Issue 16 - March 2007

Welcome! In this issue:

• Dean's Word
• ASIST Comes to Austin
• TLA & iSchool Alumni Reception
• Alumni News
• Faculty News
• Student News
• Staff News
• Career Services Office Bulletins
• Supporting the iSchool
• Contact Us

Dean's Word

Welcome to the Spring 2007 edition of the iSchool newsletter. This spring we have been actively preparing our submission for re-accreditation of the master's program by ALA. The process proved to be extremely informative, causing us to review our curricular evolution, our strategic planning, and our role in educating the next generation of leaders for the profession. I want to thank many of you who took the time to respond to surveys; the results from employers were particularly gratifying as they indicate high satisfaction with our graduates across the board. We continue to offer a top-quality education at Austin, and our students are over 90% employed within 9 months of graduation, with the majority of students already employed before they finish the program. Our goal is to educate for the future and it is clear that our graduates are in high demand by employers for their skills, knowledge and professional orientation.

We are embarking on another round of faculty hiring this spring and have a strong pool of candidates. We are also searching for a joint-hire with the College of Communication, a first for this school. As we hire, we face immense problems with space constraints. Currently the school has funds to hire more faculty than it can house. I am working with the new provost, Steve Leslie, to solve this problem, but as many of you will recall from your time here, our current space in the Sanchez Building is a major impediment to our progress as a school. At a time when our major competitor schools at Michigan and Syracuse are occupying new buildings dedicated to their programs, Texas faces a challenge that will have significant impact on our national ranking and reputation.

The COA/ALA Accreditation site-visiting team will spend three days at the school from April 15th-17th. The team members will meet with faculty, staff and students, as well as with the university administration and representative alumni to assess the quality of our educational offerings. Accreditation occurs every seven years and is a benchmark for quality that applies to all LIS programs in North America. If you are interested in participating in any alumni-related aspects of this visit, please contact us immediately.

A gift from Mrs Lee-Wen Shen has created the Ting Endowed Graduate Fellowship in Information Studies, named in honor of Dr. Lee Hsia Ting (nee Hsu), a graduate of the School (1965). Dr. Ting was born in Yangchow, China, and received her BA in English from the National Central University in Chingking, China (1944). She came to America in 1946 on a Graduate Fellowship from Mount Holyoke College, where she received an AM in English Literature (1948). Upon returning to China in 1948, she became an assistant professor of English at the University of Nanking, and married Naitung Ting, also an English professor.

When the communists took over, her husband and other faculty were forced into thought control classes which convinced them that they could not live under communism. Taking only 20 Hong Kong Dollars (US $20) each, Dr. Ting and her husband managed to escape to Hong Kong. Dr. Ting managed to find a job with the US Information Service (now US Information Agency) as an associate editor; later she taught English in a British missionary school.

Over the years that followed, she taught at several different universities: University of Chicago, Northern Illinois University, Wuhan University (China; under the Fulbright Senior Professional Program), and Western Illinois University. She formally retired from teaching in 1993. In the 1980s, she also served as the vice-president and then president of the Midwest chapter of CALA (Chinese American Library Association). Dr. Lee Hsia Ting passed away on January 7, 2005.
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ASIST Comes to Austin

The 2006 Annual Meeting of the American Society for Information Science & Technology was held in Austin November 3-8, 2006. Dean Andrew Dillon served as program chair this year for what is the premier international conference on information science. Professors Randolph Bias and Gary Geisler were members of the program committee. This conference attracts scholars and practitioners from around the globe each year and this was its first time in Austin. The iSchool community was extremely visible at this year's conference. Faculty and students were responsible for 11 papers, posters and panels, including a moderated session on the iSchool movement that attracted close to 100 people at 8am on Monday morning! Professor Lynn Westbrook received a SIG USE Honorable Mention for her for her work on Formal Information Support for Domestic Violence Victims, and during the week Professor Randolph Bias was quoted in USA Today for his work on the cost-justification of usability. With attendance up over 700, this year's conference in Austin was a great success, attracting attendees from all over the world and sponsorship from Thomson, HP and IBM. Full details, including links to the conference blog can be found at: http://www.asist.org/Conferences/AM06/index.html
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TLA & iSchool Alumni Reception

The University of Texas at Austin School of Information welcomes alumni to the 2007 TLA Conference & UT Alumni Reception.

