The staff at The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (BCCB) has announced the 2019 Blue Ribbons, their choices for the best of children's and young adult literature for the year. Blue Ribbons are chosen annually by BCCB reviewers and represent what they believe to be outstanding examples of fiction, nonfiction, and picture books for youth.

Gregory Knott (MS '17), an administrator for nearly two decades at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a graduate of two U of I System universities, has been appointed secretary of the Board of Trustees and the University, President Tim Killeen announced.

Affiliate Professor Karrie Karahalios, professor of computer science, been recognized by the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), the world's largest educational and scientific computing society, as a 2019 Distinguished Member.

This 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.

Director of the Center for Health Informatics and iSchool Research Scientist Ian Brooks gave an invited talk at the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Kaleidoscope academic conference, which was held on December 4-6 in Atlanta, Georgia. ITU is the United Nations' specialized agency for information and communication technologies. Brooks’ presentation was part of the WHO special panel on the digital transformation of the health sector.

Adjunct Assistant Professor Ellen Knutson (MS '02, PhD '08) was part of the U.S. delegation to the Dartmouth Conference: U.S.-Russia Citizen Dialogue in the 21st Century, which took place on December 3-5 in Dayton, Ohio. The Dartmouth Conference is the longest continuous bilateral dialogue between citizens of Russia and the U.S. focused on the changing nature of the relationship between the two countries.

Leep student Meredith Dominguez has received the 2019 Military Libraries Training Workshop Student Award from the Military Libraries Division of the Special Libraries Association (SLA). The award will cover her travel and registration expenses for the Military Libraries Training Workshop, which will be held on December 10-12 in Arlington, Virginia.

Associate Professor and BS/IS Program Director Emily Knox has coauthored a chapter in the book Freedom of Information and Social Science Research Design, which is being published by Routledge this month. Edited by Kevin Walby and Alex Luscombe, the book demonstrates how Freedom of Information (FOI) law and processes can contribute to social science research design across sociology, criminology, political science, anthropology, journalism, and education.

Three iSchool alumni have been selected by the American Library Association (ALA) to participate in its 2020 class of Emerging Leaders.

Elizabeth (Lizzy) Boden (MS '18), Teresa Moreno (MS '19), and Jodi Silverman (MS '16) are included in this year's class of fifty individuals from across the country. This leadership development initiative provides opportunities for newer library professionals to participate in problem-solving work groups, network with peers, observe ALA structure, and serve the profession in a leadership capacity.

MS/IM student Devashish Sahay discusses his summer internship at PwC. After he graduates this month, he will return to PwC as a technology consultant.