Spring 2020 Intersections

Intersections

Spring 2020

People

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Information

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Te c h n o l o g y

Spring 2020 School of Information Sciences University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Intersections is published by the iSchool Communications Office. For more information or to submit story ideas, please contact brya@illinois.edu.

Dean: Eunice E. Santos Editor: Cindy Ashwill Managing Editor: Cindy Brya Contributing Writers: Cindy Ashwill, Cindy Brya Photography: Cindy Brya, L. Brian Stauffer, Thompson-McClellan Photography Design: Pat Mayer

Intersections

Contents

Downs Intellectual Freedom Award

Richardson presents keynote

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501 East Daniel Street Champaign, Illinois 61820 ischool@illinois.edu Phone: (217) 333-3280

People use information for analysis, inquiry, collaboration, and play—and in so doing, change the world. The iSchool at Illinois is dedicated to shaping the future of information through research, education, and engagement, both public and professional. Intersections highlights our current work in these areas as well as achievements of our students, alumni, faculty, and staff.

On the cover: Altgeld Hall, which was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1970, was constructed in 1896-1897 and was first used as the University Library.

The University Chime was installed in the Altgeld Tower one hundred years ago this year.

Bashir receives $4M from NSF

Bales retires

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News Letter from the dean

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iSchool research partnership promotes positive health outcomes

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Smith returns to iSchool

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New administrative roles for Knox and Pintar

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New faces—Spring 2020

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Renear joins Provost’s leadership team as special advisor

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Orozco Villicana receives NAGAP Future Leader Award

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Tilley to serve on the 2020 Ringo Awards jury

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2019 Downs Intellectual Freedom Award given to the Education Justice Project

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Pinkney receives grant from the Caxton Club

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Wolske joins Journal of Community Informatics editorial board

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Adams receives recognition for nonprofit work

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iSchool at Illinois announced as 2020 Student Chapter of the Year Award winner

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Richardson presents data visualization research in keynote and competition

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Research NSF grant to accelerate synthetic biology discoveries

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Schneider receives grant for reducing spread of retracted science

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Schwebel discusses Island of the Blue Dolphins and NPS web resource

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Grant to help community organizations tell their stories

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Chan receives fellowship, Fulbright grant

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Chin receives NIH grant for study of false HPV-vaccine information

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Underwood to explore consequences of error in digital libraries

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Bashir receives an additional $4M from NSF for cybersecurity scholarships

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He coauthors book on user behavior modeling

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Bonn and alumni receive LPC Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Library Publishing

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Features iSchool response to COVID-19

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Weech celebrates forty years at iSchool

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Gorrell coauthors paper on designing trans technology

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This Is MY Fort! and What Is Inside THIS Box? receive Gryphon Award

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Creswell accepted into Librarian-in-Residence program at Library of Congress

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Student consulting team examines impact of autonomous vehicles on insurance industry

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Alumni Cubs fan, researcher Bales retires from librarianship

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Leep experience valuable in today’s remote workplace

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Three alumni and current student named 2020 Movers and Shakers

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Giving Get to know Laura Fruhauff, MS student and scholarship recipient

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Richardson legacy to live on through new award

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Leep program, scholarship help student realize goal of LIS degree

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Class Notes

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News

Intersections Spring 2020

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Letter from the dean

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am pleased to write this letter and share with you the accomplishments of our iSchool community. The past semester has been challenging, but the work of our faculty, staff,

students, and alumni has been inspiring. These efforts have enabled our continued teaching, research, and operations while supporting a range of activities to combat the effects of COVID-19.

In spite of the pandemic, our School’s excellence endures. This issue of Intersections highlights new roles and faces, accomplishments and awards, and projects supported by prestigious funding agencies. Our research is truly interdisciplinary but consistently focused on the empowerment of individuals and overarching social benefit. As evidenced in the stories that follow, our projects support wellness, education, privacy and safety, gender equity, and community resources as well as the validity of research on which important decisions are based.

Faculty hiring continues to be a top priority for the iSchool. By building faculty strength in numbers, we add to the diversity of teaching and research that distinguishes our School and enhances the student experience. Bringing new perspectives into the classroom expands the breadth and depth of learning and leads to positive student outcomes. At the iSchool, we prepare students to be critical thinkers and fair-minded leaders whose contributions make a meaningful difference.

“Our research is truly

We are proud of our alumni and encourage you to stay involved with our School. Please consider mentoring a current student, hosting a practicum, or hiring a student intern. These

interdisciplinary but

opportunities are extremely valuable to students and provide great benefits to alumni. Your

consistently focused on

experiences and insights enhance the student learning experience and are more important

the empowerment of individuals and overarching

now than ever before.

Sincerely,

social benefit.�

Eunice Santos, Dean

iSchool research partnership promotes positive health outcomes

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he Illinois Center for Health Informatics (CHI), a partnership between the Grainger College of Engineering and the iSchool, focuses on the promotion of positive local and global health outcomes through research innovation. It provides a home for multidisciplinary research teams to work with the broader health community to enhance impact on health through the advanced management, analysis, and representation of data and information. Directed by iSchool Research Scientist Ian Brooks, CHI works in collaboration with the WHO, PAHO, Mayo Clinic, and other state and local organizations. Key projects include pandemic and infodemic response, digital health fact sheets, spread of clinical innovations, and informatics support.

Intersections Spring 2020

3 New administrative roles for Knox and Pintar

Smith returns to iSchool

P Emily Knox

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Judith Pinter

ssociate Professor Emily Knox has been named interim associate dean for academic affairs for the iSchool. In this role, she will provide leadership and oversight for academic programs, including program development, curriculum coordination, and continuous improvement of educational experiences. Knox most recently served as the School’s first program director for the new BS/IS degree. Associate Professor Kate McDowell, who previously held the position of interim associate dean for academic affairs, stepped down to return to her teaching and research.

“With the introduction of our undergraduate degree, administrative coordination of our academic programs is crucial to fulfilling the School’s mission to shape the future of information research, education, and engagement. I’m looking forward to continuing Kate’s work to stabilize and improve our curricula as we grow as a School,” Knox said.

Teaching Associate Professor Judith Pintar will serve as acting BS/IS program director.

“Our undergraduate program officially opens this fall, with a slate of courses being taught for the first time, and many new teaching adventures for faculty in store,” Pintar said. “I’m happy to step in for Emily during this transition year, working with Melissa Newell and the rest of the undergraduate team to help this groundbreaking program, so many years in the making, become real.”

Knox, the iSchool’s 2019-2020 Centennial Scholar, serves on the boards of the Freedom to Read Foundation, Beta Phi Mu, Association for Information Science & Technology (ASIS&T), and National Coalition Against Censorship. Her research interests include information access, intellectual freedom and censorship, information ethics, information policy, and the intersection of print culture and reading practices. She received her PhD from the School of Communication and Information at Rutgers University and her MS from the iSchool at Illinois.

Pintar’s research interests include digital storytelling, game studies, and the development of interactive and narrative AI. She serves as director of Games @ Illinois: Playful Design for Transformative Education, a project funded by the Provost’s Investment for Growth program. Pintar earned her PhD in sociology from Illinois.

rofessor Emerita Linda C. Smith has returned to the iSchool on a part-time basis as interim executive associate dean for faculty affairs. In this role, she will provide leadership for iSchool faculty affairs and administrative oversight for the work of the School’s associate deans.

Smith retired as professor and executive associate dean in 2019. During her 42-year career at the iSchool, she taught courses concerning information organization and access, reference and information services, and information sources and services in the sciences; advised many doctoral students; and served for 20 years as associate dean for academic programs including Leep online.

“I am grateful for the opportunity to return to the iSchool in this new role with a focus on support for faculty development during a period of rapid growth and change under the leadership of Dean Santos,” Smith said.

Smith is the recipient of numerous honors, including ALISE awards for her teaching, service, and contributions to LIS education; the Award of Merit and Outstanding Information Science Teacher Award from ASIS&T; the Beta Phi Mu Award for distinguished service; selection as a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science; and recognition as an Illinois Library Luminary. She is a prolific writer who has authored books, journal articles, chapters, reports, and conference papers. Routinely named to the University's List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent, she was selected as a University Distinguished Teacher-Scholar in 1999.

Smith received her MS/LIS from Illinois, MS in information and computer science from Georgia Institute of Technology, and PhD in information transfer from Syracuse University.

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News

New faces — Spring 2020 Welcome to new staff who have joined the iSchool since the fall semester!

Donnita Harris Administrative Aide Harris supports the associate dean for administration and the Administrative Leadership Team.

Emma Lipka Recruitment and Yield Specialist Lipka works with graduate students throughout the admissions process.

Whitney McComas Instructional Technology Support Specialist McComas supports instructors with instructional technologies, such as the course management system and Zoom.

Brett Peugh Endpoint Services Specialist Peugh orders, installs, and provides second-level tech support for the laptops and desktops in the School.

Lindsey Sharp Senior Instructional Technology Support Specialist Sharp supports instructional technologies, such as the course management system and Zoom.

Tony Torres Academic Advisor and Coordinator of Undergraduate Affairs Torres will advise and support BS/IS students as well as manage student engagement, support, and outreach for the undergraduate program.

Orozco Villicana receives NAGAP Future Leader Award Renear joins Provost’s leadership team as special advisor

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rofessor Allen Renear has joined Provost Andreas C. Cangellaris’ leadership team as special advisor for strategic initiatives. Working closely with academic and research units, Renear will provide analysis, guidance, and leadership with the planning, coordination, and launch of selected strategic initiatives in the University’s Strategic Plan, The Next 150.

According to Provost Cangellaris, priority will be given to activities and programs in support of the digital transformation initiative; graduate, professional, and continuing education at the intersection of disciplines; and workforce-development strategies across the public and private sectors through the Discovery Partners Institute and the Illinois Innovation Network.

Renear joined the University of Illinois in 2001 and is a faculty member in the iSchool, where he served as associate dean for research and, from 2012 to 2019, as dean.

Renear’s current research focuses on the development of formal ontologies for scientific and cultural objects and the application of those ontologies in information system design, scientific publishing, and data curation in the sciences and humanities. His publications include articles in Communications of the ACM and Science as well as in journals and conference proceedings in library and information science.

