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Appointments & Retirements

Riedesel, Laureen

In October Laureen Riedesel, director of Beatrice (Nebr.) Public Library, retired.

May 10, 2021
Rein, Dani

Dani Rein joined Greenwood (Nebr.) Public Library as director in October.

May 10, 2021
Russ, Cathleen

December 14 Cathleen Russ started as director of West Bloomfield Township (Mich.) Public Library.

May 10, 2021
Smith, Stephanie

East Hampton (Conn.) Public Library appointed Stephanie Smith adult/young adult librarian effective in January.

May 10, 2021
Moore, Vicky

Vicky Moore retired as manager of the Osage Beach branch of Camden County (Mo.) Library District January 1.

May 10, 2021

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At ALA

Carrazco, Crystal

Crystal Carrazco, social media manager in the Communications and Marketing Office, left ALA January 22.

May 10, 2021
Ni, Autumn

Autumn Ni, coordinator in the Develop-ment Office, left ALA January 8.

May 10, 2021
Jarnagin, Briana

Briana Jarnagin left the Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services November 6.

March 1, 2021
Hix, Genevieve

Assistant Director for Major Gifts Genevieve Hix left ALA October 9.

January 8, 2021
Plagman, Emily

Public Library Association Manager of Impact and Advocacy Emily Plagman left ALA October 2.

January 8, 2021

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Cited

Ewbank, Ann

Ann Ewbank, associate professor and head of the Department of Education at Montana State University in Bozeman, received the university’s Anna K. Fridley Phi Kappa Phi Distinguished Teaching Award January 19.

May 10, 2021
Gut, Rachel

The Better Business Bureau of Dayton and Miami Valley’s Women in Business Network named Rachel Gut, deputy director of Dayton (Ohio) Metro Library, one of its Top 25 Women of Impact.

January 8, 2021
Tang, Lydia

Lydia Tang, special collections archivist and librarian at Michigan State University in East Lansing, received the Mark A. Greene Emerging Leader Award from the Society of American Archivists.

January 8, 2021
Rhodes, Angela

State University of New York at Morrisville presented Angela Rhodes, associate systems and electronic resources librarian, with its Distinguished Librarian Award in August.

November 4, 2020
Buljung, Brianna

Brianna Buljung, teaching and learning librarian at Colorado School of Mines in Golden, has been awarded a Fulbright US Scholar Grant to lecture at China University of Mining and Technology in Xuzhou in spring 2021.

September 1, 2020

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Obituaries

Kirven, Sheila

Sheila Kirven, education services librarian and associate professor at Congressman Frank J. Guarini Library at New Jersey City University, died January 9. She held positions at several libraries in New York and New Jersey.

May 10, 2021
Cottman Smith, Jessie

Jessie M. Cottman Smith, 92, retired dean of the library at Maryland State College (now University of Maryland Eastern Shore [UMES]) in Princess Anne, died December 10. She joined Maryland State in 1966 and served as the first dean of the library at UMES until her retirement in 1998. She previously had been a teacher and librarian at Worcester High School in Newark, Maryland, for 15 years.

May 10, 2021
Yung, Judy

Judy Yung, 74, a librarian for the Chinatown branch of San Francisco Public Library and the Asian branch of Oakland (Calif.) Public Library, died December 14. After her library career, she entered academia, establishing the Asian American Studies program at University of California, Santa Cruz. She wrote 10 books on Asian American history and studies and the experiences of Chinese immigrants and was a pioneer in the development of Asian language collections in American public libraries.

May 10, 2021
Talbert, Edward

Edward Talbert, 96, the first African American Area branch librarian in the D.C. Public Library System, died December 9, 2019. An ALA member for 68 years, he also worked at Prince George’s County (Md.) Memorial Library until his 1984 retirement.

May 10, 2021
Lajaunie, William

William “Terry” Lajaunie, 49, assistant director of Lamar County (Miss.) Library System, died December 3. The Mississippi Library Association has announced plans to establish an annual scholarship in his name.

May 10, 2021

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Send notices and photos to Amy Carlton, acarlton@ala.org.

Latest Library Links

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Kim Bellware writes: “A 5th-grade classroom has become the latest collision point for America’s cultural reckoning with racial bias, police violence, and academic freedom after Florida’s second-largest school district temporarily pulled an award-winning youth novel over a police complaint that the book was ‘propaganda’ against law enforcement.”

Washington Post, May 10
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In Closing the Impact Gap, a survey conducted by the UK’s Emerald Publishing, researchers say they’re not satisfied with how academic publishing presents their work to a world that needs to understand it. A total of 1,500 academics in an international pool drawn from more than 100 countries were queried for this study—45% say they agree that research papers are too long, 57% say they feel that research summaries could help to more effectively present findings to decision-makers outside of academia, and 64% say that videos, podcasts, and infographics could help when presenting research.

Publishing Perspectives, May 11
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Amy Dodson has been named the 2020 recipient of the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award. Dodson, director of the Douglas County (Nev.) Public Library, faced enormous public criticism last year for posting a diversity statement on the library’s Facebook page that included the line, “We support #BlackLivesMatter.” The Douglas County sheriff perceived it as support for violence against law enforcement and said library staff should no longer call 911 for help with disturbances, which led to national media coverage and protests.

University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign iSchool, May 11
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Starting May 12, families and households struggling to afford internet service during the COVID-19 pandemic can get help from a new federal program. The $3.2 billion Emergency Broadband Benefit program, administered by the Federal Communications Commission, provides a discount up to $50 per month for broadband service (or up to $75 per month on qualifying tribal lands) and a one-time discount up to $100 for a laptop, desktop, or tablet computer purchased through a participating provider. Library staffers in all settings and other broadband equity advocates can help raise awareness of this new emergency funding.

AL: The Scoop, May 11
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Mercedes Rutherford-Patten and Nicki Viso write: “Across the country, the makeup of university student populations is changing. First-generation students are organizing on campuses and prompting MLIS programs—such as the one we were enrolled in at San José State University iSchool—to rethink how they are engaging with students. As representatives of the first generation of college graduates in our families, we face a distinct set of challenges entering grad school.”

American Libraries column, May 11
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Author Carmen Maria Machado writes: “I have teamed up with Margaret Atwood, Jodi Picoult, Jacqueline Woodson, and many other authors whose works have been targeted for removal from class reading lists in Leander, Texas. In conjunction with PEN America, a group that promotes free literary expression, we wrote a letter to the school district demanding that our books remain available to students. While our books may contain passages that are potentially uncomfortable, challenging, or even offensive, exposure to our books is vital to expanding minds, affirming experiences, creating appreciation for the arts and building empathy—in short, respecting the adults that the students in Leander, Texas, will soon become.”

New York Times, May 11
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Queens (N.Y.) Public Library Assistant Director Fatma Ghailan writes: “Libraries have long been seen as safe havens for students, providing homework assistance and summer reading programs. Over the last decade, libraries have continued to embrace their role in training adults as well, offering them ways to learn digital skills that employers desperately need.”

American Libraries column, May

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