When & Where: April 12, 2007, 6:30 - 8:00p.m. Rosario's Mexican Cafe and Cantina, San Antonio, Texas

Rosario's is located at 910 S. Alamo in the historic King William district between S. Presa and St. Mary's, only a few blocks away from the Convention Center. Maps to Rosario's will be provided at our TLA booth. For more detailed information, please contact Ron Pollock, (512) 471-2623 or rpollock@ischool.utexas.edu

Hope you will join us, meet with other alumni, hear what is new at the iSchool, and have a great time!
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Alumni News

Lorely Ambriz, '04, is now the Information & Knowledge Management Center Librarian for the Pan American Health Organization, A Regional Office of the World Health Organization.

Marty Bruner, '04, began working as a librarian at Barrington Elementary School (AISD) last summer.

Monique Delatte, '04, co-authored an article, "Ten Ways to Build a Reluctant Reader Library" in a recent Random House publication for high school teachers, RHI: Reaching Reluctant Readers.

The article is available at the Random House Web site in .pdf format. You can also download the entire publication (10.65 MB) from Random House in .pdf format, or request a free print copy.

Mary Faye Randolph, '02, has moved to Paredes Middle School in Austin ISD. This follows her experience opening the Dessau Middle School library in Pflugerville ISD and serving six years as librarian there. In her time at Paredes Middle School, she has sponsored a Community All-Read of the book We Beat the Street: How a Friendship Pact Led to Success, culminating with a snack supper and book discussion on Oct. 19. About 30 students, parents, faculty members, and guests participated in the discussion. She also serves on the Campus Advisory Council and is supervising monthly displays highlighting cultural diversity and books relating to each featured cultural group.

Julissa Gomez-Granger, '03, and Ryan Granger, '03, are happy to announce the birth of their son, Christopher. Christopher was born Dec. 18, 2006, and weighed 7lbs, 2oz. He is now 12 lbs., healthy, and happy.

Norma Palomino, '03, has been appointed as the Multilingual Library Services Coordinator at the Provincial Library in Regina, Saskatchewan. She has worked as project manager in multicultural library settings in the U.S. and her home country of Argentina. She also has teaching experience in library schools. Recently, she wrote a chapter in the book Changing Roles of NGOs in the Creation, Storage, and Dissemination of Information in Developing Countries (Steve Witt, Editor, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign). Norma will be working with the Immigration Branch of AEE, the ten public library systems and multicultural associations to develop multilingual library services and collections, including online materials, that meet government objectives with respect to immigrant retention and to meet the needs of the citizens of province.

Red Wassenich, '97, has written Keep Austin Weird: A Guide to the Odd Side of Town (Schiffer Publishing, 2007). Red came up with the popular city slogan and has maintained the Web site www.keepaustinweird.com since 2000. In his spare time, he's a reference librarian at Austin Community College. His wife, Karen Pavelka, is on the School of Information faculty in the Kilgarlin Center for Preservation of the Cultural Record.

Stephanie Neely, '89, recevied the New York Times Award for Service. "When she became the managing librarian at the Little Walnut Creek Branch in 1997, Neely said, it was going through a rough patch. Problems with transients. Circulation not what it should have been. No materials for Vietnamese speakers at the branch library near the corner of Rundberg Lane and North Lamar Boulevard, the heart of Austin's Vietnamese community. Only about a dozen Spanish-language children's books. The library now has more than 1,000 Vietnamese-language books, DVDs and videos, and about two or three times as many materials in Spanish. It has basic, volunteer-taught computer classes in English, Spanish and Vietnamese and a new immigrants center with citizenship and immigration information and materials.