He holds an affiliate appointment in the Department of Philosophy.

Prior to his appointment at Illinois, Renear was director of the Scholarly Technology Group at Brown University. He has served as president of the Association for Computers and the Humanities (ACH) and was a distinguished visiting fellow at the Oxford University Computing Unit, a member of the advisory board of the Text Encoding Initiative, and the first chair of the Open eBook Publication Structure Working Group (the predecessor to ePUB, now the standard data format for eBooks). Renear received an AB from Bowdoin College and a PhD from Brown University.

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oises Orozco Villicana, director of enrollment management is the recipient of the 2020 Future Leader Award from the Association for Graduate Enrollment Management (NAGAP). The award is presented annually to individuals who have “clearly exhibited leadership qualities and an enthusiasm for the graduate enrollment management (GEM) profession that distinguishes them as a rising leader in NAGAP and the field.”

Orozco Villicana has extensive experience in student services in higher education and in national professional organizations. Prior to joining the iSchool in 2016, he served as associate director for recruitment and admissions in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois. He holds a BA in sociology, law, and society, with a minor in education from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and a Master of Education and PhD in educational policy studies from Illinois.

“The NAGAP Future Leader Award is incredibly meaningful to me because the selection committee consists of fellow GEM professionals,” said Orozco Villicana. “This award is a professional affirmation that the work being done at the School of Information Sciences matters, especially as we seek to diversify the information profession and strive to be a model of excellence to others in recruitment and yield practices. I would like to thank both Linda Smith and Meg Edwards for their thoughtful nomination and unwavering support.”

As the winner of the Future Leader Award, Orozco Villicana received a registration reimbursement and two nights of hotel lodging for a professional development institute of his choice as well as a check for $500.

Tilley to serve on 2020 Ringo Awards jury

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ssociate Professor Carol Tilley has been selected as a judge for the 2020 Ringo Awards for achievement in comic books. Tilley is part of a five-member esteemed jury representing a cross-section of the comic book industry, which includes educators, publishers, press, and creators across numerous genres. Unlike other professional industry awards, the Mike Wieringo (Ringo) Comic Book Industry Awards include fan participation in the nomination process.

“I’m honored to be a judge for the 2020 Ringo Awards, which celebrate in part the connections comics help make between creators and fans,” said Tilley. “The comics industry—like nearly every creative industry—is undergoing profound changes due to COVID-19, making it even more essential to recognize the people who make such outstanding storytelling through a combination of words and images possible. My experience serving as a juror for the Will Eisner Comics Industry Awards in 2016 taught me that even after nearly fifty years of reading comics and more than twenty years of studying them, I still have so much to learn about them. I have no doubt that my experience as a Ringo Awards juror will reveal the same.”

The 2020 Ringo Awards will be presented on October 24 at the Baltimore Comic-Con.

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News

2019 Downs Intellectual Freedom Award given to the Education Justice Project

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or its defense of the First Amendment rights of incarcerated individuals, the Education Justice Project (EJP) has earned the 2019 Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award. EJP is a social justice and academic community of incarcerated students, educators, formerly incarcerated individuals, family members of the incarcerated, and others. Based at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, EJP offers educational programs to eligible individuals incarcerated at Danville Correctional Center (DCC), a men’s medium-security state prison 35 miles from the Urbana campus.

During the past year, more than 200 books were removed, censored, or banned from the EJP library at the DCC. Among these titles were Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington; Don’t Shoot: One Man, A Street Fellowship, and The End of Violence in Inner-City America by David M. Kennedy; Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?: And Other Conversations About Race, by Beverly Daniel Tatum; and Visiting Day, a children’s book by Jacqueline Woodson about visiting a parent in prison.

According to EJP Director Rebecca Ginsburg, the books on race were removed from the library because prison staff considered them to be “divisive.” Members of the EJP community, including EJP/DCC librarian Holly Clingan (MS ’16), worked to inform the public that these materials had been removed, following unsuccessful meetings with DCC staff and Department of Corrections officials to have materials returned.

Ultimately, their efforts led to a state legislative hearing, and all the books that EJP submitted to be returned to the library were placed back on the shelves.

“Education Justice Project has demonstrated its commitment to ensuring that the incarcerated individuals it serves have the fullest access possible to materials that will afford them new opportunities,” wrote nominators Associate Professor Kathryn La Barre, Associate Professor Carol Tilley, and Associate Professor Kate Williams. “For that reason, we believe EJP is deserving of this year’s Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award.”

Holly Clingan (MS ’16) and EJP alumnus Michael Tafolla, following Clingan’s testimony at the public hearing in July 2019

“Education Justice Project has demonstrated its commitment to ensuring that the incarcerated individuals it serves have the fullest access possible to materials that will afford them new opportunities.”

A reception to honor EJP took place during the Midwinter Meeting of the American Library Association in Philadelphiaa.

The Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award is presented annually to acknowledge individuals or groups who have furthered the cause of intellectual freedom, particularly as it affects libraries and information centers and the dissemination of ideas. Granted to those who have resisted censorship or efforts to abridge the freedom of individuals to read or view materials

of their choice, the award may be given in recognition of a particular action or longterm interest in, and dedication to, the cause of intellectual freedom. The award was established in 1969 by the iSchool’s faculty to honor Robert Downs, a champion of intellectual freedom, on his twenty-fifth anniversary as director of the School.

With Libraries Unlimited, an imprint of ABC-CLIO, assuming cosponsorship of the award in 2012, ABC-CLIO has been dedicated to supporting the Downs Award for more than thirty years. As a publisher committed to advancing library professional development and independent critical thought, Libraries Unlimited and the entire ABC-CLIO family are strong advocates of intellectual freedom rights and the dissemination of all ideas. The iSchool at Illinois is very honored to share sponsorship with Libraries Unlimited and appreciates the contributions it and the other imprints of ABC-CLIO have made in defending intellectual freedom through the years.

Pinkney receives grant from the Caxton Club

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ecent graduate Annabel Pinkney (MS ’20) has been awarded a grant from the Caxton Club, a not-for-profit organization devoted to the study and promotion of the book arts. The grant will support her project, “Advanced Studies of the Book Structure,” in which Pinkney is creating a portfolio of at least ten book repair treatments of varying difficulty.

“The treatments will be documented extensively to demonstrate my skill progression,” Pinkney said. “I will also construct three historic book replicas focusing on areas of bookbinding that I have not yet had an opportunity to explore.”

Pinkney is conducting the project with the guidance and support of University Library staff members Quinn Ferris, senior special collections conservator, and Jennifer Teper, head of preservation services. She hopes to conclude the project with a week-long book-making workshop at the Book and Paper Intensive in Sagatauk, Michigan.

Pinkney’s dream is to become a rare book conservator, and her iSchool coursework is helping her build the skill set she needs to reach that goal.

“After taking Bookbinding (IS 590BB) at the iSchool and working as a graduate hourly for Conservation Services, I felt inspired to continue honing my conservation skills and bookbinding craft. In addition, Bonnie Mak’s History of the Book course (IS 571) gave me a much deeper appreciation for the book and its many forms. I believe I will be a more successful conservator because of it,” she said.

Wolske joins Journal of Community

Informatics editorial board

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“Our School continues to have significant focus on information systems research and design, ensuring access to and effecctive use of digital technologies to advance well-being of people and their communities.”

eaching Assistant Professor Martin Wolske has joined the editorial board of the Journal of Community Informatics. The journal includes scholarly articles and notes from the interdisciplinary field of community informatics, which involves the study and practice of Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) in support of community-defined development goals.

“It was a great honor to receive the invitation from editor-in-chief and iSchool alum Colin Rhinesmith [PhD ’14]. I am pleased to join such an august board that also includes several colleagues who have been part of the iSchool in the past, including Caroline Haythornthwaite, Noah Lenstra, and Bharat Mehra,” Wolske said. “Our School continues to have a significant focus on information systems research and design, ensuring access to and effective use of digital technologies to advance well-being of people and their communities.”

Wolske joined the iSchool in 1995 and has served in many key roles, including interim director of the Center for Digital Inclusion (CDI) and director of Prairienet. Since the late 1990s, he has taught networking, information systems, and community informatics and engagement courses, for which he received the 2011 Library Journal Teaching Award. He has been principal investigator or co-principal investigator on a number of grants related to digital inclusion and digital literacy that have received funding through the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, the American Library Association, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services, among other agencies. Wolske also serves as a conference committee member for the Community Informatics Research Network.

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News

Adams receives recognition for nonprofit work

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ecent graduate Mia Adams’ work with local and international nonprofits has earned her a Special Recognition in Graduate Student Leadership from the Graduate College at Illinois. Adams serves as director of development and board member for Three Spinners, a nonprofit organization serving refugees and immigrants in the Champaign-Urbana community.

“In addition to filling everyday needs like disseminating information within the organization, our projects, and the community, I have been very fortunate to gain the opportunity to help instigate a new service for immigrants and refugees. Working under the authority of several local practicing attorneys, one other board member and I have been coordinating pro-bono legal clinics for local families and individuals,” said Adams of her involvement with Three Spinners.

Her interest in learning about other cultures and languages was nurtured after a three-month trip to East and South Africa during her gap year before graduate school. Adams earned her MA in African studies from Illinois and served as the president of a nongovernmental organization that works with women and girls in the areas of health and education in East Africa.

Adams’ decision to earn an LIS degree was strongly influenced by her father, Paul Adams, who served as the iSchool’s director

of community networking in the 1990s and 2000s.

“My father always encouraged me to tack on an LIS degree to whatever career I chose. He would always emphasize how relevant and versatile the degree is, so I knew that I would pursue an LIS degree eventually,” said Adams.

Paul played a key role in the School’s public engagement efforts, including serving as director of Prairienet, ChampaignUrbana’s first community information network. His many projects included collaboration with the African islands of São Tomé and Príncipe to build computer labs in schools, libraries, and government offices and to provide technical training that empowered local residents.

In his first years as director of Prairienet, he took iSchool students and faculty, and his wife and two daughters, to East St. Louis

to build computer labs in community spaces. Spread out over the course of several years, this work is something Mia looks back on with great joy, and she sees the parallels between that volunteer work when she was a child and the work she currently does in the community.

