Vol. 25, No. 2 (June 2007)

President's Report

We are all here for a spell; get all the good laughs you can.
-- Will Rogers

There will be a large turnover of ALAO Board members during the two day leadership retreat that is taking place at the Atwood Lake Resort and Conference Center on June 7-8. Many board members will be stepping down from their current responsibilities to ALLAO and in appreciation of these folks, who have served the organization for a "spell," I would like to mention them by name.

I would like to express sincere thanks to second year board members Mike Tosco and Evelyn Burns. Betsy Blankenship will be stepping down from her second year board member position and as Chair of the Professional Development Committee. In the past, Betsy has given many hours of service in other capacities on the ALAO Board. Thank you Betsy for the many hours you have given to our organization! Colleen Boff will be stepping down as Secretary of the ALAO Board. Karen Diaz (Instruction Interest Group Co-Chair) and Margaret Maurer (Technical Services Interest Group Co-Chair) will also be stepping down. Heidi Beke-Harrigan will step away from her role as ALAO Newsletter Editor where she has kept the organization informed these past two years! The ALAO Board will miss the many years of experience each of our departing board members has brought to the organization.

I would like to extend thanks and say a fond farewell to Judy Williams at Ashland University, who has taken a new position at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. Judy has served on the ALAO board for many years in the past, in various positions. She also served on several conference planning committees. I would like to wish Judy and her family the best of everything as they move to the hometown of country music! Come back and see us next October for our annual conference!

Past President’s Report

Wilhoit new ALAO VP-President elect

In our second online ALAO election, held in March, 2007, Karen Wilhoit, was elected Vice-President/President Elect. Karen is Associate University Librarian for Collections at Wright State University. She has been a member of ALAO for 15 years, recently completing a two-year term as the organization’s Treasurer.

Also elected:

• Jo Ann Calzonetti, University of Akron, returns for a second term as Treasurer.
• Peggy Rector, Denison University, is the new Public Relations Coordinator.
• New Board-Members-At-Large:
  • Rob Withers, Miami University
  • Brian Gray, Case-Western Reserve University
  • Mary Lee Jensen, Kent State University

They will begin their terms of office on the second day of the annual Leadership Retreat, June 8, 2007, to be held at Atwood Lakes Resort and Conference Center near Sherrodsville, Ohio.

(Editor’s note: newsletter contributions for June have been credited to individuals according to the offices they held before the retreat during the time they sent me the submissions. The next issue will reflect new officer positions.)

2007 Conference Planning Update

Innovation Generation: Tools, Techniques, Transformations

Mr. Joe Janes, Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Academics at the Information School at the University of Washington will be returning to Ohio this year as the presenter of this years President's program. He also currently writes the "Internet Librarian" column for American Libraries magazine

Looking Forward to the 2008 ALAO Annual Conference

The 2008 conference will be held October 24, 2008 at the Roberts Conference Center and Holiday Inn just off of I-71 and conveniently located to Cincinnati, Columbus, and Dayton. With 900+ spaces of free parking we hope to see everyone there in 2008.

Dates to Remember

Membership News

Announcing the new ALAO list: alao@lists.uakron.edu

This is the main listserv for the Academic Library Association of Ohio (ALAO). Subscribers may post announcements of interest to ALAO members such as workshops, professional development opportunities, position/job announcements, grants or funding resources, etc. The list serves as one of the three major communication venues for ALAO; along with the ALAO News Blog and the ALAO Newsletter.

Thanks to the ALAO co-webmasters, Frank Bove & Karen Plummer, for getting this list set-up though the University of Akron. All current ALAO members are subscribed to this list; however, if you are experiencing difficulty with your list subscription please send details of the problem to: alao-request@lists.uakron.edu

Interest Group/Committee News

Curriculum Materials Center Interest Group

Spring Workshop
The CMCIG Spring Workshop, Dynamic CMCs: Tools to Improve Service, was held on Friday, May 18, at the Instructional Materials Center of the King Library at Miami University. Academic librarians, as well as several K-12 librarians, from Ohio, Kentucky, Michigan, and Indiana, attended the all-day event. The four sessions held during the day covered a variety of topics relevant to CMC operations. In addition to the sessions, there was a business meeting, a tour of Miami’s Instructional Materials Center, and ample opportunity for meeting with colleagues both to renew acquaintances and to talk about CMC issues and operations.

