Class Notes

Kadet Alaks (MS/LIS '21) has been hired by the College of DuPage as a technical education and applied arts librarian, liaising to architecture/construction, cosmetology, fashion, interior design, automotive, horticulture, HVACR, manufacturing, welding, electronics/electro-mechanical technology, fire science, and aviation.

Livia Garza (MS/LIS '21) has started a new job as a program manager in the Office of Undergraduate Research and Major Awards at the University of Houston.

Josh Henry (MS/LIS '21) coauthored and presented the paper "Cultivating the Scientific Data of the Morrow Plots: Visualization and Data Curation for a Long-term Agricultural Experiment" at the 18th International Conference on Digital Preservation in Glasgow, Scotland.

Olivia Palid (MSLIS '21) is starting a new role as a Program Coordinator with the Department of Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Katie Peterson (MS/LIS '22) started a new job as an electronic resources cataloger at the University of Iowa in September 2022.

Helen Salkeld (MS/LIS '22) has accepted a youth services library assistant position at the Eva Perry Regional Library in Apex, North Carolina.

Mimosa Shah (MS/LIS '22) is associate curator, Schlesinger Library at Harvard Radcliffe Institute. This two-year position is part of the library's Diversity Residency Program and in partnership with Harvard's Administrative Fellowship Program and ACRL Diversity Alliance. Responsibilities include working with donors, managing incoming material, collection appraisal, collection development audits, exhibits, and teaching.

Taylor Vazquez (MS/LIS '20) joined the SIU Medical Library team in June 2022 as a reference and education services librarian. She is enjoying her foray into medical librarianship.

In October 2022, Megan Williams-Friemel (MS/IM '20) started a new position with Abbott as a competitive intelligence manager in the Rapid Diagnostics Division.

Kerstin Wolf (MSLIS '21) joined a new team at Vesta as a data scientist.

Emily Zerrenner (MS/LIS '22) blogged about her experience landing her first librarian job as research and instructional services librarian at Salisbury University on ACRLog.

Barbara Alvarez (MS/LIS '12), who serves as an adjunct lecturer at the iSchool, was featured in an Academic Movers Q&A in Library Journal on November 30.

Barbara Alvarez (MSLIS '12) has authored a new book, The Library's Guide to Sexual and Reproductive Health Information, which was recently published by ALA Editions.

Caitlin Archer-Helke (MS/LIS '15), acquisitions and content support specialist at the national law firm Dykema, was featured in the Illinois Library Association's Member Spotlight for the week of September 29, 2022.

Mary Baker (MS/LIS '16) was promoted to lead at Bain & Company in September 2022. She supports consulting staff research as part of the company's Research & Data Services team.

Sara Benson (MSLIS '17) has been named a senior policy fellow for the American Library Association's Public Policy and Advocacy Office.

Claire Berman (MSLIS '18) started a new position in January as the librarian for mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

David Bond (MSLIS '14), library director of Val Verde County Library in Del Rio, Texas, is part of a county team working on the Cardwell Branch Library Project, an outreach library that will benefit an underserved area of Del Rio.

Anne Booker (MS/LIS '13) recently accepted a position as the adult services librarian for the Central Skagit Library District in Sedro-Woolley, Washington.

Elisandro Cabada (MS/LIS '17) was featured in Library Journal's Academic Movers Q&A on November 2, 2022.

Katie Chamberlain Kritikos (MS/LIS '10), adjunct lecturer at the iSchool, served as guest editor of the just-published special issue of the Journal of Information Ethics, Issue 31, Volume 2, on social justice and information ethics.

Ben Chiewphasa (MS/LIS '19) has started a new position as the social sciences and policy librarian at Columbia University in New York City.

The Most Haunted House in America by Jarrett Dapier (MSLIS '15) has been selected as one of 36 Illinois Reads books for 2023 (K-2 category).

Robin Davis (MS/LIS '12) is the associate head of the User Experience Department at North Carolina State University Libraries. 

Maria Emerson (MSLIS '14), Lauryn Lehman (MSLIS '18), and MSLIS student Isabela Pessoa Tavares de Oliveira are presenting a workshop, "Collection Diversity Audits: Planning and Development," at the 2023 Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) conference. The workshop is based off of their extensive diversity audit previously completed at Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois.

Jessie English (MS/LIS '13) has started a new position as grants and data coordinator for St. John Center in Louisville, Kentucky. The Center is on a mission to help people experiencing homelessness address the barriers to housing and self-sufficiency so they can leave homelessness for good.

Andrea Gannon (MS/LIS '15) has been promoted to senior product manager at Microsoft in the Modern Work Transformation organization. She continues to work and reside in Dublin, Ireland, where she has lived since 2018.