“Following in my father’s footsteps, I am most interested in serving marginalized groups through digital and media literacy programming. My focus during my studies has been community engagement and community informatics,” she said.

Her father passed away suddenly in the summer of 2018, but not before they found out she had been admitted to the iSchool.

“I am thankful every day that I got to share this joy with him,” said Adams.

Now that she has earned her MS/LIS, Adams plans to take a gap year to rest, work, and save money for an advanced degree in social work from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

“My ultimate goal is to work with nonprofit organizations creating digital literacy programming for marginalized populations.

I have a strong passion for working specifically with women and children, immigrants, and refugees, but I would be happy working with any marginalized groups, so long as I can help people seek educational opportunities and self-enlightenment through the development of digital literacy skills,” she said.

iSchool at Illinois announced as 2020 Student Chapter of the Year Award winner

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he American Library Association’s New Members Round Table (NMRT) Student Chapter of the Year Award (SCOTYA) Committee named the University of Illinois as the winner of the 2020 ALA Student Chapter of the Year Award. The SCOTYA Committee was impressed by the engagement of iSchool’s ALA Student Chapter, which includes 103 active members and 245 total members. The members are very active with programs, projects, activities, and events, holding monthly meetings to encourage participation. The chapter used a variety of communication tools, such as Web 2.0 technologies, listservs, publications, flyers, and website development. Through the hard work of its members, this chapter has made significant contributions to the School and ALA. -Adapted from an American Library Association news release

Richardson presents data visualization research in keynote and competition

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hD student Courtney Richardson was the keynote speaker for “Storytelling with Data,” a webinar hosted by LACONI (Library Administrators Conference of Northern Illinois) on April 10. The webinar taught participants how they can interpret and communicate library information to community stakeholders using persuasive storytelling and data visualization.

In her talk, “Telling a Story with Data from an Artist’s Perspective,” Richardson discussed how she creates visualization projects in order to present archival material to the public.

“My presentation highlighted some key aspects to consider when telling a story with data (e.g., audience, structure, visual tools/principles, etc.). I also discussed case studies from my own presentations in art research to demonstrate various ways of visually relaying a message to connect with various audiences,” she said.

Her talk was followed by a brief overview of how librarian KatieRose McEneely (MS ’12) uses dashboards to communicate library data to Rosalind Franklin University’s administration, faculty, and staff.

Richardson’s research interests relate to spaces of art, design, and historical information and involve the exploration of how their intersections can increase and enhance public access to knowledge. She is currently working on a textile/fabric art project in order to research and re-present historical data of an eighteenth-century manuscript concerning the migration of Black Americans from America to Nova Scotia (see below). Richardson received her MFA in art from Wayne State University, where she also taught as a graphic design lecturer.

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ichardson also won second place in the Graduate College’s Image of Research competition for her image, “Complicating Matters of Cultural Historical Information Reproduction through Art and Design: A Material/Visual Study on Emigration Data about the Black Loyalists.”

According to Richardson, "This image displays an in-progress state of my visual study: a textile/fabric iteration of a historically based dataset. This 2016 dataset is a simplified and incomplete copy of an 18thcentury handwritten manuscript entitled, Book of Negroes. The registry documents the biographical material of 3,000 Black Americans (historically labeled the Black Loyalists) who emigrated from New York (America) to Nova Scotia (Canada) at the end of the American Revolution. This process image is part of a larger study that uses art and design to explore questions on how incomplete historical material can matter in relation to human interaction and experience. 1,000+ names of the Black Loyalists are re-presented as traveling across the fabric. While working closely with these names (optically and tangibly), I noticed how I viewed them as surrogates for the actual

migrants who traveled across land and water. This resulted in me working less mechanically and more intuitively, prioritizing name placement based on possible familial connections over that of abstract rules for structure and arrangement. The latest intervention with embroidery retraces my deci-

sions for arrangement. While working, thoughts of repeated joining and disjoining of relationships and mis/re-identification of individuals emerged, complicating perceived experiences of the Black Loyalists,” said Richardson.

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10 Intersections Spring 2020

Research

NSF grant to accelerate synthetic biology discoveries J. Stephen Downie

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multi-institutional $1.2M grant from the National Science Foundation will accelerate discovery and exploration of the synthetic biology design space. Professor and Associate Dean for Research J. Stephen Downie serves as a principal investigator on the project, “Synthetic Biology Knowledge Systems,” which brings together researchers from the University of Illinois; University of Utah; University of California, San Diego; Virginia Commonwealth University; Worcester Polytechnic Institute; and the nonpartisan and objective research organization NORC at the University of Chicago.

During the course of the two-year project, a multidisciplinary team of biological engineers, machine learning experts, data scientists, library scientists, and social scien-

Jacob Jett tists will build a knowledge system integrating disparate data and publication repositories. The goal will be to deliver effective and efficient information access to researchers who are currently using a trial-and-error approach because reliable information about prior experiments does not exist.

According to Postdoctoral Research Associate Jacob Jett (MS ’07, CAS ’10, PhD ’19), a lead researcher on the project, machine learning methods like named entity recognition, topic modeling, and word embeddings will be used to mine information from the existing synthetic biology literature.

“The results of these machine learning processes will be reconciled and grounded using existing knowledge representations of

real-world entities like organisms, genes, proteins, and cell parts through ontologies and controlled vocabularies like the Gene Ontology, the Sequence Ontology, and the National Center for Biotechnology Information’s organism taxonomy, among other vocabulary resources,” Jett said.

The Illinois team will help build an information retrieval recommender system for the scientists and advise on the ontologies and metadata.

“Synthetic biology has a transformative potential in applications from energy, agriculture, materials, and health. Our participation in this important project illustrates how the iSchool can make unique contributions to harnessing the data revolution,” Downie said.

Schneider receives grant for reducing spread of retracted science

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he Alfred P. Sloan Foundation has awarded Assistant Professor Jodi Schneider a $174,981 grant for reducing the spread of retracted research. When retracted papers are cited both before and after retraction, the scientific publication network inadvertently propagates potentially faked data, fundamental errors, and unreproducible results.

According to Schneider, a retracted source paper concerning a fraudulent trial of blood pressure medication is still in the top 1% of most cited articles, with 930 citations in the abstract and citation database Scopus.

“Collaboration across diverse stakeholders in the academic publishing ecosystem is needed to reduce the inadvertent spread of retracted science,” she said.

Schneider’s project, “Reducing the Inadvertent Spread of Retracted Science: Shaping

a Research and Implementation Agenda,” will bring together a variety of stakeholders, including funders, editors, peer reviewers, authors, and publishers for interviews and a workshop. In addition to investigating the

harm associated with retracted research, Schneider’s research group will look at intervention points for stopping the spread of retraction, discuss which classes of retracted papers can be considered citable, and examine the impediments to open access dissemination of retraction statuses and notices.

“This is a crucial moment for stakeholder dialogue, because the data needed to identify retracted research has become available,” Schneider said. “In October 2018, Retraction Watch released a comprehensive database of all known retractions. Currently, the database has limited availability on the web, with bulk use arranged for private research use or by commercial licensing. A sustainability model for continuing to update and steward retraction data is critically needed.”

Schwebel discusses Island of the Blue Dolphins and NPS web resource

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ith schools resorting to virtual instruction during the pandemic, educators and families rely on online resources such as the National Park Service’s Island of the Blue Dolphins website, which was developed by Sara L. Schwebel, iSchool professor and director of The Center for Children’s Books, in partnership with the NPS. In this Q&A, Schwebel discusses how her research on the Island of the Blue Dolphins book led to her work with the NPS and future plans for the Books to Parks initiative.

Why did you choose Scott O’Dell’s book, Island of the Blue Dolphins, for your research?

Island of the Blue Dolphins has arguably been the most widely taught work of children’s historical fiction in the United States for decades; as such, it has played an outsized role in children’s understanding of the national past. Historians have long been interested in exactly what history children learn in school textbooks. But the history they learn by reading fiction is equally important.

Why do you think Island of the Blue Dolphins has remained a classroom staple after so many years? What lessons does the book teach?

The answer is complicated, and not what everyone wants to hear. The easy response is that the Newbery-winning book narrates a compelling story in beautiful, spare prose.

At the time of its original, 1960 publication, it spoke to both the feminist and environmental movements with its strong, female character who flourished alone on an island and cared for its natural resources. But the novel’s protagonist is a Native Californian who is alone on the island as a result of imperialism and multinational policies of Indian removal; moreover, the novel is a Vanishing Indian story.

At the book’s end, the protagonist has been “rescued” by white hunters and a priest and brought

to the California mainland. Readers are told in the afterword that she died just seven weeks later, as the last of her people. (In fact, the rapidity of her death is true, but she was not “the last of her race.”) Today’s readers are more conscious than those of the past that Dolphins is not an #OwnVoices text. Yet the irony of labeling an indigenous woman a “female Crusoe” is more difficult for many to see. My hope is that children, parents, and teachers will read Island of the Blue Dolphins alongside a wealth of historical and scientific material on the NPS website (as well as in conversation with #Own Voices texts) to better understand how the stories we tell—and how we tell stories—matter.

Tell me about the Island of the Blue Dolphins project with the National Park Service. How did the project originate?

Fortuitous timing! I had written about Island of the Blue Dolphins in my first book, Child-Sized History: Fictions of the Past in U.S. Classrooms (Vanderbilt, 2011), and I was in the process of creating a critical edition of the novel as part of my plan to publish a deeply researched, critical resource on the book that would be accessible to elementary school teachers and librarians: the people who introduce Dolphins to children. I contacted the Channel Islands National Park because I knew that teachers frequently sought them out for information about the real, historical story that shapes the structure of the novel (it is set on a California Channel Island during the early nineteenth century).

As it turned out, the park was in the begin-

11 Intersections Spring 2020

Q&A

ning stages of creating a web resource on the novel; we decided to partner, and the project grew broader and deeper than any of us could have imagined at the time.

How has the Island of the Blue Dolphins NPS site been used by educators and parents?