Session I was a presentation by Sara Bushong of Bowling Green State University. Sara presented a very informative and helpful session on Weeding and Cooperative Collection Development. Her thought-provoking session raised several issues that the CMCIG and OhioLINK’s Education Subject Group should consider.

Session II, Treasures of Children’s Literature at Miami University, was led by Janet Stuckey, Special Collections Librarian at the King Library. Janet gave an overview of the types of materials in Special Collections at the King Library, and then gave a very interesting talk on the children’s books in the collection.

Following Janet’s session, Frances Yates, Instructional Materials Center Librarian, gave a tour of the King Library’s beautiful IMC. Following the IMC tour, attendees split into two groups. While one group ate lunch, the other group toured the William Holmes McGuffey Museum near the King Library. The museum is in the house where McGuffey lived while he taught at Miami University.

Following lunch, Elaine Fultz, Library Media Specialist at Weller Elementary in Centerville, Ohio, gave a very informative talk on Children’s and Young Adult Literature – The Favorites, Old and New. It was very helpful for us to hear Elaine’s perspective on what kinds of books young children today are really reading.

The final session was a brief presentation by Greg Martin on The Care and Feeding of Library Student Assistants, followed by an open group discussion of issues related to hiring, training, and supervising student assistants.

The day ended with a brief business meeting, at which Ann Raney of the University of Dayton was elected co-chair for 2007-2008.

Support Staff Interest Group

ALAO SSIG held their 2007 Spring Workshop in Delaware, Ohio at Ohio Wesleyan University on Monday, May 7, 2007. The program theme was, "Succeeding In Spite of Yourself." The day started with a panel discussion entitled, "Successful Library Relationships." Peggy Rector, Denison University, Brian Hickam, University of Toledo and Louis Mays, Southern State Community College were the panel speakers. Other sessions were two library snapshots: Carol Holliger shared the Special Collections at Ohio Wesleyan University. Julie Houston brought some items and shared information from the Delaware County Historical Society. John Napp and Alice Crosetto from University of Toledo led a session called "Successful Poster Presentations." Laura Kinner and Sheryl Stevens from the University of Toledo taught "Fun and Games: Creating Lists in Millennium." Patty Bisker from Ohio Wesleyan presented "Spam...alot" talking about email spam.

Sheryl Gannon from Heidelberg College will take over as the chair of SSIG on June 7th at the 2007 Leadership Retreat. Judith Verdi from Washington State Community College in Marietta, Ohio is the secretary/chair elect. Judy Orahood is the outgoing chair.

SSIG is currently accepting nominations for the SSIG Support Staff Award of Excellence and the SSIG Award of Appreciation for 2007. The deadline is August 31, 2007. Please send nominations to Judy Orahood, Ohio Wesleyan University, L.A. Beeghly Library, 43 Rowland Ave., Delaware, Ohio 43015 or via email jaorahoo@owu.edu.

The planning committee is discussing the programs for the fall conference. Support staff watch for announcements and please attend the fall conference!

Technical, Electronic and Digital Services Interest Group

ALAO's Technical Services Interest Group (now the Technical, Electronic and Digital Services Interest Group, TEDSIG) held their Spring Meeting on the beautiful campus of Denison University in Granville, Ohio on May 4. The theme of the meeting was "Bullseye: Hitting Technical Services Target Audiences."

Keynote speaker, Carol Pitts Diedrichs, Dean of Libraries at University of Kentucky discussed advocating for technical services in her presentation "How do I Make them Understand? Advocacy in Today's Library World."

Dr. Roger Durbin, Associate Dean of University of Akron Libraries described the experience of working with trained graduate business students in preparing a marketing communications analysis and plan in "Using Campus Resources for Marketing Library Services." Head of Acquisitions and Marketing Manager of University of Akron Press, Julia Gammon presented "How to Write a Marketing Plan: Thinking Beyond the Book."

After the presentations, attendees broke out into three separate groups to address marketing technical services to library deans and directors, public services faculty and staff, and college and university faculty. Break out groups were facilitated by Durbin, Gammon, and Trisha L. Davis, Rights Management Coordinator and Head of Serials/Electronic Resources at The Ohio State University. Following break out reports, Diedrichs wrapped up the day with a synthesis of the day's events.

