All posts tagged with annual-meeting

For the first time, the Biodiversity Heritage Library held its annual meeting in conjunction with a major biodiversity/natural sciences organization. In June 2022, BHL joined with the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC) and the Natural Sciences Collections Society (NatSCA) to host our meetings in Edinburgh, Scotland. Recognizing that the global pandemic had forced so many meetings to turn to virtual, we were fortunate to have this 2022 meeting as a hybrid virtual/in-person event.

Like many organizations around the world, the Biodiversity Heritage Library was compelled, for the second year in a row, to move the 2021 BHL Annual Meeting to a virtual environment. In consultation with our prospective 2021 host, the Muséum national d’histoire naturelle in Paris, the BHL Executive Committee again made the difficult, yet necessary, decision to move to a virtual meeting, but one that would be much enhanced from 2020 with a goal of trying to recreate the interaction and programmatic content of our in-person meetings.

Join us for a special closing event presented as part of the 2021 BHL Annual Meeting!

Notes from Nature: The Biodiversity Heritage Collections
Date and Time: Friday, 16 April 2021 @ 1130-1230 UTC
Location: Online (via Zoom webinar)

Discover the natural world through a vast collection of biodiversity knowledge online. Find out how Singapore and France have worked together across boundaries to advance biodiversity literature, digitisation and public outreach efforts.

This discussion is organised by the National Library Singapore and Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle, France in partnership with the Biodiversity Heritage Library, the world’s largest open access online repository of biodiversity knowledge.

Registration is now open for our virtual BHL Day 2021 on 14 April, presented as part of our 2021 Annual Meeting! Themed “Reflections In Crises”, the program will include sessions reflecting on BHL’s roles in addressing the biodiversity crisis, challenges arising from COVID-19, and systemic racism in natural history collections.

Save the date for a virtual BHL Day 2021 on 14 April, presented as part of our 2021 Annual Meeting! Themed “Reflections In Crises”, the program will include sessions reflecting on BHL’s roles in addressing the biodiversity crisis, challenges arising from COVID-19, and systemic racism in natural history collections.

Like many organizations around the world, the Biodiversity Heritage Library was compelled to move the 2020 BHL Annual Meeting to a virtual environment. In consultation with our prospective 2020 hosts, the Muséum national d’histoire naturelle in Paris, the BHL Executive Committee made the difficult, yet necessary, decision on 11 March 2020 to move to a virtual meeting rescheduled from April to May.

The 2020 BHL Virtual Annual Meeting was conducted over the course of May 2020. The Executive Committee and Secretariat staff provided pre-recorded video presentations which were made available to the BHL partner community in early May. Three video calls were hosted at various time zones in mid- to late-May to allow for the widest participation and the least inconvenience for partners. These three calls brought together 38 participants from 24 institutions and organizations, representing eight countries, and provided an opportunity for interaction and discussion even while separated by (in some cases great) distances.

The 2019 BHL Annual Meeting was held 29 April – 3 May in Ithaca, New York. Hosted by the Albert R. Mann Library of Cornell University, the Meeting brought together 34 participants from 23 institutions, representing 9 countries.

As BHL Program Director Martin Kalfatovic noted: “The BHL Annual meeting is an opportunity for the partners, from all over the world, to come together to chart the course of the BHL for the coming year. The conversations, both formal and informal, are key to keeping the Library relevant to both its global user community and the partners that sustain the BHL.”

The meeting agenda included reports on the state of the consortium, facilitated discussions around key program areas, a strategic planning session, a panel session with BHL partner representatives, a public event with a panel of Cornell scientists, and many amazing tours and excursions.