In October 2022, Heather M Gunnell (MS/LIS '15) was selected as the new youth services collection management librarian at the Rockford (IL) Public Library, where she previously served as a youth services librarian.

Jason D. Harvey (MSLIS '16) is currently the senior program manager of the ASU/Chandler Innovation Center in the J. Orin Edson Entrepreneurship + Innovation Institute at Arizona State University.

EvaAnne Johnson (MSLIS '18), genealogy and local history librarian at the Wilmette Public Library, has been appointed to the Illinois State Archives Advisory Board/Illinois Historical Records Advisory Board.

In February 2023, Kevin Kelley (MSLIS '18) started a new job as associate director of children's services at the New York Public Library. 

Alex Kinnaman (MSLIS '17) and Alan Munshower of Virginia Tech University Libraries won the Best Paper Prize at iPRES 2022, the 18th International Conference on Digital Preservation in Glasgow, Scotland.

Thomas Kuipers (MS/LIS '19) is the sole archivist and curator at the Betsy Ross House, responsible for all current and new exhibits as well as maintenance of their collections. He is also a grant-funded archivist for the Woodford Mansion, where he organizes and maintains the mansion's entire paper collection.

Thomas Kuipers (MS/LIS '19) has started a new job as collections and exhibits assistant at the Betsy Ross House in Philadelphia.

Xiang Li (MSLIS '17) passed away unexpectedly on March 12, 2023. He worked at the Palatine (IL) Library.

Sawyer Magnus (MSLIS '18) was promoted to university archivist for the Velma K. Waters Library at Texas A&M University-Commerce.

Van McGary (MS/LIS '18), adult and teen services assistant manager at Downers Grove (IL) Public Library, was featured in the Illinois Library Association's Member Spotlight for the week of October 3, 2022.

Emily Moran (MSLIS '16) gave birth to her first child, Orion Fox Moran, on January 29, 2023.

Christina Norton (MS/LIS '14) was interviewed by the Illinois Library Association after her election as secretary of the Illinois Association of College and Research Libraries (IACRL).

Kinsley L. Riggs (MS/LIS '15) has been promoted to deputy county librarian at Johnson County Library in Overland Park, Kansas, and will begin her new role in December 2022.

Martin Rollins (MSLIS '19) joined Walgreens as a creative asset librarian in December 2022.

Kelly Schulz (MS/LIS '18) started a new position as an archivist in the Gallery Archives at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC.

Kristin Somers (MS/LIS '14) is a nurse technician at Carle BroMenn Medical Center in Normal, Illinois.

Madison Sullivan (MS/LIS '15) was promoted to associate librarian with permanent status at the University of Washington Libraries on June 3, 2022, following the birth of her first child, Agnes Rooney Sullivan. She is the fine and performing arts librarian at UW, and teaches art librarianship at the San Jose State iSchool.

Lydia Tang (MSLIS '15) will serve as a keynote speaker for the Code4Lib 2023 conference, which will be held from March 14-17 in Princeton, New Jersey.

Michelle Urberg (MSLIS '16) left EBSCO Information Services in October for a role as client success manager at LibLynx LLC. She also established her own LLC for consulting in the library and publishing industries (Data Solve LLC) and became the North American editor for Learned Publishing.

LaTesha Velez (PhD '17) received the 2022 American Library Association (ALA) Ethnic and Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table (EMIERT) David Cohen/EMIERT Multicultural Award for her article, "It Was Like He Was Writing My Life:" How Ethnic Identity Affected One Family's Interpretation of an Afro Latinx Text," which was published in the Fall 2021 issue of Library Trends. 

Latinas on the Line: Invisible Information Workers in Telecommunications (2022, Rutgers Press), authored by Melissa Villa-Nicholas (PhD '16), received honorable mention for the inaugural Labor Tech Research Network book award. Her upcoming book, Data Borders: How Silicon Valley is Building an Industry around Immigrants (UC Press), is available for pre-order.

Bryan Whitledge (MS/LIS '11) is the public services librarian and archivist for the Clarke Historical Library at Central Michigan University. He recently received the Exemplary Service Award from the Society of American Archivists for "his longstanding and passionate commitment to advocating for a better world for archives, archivists, and the public."

Madeleine Wolske (MSLIS '16) has been named director of the Illinois Small Business Development Center at the Champaign County Economic Development Corporation.

The Missoula (MT) Public Library has named its newly expanded People's Terrace in honor of its retired director, Honore Bray (MS/LIS '05).