Diversity Committee

OSAE Diversity Workshop

Ione Damasco, Co-Chair of the Diversity Committee, attended the Ohio Society for Association Executives Diversity Workshop in April on behalf of ALAO. She was part of a panel discussion on the topic "Achieving Association/Business Goals through Diversity." Ione was able to share some of the activities the Diversity Committee has been engaged in over the past few years as positive examples of diversity in action. The workshop consisted of association executives from many different fields, ranging from accounting to psychology, and generated some good discussion on the importance of actively pursuing diversity and inclusion initiatives in any kind of organization. Joyce Wright-Harris and Kathy Williams-Wright from the Ohio College Association were also in attendance. Kathy publicly commended ALAO and the Diversity Committee for all of the hard work our member volunteers do to provide a wide variety of programming for the membership.

Diversity Scholarship Awarded to Ms. Dawn Thompson

The Diversity Committee is pleased to announce Ms. Dawn Thompson is the recipient of the annual Diversity Scholarship for the academic year 2007-2008. Ms. Thompson will be a new student in the Kent State University SLIS program in Columbus. She will be mentored by Ione Damasco, Co-Chair of the Diversity Committee, and she will attend the annual conference in October. The Committee received strong applications for the scholarship this year, and selecting an individual winner was a challenge. However, Ms. Thompson’s record of academic success, which included graduating cum laude from Otterbein College, and her commitment to serving diverse populations in both her career choices and her personal activities, made her a standout choice for this year’s scholarship. She has worked as a family support advocate, served as co-president of the Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual student group at Cleveland State, and worked as a kindergarten art teacher. In her essay, Ms. Thompson clearly demonstrated a commitment to marketing and outreach of library services to the people who need it the most:
People, children most importantly need to see that the library is invaluable to our world and to their community. They need to see diverse employees and diverse patrons taking advantage of the many services offered by our ever expanding library systems; otherwise the library system has failed that child.

The Committee is confident that Ms. Thompson will be a valuable advocate for diversity in libraries as she pursues her career in librarianship. Congratulations to Ms. Thompson! ALAO looks forward to seeing you in October!

National Legislative Day 2007

Susan Scott attended National Library Legislative Day in Washington DC, May 1 & 2nd, 2007. Susan (2nd row far right in photo at left) was one of 3 Ohio academic librarians attending the event. Ray English, Oberlin College and Susan Kroll, The Ohio State University also attended as did Jo Budler, State Librarian and several Ohio public librarians and library trustees.

May 1st was spent as a briefing day. On May 2nd, attendees met with legislators and aides on the Hill. Federal funding for libraries via The Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA), part of the annual Labor, Health and Human Services and Education Appropriations bill is an item we say thank-you for as OhioLINK and thus Ohio's academic libraries benefit from these funds. We also asked legislators to retain the President's request of $226,182,000 for LSTA in the 2008 proposed budget.

There are numerous issues of interest to librarians and in a meeting with a legislator or an aide we have limited time. However, one issue we had the chance to focus on is open access to federally funded research. In addition we asked legislators to make the critical, taxpayer-funded reports produced by the Congressional Research Services available to the public over the internet.

A highlight for me this year was the opportunity I had to work with Lynne Bradley, ALA Washington Office of Government Relations, Director for Access and Telecommunications, Government Information, and Privacy, a private consultant and an aide to Senator Sherrod Brown on a bill Senator Brown was just in the process of working on.

ALAO Website: New Digs and a New Face

Once upon a time, ALAO’s Website resided with an Internet Service Provider (ISP) called Clearlight. Located in Kent, Ohio, Clearlight was kind of a "small town" company. Clearlight’s server stability and excellent service record helped bring ALAO into the digital age. But by 2005, ALAO’s Website had outgrown its small town roots and yearned to move to the "big city" and incorporate all the bells and whistles that additional functionality might bring for its users. Co-Webmaster Frank Bove (University of Akron) and I set forth to make this dream come true.

Phase 1: Identifying a New ISP and Developing a Redesign Plan.

Working as efficiently as a top-notch real estate agent, Frank investigated a number of different companies to provide a new home for our beloved website. Looking for features such as additional server space; extended database and scripting support; multimedia features; e-commerce support; multiple domain hosting; content management system support; password-based security; and extended capabilities for communications (blogs, wikis, surveys, listservs, organizational email accounts, etc.), he identified a company called Bluehost Inc., located in Orem, Utah. This company provided the functionality that we were searching for and provided their services at less annual cost. It worked out to a simple formula: [More Stuff] + [Less Cost] = Happy ALAO!