It’s always difficult to know how resources you’ve sent out into the world are utilized, but prior to the pandemic, I Skyped with fourth grade classrooms who interacted with a variety of media on the website as their class studied Island of the Blue Dolphins. The children asked insightful questions about the choices O’Dell made in his story, so I know that the website helped them to think about what was fact and what was fiction—and why that mattered.

What are your plans for partnering with the NPS to expand the Books to Parks initiative?

The website is the first in a Books to Parks initiative that, in linking award-winning children’s literature to national parks, creates pathways for every child in the United States to visit and be inspired by our national treasures: public lands protected for the benefit of all.

The Center for Children’s Books plans to partner with the NPS to create a landing page that provides a list of books-to-parks links. As individual parks decide that they are interested in building an expanded site with multiple features—similar in kind to the Island of the Blue Dolphins site—I will work with iSchool students to offer support in the form of research and the creation of a variety of content, such as K-12 lesson plans, interactive maps, and digital archives.

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Research

Grant to help community organizations tell their stories

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ssociate Professor Kate McDowell has received funding from the Center for Social and Behavioral Science Small Grant program at the University of Illinois to help community organizations tell more effective data stories.

The goal of the “Data Storytelling for Community Organizations” project is to develop and pilot a toolkit, based on the iSchool’s Data Science Storytelling course (IS 590DST), to bring storytelling in information science to community organizations.

The project will create a data storytelling kit for community organizations, position public libraries to distribute this toolkit, and support community organizations using the toolkit.

“Public libraries and nonprofit community organizations need data storytelling to

keep up with a changing media landscape,” said McDowell, who has been teaching storytelling at the iSchool since 2007. “Corporations have already begun incorporating aspects of data storytelling into their social media presence, advertising campaigns, and public engagement strategies. Data storytelling—especially as an extension of traditional storytelling within libraries—can help nonprofit organizations use the limited resources they have to connect with communities as ‘audiences.’”

The project’s team includes McDowell (principal investigator); Assistant Professor Matt Turk, who co-teaches the data storytelling course; Assistant Professor Rachel M. Magee; and Teaching Assistant Professor Martin Wolske. Rounding out the team will be a research assistant, funded by the grant.

Kate McDowell “The project will leverage pre-existing relationships established by the former Center for Digital Inclusion [formerly directed by Wolske] through library practicums, and by the Youth Services Community Engagement course (IS 490YS), which has, since 2012, placed master’s students in community organizations to build bridges between their work and library services,” said McDowell.

The pilot partners for the project will be The Urbana Free Library, as the pilot library site for publicizing and sharing the data storytelling toolkit, and The Idea Store, as the initial community site for distributing and enacting the toolkit.

Chan receives fellowship, Fulbright grant

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Anita Say Chan

nita Say Chan, associate professor in the iSchool and the Department of Media and Cinema Studies, received a 2019-2020 Fiddler Innovation Faculty Fellowship from the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) and a Fulbright Specialist grant. Chan was awarded the fellowship in conjunction with the multidisciplinary Innovation Illinois Community Laboratory project, which involves a series of interdisciplinary courses and the development of the Community Data Clinic, a mixed methods data studies and community research lab. As part of the Fulbright grant, she will spend three weeks at Javeriana University in Bogota, Colombia, lecturing on feminist data methods and giving a workshop on community data.

“I’m thrilled to be able to share the innovative interdisciplinary work in civic

and community data methods we are cultivating at the Community Data Clinic and to work with the talented faculty, students, and researchers in the Communication, Languages, and Information doctoral program at Javeriana,” she said.

Chan noted that her upcoming work in Colombia is reflective of the iSchool’s commitment to building global research networks for collaboration and exchange around varied social justice projects.

“I am also excited to be able to use the time to deepen my research on and with feminist data justice networks addressing feminicide and online gender-based harassment in the region,” Chan said. “Their research practices and outreach methods to extend the visibility of their data resources have undoubtedly been some of the most impactful cases that scholars have seen emerge in any global context.”

Intersections Spring 2020

13 Chin receives NIH grant for study of false HPV-vaccine information

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ssistant Professor Jessie Chin has received a $389,810 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to identify false information about the HPV vaccine and model its impact on risk perceptions.

Human papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection in the U.S., with over 34,000 new HPV-related cancers diagnosed annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. An HPV vaccine, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 2006, is recommended as part of routine vaccinations for school-aged children. However, the vaccine’s uptake remains low in part because of incorrect perceptions of vaccination risks, which has been linked to the spread of false information about the vaccine.

“I’ve been working on how to promote an accurate comprehension of health information among adults with varying degrees of health literacy. While people with inadequate health literacy are vulnerable to health misinformation, people with adequate health literacy may also fail to identify health misinformation, especially when it has been delivered from known social connections,” Chin said of how the project originated.

Chin and her collaborators from the University of Illinois at Chicago and University of Chicago will build a model to identify false HPV-vaccine information on Twitter and demonstrate its impact on individual risk perceptions.

“We propose a novel approach to leverage machine learning, natural language processing, network analysis, crowdsourcing/expert data annotation, psycholinguistic analysis, and statistical modeling to investigate the false HPV-vaccine information collectively (in terms of its detection and propagation patterns) and individually (in terms of its impact and underlying cognitive mechanisms),” she said.

According to Chin, the project’s findings will provide important contributions toward understanding the impact of false health information on HPV vaccination behavior and could be expanded to other health topics. The project will also address the National Cancer Institute priorities in promoting HPV vaccines and combating misinformation in cancer prevention and control.

Underwood to explore consequences of error in digital libraries

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rofessor Ted Underwood has received a $73,122 grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to investigate the consequences of error in digital libraries. While digital libraries represent an immense storehouse of knowledge, the texts are full of errors because of the imperfect process by which they are transcribed optically.

“It isn’t unusual for five percent of the words in volumes to be mistranscribed, with the level of error much higher in some volumes,” said Underwood. “Simply measuring the fraction of mistranscribed words is easy. It’s harder to know how much difference those errors make for the methods and questions that actually interest researchers. Some forms of analysis are undisturbed by high levels of error; others may be quite sensitive, especially when errors are distributed unevenly across different historical periods and genres.”

Underwood will work with graduate students from the iSchool and English Department to construct parallel collections that pair each “clean” text with a realistically error-ridden version of the same book drawn from a digital library. The team will build collections of Chinese texts as well as English texts ranging from 1700 to the present, because different character sets and printing technologies produce different kinds of error. Then the team will apply a wide range of data-mining methods to both the clean and error-ridden collections and measure the distortion produced by transcription error and other common sources of noise. The project will provide tools that help other researchers estimate the level of uncertainty in their own conclusions.

“No data is perfect. There’s always some kind of error. The question is whether the error is of a kind and magnitude likely to matter for a particular question,” he said.

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Research

Bashir receives an additional $4M from NSF for cybersecurity scholarships

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or a decade, the Illinois Cyber Security Scholars Program (ICSSP) has been offering scholarships to undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Illinois in exchange for government service after graduation. The program is offered through the University’s Information Trust Institute (ITI), an interdisciplinary research center addressing all aspects of information trust.

Funded through the National Science Foundation’s Scholarship for Service program, ICSSP scholarships provide full tuition plus a generous stipend, enabling talented students to pursue cybersecurity studies without worrying about financial pressures.

Under the program’s terms, once students have graduated, they must work for the government for as many years as they received funding. In addition to supporting students, the program is also helping provide the government with a vital pipeline of trained cybersecurity workers.

“As cyber threats continue to increase in volume, sophistication, and severity, there is a huge shortage of cybersecurity professionals and researchers around the world to defend against and prevent such threats, meaning that millions of jobs are currently unfilled and even more will be needed in the future,” said Associate Professor Masooda Bashir, principal investigator of the program and an affiliate of the ITI. “One of the reasons the government is offering this program is that we need to build a workforce that protects information infrastructure and is sensitive to the privacy, security, and ethics aspects of information systems that are critical to society. We need graduates from top universities such as Illinois to be working on these problems.”

Scholarship recipient Mark Cockburn and Masooda Bashir Over sixty students have successfully completed the ICSSP program to date, supported by over $10 million in NSF funding. Because of the strong success of previous ICSSP graduates, NSF has once again renewed the program.

“We’ve been able to renew the program twice, allowing us to celebrate the ten-year anniversary this year,” Bashir said.

Thanks to the most recent funding extension of $4M, the scholarships will be offered for at least four more years. For the first time this year, the scholarship program was open to students in the School of Information Sciences as well as students in Grainger College of Engineering.

The first iSchool recipient of the scholarship is MS/IM student Mark Cockburn. Originally from Delaware, Cockburn moved to central Illinois in 2014, earning his pilot’s certificate and an associate’s degree from Parkland College and a BS in psychology from the University of Illinois.

“Learning of ICSSP and the inclusion of students in the MS in Information Management program, I was immediately interested in this potential pathway,” Cockburn said. “Prior to learning of the opportunity, my intention was to seek government employment upon graduation. With ICSSP, I learned I’d have access to exclusive job fairs and internship opportunities available only to scholarship recipients.”

Cockburn is interested in aviation safety, in particular the impact a lack of encryption or other security measures may play in a newly implemented anti-collision traffic detection broadcast protocol now required by all aircraft.

“After receiving my degree, I would like to work for a government agency that deals with aviation regulation and infrastructure,” he said. “My hope is to utilize the skills and knowledge gained throughout my graduate education to continue improving both commercial and general aviation industries while ensuring flying remains enjoyable and the safest mode of transportation available.”

Cockburn is one of eight new students who joined this year. According to Bashir, the program selects students who are smart, model citizens who want to work for the government; applicants must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents.

In addition to receiving funding support, scholarship winners attend a specially developed seminar series and receive one-on-one mentorship and advising from ICSSP faculty.

They also receive career support and have the opportunity to learn directly from past program participants.

“Our alumni are actively in contact with us; they give talks to current students, and provide mentorship,” Bashir said. “Even after they finish the obligatory contract, we’re still in contact with them and invite them to come back to mentor current students.”

-Adapted from a CSL news release

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He coauthors book on user behavior modeling

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ssociate Professor Jingrui He and Arun Reddy Nelakurthi, senior engineer in machine learning research at Samsung Research America, have coauthored a new guide to user behavior modeling. Their book, Social Media Analytics for User Behavior Modeling: A Task Heterogeneity Perspective, was recently published by CRC Press.

