UPDATE: ALA presenters, panel participants, and attendees, we want to hear about your sessions! PRaM is seeking brief recaps from you to include in next week’s Library News (especially if you’d like to write a note for your colleagues who may be too shy to submit highlights about themselves). Please use our “Submit an Article” form to send a paragraph about relevant ALA sessions so we can collect as many highlights as possible to include in our round-up. We are so proud that many our colleagues are representing the University Libraries and leading on the largest national stage of the library profession, so please don’t hesitate to submit your recaps to help inform all of us about your work. Thank you!
Karen Estlund, Penn State University Libraries associate dean for technology and digital strategies, was one of six individuals selected as a panelist for the Women in Library Technology Leadership open conversation during the American Library Association’s annual conference being held in Orlando, Fla., through June 28.
The session on Sunday, June 26, included personal journeys into the technology field, visions for the future of libraries, issues around the intersection of gender, libraries, technology, and other topics of interest.
“Question the Status Quo: Challenges for Women in Technology Leadership,” an American Libraries Magazine article which covered the discussion, was published June 26.
Estlund also was a panelist for the Peel Back the Layers of Publishing Opacity: Open Editorial and Peer Review session, which included overall discussions on experiences as authors, publishers, and reviewers in the emerging and transformative models of editorial and peer review.
In addition, three Penn State librarians — Athena Jackson, Matt Ciszek, and Rebecca Miller — who were elected in May by their peers to serve in ALA leadership positions, will begin their ALA service July 1following the Orlando conference’s conclusion.
Jackson, Dorothy Foehr Huck Chair and Head of Special Collections, has been named vice chair/chair-elect of the ACRL’s Rare Books and Manuscripts Section (RBMS). She will serve three years as vice chair, chair and past chair on the RBMS Executive Committee.
Ciszek, head librarian of the Lartz Memorial Library, Penn State Shenango, was re-elected to a two-year term on the Executive Board of the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Round Table as one of three directors-at-large. Ciszek has been involved with the GLBT Round Table since 2007, and had served as membership chair before his election to the Executive Board in 2014.
Rebecca K. Miller, head of Library Learning Services, was elected to a three-year term as a councilor-at-large on the ALA Council. She will serve in that capacity through the close of the 2019 ALA Annual Conference in Washington, D.C.
Congratulations to our colleagues representing the University Libraries on a national scale!