The idea of moving the site to new digs was exciting enough, but our site was looking a little old and frayed around the edges. The site had undergone many nips and tucks over the years, but never a full-blown redesign so as my colleague investigated new homes for the site, I began working on a plan for a major face lift based on years of feedback from our membership. This process entailed not only putting together a new look and feel for the site that included standards-compliant code, but also reorganizing the multiple pages on the server to be more intuitive and efficient. At the annual ALAO Leadership Retreat in June 2006, Frank put forth a proposal for moving to Bluehost and I presented a number of possible design concepts for the new site. The Executive Board gave the go-ahead, approving the proposal for a new ISP and selecting a new design for the site. Woo hoo! We were on our way!

Phase 2: A Move and a Face Lift.

With approvals in hand, Frank and I began a year-long journey to re-code, reorganize, and move http://www.alaoweb.org/ to its new home, which went live in May 2006. The journey has certainly had its ups and downs, including broken links, corrupted tables, panic attacks, frustration, and outdated pages. There’s a lot of satisfaction is getting the new site up and functional even while some updating, tweaking, and other general fix-it work remains before we can close the door on this phase of the project. Soon we’ll be ready to move to phase 3 infrastructure changes, which include implementing a content management system for the site; expanding and enhancing the membership database; and developing a full index for the site. Additionally, we’ll create documentation for the site’s care and maintenance.

Thank You!

As we wrap up work on Phase 2, Frank and I would like to take this opportunity to express our heartfelt thanks to the members of the ALAO Executive Board for their patience, support, and assistance and to the general ALAO membership for their suggestions, patience and kind words. And as in the past, PLEASE, dear ALAO members, if you see problems or have suggestions concerning the website, email webmaster@alaoweb.org! We couldn’t do this without your input!

Feature Articles

Education Grant Paves the Way for Two Presentations at the Electronic Resources and Libraries Conference

Deberah England, ALAO Continuing Education Grant Award recipient, utilized her grant to present two programs at the Electronic Resource and Libraries Conference held in Atlanta on February 22-24. Deberah's second program, co-presented with Tina Feick, Vice President of Customer Relations for Swets Information Services, was well received to a packed house.

Below is the blurb from "e-Notes" Swets' Client Newsletter dated February 2007:

ACRL Conference Encourages New Avenues of Communication with Students

As a first time attendee of the ACRL conference in Baltimore, I found the event enlightening and overwhelming. My very first stop was the famous ACRL poster sessions. Talk about information overload. I now have a lot more empathy for first time users of my large academic library! Nonetheless, I was able to get a lot of helpful flyers from the session even if I wasn’t able to talk directly with the presenter. It is great that the ACRL has provided a poster sessions abstracts. This way you can contact presenters regarding the sessions even after the conference. The networking opportunities from Baltimore never stop.

What really left an impression on me from the conference is that we must change our style of communicating to students. Luz P. Mangurian a designer of an innovative information literacy program and professor emerita from Towson University presented a paper titled "Learning, Emotion and their Application for Teaching." Dr. Mangurian claims that the lecture is not the most effective teaching method for our students. She stressed that we must incorporate visual, auditory and tactile information into our classroom presentations. There are limits on people’s ability to pay attention. To keep students from nodding off Dr. Mangurian suggested having students contrast ideas. This keeps the synapses firing and the heads off the tables! While many of us already know that lectures are not the best way to impart wisdom about the library it is refreshing to hear a professional say people can only inhale so much information at once. The good news is that Dr. Mangurian assures us that students still need us to distinguish good information!

On another happy note, I learned in the session, "Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Library?" that group instruction was the most effective way to get across information literacy. It might surprise some to know that one-on-one instruction came in second. The researchers attributed this to the factor that it is hard to keep up the same level of enthusiasm if you are conducting a lot of one-on-one sessions covering the same materials in a small time period. You see, we need to keep our synapses firing too! In the same panel session it was mentioned by Don Latham from Florida State University that students feel they learn the most from other students. I am wracking my brain to think of new creative ways to incorporate peer-to-peer learning in my library sessions. Of course there was talk in sessions and chatter in the conference hallways about reaching out to students with gaming or using new social software. Before it had seemed a little silly for a librarian to have a Facebook account but now I can see the benefits of meeting up with our students in their own world. And I think we all know that our students’ world has been taken over by Facebook!