The New York Times was impressed with Neely's work and granted her - along with 24 other public librarians out of more than 1,300 nominated from across the country - one of its Librarian Awards for "outstanding public service."

Read the full article at: http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/01/08/8librarian.html
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Faculty News

Dr. Randolph Bias in Usability Podcast: Associate Professor Randolph Bias is interviewed on the future of usability in this BMC Software podcast.

Dean Andrew Dillon was interviewed by Chicago Sun-Times this month for an article on technology's impact on learning, reading, and memory.

Dr. Miles Efron rejoined the faculty this spring after his leave.

Dr. Gary Geisler received the Texas Exes Teaching Award this year. Gary was selected by current iSchool students, and the award includes a prize of $1000.

Dr. Glynn Harmon co-authored with doctoral student Ron Houston a chapter on "Vannevar Bush and Memex" in the 2007 volume of the Annual Review of Information Science and Technology, and participated a global Critical Delphi study on a new knowledge map of information science; a series of knowledge map papers will be published in the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology.

Other recent faculty publications include Dr. Lynn Westbrook (2007) "Digital Information Support for Domestic Violence Victims." Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 58,3, 420-432. Full details of the publications of iSchool faculty can be found on our Research page: http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/research/publications.php.
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Student News

School of Information Digital Archivists to Present Papers at Upcoming Meetings

Students studying the archival preservation of digital documents and multimedia objects with Dr. Patricia Galloway will be presenting papers and project reports at several upcoming meetings. Maria Esteva, PhD candidate, will present papers on her dissertation work with a "natural digital archive" at two meetings, the Archiving 2007 conference in Alexandria, Virginia, May 21-24, and the Digital Humanities conference in Urbana-Champaign, June 2-8. At the Society of Southwest Archivists meeting, May 30-June 2 in Oklahoma City, the work of SI students Jose Garza, Jennifer Lindley, Sidney Tibbets, Lorraine Dong, Megan Durden, Sarah Kim, and Gabriela Redwine will be presented in a session on preserving the digital portions of three literary collections at the Humanities Research Center: those of Leon Uris, Arnold Wesker, and Norman Mailer.

Student Received Sponsorship to Attend IA Summit

Dimitri Lundquist, current master's student, received the FatDUX sponsorship award to attend this year's Information Architecture Summit in Las Vegas. Six such awards were made nationally to support student participation. Dimitri will present a poster on "Rhetorical Analysis as an IA Deliverable."

Doctoral Student gives UT Awards speech

Snowden Becker, a new doctoral student and recipient of one of the prestigious Harrington Fellowships from UT, was invited to address the Texas Leadership Society at this spring's lunch meeting with President Bill Powers. Snowden spoke on her work in film preservation.

ALA Student-to-Staff Program

The ALA Student-to-Staff Program offers students the chance to work on the inside of ALA during their Annual Conference in Washington, D.C. Students are afforded the opportunity to see a large professional association from the inside, to meet students from other ALA accredited schools and meet many prospective employers. For the 2007 Annual Conference, the iSchool is proud to send Lea Engle.

Pimp My Book Cart Honorable Mentions

Three graduates from the iSchool - Alex Jasinski, Catherine Stollar Peters and Jennifer Hecker - have been awarded a prize and Honorable Mention in the Pimp My Book Cart contest sponsored by Overdue Media's Unshelved comics.

The winning book cart, HRC1, reflects a 1950's theme inspired by the 50th anniversary celebrations at the Harry Ransom Center. Pictures of HRC1 and all other winning book carts are available at www.overduemedia.com.

Spring 2007 ANAGPIC Student Conference

The School of Information will have 3 speakers and 1 poster presenter for the spring 2007 ANAGPIC Student Conference.

