SLIS Meets Mickey & Goofy

ALA Reunion

Will you be in Anaheim this summer for the ALA annual convention?
Then join your SLIS colleagues past and present on Sunday, June 29, 5:30–7:30 p.m. at the:
Catal Restaurant and Uva Bar
1580 Disneyland Drive (in the Downtown District)
http://www.patinagroup.com/catal/
714/774-4442

We’ll have hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar. See you at 1580 Disneyland Drive
in the Downtown District. Questions? Please contact SLIS alumni reunion chair Nancy McClements at
nmcclements@library.wisc.edu.

SLIS Student Award Winners

Lawrence C. Zweizig Student Leadership Award
This award was created in memory of SLIS student Lawrence C. Zweizig, who graduated in 1990 and died soon after taking his first professional position. As a student he participated actively in the life of the School, showing a commitment to leadership and for activating a spirit of fun and good humor in those around him Intention of the award: To recognize and nurture leadership in first year SLIS master’s students, thereby helping to sustain the School’s commitment to graduating future leaders in the profession. Eligibility: All continuing SLIS students are eligible. The winner of the award is selected through a vote of current SLIS students.
This year’s award is given to Besty Wermuth for her cheerful attitude toward her work in the SLIS library, her program management of the Allied Drive Story Time program which includes coordinating volunteer readers across campus, and her commitment to research in the area of story time programming. In voting for Betsy, one student said, “She always greets you with a smile and her dedication to school activities proves she'll be a star librarian for some lucky library in the future!”

Valmai Fenster Award for Outstanding Promise for Exceptional Scholarly Contribution to the Profession
This award was created in honor of Valmai Fenster, a former SLIS faculty member, to recognize exceptional scholarship of a SLIS student as evidenced in a scholarly paper.
Eligibility: All current SLIS students are eligible to submit a single scholarly paper.
This year’s award is given to Katie Rudolph for her paper “Separated at Appraisal: Maintaining the Archival Bond Between Archives Collections and Museum Objects.” In this paper, Katie tackles the problem of three-dimensional objects donated to archives along with textual materials. Katie conducted a case study of the Krzyzanowski Family Papers, 1886-2003, currently housed in the Wisconsin Historical Society archives, the three-dimensional items that were “separated” from the textual materials, and the potential for loss of continuity of the collection.

James Krikelas Award for Innovative Use of Information Technology
This award was established in 1998 in honor of Emeritus Professor James Krikelas, who for several decades was a SLIS leader in teaching and using information technology in the classroom, to recognize the work of a SLIS student who has presented the innovative use of information technology through a SLIS course assignment.
Eligibility: All current SLIS students are eligible to submit a single project.
This year’s award is given to David Drexler, Rae Roche, and Laura Wynholds for their proposed redesign of the web site for the UW Oral History Program, part of the University Archives. The students created a site based on the need to integrate the Oral History site with the parent University Archives site and to create an interactive site through the development of a metadata scheme. They write of their project, “We hope that when implemented, these recommendations will help OHP present a web site that is valuable and easy to use for researchers, students, and members of the general public who take an interest in the history of the University of Wisconsin.”

Dianne McAfee Hopkins Diversity Award
This award was created in honor of Dianne McAfee Hopkins, the first African-American SLIS faculty member and committed leader in school library education, intellectual freedom, and diversity in the library profession. In 2004 the School, through its Diversity Committee, set forth a formal mission statement: to promote diversity within the profession through recruitment, curriculum, and programming at SLIS. This award is intended to recognize a student who's SLIS and extra-curricular activities support this mission.
Eligibility: All current SLIS students are eligible to apply.
This year’s award is given to Estevan Montano for his work on the SLIS Diversity Committee. In nominating Estevan, Dr. Whitmire said, “[his] work and scholastic interests add to the diversity of the SLIS curriculum by introducing issues and communities that some of our students might not be familiar with.”

C. Berger Entrepreneurial Promise Award
The C. Berger Group, Inc. Entrepreneurial Promise Award was established by the C. Berger Group in 2000 at the University of Illinois to honor a student who exhibits unusual creativity, reflects innovative spirit and shows the most promise for an outstanding career in a special library, non-traditional library setting or as an entrepreneur. Carol Berger, Chairman of the CBG Board and CBG's Manager, Marketing Communications is a former special librarian herself. She initiated the gift there and at selected other library schools to encourage an interest in special librarianship as a career option for students and to focus on the qualities and skills needed to succeed in this area.
Eligibility: All SLIS students are eligible and are nominated by the faculty.
This year’s award is given to Molly Beverstein for her promise of leadership potential in the field of special librarianship. In nominating Molly, Dr. Eschenfelder said, “Molly is a ‘how do we make this work?’ sort of person. Her creativity, willingness to take risks, and focus on getting complicated problems worked out through one on one contact and charm will serve our profession well and serve as a great asset to whoever she is working with.”

