Announcing the Winners of the 2011 SLIS Student Awards!

Congratulations to the following recipients of the 2011 SLIS Student Awards!

Check out the SLIS Awards page HERE for in-depth descriptions of all awards, criteria, and application information.

C. Berger Entrepreneurial Promise Award

This year’s award is given to Fritz Hoehn.   In supporting her nomination of Fritz, Debora Shapiro said, “On his resume, there is ample evidence of situations where he perceived an opportunity, and seized it. For example, while in the military and stationed Haiti, he and several others in his unit started a free school for kids in the area, whose families couldn't afford private school, that also provided teaching experience for adults. I believe that Fritz will continue to apply his entrepreneurial spirit to his career in librarianship.” 

Dianne McAfee Hopkins Diversity Award

This year’s award is given to Melissa J. Nicholas in recognition of her contributions to the student chapter of REFORMA, including the Grant Writing Workshop she organized, and for her work in the MERIT Library in developing the LGBTQ young adult book collection and LGBTQ book displays. 

Valmai Fenster Award for Outstanding Promise for Exceptional Scholarly Contribution to the Profession

This year’s award is given to David Woken for his paper,

“Progress and setbacks in the formation of a print counterculture: La Protesta goes daily, 1903-1905”  

Honorable mentions are given to Gregory Bond for his paper,

“Unnecessary and Unpractical: The Baltimore Civil Rights Movement and the Color Line Behind the Desk and the Enoch Pratt Free Library, 1925-1945”

and to Eric Wiley for his paper,

“Appraisal in Community Archives Collections: A case Study of University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee Appraisal Methods and Decisions for LGBT Collections.” 

Lawrence C. Zweizig Student Leadership Award 

This year’s award is given to Eric Wiley for his leadership within the Society of American Archivists-Student Chapter. 

A special runner-up Zweizig Student Leadership Award, sponsored by SLIS Class of 2010, is given to Erinn Batykefer in recognition of her work in the development of the “e-book petting zoo” for the Reading Interests of Adults course and for her participation in the statewide public library e-book summit sponsored by the Department of Public Instruction, Division for Libraries, Technology and Community Learning.

 James Krikelas Award for Innovative Use of Information Technology

This year’s award is given to Jiekun Yang for her work in Database Design for Libraries and Information Agencies. In this course, she created a database called the Web Content Coding and Analyzing database which can be used by researchers to “code selected web content and link them with proper target group, type, author, and subject,” to be used on the Public Library Financial Literacy Project with Professors Eschenfelder and Smith. 

Larry Jacobsen Innovations in Library Science Award

This year’s award is given to Kate Hill on the basis of her exceptional strengths not only in an understanding of collection development and all its subprocesses, but also of scholarly communication and the challenges of upholding intellectual freedom in an academic library setting.  

The Penelope and Stephen Klein Scholarship Award

This year’s award is given to Erinn Batykefer by the Klein family on the basis of her impressive resume and insightful and thoughtful application essay.  Erinn is finishing her first year in the program, and hopes eventually to work in a public library focusing on electronic access. 

Calling all Emerging Leaders!

SLIS graduates are known as innovative leaders in the library world-- not surprising considering the excellence of UW's program-- but did you know you can kick-start your career right now by applying for the ALA Emerging Leaders program? You can!

ALA Emerging Leaders Interest Group

Are you under 35 or a new library professional with under 5 years experience?  Are you interested in serving ALA by participating in problem-solving taskforces?  Would you like to attend ALA conferences, make fantastic professional connections, and boost your librarian cred?

Applications for the 2012 class of Emerging Leaders are now being accepted. Deadline for submission of the application and all references is August 1, 2011.  

Check out the ALA Emerging Leaders Interest Group page above to check out the Selection Criteria. The application can be accessed at: http://www.ala.org/cfapps/emergingleaders/index.cfm.

UW SLIS alum Lillian Wallis leaves massive gift to Hennepin County Library

Lillian Wallis

Who says the good die young? 

Lillian Wallis, who graduated from the UW School of Library and Information Studies in 1950 died at 85 in September, 2010 after a long life of travel and library service.  But what might have been a sad post on the loss of a great librarian who really believed in how libraries could serve and enrich a community has turned into a much more fitting elegy:  celebration!

Lillian, who retired as technical services chief from Minneapolis Library in 1987, willed the bulk of her estate-- $646 thousand dollars-- to Hennepin County Library.  In typical librarian fashion, she organized her life and her finances in such a way that her legacy and impact on her community will continue long after her death.  Her gift stipulated that the money should be used to buy popular titles that circulate.  Brava, Ms Wallis!

Read the full article from the Star Tribune here: 
Librarian leaves $646K gift for Hennepin bookshelves

New edition of Introduction to Public Librarianship is out!

Distinguished UW SLIS alum, Kathleen la Peña McCook has a new book out!  

 

The latest edition of Introduction to Public Librarianship from Neal-Shuman Publishers includes lots of examples from Wisconsin libraries and is a great entree to this aspect of librarianship.  Check it out!