iSchool Dean Allen Renear was a keynote speaker at the symposium, "Libraries in the 21st Century: Best Practices and International Trends," on June 4 in Dilijan, Armenia. The symposium was part of the inauguration ceremonies for the Vartan Gregorian Learning Center at UWC (United World Colleges) Dilijan College.

Seven master's students have been named 2018-2019 Spectrum Scholars by the American Library Association (ALA) Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services. Established in 1997, the Spectrum Scholarship Program promotes diversity among graduate-level students pursuing degrees in library and information studies through ALA-accredited programs.

iSchool faculty, staff, and students will participate in the 2018 American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference and Exhibition in New Orleans, Louisiana, on June 21-26.

The iSchool at Illinois seeks nominations for the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award. Given annually, the award acknowledges individuals or groups who have furthered the cause of intellectual freedom, particularly as it impacts libraries and information centers and the dissemination of ideas. The deadline for nominations is October 5, 2018.

Deborah Stevenson, director of The Center for Children's Books at the iSchool, will present the App Authors research project at the Border-Crossing in Children’s Literature: The Second International Symposium for Children's Literature, which will be held on June 14-15 at Princeton University.

Associate Professor Victoria Stodden will be a keynote speaker at the second annual Building Research Integrity Through Reproducibility conference, which will be held on June 15 at the University of Utah. She will also moderate the panel, "What Universities Do (and Don't Do) to Influence (or not) Research Reproducibility."

Associate Professor Emerita Christine A. Jenkins and Michael Cart have authored a new comprehensive history of young adult literature featuring LGBTQ+ themes. Their book, Representing the Rainbow in Young Adult Literature: LGBTQ+ Content Since 1969, was recently published by Rowman & Littlefield.

iSchool alumnus Alexander Salopek (MS '15), acquisitions/government documents librarian for the Supreme Court of the United States, has been chosen to participate in the highly competitive American Library Association Leadership Institute. 

Last month a contingent from the iSchool at Illinois took part in a special dialogue with librarians in Russia. The second working meeting of the U.S.-Russia Dialogue on the Civic Role of Libraries in the 21st Century was held on May 14-15 in Suzdal, Russia.

Associate Professor Victoria Stodden will be a keynote speaker at the 2018 IEEE Data Science Workshop, which will be held June 4-6 in Lausanne, Switzerland. The workshop will bring together researchers from the academic disciplines of data science, along with industry experts.