The Penelope and Stephen Klein Scholarship Award
Penelope Klein earned an MA from SLIS in 1997. In thanks for her years at SLIS, she and her husband offer this scholarship to a SLIS student who is entering into the second year of study at SLIS, intends to have a career as a public librarian, has a background in the humanities, a demonstrated commitment to public librarianship, and has achieved academic excellence.
Eligibility: All continuing SLIS students are eligible.
This year’s award is given to Kristin Hamon. Kristin has already displayed her passion of working with children as a frequent volunteer reader for the Allied Drive Learning Center Reading program, her work as a tutor coordinator for the Title VII Indian Education program with the Madison Metropolitan School District, her work as tutor in literacy for elementary and middle school children in the America Reads program, and as volunteer coordinator with AmeriCorps. Kristin is looking forward to being a youth services librarian after she graduates next year.

Larry Jacobsen Innovations in Library Science Award
This award was established by Larry Jacobsen, class of 1971, who wanted a way to express appreciation for a long and fruitful library career at the Lawrence Jacobsen Primate Research Center Library. He also wanted to help students like those he had supervised in the library who had struggled financially to make it through graduate library education and who have demonstrated originality and willingness to risk, or innovativeness in his or her class or extracurricular activities, including the workplace.
Eligibility: Any student completing his or her first year may be nominated provided they need financial assistance to complete the second year of the SLIS program and have a focus on academic or special libraries.
This year’s award is given to Laura Wynholds. In nominating Laura, Drs. Eschenfelder and Besant said “People talk about thinking ‘outside the box,’ well Laura’s not in the box, and she’s never been in the box. Laura’s IT skills are very high and she is always looking for ways to use them to improve information resources or services … [her] unconventional, out of the box thinking, leads her both to take risks, and try new approaches that many might eschew.”

SLIS Honors von Dran as Distinguished Alumnus

Raymond F. von Dran, (M.A., 1971, Ph.D. 1976) is the recipient of the 2008 Distinguished Alumnus Award. The SLIS Alumni Association has taken the unusual step of making this award posthumously since the process of conferring the award was well under way when word was received of his death.

Raymond F. von Dran died unexpectedly Monday, July 23, 2007, while visiting in New York City. Ray was just beginning a year's sabbatical preceding his announced retirement from the position of Dean of the Syracuse University Information School after over thirty years of distinguished service to library and information science education.

Upon graduation from SLIS, von Dran worked as Humanities Bibliographer at Iowa State University and during that period completed his master's thesis in history, also from UW, on the topic of science fiction during the seventeenth century.

In 1973 he returned to SLIS as a doctoral student, where he continued to excel and to impress his colleagues with his zany sense of humor and imaginative mind. After receiving his Ph. D. under the director of James Krikelas, Ray joined the faculty of Catholic University of America where he progressed from Assistant Professor to Dean of the School and undertook an extensive study of the Library of Congress's National Union Catalog. His analysis and recommendations led to changes in the Catalog not only at the Library of Congress but at other universities such as Ohio State and Wisconsin. He also served as consultant to various government agencies. In 1987, von Dran was recruited to join the faculty of the University of North Texas (UNT) as Dean of the library school.

During his eight years in Texas, Ray help expand the school’s faculty and program. He created and directed a truly interdisciplinary Ph. D. degree in information science by combining resources of the departments of Computer Science, Business Information Systems, Communications Studies, and others. He served as Chair of the University's Information Resources Council and as Executive Assistant to the Provost for Information Resources. In 1995, von Dran was once again approached to lead a school in transition, Syracuse University. The respect and affection that the UNT administration held for Ray was best expressed when they named the then newly installed University mainframe computer ABubba Ray@ in his honor.

