Hello, KLASusers! Although we are in an off-year between full KLAS Users’ Conferences, we still want provide opportunities for you to keep up-to-date on KLAS New Features, provide feedback and development requests, and network with each other. With that in mind, just like our last non-conference year, we are working with the Programming Committee to facilitate monthly webinars and will be hosting a “bite-sized” mini-conference this summer.

This began with last month’s Keystone-presented webinar on Cataloging for Duplication, and will continue following a pattern of one LBPD user-presented, one IRC user-presented, and one Keystone-presented webinar per quarter.

APH Roundtable Webinar

For this quarter’s IRC webinar, we have a Roundtable on the APH Census, with discussion on how you go about the census process and how KLAS can better support that work. That roundtable is scheduled for Tuesday, February 22^nd, at 3pm Eastern Time, and will be moderated by Jared Leslie, Director of Media and Development at the Foundation for Blind Children in AZ, along with Sally Shreck, Specialized Media Coordinator at the Maryland School for the Blind IRC, and Allen Huang, Director of Accessible Instructional Materials and Outreach Services, and Kathy Segers, Educational Consultant, at Tennessee Resource Center for the Visually Impaired. We hope you’ll be able to join in, learn from their approaches, and provide your own perspective!

Connection details will be posted about one week before the webinar.

Save the Date: KLAS Mini-Conference

Like 2020’s mini-conference, we plan to take an afternoon in early May to share Keystone Updates and KLAS New Features. This year, we are also adding a second afternoon, which will include a Users’ Group Meeting to review and vote on a bylaws change, and a few user-led Birds-of-a-Feather sessions.

We plan to stagger IRC, General, and LBPD content as much as possible to ensure you get as much out of this as possible with the least time investment. While the exact schedule is still to be determined, we currently have the week of May 9^th(the week before the NLS Conference) earmarked for our two-day, bite-sized, online mini-con.

Admin Training

While broader webinars and networking events are great, sometimes you need a more specific, hands-on, deep dive into KLAS and how to make it work best for your specific situation.

A fantastic way to do that is to join us for Administrator’s Training! 

This year’s dates for Admins at LBPD libraries are:

• June 6-9, 2022
• September 12-15, 2022

We want to host a session for IRC Admins as well, but we need you to help us set the dates! If you can commit to a session, please let us know so we can work with you to set up dates.

Our Online Administrator's Training article has more info about training structure, pricing, and a link to register. Because of the significant time investment needed from Keystone staff to host Admin Training, we will need at least two confirmed attendees for any session to proceed.

Hoping to learn something new or touch base with Keystone staff? We've got some great training and networking opportunities on the calendar, with more in the works! Let's take a look at what we have coming up:

Online KLAS LBPD Administrator Training - March 27-30

The next online session of KLAS Administrator training for staff of Libraries for the Blind and Print Disabled will be held the afternoons of March 27-30. If you act as the KLAS Admin for your library and have never taken (or it's been a long while since you've attended) KLAS Admin Training, we encourage you to join us!

This training is done via Zoom, sessions are recorded and provided to attendees for later review, and allows you to get down and dirty in parts of KLAS aimed to help you improve service for your patrons and give you the knowledge to better support your staff and library as they use KLAS. Cost is $600 / attendee and each must have the authority to change records and policies for their KLAS system.

Find out more and then register for a session via these articles:

• Online Administrator's Training
• Administrator’s Training – What to Expect

E-Braille Circulation Roundtable - Date TBD

During the year of a KLAS Users' Conference, the Program Committee focuses their efforts on eliciting sessions for and building the agenda for the conference, instead of offering an online program every month. However, we still aim to host one webinar each quarter (other than the one in which the conference takes place) to address more timely concerns and help keep everyone in-touch and up-to-date. 

For our first quarter offering this year, we're seeking panelists for a Roundtable discussing the best ways to prepare for the NLS refreshable braille devices and manage E-Braille circulation. The session will be scheduled based on panelist availability.

If you want to participate, please contact our session organizers, James Gleason at Perkins Library and Katy Patrick at Keystone Systems. We'd also love to hear what questions you might have, topics you want to see discussed, or tips you have to share!