“Recent years have seen a rapid growth in social media use, both in terms of the number of users on each platform (e.g., Twitter) and the variety of platforms being used,” said He. “This book aims to analyze the rich data from social media usage, in order to address research questions of data reliability and acceptance, data heterogeneity, and model transparency and trustworthiness.”

The book includes a range of models and algorithms dedicated to each of the research questions and demonstrates their successful applications across several domains, such as healthcare.

“In collaboration with Mayo Clinic Arizona, we have deployed some of our algorithms to analyze diabetes patients’ online social behaviors, as well as the connections with the patients’ physical markers. This book is expected to inspire future work in this exciting research area,” said He. He’s research focuses on heterogeneous machine learning, rare category analysis, active learning and semi-supervised learning, with applications in social network analysis, healthcare, and manufacturing processes.

She was recently named a Senior Member of IEEE, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.

Bonn and alumni receive LPC Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Library Publishing

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ssociate Professor and MS/LIS Program Director Maria Bonn and three iSchool alumni have received the 2020 Library Publishing Coalition (LPC) Award for Outstanding Scholarship in Library Publishing, which recognizes significant and timely contributions to library publishing theory and practice. Bonn’s coauthors include Katrina Fenlon (MS ’09, PhD ’17), assistant professor in the College of Information Studies at the University of Maryland, College Park; Megan Senseney (MS ’08), head of the Office of Digital Innovation and Stewardship at the University of Arizona Libraries; and Janet Swatscheno (MS ’14), instructor and digital publishing librarian, University Library at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

They received the award for their article, “Humanities Scholars and Library-Based Digital Publishing: New Forms of Publication, New Audiences, New Publishing Roles.” In the article, the authors present findings from a national survey of humanities scholars on their attitudes toward digital publishing, the diversification of scholarly products, changing perceptions of authorship, and the desire to reach new audiences. They offer recommendations for how library publishers can contribute to the scholarly publishing ecosystem and support digital scholarship. The work is part of Publishing Without Walls (PWW), a humanities-focused digital publishing initiative at the University of Illinois funded through a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

According to Matthew Hunter, member of the LPC Research Committee, “The results of the survey conducted by Katrina, Megan, Maria, and Janet will provide invaluable data for publishing programs looking to expand their services to support the advancement of digital scholarship projects in the humanities, increase the diversity of supported scholarly outputs, support new modes of authorship, and increase the reach and impact of that scholarship through interdisciplinary and openly accessible publishing. The survey instrument itself will also be a useful tool for institutions interested in tailoring these results for their own particular communities.”

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Features

iSchool’s response to COVID-19

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his is an unprecedented time in the history of our University and School, as we respond to the challenges presented by the COVID19 pandemic. This spring, the iSchool successfully transitioned to alternative course delivery and implemented social distancing while maintaining research activities and business operations. In addition, we offered a virtual format for events, including the iSchool’s first Undergraduate Open House and annual Master’s Student Showcase.

The resilience of our iSchool community also has been demonstrated by the work of our alumni and students to implement solutions that combat COVID-19. We are interested in telling these stories! Please send your news to communications@support.ischool. illinois.edu. By promoting your efforts, we can build connections and share ideas that can be implemented in communities nationwide. Here are just a few examples from our COVID-19 web page (go.ischool.illinois.edu/COVID19-response): • Jeanie Austin (MS ’09, PhD ’17) worked with PEN America to draft an open letter regarding the need for people who are incarcerated to have free access to information during the coronavirus pandemic. This is an especially pressing issue as almost all services— including library services—have been suspended in prisons across the U.S. • Ben Chiewphasa (MS ’19) released a COVID-19 Government Information LibGuide to highlight current, reliable, and vetted government information related to the pandemic.

• Elaine Hicks (MS ’10), research, education, and public health librarian at Tulane University, created the Librarian Reserve Corps (LRS), a global librarian crowdsourcing approach that is currently being used to gather COVID-19 scientific information for the World Health Organization.

• PhD student Clair Irwin (MS ’16, CAS ’17), founder of the Illinois chapter of #insulin4all, is leading efforts to roll out increased public service communication throughout the state for those severely affected by the intersection of the insulin crisis and COVID-19.

• Colin Rhinesmith (PhD ’14) and Chris Ritzo (MS ’09) are partners on the project, “Measuring Library Broadband Networks for the National Digital Platform,” which examines how advanced broadband measurement capabilities can support the infrastructure and services needed to respond to the digital demands of public library users across the U.S., which has specific relevance to COVID-19.

Our faculty are leading research projects that address both the health and societal impact of the pandemic, including: • Professor and Dean Eunice E. Santos and her graduate students are developing models to better understand human behavior during pandemics, which will help inform public policies.

• Research Scientist Ian Brooks addresses public health topics, especially disease surveillance; develops information systems to generate data for public health decision making; and collaborates with WHO/PAHO and other public health agencies on multiple service projects.

• Affiliate Professor Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe (MS ’94) is collaborating with a colleague to develop a survey to track the response of academic libraries to COVID-19 and provide real-time data on their actions.

• Associate Professor Halil Kilicoglu’s research supports drug discovery for COVID-19 and semantic technologies to address information overload in the management of epidemics and other disasters.

• Adjunct Lecturer Melissa Wong (MS ’94), an expert in e-learning and online instructional strategies and techniques, addresses challenges in migrating classes online in a very short time frame.

• Associate Professor and MS/IM Program Director Catherine Blake’s Claim Framework automatically identifies explicit (causal) claims, comparisons, and study outcomes directly from biomedical literature, which can be used to reveal the underlying biological processes involved in COVID-19.

• Assistant Professor Jodi Schneider accelerates search and appraisal for optimal information in a pandemic; crowdsourcing COVID-19 information on Wikidata; text and data mining of COVID-19 data; and studying dissemination of COVID-19 misinformation.

In light of the global pandemic and its effects on education and the economy, the iSchool is offering expanded, online services for alumni and students to ease stress and offer a high-touch experience for important conversations and resources. Alumni may subscribe to a career support mailing list and campus careers bulletin for career assistance. More details, including links, are available on the COVID19 web page.

Stay safe and stay in touch!

Intersections Spring 2020

17 Weech celebrates forty years at iSchool his year, Associate Professor Terry L. Weech is celebrating forty years at the iSchool. He is well known for his teaching and research, his positive influence on students as an advisor and mentor, and his contributions to international librarianship and intellectual freedom.

As a favorite professor among library and information science students, Weech has taught Library Administration; Introduction to Information Services; Reference Sources and Services; Reference Service in the Humanities and Social Sciences; Library Systems; Doctoral Seminar in Library and Information Science; Government Publications; Advanced Government Publications; Library Use Instruction; Economics of Information; International Librarianship; History and Foundations of Library and Information Science; and Libraries, Information and Society. He has advised countless students

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who have become successful professionals in rewarding, meaningful jobs. His research interests include reference services and sources, government information, library administration, library cooperation and networks, library use instruction, and economics of information.

In 2017, Weech was honored with a Scroll of Appreciation from the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) for his distinguished contribution to IFLA and the library profession, especially in the internationalization of library and information science education. An active member of IFLA, he has authored or coauthored numerous research reports and lectured on librarianship and LIS education in more than thirty countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, and North and South America.

Weech also has worked closely with the University’s Mortenson Center for

International Library Programs, and he has received more than five Fulbright Senior Specialist and similar funded awards for international travel.

For more than 35 years, Weech has been involved in the administration of the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award, which honors individuals or groups for furthering the cause of intellectual freedom, particularly as it affects libraries and information centers and the dissemination of ideas.

Weech received his MS and PhD degrees in library and information science from the iSchool at Illinois.

Quotes from former students and colleagues

“Terry Weech was my advisor for my CAS and had a major impact on my library and information science education. My interest in library marketing and outreach began in my MS/LIS and blossomed into my CAS coursework and research project. Terry was very encouraging when I came to him with the plan for my CAS and signed on right away. He helped guide my research project and encouraged me to submit part of it to BOBCATSSS, an annual international symposium for library and information science students. The paper we wrote together was accepted, and we each had a wonderful time at the conference in Barcelona.”

— Nicole Helregel (MS ’13, CAS ’15), Student Success Librarian, Purchase College (SUNY)

“I took three courses taught by Terry while pursuing my graduate degree. His course, Economics of Information, was one of the most interesting classes I’ve ever taken. With Terry’s guidance, I presented at the 2015 and 2016 BOBCATSSS, which connected me to other information professionals from around the world. I’m grateful for his role as a teacher, mentor, and friend—and for our regular lunches!”

— Alyson Bell (MS ’16), Assistant Director of Stewardship and Donor Relations, Grainger College of Engineering, University of Illinois

“I worked with Terry on my thesis project. He was very helpful throughout the process, from helping me to hone my topic, to assisting with potential avenues of research, to the final editing process. It was such a joy to work with Terry on the project that was later published in an academic journal. He was such an

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integral part to my MS/LIS degree, and I will never forget his contribution to my success in the field of librarianship.

— Sara Benson (MS ’17), iSchool Adjunct Assistant Professor and Copyright Librarian, University Library, University of Illinois

“When I started my PhD program in library science at the University of Illinois in the 1990s, I took Terry’s Economics of Information course as a part of my coursework for the degree. He became my dissertation advisor and assisted me through the process until successful completion. Several years ago, I presented a lecture to one of his courses. I count Terry as a friend and appreciate his quiet humor, knowledge of librarianship, and his willingness to share information with all individuals. He has played an important role in my career development and any success that I might have had along the years.”

— John A. Moorman (PhD ‘02), Retired

“When I joined the iSchool as a MS/LIS student in 2001, I had just completed a degree in the French Department at Illinois, and because of my interest in international librarianship, Terry Weech was assigned as my advisor. Memorable aspects of being Terry’s advisee include: he instantaneously would answer email; he was supportive when I joined the Graduate Employee Organization and participated in a sit-in during our attempts to unionize; he taught the class that led to my first scholarly publication in LIS; and he never stopped being a great mentor and friend.”

