No. 125 Journal of East Asian Libraries

              FROM THE PRESIDENT
October 1,200l
Dear Members and Friends of CEAL:
As I write this message and reflect on today   s date, several things come to mind. After
the events of Sept. 11,2001, in a number of profound ways our lives will never be quite
the same. For some of us, dates and times will take on a new significance. Nevertheless,
we continue on with life and work in the present and with plans and hopes for the future.
Looking to the past, today marks the 52nd anniversary of the founding of the People   s
Republic of China. Looking to the present, today marks the first day of fall quarter for
students at my institution, and I reflect on new beginnings. Looking to the future, today
also marks the approximate half- way point between the 2001 and 2002 CEAL annual
meetings, and I think of marvelous things to come. Your CEAL committee chairs and
committee members are already actively planning meetings and workshops for our
Washington, D. C. conference in April 2002. Soon you should see the draft schedule
posted on our website: http:// purl. oclc. org/ net/ ceal. Please contact your committee
chairs or any of the CEAL Executive Committee members if you have good ideas for
presentations and discussions, and volunteer to participate actively yourself. The names
of these individuals are listed on the inside front cover of JEAL, the Journal ofEast
Asian Libraries. Their contact information is listed in our online CEAL Directory.
Included in this issue are the minutes of the two CEAL Executive Committee meetings
from the Chicago conference. I would like to call your attention to three appointments
mentioned there. Jim Cheng of the University of Iowa has agreed to chair a new ad hoc
CEAL Membership Committee. Its first charge will be to investigate the best way of
keeping our CEAL Directory up to date. Sun- Yoon Lee of the University of Southern
California has agreed to serve as our Equipment Coordinator for the 2002 conference.
Her excellent computer skills and strong experience should help to make our meetings
flow smoothly as she coordinates the behind- the- scenes arrangements for intemet
connections, software and hardware needed for our increasingly complicated ( and
impressive!) presentations. Finally, Vickie Fu Doll of the University of Kansas will
continue to work with Fung- yin Simpson of the University of Illinois at Urbana-
Champaign in collecting, organizing and disseminating our CEAL statistics. Vickie will
serve as chair of a new Standing Committee on Statistics. I am very grateful to these
individuals for their willingness to serve all of us in CEAL. If they should approach you
to work with them,- please say     yes   !
Bill McCloy, President
Council on East Asian Libraries ( CEAL )
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