At Syracuse, von Dran was instrumental in implementing a number of innovative changes to a school already possessing a national reputation for being a pioneer in information studies and technology. He helped the School develop a modern curriculum not only at the traditional master's level but also in undergraduate studies, as well as an interdisciplinary doctoral program. He oversaw the expansion of the faculty and student body B tripled in size according to one source B and expanded the School's sponsored research almost five-fold. Under his leadership seven research centers were created. Finally he was able to enlarge the School’s endowment; and he subsequently assisted in securing the largest single financial gift in the School's history. Ray also was extremely proud of one other accomplishment. He convinced the University administration to gather all of the various components of the AI-School@ into one physical location. They provided 50,000 square feet in a newly renovated campus building, thus bringing all activities under one roof.

Von Dran was an active member of the professional community. He was a founder of the I-School Group, served on numerous committees within the American Library Association, the Association of Library and Information Science Education, and the American Society for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T). As chairman of ASIS&T's Education Committee he helped create the organization’s first standards for education of information specialists. Over the course of his career he produced numerous articles and reports; he also served as a consultant to numerous universities not only on education for librarianship and information science but also on information technology.

In an outpouring of sympathy sent to the I School at Syracuse, it became clear that with all of his success as an administrator during his thirty-five years of service, Ray was even more revered as a teacher and mentor. He will be missed as a colleague and friend. We are proud to recognize his accomplishments.

Retirement Fete for Anne H. Lundin

Friends of SLIS joined Anne H. Lundin, children’s literature and services professor, as she is feted with high tea on May 2, 2008, at 3:30 p.m. in the SLIS Commons, on the occasion of her retirement after a 40-year career in teaching and librarianship, the last fifteen at UW-Madison. She has served SLIS as chair and longtime member of the SLIS Curriculum Committee; co-edited the history of SLIS, Tradition and Vision: A Centennial History, and was faculty advisor to the Beta Beta Epsilon Chapter of Beta Phi Mu. Watch the SLIS web site for more details.

Lundin began teaching in 1967 in Lake Forest, Illinois, and has taught in several independent schools and universities. Teaching writing in the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta, Georgia, converted her to a belief in the power of writing to transcend boundaries. Lundin also pioneered undergraduate teaching for SLIS, offering an online children’s literature course that drew over 500 students over two years.

During 5 years as a curator of a special collection on children’s literature: the de Grummond Collection at the University of Southern Mississippi, she presented and wrote articles on the collection, developed an educational outreach, and secured valuable contributions, such as the Reys’ Curious George original materials. While in Mississippi, she wrote a weekly column on children’s books that ran in the statewide paper, The Clarion-Ledger.

But her writing began much earlier. Her short stories, written as a young girl, featured Madame Oushaw, based on the nanny in Eloise. She has written hundreds of poems, and has a real passion for working with others in discovering their voices as writers.

Professor Lundin’s scholarly contributions are unique. She is one of the few in the field who straddle the fields of literature and librarianship. Her work, Constructing the Canon of Children’s Literature: Beyond Library Walls and Ivory Towers (Routledge) connects the institutional histories of the two fields and calls for a shared field to emerge. Lundin’s work as a literary historian also illuminates the reception of children’s literature in Victorian Anglo-American culture. Her Victorian Horizons: The Reception of the Picture Books of Walter Crane, Randolph Caldecott, and Kate Greenaway relates the extent of interest in children’s literature in the Victorian press and presents a “horizon of expectation” that greeted the pioneer picture book genre.

In addition, she co-edited with Wayne Wiegand Defining Print Culture for Youth: The Cultural Work of Children’s Literature, and wrote the introduction to the boundary-spanning work. She is also the author of over fifty articles, book chapters, and poems, one of the earliest a study of the Robinson Crusoe myth in children’s literature and the most recent an ongoing study of the work of Kate Douglas Wiggin as children’s book author and progressive reformer. One of her articles –on Kate Greenaway’s work—appeared in a collection entitled Literature and the Child: Romantic Continuities/Postmodern Contestations, about which Wayne Wiegand exclaimed, “You are the first person in LIS to be included in a book with ‘postmodern’ in its title!”

She has frequently reviewed books for Children’s Literature Association Quarterly, The Lion and the Unicorn, H-Net, Library Quarterly, and Libraries and the Cultural Record. Known in the field as someone versed in the classics, she is often called on to review books related to Victorian works.

Active professionally, she has been a member of the Newbery, the Hans Christian Anderson, the Phoenix awards committees, and now chairs the Children’s Literature Association’s Anne Devereaux Jordan Award Committee. A member of the advisory board of the Center for the History of Print Culture in Modern America since 1993, she helped plan the “Defining Print Culture for Youth” conference in 1997 and edited a special issue of Library Quarterly on the subject. She has been active in the International Children’s Literature Association for over 20 years. She is a frequent presenter at national and international conferences, this year attending conferences of the Society for the History of Childhood and Youth in Sweden, the Modern Language Association, the University of California-Berkeley’s Canon Conference, and the Children’s Literature Association.