— Heather Moulaison Sandy (MS ’02), Director of Graduate Studies and Associate Professor, School of Information Science & Learning Technologies, University of Missouri

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Features

Gorrell coauthors paper on designing trans technology

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s a Research Experience for Master’s Students (REMS) Fellow at the University of Michigan School of Information last summer, Dykee Gorrell (MS ’20) worked with Oliver Haimson, assistant professor at Michigan, on a research project about trans technology design.

One of the papers that resulted from their research, “Designing Trans Technology: Defining Challenges and Envisioning Community-Centered Solutions,” received a Best Paper Award at the Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems (CHI 2020).

Additional coauthors and research team members include Michigan graduate students Denny Starks and Zu Weinger.

For the project, the researchers conducted participatory design sessions with transgender people and non-binary people from the LGBTQ community in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

“The purpose of these design sessions was to understand the challenges that transgender people and non-binary people face in the community,” Gorrell said. “After those challenges were identified, we asked the participants to brainstorm technologies that they thought could address some of these issues by participating in a series of collective drawing activities. After the activities, participants shared what they drew and why.”

In their paper, the researchers discuss how the solutions envisioned by participants fell into four categories: technologies for changing bodies, technologies for changing appearances/gender expressions, technologies for safety, and technologies for finding resources. According to Gorrell, it was surprising how the participants’ geographic locations influenced the issues they raised in the design sessions.

“Participants in Philadelphia talked a lot about systemic violence as it pertained to the murders of black transgender women, police brutality, poverty, housing insecurity, and food deserts,” Gorrell said. “In Ann Arbor, many of the participants suggested a TransYelp, which would include anything from reviews on different healthcare providers offering LGBTQ services to safe spaces for trans folk to exist in every day.”

The researchers found that integrating trans people in the design process enabled inclusive technology design that focused on sharing community resources and prioritizing connection between community members.

This Is MY Fort! and What Is Inside THIS Box? receive Gryphon Award

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his Is MY Fort! and What Is Inside THIS Box?, written by Drew Daywalt and illustrated by Olivier Tallec, and published by Scholastic Press, are the winners of the 2020 Gryphon Award for Children’s Literature.

The Gryphon Award, which includes a $1,000 prize, is given annually by The Center for Children’s Books (CCB). This year’s committee was chaired by Clinical Assistant Professor Deborah Stevenson and Kate Quealy-Gainer, assistant editor of The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books.

The prize is awarded to the author of an outstanding English language work of fiction or nonfiction for which the primary audience is children in kindergarten through fourth grade, and which best exemplifies those qualities that successfully bridge the gap in difficulty between books for reading aloud to children and books for practiced readers.

With a core of regular committee members, the award has become a way to contribute to an ongoing conversation about literature for inexperienced readers and to draw attention to the literature that offers, in many different ways, originality, accessibility, and high quality for that audience.

Three Gryphon Honors also were named: • The Very Impatient Caterpillar (Scholastic), written and illustrated by Ross Burach • ¡Vamos!: Let’s Go to the Market! (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), written and illustrated by Raúl the Third • Lion of the Sky: Haiku for All Seasons (Millbrook), written

by Laura Purdie Salas and illustrated by Mercè López The Gryphon Award was established in 2004 as a way to focus attention on transitional reading. “Each year, new books redefine and remake this important genre,” Stevenson said, “and we’re grateful for our opportunity to celebrate and identify books that reward youngsters when they’re in that crucial early stage of developing their relationship with reading.”

The award is sponsored by the CCB and funded by the CCB’s Gryphon Fund. Income from the fund supports the annual Gryphon Lecture as well as the Gryphon Award for children’s literature.

Student consulting team examines impact of autonomous vehicles on insurance industry Creswell accepted into Librarian-inResidence program at Library of Congress

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arilyn Creswell (MS ’20) has been accepted into the Librarian-in-Residence Program at the Library of Congress. In addition to the experience she will gain working in the U.S. Copyright Office, Creswell will participate in enrichment assignments, receive professional mentoring, and take part in library-wide activities.

Creswell, who holds a BA in economics from Pomona College and a Museum Studies Certificate from Northwestern University, decided to pursue her MS in library and information science with the goal of being a museum collections manager.

“Librarians are the experts in cataloging, organizing, and making collections accessible,” she said.

She chose the iSchool at Illinois because of the program’s ranking and flexibility, the latter of which she needed in order to continue her work and travel.

“While I entered the program only thinking about museums, my interests have only grown. It turns out that museums are not the only institutions with unique collections. The special collections track has opened my eyes to opportunities in archives, rare book collections, special libraries, government records, and digital asset management. Copyright is a delight, and it is relevant to absolutely anyone; every iSchool student should take the class!

There is also a special place in my heart for map collections,” said Creswell.

She also recommends the iSchool’s mentoring program, which she calls “inspirational, edifying, and a total joy.”

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n the fall semester, students in Associate Professor Yoo-Seong Song’s Applied Business Research class (IS 540) worked with COUNTRY Financial at the Research Park on a project examining the impact of autonomous vehicles and smart cities on the insurance industry.

The student consulting team’s research provided the company with a glimpse of how the additional liability autonomous vehicles bring would change the landscape of the insurance industry.

“We did extensive competitor research to see how the various players in the auto insurance market are tackling these issues,” said Simran Wig, who served as the team’s project manager. “Our recommendations to COUNTRY Financial were a series of steps based on a 10-year timeline and multiple phases, suggesting the best possible ways to adapt to the dynamically changing property and casualty insurance industry with autonomous vehicles and smart cities.”

The Impact of Autonomous Vehicles and Smart Cities on the Insurance Industry project team consisted of Wig, Saurav Yadav (senior manager), Srikanth Pendyala (senior consultant), and consultants Devanshi Bhatt, Dhruman Shah, and Nishi Mehta.

Julia Hart, site leader for the COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab, was impressed with the student consulting team.

“It was very clear that they spent a lot of time researching and analyzing trends and forecasts for autonomous vehicles and connected cities in the insurance industry,” Hart said. “Additionally, the team was very dependable and always came to meetings prepared and able to answer without hesitation any question asked about the topic. I enjoyed working with the team and wish them continued success.”

Nishi Mehta, Devanshi Bhatt, Julia Hart, Jim Jacobs (CEO of COUNTRY Financial), Saurav Yadav, Simran Wig, Dhruman Shah, and Srikanth Pendyala

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20 Intersections Spring 2020

Alumni

Cubs fan, researcher Bales retires from librarianship

ERIN WYSON/UNIVERSITY OF MARY WASHINGTON

“It’s been a great 40 years!

I’ve always liked the research end of library work, so assisting students and faculty was tailor-made for me.”

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ack Bales (MS ’74) combined his expert research skills and interest in the Cubs to author a book on the team’s early history.

His book, Before They Were Cubs: The Early Years of Chicago’s First Professional Team, was published last spring by McFarland & Company.

“It took years of research and writing (I have a full-time job), and since some of the newspapers I needed to consult are not available online, I spent several years going through microfilm page by page and year by year,” Bales said. “I would spend every Christmas vacation camped out by the library’s microfilm reader-printers. One of my colleagues still remembers how she came in one day when I wasn’t there and noticed my CD player, sweater, water bottle, snacks— and even my bedroom slippers—all neatly arranged beside reels of microfilm.”

He estimates around two thousand primary sources were used and cited in his book.

In 2017, Bales received the McFarlandSABR Baseball Research Award from the Society for American Baseball Research for his article, “The Show Girl and the Shortstop:

The Strange Saga of Violet Popovich and Her Shooting of Cub Billy Jurges,” which he is now expanding into a small book. The award “honors the best articles on baseball history or biography completed or published during the preceding calendar year.”

He will have more time to work on his next book after July 24, when he will retire from the University of Mary Washington after forty years as a reference and humanities librarian. According to Bales, his proudest accomplishment as a librarian is the impact he has made on students, instilling in them a love of research and writing.

“A few months ago a student came by my office and said, ‘My father knew you when he was a student here,’ and she told me his name. I immediately replied, ‘Not only do I remember your father, but I remember that he wrote a major history paper on President Gerald Ford.’ I think that surprised her! A few days later, her father came in to talk to me and reminisce a bit,” Bales said.

Bales realized he had a talent for research and writing as early as junior high school, when he wrote his first term paper. Working

on that paper also piqued his interest in the field of library and information science. Later on, as an undergraduate English major at Illinois College, he worked in the college library.

After earning his MS/LIS degree from the University of Illinois, he worked briefly in the libraries at Eureka College and Illinois College before settling into the University of Mary Washington. He considers himself fortunate to be surrounded by “marvelous, wonderful colleagues,” doing a job he loves.

In addition to working on his book, Bales plans to spend retirement visiting and traveling with his two grown children. For years, he and his family have enjoyed hiking together, especially in the Blue Ridge Mountains in Shenandoah National Park, a place where they plan to spend more time.

His advice to current students is to “find your passion—some overriding interest that gets you up in the morning, eager to face the day.”

“It’s been a great 40 years! I’ve always liked the research end of library work, so assisting students and faculty was tailor-made for me,” he said.

When asked which he would enjoy more, watching the Cubs play or doing research on the team, Bales has to give it some thought.

“That’s a tough question, as I really like doing my research. I suppose, though, I would have to come down on the side of watching them play,” he said.

Leep experience valuable in today’s remote workplace

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uring this period of working remotely, Julianna Perry (MS ’09) is using skills that she learned from supporting and taking online (Leep) classes in her job as enterprise project manager for the University of the Sciences (USciences) in Philadelphia. Perry worked as a Leep graduate assistant while earning her MS degree from the iSchool.

“Mostly I was focused on supporting the students and instructor, but that’s a great way to see a bunch of styles for interacting in a synchronous online learning environment,” she said. “It also makes you very focused on the quality of the audio. I started back when GAs had to run the class via sound board and phone but helped with the transition to platforms like Blackboard Collaborate.”

At the moment, Perry’s main focus at work is project managing USciences’ implementation of Workday Student, a student

information system. As the project requires a very large team on both the university side and the consulting side, the coronavirus situation called for a change in how team meetings were held.