Not only do we need to change the way we interact with students but with faculty as well. Librarians are a very vital aspect of the campus community. It was really great to see the program "Librarians as Academic Leaders: Uniquely Qualified for the Job." This session really brought to the forefront how important it is for librarians to be involved with such things as curriculum planning and accreditation.

I must say a week after the conference and I still feel energized by the keynote speakers John Waters and Dr. Michael Eric Dyson. Both speakers focused on how important it is to get people into the actual library. Waters suggested that we go though books and put a post-it-note on the "good parts." Dr. Dyson assured us not to worry that many students get their news from John Stewart on the Daily Show. He told us that as librarians we must be ready to provide more in-depth information than a television show can. Dr Dyson said he knew he was preaching to the choir but "Sometimes the choir needs to sing louder!" I think that is true; there is a place for librarians in this super information age. It might be on a campus committee, a Facebook account or even in the virtual world.

Xudong Jin’s Study Leave to China Set the Stage for Continuing Cooperation

From July 17th to 21st 2006, Xudong Jin, Associate Director of Libraries and Head of Technical Services at Ohio Wesleyan University, led a five-librarian delegation from CALAMW (Chinese American Librarians Association Midwest Chapter) to conduct a five-day seminar entitled "CALA Twenty-first Century Librarian Seminar Series" in China. The delegation consisted of four other Chinese librarians from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Oberlin College, the Western Kentucky University, and the University of Illinois at Chicago. The seminar was co-sponsored by the Yunnan Provincial Commission of Academic Libraries (YPCAL), the CALAMW and Yunnan University. It focused on providing a practical way to examine librarianship in the United States. More than 100 librarians from China participated in the event. The topics covered included library management, reference and instruction, cataloging and digital libraries, library consortium and outsourcing and challenges and opportunities to name a few. Feedback from participants was very positive. In his letter to Xudong Jin, Dr. Yonglin Wan, Vice-Chair and the YPCAL and Library Director of Yunnan University, said, "We believe that the program you and the other four CALA members conducted has promoted the already-established academic exchange between librarians in China and those in the United States. We appreciate your contributions."

In fact, the seminar turned out to be so successful that the YPCAL requested that the group return again. After sending their librarians to the seminar, three other institutions, the Yunnan Library Association, the Northeast Normal University in Jilin Province, and the Shanxi Agricultural University in Shanxi Province in China, also made agreements with CALA, which means there will be four groups from CALA going to China to conduct the CALA Twenty-first Century Librarian Seminar Series in summer 2007. ALA International Leads reported on this seminar in Volume 20, No. 4 in December 2006 (see http://www.ala.org/ala/irrt/intlleads/leadsarchive/200612.pdf)

During his study leave last summer, Xudong Jin presented a paper entitled "Human Touch of Library Management in the United States - Personal Experiences of Creating and Developing a Harmonious Environment" at the Library Society of China 2006 Conference in Kunming, China. His paper was selected for the Second Award for the LSC Best Papers Contest and was published in the Chinese Librarianship: an International Electronic Journal (http://www.iclc.us/cliej/cl22.htm) in the United States in December 2006 (http://white-clouds.com/iclc/cliej/cl22.htm)

Xudong Jin also taught a seminar entitled "Practices of Technical Services, Resources Sharing, and Acquisitions in Academic Libraries in the U.S." at the Shanghai Commission of Academic Libraries on July 12th and was invited to visit the Shanghai University of Political Science and Law on July 13th. The Vice President and Library Director of the university met him during his visit.

Recently, Xudong Jin was elected as CALA (Chinese American Librarians Association) Vice-President/President Elect for 2008/2009. CALA is an affiliate of the American Library Association.

People and Library News

Bowling Green State University - Firelands College

William W. Currie retired on 1 May, 2007 from Firelands College of Bowling Green State University where he had served for 26 years, the last 17 as Librarian. William has been an ALAO member since 1981. His successor is Sharon Britton of Hamilton College in New York.

Patricia Antonelli, Assistant Librarian, BGSU Firelands & Nashieli Marcano, Assistant Professor of Bibliography, University of Akron, had an article published in the Spring 2007 AURCO Journal. Title: "Classroom or Online? A Comparison of Learning Venues for Information Literacy".

