmett Till") speak about their writing, followed by a dessert reception.

Bring your friends. Network with new ones. Register online for Drive In Day only at:
http://www.ala.org/ala/eventsandconferencesb/annual/2006a/registration.htm. Registration for Saturday, Sunday or Tuesday must take place on site.