“We were already doing a number of weekly remote meetings—you have to for a project like this—but people tend to save some of the more potentially controversial or detailed discussions for face to face when possible,” Perry said. “They want to see facial expressions and cues more clearly, and help people feel like they’re being heard, which can be hard to do in a remote environment if you’re not used to working that way.”

Perry tries to make her team feel supported while working remotely, assuring them that if something isn’t working, they will try it a different way, and helping with equipment needs—“the iSchool’s ITD office taught me the importance of a good headset!”

Three alumni and current student named 2020 Movers and Shakers

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hree iSchool alumni and a current student are included in Library Journal’s 2020 class of Movers & Shakers, an annual list that recognizes fifty professionals who are transforming what it means to be a librarian. Thomas Padilla (MS ’13) and Nicholas Weber (MS ’10, PhD ’15) were honored in the Digital Developers category; Haley Samuelson (MS ’08) was honored in the Educators category; and MS/LIS student Edward Kristan was honored in the Community Builders category.

Padilla is interim head of Knowledge Production at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. In 2016, Padilla received an Institute of Museum and Library Services National Leadership Grant to document, build on, and share current and potential approaches to developing cultural heritage collections that support computationally driven research and teaching. Two years later, he was awarded a Mellon Foundation grant to further explore what it takes to develop and provide access to collections as data and what it takes to sustainably and ethically support their use.

Weber is an assistant professor and technical director of the Qualitative Data Repository in the Information School at the University of Washington. He is working to make social science research datasets— such as interviews, images, videos, and speech transcripts—easier to store, discover, and access. He is also cofounder of the open-source Council Data Project, which provides tools to make local government data easily searchable, and the nonprofit Seattle Civic User Testing group, a cooperative of technologists and UX researchers that organizes co-design sessions in public libraries and engages members of underrepresented minorities in testing and providing feedback on city apps.

Samuelson is a reference librarian for the Cook Memorial Public Library District in Libertyville, Illinois. She and her colleague, Nate Gass, started a class at the library to help patrons identify fake news.

The class was so popular that they devoted an episode of the library’s podcast to the topic. They presented a webinar at the Pub-

lic Library Association conference to share their work with other librarians. To prepare patrons for district elections, including school and library boards, village trustees, and ballot measures, they started the Be a Voter initiative, a pathfinder that describes the candidates and ballot measures and provides key resources, as well as information on how to register to vote.

Kristan is safety and security supervisor for the Warren-Newport Public Library in Gurnee, Illinois. He has built relationships with public service staff as well as formerly “troublemaker” teens, people with mental health issues, and others. Suspensions are saved for serious infractions—for instance, using demeaning, foul, or abusive language directed at staff and other patrons or vandalism. He tries hard to make the library a safe place for the staff and roughly 1,800 patrons who seek its services every day, without losing sight of its value as a “community center for any and all information needs.”

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Giving

Get to know Laura Fruhauff, MS student and scholarship recipient

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eep student Laura Fruhauff was on the verge of emailing her advisor to rescind her fall 2019 registration when she received notification from the iSchool that she would be receiving the Helen T. Stewart and Mildred Stewart Scholarship. During her undergraduate studies at Roosevelt University in Chicago, she sometimes worked 80 hours a week to stay in school.

According to Fruhauff, “This time around, in graduate school, I cannot do that. In addition to my full-time job, I have caretaker responsibilities to my parents and to my partner that occupy those other hours and funds I had originally designated to school.

I cannot impress enough how crucial receiving a scholarship was and is for me and how grateful I am.”

Why did you decide to pursue an LIS degree?

I had completed a term of service in an AmeriCorps program at The Field Museum of Natural History and had wanted to stay involved in the museum.I had always been interested in exhibitions, and during my term with AmeriCorps, I informationalinterviewed myself into a volunteer position in the exhibitions department— specifically with the museum’s exhibition developers. I absolutely felt at home working in the collections management system and was grateful and thrilled to handle and document information on specimens that would potentially be used in upcoming exhibitions. To secure such a job, however, I knew I would need to first acquire an advanced degree. As such, I began toying with the idea of graduate school but had no idea where to start. Museum studies had been recommended, but the programs I would feasibly be able to attend seemed limited. The versatility of an LIS

degree appealed to me most. The variety of skills offered through LIS programs offered a wider range of possible careers without limiting me to any specific location.

Why did you choose the iSchool at Illinois?

I chose the iSchool at Illinois for multiple reasons. High recommendations from a trusted undergraduate mentor and from current iSchool students on track for amazing careers were key influences. An important portion of my decision, however, rested on practical necessities, and the iSchool’s incredible and unique accessibility was a deciding factor. No other program of such high quality is as financially accessible as the iSchool, and the online courses do not prevent me from working or caring for family. I was worried at first that distance learning would not provide the best quality of instruction, but the iSchool has been the most ideal program, with courses that have been dynamic, engaging, and demanding.

I feel like I am making the very best investment in my future.

What particular LIS topics interest you most?

LIS topics that interest me most include access, particularly access to information for the vulnerable and for incarcerated individuals and groups.

What do you do outside of class?

Outside of class, I work at a wonderful youth music nonprofit and spend time with family. The best times are spent with my partner, his son, and our dog.

“In addition to my full-time job, I have caretaker responsibilities to my parents and to my partner that occupy those other hours and funds I had originally designated to school. I cannot impress enough how crucial receiving a scholarship was and is for me and how grateful I am.”

What career plans or goals do you have?

Starting my studies at the iSchool, I had tunnel vision for museum exhibitions and felt that was the only vein of careers that would truly provide fulfillment. However, the classes I have taken and the students, instructors, and mentors I have met and have learned from have unequivocally broadened my interests. My career plans are far more flexible than they were when I started, and I feel that many LIS and related careers would make me happy to wake up and commute to work every day. Things that I never imagined bringing me joy, like reference services, are sticking in my mind as I contemplate my next steps. At the core of anything I hope to do, however, is service to others, and LIS is an incredible field that provides ample service-focused careers.

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“She required respect

for the field of children’s literature, demonstrating that quality literature for any age fits the criteria for quality literature of any kind.”

—Christine Oyer (MS ’81)

o her many students, Professor Emerita Selma Richardson was not only a dedicated teacher but also a mentor and role model. At the iSchool, she taught classes on children’s literature and served as an advisor to students pursuing careers as school librarians. An authority on school library media services, Richardson worked in a number of school libraries, including Oak Park and River Forest High School, before joining the University of Illinois in 1974.

“Dr. Richardson made us think outside the box in so many ways,” said former student Christine Oyer (MS ’81). “Her expectations were very high, and the depth and breadth of our learning grew exponentially as a result. As with many areas that deal with children, literature for the young does not always garner the level of respect given to literature for adults. She required respect for the field of children’s literature, demonstrating that quality literature for any age fits the criteria for quality literature of any kind.”

Richardson took an active interest in the lives of her students and made it possible for some of her students to negotiate family responsibilities and jobs while taking classes. Many former students stayed in touch with her after graduation, exchanging Christmas cards and visiting her at home in Champaign. One of these students noted how Richardson “kept up with our families and our career changes” and “encouraged me to get active in my profession and serve on committees that promoted school librarianship.”

Richardson passed away in July 2019, and her students are establishing an award at the iSchool in her honor. The Selma K. Richardson Award in Children’s Literature will be selected by the faculty and given at Convocation to a student in youth services who plans to work in a public or school library.

“Dr. Richardson touched innumerable lives. Her legacy lives on through the careers of her students and their impact on the lives of a myriad of children,” Oyer said.

To learn more about this giving opportunity, please contact Diana Stroud in the iSchool Advancement Office at (217) 244-9577 or dstroud@illinois.edu.

Leep program, scholarship help student realize goal of LIS degree

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s a young professional working to advance her career, Erica Halpern (MS ’19) appreciates the flexibility and convenience of the iSchool’s online MS/LIS program. She also is grateful for the George Bonn Scholarship that she received from the School, which removed a “huge financial burden” and allowed her to focus on her studies.

Halpern works full time as the development director for the YMCA of Greater New Orleans. Once a week, she volunteers at The Historic New Orleans Collection, and she will soon start volunteer projects at The Jazz & Heritage Foundation Archive and Loyola University New Orleans Special Collections and Archives.

“Thanks to my scholarship, I could continue to spend one day a week focusing on internship and volunteer opportunities,” Halpern said. “In the future, I would like to work in archives or rare books, perhaps within an academic setting. Right now, I am

open to all possibilities and enjoy finding opportunities around New Orleans to put my learning to good use! I figure any experience is good experience, so I am open to them all as I work to build up my professional resume.”

Halpern graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in English and cre-

ative writing. During her undergraduate years, she worked at Penn’s Rare Books and Manuscripts Library, where she grew to understand and appreciate what librarians, archivists, and other information professionals do.

“After that experience, I always knew I would pursue my LIS degree. Life did take me down another path for about seven years before I decided to return to school, but this goal was in the back of my mind the whole time,” she said.

Halpern values the variety of course offerings offered by the iSchool and the synchronous online learning environment in the Leep program.

“Being in class ‘live’ with fellow students and an instructor made class more enjoyable and personally helped to keep me accountable to myself and my peers,” Halpern said.

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Richardson legacy to live on through new award

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Class Notes

Decade: 2010s Tegan Beese (MS ’18) has been selected for a 2020 Volunteer of the Year Award by the Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA).

Sara Benson (MS ’17), copyright librarian and assistant professor at the University of Illinois Library, has been selected to participate in the 2020 American Library Association (ALA) Policy Corps.

David Bond (MS ’14) came out of retirement to become the director of the Val Verde County Library in Del Rio, Texas, in May 2019.

Sierra Campbell (MS ’13) has accepted a position as a research and instruction librarian at Lewis University.

Lindsey Ann Carpino (MS ’14) has received an Emerging Leader Award from the American Association of Law Libraries (AALL).

Rachel Chapman (MS ’18), a school librarian for the New York City Department of Education, will present at the Urban Librarians Conference in Brooklyn, New York, in October.

Ann Matsushima Chiu (MS ’15) accepted a position as the social sciences librarian at the Eric V. Hauser Memorial Library at Reed College in Portland, Oregon.