Andrea Knowlton and Erin Hammeke, third-year conservator students, will co-present their research on metal book furniture. Snowden Becker, IMLS Doctoral Preservation Fellow, will present her research on the issues of preserving A/V media that is primary documentary evidence in criminal investigations. Julie Mosbo, a second-year preservation administration student, will present a poster session on the identification, assessment and testing of and final recommendations for preserving the films held in the HRHRC's Edward Larocque Tinker Gaucho collection.
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Staff News

New Staff Members

Luke Dunlap joined the iSchool on December 18th. He came to the School from the Office of the Vice President for Development where he was an Assistant Director of Development and the program manager for the President's Associates. His other positions in the UT Development Office included Development Specialist for Communications and External Relations and Microcomputer Applications Specialist. He also served as a Presidential Intern at The American University in Cairo. Luke has a BA in geography from UT.

Dorothy Hight is the iSchool's new financial analyst. Dorothy joins us from Nova Southeastern University, Ft. Lauderdale, FL, where she was a grant officer. Prior to that, she worked at UT's Office of Accounting: Contracts and Grants. She holds a BA in psychology and a post-bac in accounting from Arizona State University.
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Career Services Office Bulletins

Where Alumni Work: Over 200 graduates of the School of Information/Graduate School of Library and Information Science are listed on the Alumni Careers Web site. This listing provides alumni with information about the jobs and locations of classmates, and it provides prospective and current students with an idea of the locations and kinds of jobs our graduates obtain.

If you are not already listed, or if you have changed jobs, please let us know. We are especially interested in the careers of our international students, whether they are in the U.S. or international locations. Please let us know by sending an email to careers@ischool.utexas.edu. Please include your name, degree, date of graduation, job title, organization, and city/state/country of employment.

Note: We will not link your email address on the Web site, nor will we provide it without your permission. In cases where a student would like to contact you for information about a job, organization, or location, we will contact you with the email address of the student and allow you to choose to respond.

Alumni Speaker Series: Sharing your job search and career experiences provides students a valuable tool to use in their preparation for graduation and their career search. Alumni speakers meet with students in an informal, interactive setting that promotes the sharing of experiences and profession knowledge. If you will be in the Austin area and would like help our current students in their career development, the Career Services Office would like to here from you. Please contact Ron Pollock at rpollock@ischool.utexas.edu for information or to coordinate a visit.
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Supporting the iSchool

Gifts to the School enable us to provide more than 20 named scholarships each year as well as to support student activities in specialist areas such as archives, preservation, and services to indigenous communities. Endowments can also create professorships or teaching fellowships to attract the very best faculty to our School. Excellence funds allow us to innovate and react to changing needs. Such gifts significantly enhance the ability of our school to educate professionals for careers that make a significant difference for all of society, both now and in the future. All gifts are welcomed, but we currently have special needs in the following:

Julie Hallmark Endowed Graduate Fellowship. Named in honor of recently retired faculty member Dr. Julie Hallmark, this endowed fund needs to reach $50,000 to be established to provide support for students in the area of special librarianship. The School has received a matching challenge from a donor that will double the gifts made to this fellowship up to its target.

Dean's Excellence Funds. These funds support new initiatives and provide money for a wide range of activities, including student research support, special equipment needs and alumni events. As central funding to all units decreases in proportion to rising costs, excellence funds are often our only source of support for activities and resources that enable the school to maintain its national visibility.

To make a gift online, see: http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/development. Be sure to specify the School of Information in the relevant box and to name the general area or fellowship you would like to support. Every gift really helps. We thank you for your generous support.
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Contact Us

Almost 1000 subscribers received this newsletter. If you know someone who has graduated from our program and is not receiving this, please forward a copy and point them to the subscription page on our site at http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/mailman/listinfo/alums.

Moving? Need to update your alumni records? An "Information for Alumni" page has been set up with various links to help make it convenient for you to make changes. Go to: http://www.ischool.utexas.edu/people/alumni.php to learn more.
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Alumni Mailing List
alums@ischool.utexas.edu
https://www.ischool.utexas.edu/mailman/listinfo/alums