School of Information Sciences

Alumni win ACRL innovation and publication awards

Two GSLIS alumni have won awards from the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL). Kimberly Willson-St. Clair (MS '01), along with colleagues at Portland State University, has been selected to receive the 2014 ACRL Instruction Section Innovation Award. Wendy Holliday (MS '02) has received the 2014 ACRL Instruction Section Ilene F. Rockman Publication of the Year Award with co-author Jim Rogers.


adapted from an American Library Association press release

Kimberly Willson-St. Clair (MS '01) and colleagues Meredith Farkas, Amy Hofer, and Lisa Molinelli, all of Portland State University, have been selected to receive the 2014 ACRL Instruction Section Innovation Award for their work on the software Library DIY, which assists students in finding the information they need quickly.

Sponsored by ProQuest, the annual award recognizes a project that demonstrates creative, innovative, or unique approaches to information literacy instruction or programming. A prize of $3,000 and a plaque will be presented to the group during the 2014 ALA Annual Conference in Las Vegas.

“The committee liked the DIY approach and was impressed by the scope of the project and ease of use,” said award committee co-chairs Lori Dubois of Williams College and Susanna Eng-Ziskin of California State University-Northridge. “While many libraries have comprehensive information literacy tutorials, this project provides a model for libraries considering how to help students quickly answer questions as they are doing their research."

Library DIY is a system of learning objects at Portland State University that is designed to give students the quick answers they need for point-of-need support. The content and information architecture of Library DIY is designed to mirror a reference desk transaction; students can drill down to the specific piece of information they need rather than having to skim through a long tutorial to find what they’re looking for.


adapted from an American Library Association press release

Wendy Holliday (MS '02), head of academic programs and course support at Northern Arizona University, and Jim Rogers, associate professor and director of the Intensive English Language Institute at Utah State University, have been chosen as the winners of the ACRL Instruction Section Ilene F. Rockman Publication of the Year Award, for their article “Talking About Information Literacy: The Mediating Role of Discourse in a College Writing Classroom,” published in 2013 by portal: Libraries and the Academy. The award recognizes an outstanding publication related to library instruction published in the past two years.

The award, donated by Emerald Group Publishing Ltd., consists of a plaque and a cash prize of $3,000. Holliday and Rogers will receive the award during the 2014 ALA Annual Conference in Las Vegas.

“Holliday and Rogers’s study is important because it challenges us to think about how the words we use to describe the research process in the classroom affects student learning and engagement in research,” said award committee co-chairs Lori DuBois of Williams College and Susanna Eng-Ziskin of California State University-Northridge.

In their study, Holliday and Rogers analyze how librarians' and writing instructors’ word choices focusing on “sources” as containers, instead of the ideas within them, may lead students to focus on finding sources to fulfill the assignment parameters rather than engaging more fully with the information to learn about the research topic.

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