Stephen Lajoie (MS ’19) is a technology librarian at Sawyer Free Library in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

and became assistant director of the Winnefox Library System, which serves 30 libraries in central/eastern Wisconsin.

William Langston (MS ’14) recently started a new position as entrepreneurship librarian at Michigan State University.

Caitlin Stamm (MS ’15) recently joined the faculty of the Pius XII Memorial Library at Saint Louis University as an archivist.

Joshua Lynch (MS ’18), metadata services specialist for the Illinois Digital Heritage Hub, passed away on April 1, 2020.

Sreeharsha Sura (MS ’18) is a consultant for Deloitte Consulting LLP.

Catherine Manci (MS ’16) is the public programming and community engagement specialist for the Georgia Institute of Technology Library.

Lydia Tang (MS ’15) assisted in creating the Archival Workers Emergency Fund and spearheaded the creation of the Archivists at Home document with the SAA Accessibility & Disability Section Steering Committee.

Sarah Meisch-Lacombe (MS ’18) began working as the instruction librarian and liaison for social sciences at the University of Texas at Tyler.

Cindy Tian (MS ’19) accepted a position as metadata services librarian at Kresge Law Library at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana.

Mark Miller (MS ’16) has authored a new book, The Librarian at the End of the World.

Melissa Villa-Nicholas (PhD ’16) will be the keynote speaker for Library Instruction West 2020 at the University of Washington, Seattle, in July.

Miriam Larson (MS ’11, CAS ’13) has been named executive director of the Independent Media Center in Urbana.

Melissa Lydston (MS ’15) started a new position as librarian informationist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston in August.

Jamie Wittenberg (MS ’15) has accepted a new position as assistant dean for digital strategy and information technology services at the University of Colorado Boulder Libraries.

Decade: 2000s

David E. Cox (MS ’13) became the 2019-2020 president of the New Mexico Library Association on October 31.

Gail Murray (MS ’15) is the WISCAT technical coordinator at the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, where she manages Wisconsin’s statewide interlibrary loan platform.

Terrorism researcher Moustafa Ayad (MS ’09) was featured in an NPR segment on November 1, in which he discussed how ISIS is using Twitter.

Jarrett Dapier (MS ’15) was featured in an article about school safety in the U.S., published in The Guardian on December 2.

Christopher Nixon (MS ’15) started a new position as a user experience researcher at Facebook in Menlo Park, California.

Matthew David (MS ’07) is the new learning experiences manager for the Tampa Hillsborough County Public Library (THPL).

Leah Dudak (MS ’17) received Public Library Association’s Demco New Leaders Travel Grant, which funded a trip to the PLA conference in 2020.

Stephanie Norick (MS ’15) started a new position as a visual analytics consultant with Decisive Data.

Janice M. Del Negro (PhD ’07), a professor in the School of Information Studies at Dominican University, is an Illinois Library Luminary nominee.

Tammy Hansen (MS ’17) has started a new job as a library specialist at the Illinois State Library.

Devashish Sahay (MS ’19) recently converted an internship with PwC into a full-time position as an advisory associate.

Jen Jacobs (MS ’16) started a new job in August as a librarian at Deerfield High School in Deerfield, Illinois (Township High School District 113).

Devin Savage (MS ’11) has been named dean of libraries for the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT).

Pujeethaa Jakka (MS ’19) is a data scientist at Pattern Computer Inc. working on high-dimensional data visualization.

Kelly Schulz (MS ’18) accepted a job as the new assistant archivist with the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center.

Itzel Jihan (MS ’19) started their position as a metadata curator at CAT Digital in Peoria, Illinois.

Kevin Kelley (MS ’18) has been promoted from children’s librarian to afterschool program coordinator at the New York Public Library.

Beth Sheehan (MS ’10) received the Emerging Leader Award from the Illinois Chapter of the Special Libraries Association (SLA). She was recently elected as membership director to the Board of Directors for SLA Illinois.

Jane Kelly (MS ’18) recently became the records and accessioning archivist at Tufts University’s Digital Collections and Archives.

Clairellyn Sommersmith (MS ’13) completed a $1.2 million capital campaign to expand and remodel the rural library in Princeton, Wisconsin,

Leah Dodd (MS ’05) joined the Olin Library at Cornell University as the research services lead librarian in January 2020.

Marcie Dowling (MS ’07) was named director of Polk County Libraries in North Carolina.

Gwen Evans (MS ’02) has been appointed vice president, global library relations, for Elsevier, a global information analytics business specializing in science and health.

Jim Hahn (MS ’07, CAS ’11) started a new job as head of metadata research for the University of Pennsylvania Libraries in January 2020.

Emily Hope Hofher (MS ’05) passed away on October 15, 2019. She was the librarian at South View Middle School in Edina, Minnesota.

Helen Linda (MS ’07) started a new position as continuous improvement program manager at the Vermont Agency of Transportation.

Dallas Long (MS ’02) was named dean of the Milner Library at Illinois State University on January 31.

Robin Miller (MS’ 09) accepted the 2019 Federal Depository Library of the Year Award for McIntyre Library at University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, where she is the depository coordinator.

Adria Olmi (MS ’01) has been elected to a leadership role in the Association of Specialized, Government and Cooperative Library Agencies (ASGCLA), a division of the American Library Association. She has been elected as the designated director, Armed Forces Libraries.

Robert Sandusky (PhD ’05) passed away on April 10, 2020. He was an associate professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the University Library’s associate university librarian and associate dean for information technology.

Janette Shaffer (MS ’01) started her position as assistant state librarian for library advancement at the Vermont Department of Libraries in November 2019.

Sharon Silverman (MS ’04) defended her dissertation,“Librarians in Community Colleges: Strategies for Promoting Information Literacy,” on December 10, 2019, at Northern Illinois University.

Bruce Stoffel (MS ’01) has received a Living Our Values Award from Illinois State University. He is the coordinator of academic programs and policy for the Office of the Provost at Illinois State.

Maurice York (MS ’03) has been appointed as the new director of library initiatives for the Big Ten Academic Alliance.

Anita Coleman (PhD ’96) has been named associate professor of bibliography and research and director of library services for the Ernest Miller White Library at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

Lisa German (MS ’92) started her new position as university librarian and dean of libraries at the University of Minnesota in February 2020.

Jeffry Archer (MS ’91) has been appointed dean of University Libraries at Baylor University.

Daniel Burgard (MS ’90), executive director of library and information services at UNTHSC Gibson D. Lewis Health Science Library in Fort Worth, Texas, has received the Distinguished Service Award from the South Central Chapter of the Medical Library Association.

Ann-Marie Horcher (MS ’81) was selected as a 2020-2021 Fulbright Scholar. She will be going to Poland in 2021 to do research and teach in media literacy and cybersecurity.

Patt Leonard (MS ’93) recently joined the University Technology Office at Arizona State University, where she is now a systems analyst.

Ruth Riley (MS ’85) received the 2019 Gerald J. Oppenheimer Cornerstone Award from the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries (AAHSL).

Jennifer Erica Sweda (MS ’94) left the University of Pennsylvania Libraries to accept the position of editor, Books and Proceedings, Web of Science Group, at Clarivate Analytics, Inc.

M. Elizabeth (Van Dyke) Van Jacob (MS ’88) was named library director for Ivy Tech Community College at South Bend/Elkhart, Indiana, on January 31, 2020.

Tom Walker (PhD ’92) has been selected as the associate dean of the Wayne State University School of Information Sciences.

Decade: 1970s

Melissa A. Wong (MS ’94) published Instructional Design for LIS Professionals: A Guide for Teaching Librarians and Information Science Professionals (Libraries Unlimited, 2019), an introduction for faculty and librarians seeking to develop high quality courses and professional development offerings.

Decade: 1980s Scott G. Burgh (MS ’86) has received the Robert L. Oakley Advocacy Award from the American Association of Law Libraries.

A book coauthored by Michèle Valerie Cloonan (MS ’84, PhD ’88), Libraries, Archives, and Museums Today, was recently published by Rowman & Littlefield. Her 2018 book, The Monumental Challenge of Preservation: The Past in a Volatile World, won the 2019 University of Mary Washington Historic Preservation Book Prize.

Bei Yu (PhD ’06), Katchmar-Wilhelm Associate Professor at the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University, has been selected as a Microsoft Investigator Fellow.

Decade: 1990s

Mary Ellen Davis (MS ’81), executive director of the Association of College & Research Libraries (ACRL), retired in April 2020.

Connect with us!

Virginia (Mattson) Carden (MS ’77) received the 2019 MAC Award for Professional Excellence by a Health Science Librarian at the MAC/MLA Annual Meeting held in Durham, North Carolina.

Kathryn Harris (MS ’71) was appointed to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Board by Illinois Governor JB Pritzker.

She retired as the library services director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library in 2015 after serving in that role since 1996.

Harris is the first woman and first African American to serve as president of the Abraham Lincoln Association; she is currently the immediate past president.

John Richmond (MS ’79) has retired after 18 years as head librarian at Alpha Park Library in Bartonville, Illinois.

David Tyckoson (MS ’78) retired in May. He has been at California State University, Fresno, since July 1997 and has been a librarian since August 1978.

Send us your news!

We’d love to hear from you! Send us your updates as well as any employment or internship opportunities, conferences of interest, or opportunities for iSchool alumni to connect in your area.

Office of Advancement and Alumni Relations School of Information Sciences 501 East Daniel Street, Champaign, IL 61820 ischool-advancement@illinois.edu (217) 300-5746 ischool.illinois.edu/engage/alumni

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Non Profit Org. U.S. Postage PAID Permit No. 75 Champaign, IL University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 501 East Daniel Street, MC-493 Champaign, IL 61820-6211

iSchool Student Emergency Fund iSchool students whose lives have been upended due to COVID-19 can receive emergency financial assistance through a new fund established at the iSchool. We are committed to helping our students who are struggling with loss of employment because of the pandemic and facing tough decisions of whether to buy groceries or pay rent. Show your support for students by making a gift to the iSchool Student Emergency Fund.

For more information about giving to the iSchool, or to make a gift, visit go.ischool.illinois.edu/give.

ischool@illinois.edu I ischool.illinois.edu I Phone: (217) 333-3280