After 17 years as the web services/business reference librarian at Creighton University, Christine Carmichael (MS/LIS '04)  was recently promoted to senior research and instruction librarian for business, arts, and sciences. Her new role includes info lit assessment, creating workshops, and developing a peer-to-peer mentoring program.

Laurie Chipps (MS/LIS '07) recently became the acquisitions librarian for the Wisconsin Historical Society's Library. The Society is a state agency that also serves as the American History Library for the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Melissa Cragin (PhD '09) is the new associate vice president of research computing at Rice University.

Nanette Donohue (MSLIS '03) was featured in the Illinois Library Association's Member Spotlight for the week of December 12, 2022.

Lesley (Lee) Dzik (MS/LIS '06) married Matthew F Dzik, Jr., on December 31, 2021, at the I Hotel and Conference Center in Champaign.

John Fischer (MSLIS '07) has been named the new director of the Normal (IL) Public Library.

Dan Freeman (MSLIS '05) is the director of continuing education at the American Library Association.

Cate Kaufman (MS/LIS '09) was recently promoted to dean of Faculty Development and Learning Innovation at Illinois Central College. She oversees the Library, Academic Support Center, Center for Teaching and Learning Excellence, and Illinois Tutoring Initiative.

Stacey Knight-Davis (MS/LIS '01) has received the President's Award from the Health Science Librarians of Illinois (HSLI). 

Martin Kong (MS/LIS '05) recently started his new job as a library services coordinator for the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois.

Diana Koppang (MSLIS '04) has been elected to the Executive Board of the American Association of Law Libraries. Her three-year term will begin in July 2023. 

Karla Lucht (MSLIS '07) has been selected to join the The Reading List Council (CODES, RUSA, ALA). The Reading List seeks to highlight outstanding genre fiction that merit special attention by general adult readers and the librarians who work with them.

Sarah McHone-Chase (MS/LIS '05) was interviewed by the Illinois Library Association after her election as vice president/president-elect of the Illinois Association of College and Research Libraries (IACRL).

Robin Miller (MS/LIS '09) was promoted to full professor at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire in July 2022. Robin has also accepted a new position as head of library collections and discovery after having served as an instruction librarian since 2010.

Liz Muller (MS/LIS '08) was promoted to associate director of special collections processing at the New York Public Library in October 2022.

Safiya Noble (MS/LIS '09, PhD '12) will receive the Privacy Champion Award from the Electronic Privacy Information Center for her groundbreaking research on algorithmic discrimination.

Safiya Noble (MS/LIS '09, PhD '12) has received the 2023 Miles Conrad Award from the National Information Standards Organization (NISO).

Josh Petrusa (MS/LIS '07) became dean of libraries at Butler University in Indianapolis, Indiana, on December 1, 2022.

Heidi Rhea (MSLIS '08), adult services and outreach librarian at Alpha Park Public Library in Bartonville, Illinois, was interviewed by the Reference and User Service Association (RUSA), a division of the American Library Association. 

Rachel Scott (MSLIS '07) recently published Open Access Literature in Libraries: Principles and Practices with ALA Editions.

Manya Shorr (MSLIS '04), library director of the Fort Worth (TX) Public Library, has been named one of the top 100 local government influencers for 2022 by Engaging Local Government Leaders.

Sarah Shreeves (MSLIS '02) has been named dean of libraries for the University of Utah, effective June 2023.

Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe (MSLIS '94), professor and coordinator for research and teaching professional development in the University of Illinois Library, has been appointed chair of the Open Research and Contributor ID (ORCID) Board.

Jeffrey Makala (MS/LIS '98) authored Publishing Plates: Stereotyping and Electrotyping in Nineteenth-Century US Print Culture, which was published by Penn State University Press in November 2022.

Bethany Stone (MS/LIS '99) was promoted to chief operating officer of the Orange County Library System in Orlando, Florida, in October 2022.

The American Library Association's Library History Round Table has selected Carol A. Leibiger (MSLIS '85) and Nicole A. Cooke as the new coeditors of its official peer-reviewed journal Libraries: Culture, History, and Society (LCHS), the United States' only scholarly journal of library history.

Jerome Richard "Dick" Stegman (MSLIS '70) passed away in December 2022 at the age of 80. He spent the majority of his librarian career in Clark County, Nevada, where he made significant contributions to the growth of public libraries in the rural enclaves of Alamo, Amargosa, Beatty, Gabbs, Pahrump, and Round Mountain.

Ruth Guldner Miller (MSLIS '63) passed away on July 13, 2022.

Susan (Harrington) Steiniger (MSLIS '62) passed away on August 7, 2021.

Rebecca (Becky) Wetzel (MS/LIS '69) passed away on September 23, 2022.