At UW, she has chaired the University Library Committee and the Archives Committee; served as Faculty Senator for over 10 years; served as an L&S Faculty Advisor for 14 years and on the advising service’s Steering Committee for 5 years; was a member of the Campus Planning Committee; and participated in the Women’s Mentoring Committee. She co-led an interdisciplinary 2-year seminar (2005-07), “The Good Childhood,” sponsored by the Humanities Institute, culminating in a series of public forums in winter 2007 and “The Call of Stories,” a 2004-05 seminar.

Professor Lundin looks forward to continuing to explore areas of interest to her, taking courses, volunteering, traveling to see her family members, and enjoying life in Madison with her husband, Tom Lovett.

SLIS Hires New Student Services Coordinator

SLIS is pleased to announce the appointment of Andrea Poehling as the new Student Services Coordinator. Andrea has come to SLIS from the UW School of Medicine and Public Health. From 1997 to 2004 she was the Associate Director of International Programs in the School of Business. Andrea also served in the Peace Corps in Guatemala in 2004-05.

Andrea holds a masters degree from UW-Madison in Counseling, with an emphasis in higher education administration. Her responsibilities at SLIS include admissions, advising, practicum and career placement, and alumni relations.

UW-Madison SLIS Gains Continued Accreditation

The Committee on Accreditation of the American Library Association has informed the School of Library and Information Studies that its accreditation will be unconditionally continued for the maximum seven years following an extended process that culminated in a meeting with the COA at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia.

The School, which has been continuously accredited since ALA first undertook to accredit education for the field in 1924-25, will next be reviewed in 2014.

According to Louise Robbins, director, the School was in much better shape this time than the last time it was reviewed. “We are grateful for the support we have received from the College and the University and from our graduates and friends across the community and country,” Robbins said. “The faculty and staff devoted a lot of time to self-study and to the preparation of the report and the site visit by our External Review Panel. Without everyone’s efforts—and the excellent editorial and production work of Allison Kaplan—this would have been a much more arduous process.”

UW-Madison SLIS Grads Garner Teaching Awards

Christine Jenkins and Toni Samek, both graduates of the UW-Madison School of Library and Information Studies doctoral program, won national teaching awards at the annual midwinter conferences of library and information science educators (ALISE) and of librarians (ALA). Two other people with UW-Madison ties were finalists for one of the awards.

Jenkins (Ph. D. 1995), who teaches children’s literature and programming and intellectual freedom at the top-ranked Graduate School of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was given ALISE’s Teaching Excellence Award. She was honored at the ALISE awards reception on January 10 in Philadelphia.

Samek (Ph.D. 1998), who teaches in the areas of intellectual freedom and social responsibility in librarianship and information ethics, among other things, at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, won the Library Journal’s first ever teaching award. She was honored with a reception and presentation on January 12. In addition, she was featured in an issue of Library Journal and in an issue of the Madison, WI, Capitol Times newspaper.

Finalists in the LJ award were current SLIS faculty member Madge Hildebrandt Klais, a UW History Ph.D., who teaches children’s and young adult literature as well as school librarianship courses and current doctoral candidate Sharon McQueen, nominated for her teaching in the children’s literature and services area for two years in Kentucky.

SLIS alum wins teaching award

Toni Samek, who earned a Ph.D. at UW-Madison SLIS and is now on the faculty of the School of Library and Information Studies at University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada received the Library Journal's first teaching award:

Her work goes far beyond the three standard measures of academic performance: teaching, research, and service. Her teaching “is deeply informed by her commitment to, and scholarship in, human rights and the core values of the profession,” says Kenneth Gariepy, who nominated her for LJ's award.

read full LJ article

Celebrate Barbara Arnold

Barbara J. Arnold, long time SLIS Admissions and Placement Adviser, will retire at the end of the fall semester. Join us December 14, from 4:00 - 6:00 p.m. in the SLIS Commons, for food and drink to celebrate Barbara’s many years of achievement and contribution to the School. Those wishing to do so may make contributions to the UW Foundation (you can send them to the School to be deposited) for the SLIS Community Fund to support those activities in which Barb so strongly believes—networking and professional development.