Denison University

At the ALAO SSIG 2007 Spring Workshop entitled Succeeding in Spite of Ourselves held May 7, 2007 at the L. A. Beeghly Library on the campus of Ohio Wesleyan University, Peggy Rector, Denison University, served on the morning Panel Presentation and Discussion "Successful Library Relationships".

Miami University

Jen-chien Yu, Electronic Services librarian and data specialist at Miami University Libraries, has been awarded continuing contract status and has been promoted to associate librarian. Yu received her MLIS in 2000 from the University of Pittsburgh and has been at Miami since 2001. Yu’s areas of research interest include data literacy and online information literacy tutorials

After 32 years of service, Humanities Librarian William A. Wortman has retired from the Miami University Libraries. Bill was responsible for collection development and reference services in English, French and Italian, German, and Theatre. In his time with the libraries, Bill has contributed greatly to his campus, community and profession, both through service and scholarship. He has published articles and papers on the subjects of collection management and English literature, as well three books, the most recent being Literature in English: A Guide for Librarians in the Digital Age. Bill is also the director and founder of the Native American Women Playwrights Archive, a collection of original materials by Native women playwrights of the Americas. Bill’s knowledge, expertise and enthusiasm for librarianship and higher education will be greatly missed.

Oberlin Collegee

CALA 21st Century Librarian Seminar Program
Two ALAO members, Haipeng Li at Oberlin College, Xudong Jin at Ohio Wesleyan University, along with Professor and Chinese Studies Librarian at Ohio State University, Guoqing Li, are spearheading a new initiative for the Chinese American Librarians Association (CALA), a national organization that has over a 1,000 registered members. The purpose of this program is to promote global library exchange between libraries and librarians in China and the US. This year the program includes sending four CALA delegations to China to conduct training seminars on the practical aspects of librarianship. Haipeng Li is current president of CALA, and Xudong Jin and Guoqing Li are co-chairs of the CALA International Relations Committee. Under their leadership, four Chinese institutions and library associations have agreed to collaborate with CALA this year to conduct regional training workshops which will benefit many librarians from several regions in the Southwest, North, and Northeast of China. The CALA Board has approved this to be an ongoing project for the organization, serving as the library ambassador between American and Chinese libraries, and in the meantime to provide more professional opportunities for those who need them. Plans for the future are underway to cover other areas as well, including the Northwest, Central, and Southeastern regions in China.

If anyone would like to know more about the program, please go to the CALA website at http://www.cala-web.org/, and click on the link "CALA Twenty-first Century Librarian Seminar Series," or contact one of us for more information:

Haipeng Li, Oberlin College: haipeng.li@oberlin.edu
Xudong Jin, Ohio Wesleyan University: xdjin@owu.edu
Guoqing Li, Ohio State University: li.272@osu.edu

Ohio Dominican University

Evelyn Burns has been promoted to Electronic Services Librarian at Ohio Dominican University Library. Evelyn received her MLS from Kent State in December 2005.

Ohio State University – Marion

Patricia Wood, Library Associate, Marion Campus, graduated March 18 from The Ohio State University with a Bachelor's degree in Psychology and a Minor in English.

Ohio Wesleyan University

Clinton Baugess joined Ohio Wesleyan University Library to serve as new Technical Services and Government Document Assistant in December 2006. Clinton completed his Bachelor of Arts in May 2006 from the College of Wooster. He worked three years in the College of Wooster libraries as a Student Coordinator, and has experience in supervision and training of new student employees. During two years of summer employment in the library he worked in the Technical Services Department of the College of Wooster Library. Under the supervision of the Serials Manager Mr. Baugess assisted with serials check-in, preparation of bindery shipments, and participated in editing records in CONSORT’s shared catalog. After training, Clinton has been working independently on cataloging and processing government documents and coordinating the library gift materials. He is also involved in other library team work such as the LIS Retreat Team and the LIS Celebration of Scholarship.

University of Akron

Congratulations to Jo Ann Calzonetti and Lori Fielding! Jo Ann has received indefinite tenure and has been promoted to Professor; Lori has received indefinite tenure and has been promoted to Associate Professor.