National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled Regional Conferences

We're excited to have the opportunity to again attend NLS conferences in person to see and connect with you. Keystone will send two staff members to each of the three regional conferences this year. In addition to hosting the KLAS Users' Meetings, we hope to attend conference sessions, be available for informal discussions, and learn about your challenges, new initiatives, and more!

Dates / times of each KLAS User meeting:

• WesternRegional NLS Conference - Wednesday, April 26, at 5 PM
• Northern / SouthernRegional NLS Conference - Wednesday, May 3, at 11:30 AM
• Midlands Regional NLS Conference - Tuesday, May 16, at 2 PM (tentative; final schedule pending)

2023 KLAS Users' Conference - July 17-20

This one's a no-brainer, but you know we can't help it. This is the biggest opportunity we've had for in-person training and networking since our 2019 conference and it will offer even more ways to connect with other KLAS Users' since it's our first HYBRID conference! The KLAS Users' Program Committee and Keystone staff are working hard to plan learning experiences for all types and levels of KLAS Users.

We hope you will help us make it excellent by joining us in-person or online, submitting an in-person or virtual session proposal, or sharing a session topic suggestion! 

More conference info:

• KLAS UC2023: Preliminary Conference Info
• KLAS UC2023: Call for Session Proposals
• 2023 Conference Session Ideas Forum Post - reply with your suggestions or requests for session topics!

We hope to see you soon at one of these training & networking opportunities! 

Let’s talk training!

We try to have lots of resources available for everyone, and of course our Customer Support team is always happy to answer questions, but we think the availability of online webinars and other training opportunities are also incredibly valuable. That’s especially true between conferences, as we are now on a biennial schedule.  

With that in mind, let’s take a look at what’s coming up, and what other opportunities are available for you.

Upcoming Webinar

Our next Keystone-presented Webinar is scheduled for Thursday, August 19^th at 3pm Eastern Time. I’ll be covering New Features released since the conference, so if you haven’t been keeping up with those Release Lists (or if you have questions about any of the new features) please make sure to join us!

As usual, if you can’t make it, the session will be recorded and posted here on KLASusers to view at your convenience as well. I’m always happy to take questions or requests ahead of time if there’s something specific you want me to address.

Possible Future Webinars

We plan to continue regular New Features webinars, but what else would you like to see in terms of Keystone-presented webinars?

We’re likely to do the occasional open Q&A Session and perhaps a dedicated Duplication Q&A. We’re also discussing a webinar series specifically for new users. Would these be valuable for you? What other topics would you benefit from the most?

Please let us know in the comments section or send us an email describing what you hope to see from us!  

Custom Webinars

Of course, while webinars open to the full Users’ Group have their advantages, sometimes you need something more specific for your staff or organization. Customer-specific webinars can get deeper into just your questions and provide answers and training tailored to your settings and workflow.

To support the transition to Duplication, we're offering Duplication Training webinars to each library as they get their duplication equipment. But, we also know one-hour likely isn't enough to learn everything you need to know. If you need a refresher or follow-up session, please let us know and we'll get something scheduled. 

Need something else? There's the option of arranging custom webinars or a webinar series on whatever topic you need--whether it's new staff training, review, or something in-between. This is a paid service, so let us know if you're interested and we'll send our current online training rates.

Other Training Options

Want to be sure you have regular training built in the budget? You can include a set number of Training Hours in your contract to be scheduled as needed during the year. This is a great option for libraries with a lot of turnover or special projects, or who have a harder time getting one-off expenses approved. 

Finally, with vaccinations widely available we can start offering In-person Training again. Like custom webinars, in-person training is flexible for your needs with the added benefit of introducing us to your space and helping us learn your workflows and systems a whole lot better. This is our preferred option for Assistive Technology Training since it allows us to set up the AT user's workstation and software in addition to talking them through using it. 

I hope this breakdown has helped you understand how Keystone can help you and your organizations keep up to speed! Please let us know what Webinar topics you'd like to see from us--and get in touch if you need a quote for something tailored to fit.