Julie Edwards (MS '05) fell in love with Botswana in 2015 when she helped plan a conference there for the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA) Reference and Information Section. As soon as her conference ended, she vowed that one day she would return. She is now back in Botswana as a Fulbright Scholar for the 2017-2018 academic year.

The Kansas City Public Library's defense of the First Amendment has earned it the 2017 Downs Intellectual Freedom Award. The award is given annually by the faculty of the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and cosponsored by Libraries Unlimited.

Professor and Associate Dean for Research J. Stephen Downie was a keynote speaker for the 7th Rizal Library International Conference, which was held from November 16-18 at Ateneo de Manila University in Quezon City, Philippines. The theme of the conference was "CLICK! Connecting Libraries, Information, and Community Knowledge."

Renee Hill, senior lecturer and director of the school library specialization at the University of Maryland's College of Information Studies (CIS) and a research fellow at the iSchool, has won the 2017 LJ/ALISE Excellence in Teaching Award, sponsored by Rowman & Littlefield.

Assistant Professor and MS/LIS Program Director Nicole A. Cooke has been elected director for Special Interest Groups (SIGs) for the Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE). As director, Cooke will serve on the ALISE executive board and act as the liaison to all of the special interest groups and committees.

The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books has released the 2017 Guide Book to Gift Books. This annual publication, available as a free downloadable pdf, highlights more than three hundred of the best books for giving and receiving. 

Embedded in our society is a cultural memory of the old-time family doctor, a medical practitioner who knows of your family, your history, and your daily life, and uses that knowledge to provide the most optimal care. One Illinois faculty member and his research team have been working to move closer to that goal by exploiting a piece of familiar technology—the smartphone that can now be found in the average American's pocket.

Professor of Medical Information Science Bruce Schatz, an affiliated faculty member at the iSchool, and coauthors previously developed software for Android phones that uses the phone's native motion sensor to predict a lung patient’s disease state. 

Sharon Irish, project coordinator for the iSchool's Center for Digital Inclusion (CDI), has received the "Yes We Can" Education Award from the Champaign County Chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). The award, presented at the NAACP's Freedom Fund banquet on October 20, recognizes Irish's service to the community and commitment to equity in education. 

Laurie Allen, director for digital scholarship at the University of Pennsylvania Libraries, has been selected by the iSchool faculty as a research fellow for the 2017-2019 academic years. Research fellows are chosen because their work is relevant to the interests of the School's faculty and students. During the period of their appointments, fellows give at least one public lecture.

Doctoral candidate Jeanie Austin successfully defended their dissertation, "Libraries for Social Change: Centering youth of color and/or LGBTQ and gender non-conforming youth in library practice," on November 6.