Mae Schreiber, Associate Professor of Bibliography and Government Documents Librarian, will be retiring at the end of July. Mae has worked in the University Libraries for 18 years, during that time she has been a valued colleague and mentor and she will be greatly missed.

Valerie Jenkins, John Kline & Joy Ramos have been promoted to Library Cataloging Specialists. Also, Donna Lanik, Teri Mackey, and Marie Zufall have been promoted to Library Specialist.

The following University Libraries employees were honored earlier this spring for their service to the University of Akron, congratulations everyone!

• Shelle Davis -- 5 years
• Chris Laursen -- 5 years
• Valerie Jenkins -- 15 years
• Marcia Nicholson -- 20 years
• Diana Chlebek -- 20 years
• Joe LaRose -- 20 years
• Bennie Robinson -- 20 years
• Teri Mackey -- 20 years
• John Miller -- 35 years

University of Toledo

At the ALAO SSIG 2007 Spring Workshop entitled Succeeding in Spite of Ourselves held May 7, 2007 at the L. A. Beeghly Library on the campus of Ohio Wesleyan University, John Napp and Alice Crosetto, University of Toledo, presented Successful Poster Sessions and Presentations; Laura Kinner and Sheryl Stevens, University Toledo, presented Fun and Games: Creating Lists in Millennium; and Brian Hickam, University of Toledo, served on the morning Panel Presentation and Discussion.

Alice Crosetto, University of Toledo, and Polly Wilkenfeld, Ursuline College, had the chapter "Responding to the Needs of our Graduate Students: a Pilot Information Literacy Course in Graduate Education," published in Trudi Jacobson’s latest work on Information Literacy entitled Information Literacy Collaborations That Work. Eds. Trudi E. Jacobson and Thomas P. Mackey. New York: Neal-Schuman. 2007. 33-55.

Barbara Floyd, Director of the Ward M. Canaday Center for Special Collections, has been elected 2007-08 Chair of the Main Campus Faculty Senate.

Gregory Johnson has been hired as Digital Initiatives Archivist for the Ward M. Canaday Center. It is a 3-year Visiting Instructor position.

Jolene Miller, Coordinator of Information Services, Mulford Health Science Library, achieved Distinguished level in the Medical Library Association's Academy of Health Information Professionals (AHIP), a peer-reviewed professional development and recognition credentialing for medical and health care librarians.

Wittenberg University

Gina Entorf, Reference Librarian, Associate Professor, and Information Literacy Coordinator, will be retiring at the end of summer. Gina has been at Wittenberg University since 1973. Over the years she has been liaison to numerous departments, worked with University archives, supervised students and interns, hosted international students, and she has taken a sabbatical to teach library science in China. Dubbed the "Info Queen" by two of her co-librarians, she has been a mentor and friend to many. Her retirement plans include putting the yarn and fabric that she has collected over the years to good use and learning how to use a chainsaw.

Douglas K. Lehman, Director of Thomas Library, Wittenberg University, has been elected to the SOCHE Library Council Executive Committee as a member-at-large. He will serve in this position for the 2007-08 year. Also, Mr. Lehman delivered the keynote address at the Dade County Library Association's Library Fair held at Carlos Albizu University in Miami, Florida on March 21. His presentation, "The Crisis In Scholarly Communication: Why Open Access Matters To All Librarians!", explored the problems surrounding the current scholarly communication and publishing model and why the open access movement provides a solution to the problem.

About the ALAO Newsletter

ALAO Newsletter Publication Information

The ALAO Newsletter is published four times a year by the Academic Library Association of Ohio, in September, December, March, and June. It is made available as a benefit of membership. The purpose of the ALAO Newsletter is to advance the goals of the organization and serve the membership.

Deadlines for Contributors:
August 15, November 15, February 15, May 15.

Submission Guidelines:
We reserve the right to edit for space and clarity. Please send officer reports and feature articles copy to Lindsay Midkiff Miller and membership news (people and library news items) to Lori J. Fieldingin electronic format, preferably as an electronic mail Word document attachment or within the body of an email message. Include your name as you wish it to appear. If you are past deadline, PLEASE call Lindsay Midkiff Miller!

The Academic Library Association of Ohio assumes no responsibility for the statements and opinions of the contributors to this publication. Editorial views do not necessarily represent the official position of ALAO.

Editor:
Lindsay Midkiff Miller
Phone: 513-529-8035
Email: newslettereditor@alaoweb.org