A record seventeen iSchool master's students were named 2020-2021 Spectrum Scholars by the American Library Association (ALA) Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services. This "Spectrum Scholar Spotlight" series highlights the School's scholars. MS/LIS student Kyra Lee earned her BA in creative writing with a minor in business administration from Southern Illinois University.

Hadley So, a freshman from the San Francisco Bay area, is interested in ethically harnessing technology's potential to help society and the world. According to So, the iSchool classes he has taken so far have helped him analyze problems in new ways, and his professors' wide range of backgrounds and perspectives "keep the lessons interesting and relevant to modern issues."

MS/LIS student Ari Negovschi has been selected to receive the 2021 Nancy Mysel Legacy Grant from the Film Noir Foundation. The purpose of the $5,000 grant is "to enhance or benefit a student's film restoration/preservation or moving image archive studies." Negovschi earned her BFA from California Institute of the Arts' Film and Video Program and worked in various fields, including the film industry, before deciding to pursue a degree in library and information science (LIS).

A paper coauthored by Ruohua Han, iSchool doctoral candidate, and Linqing Ma (Renmin University of China) has been named one of five finalists for the Best Short Research Paper Award at iConference 2021. The winner will be announced during the conference, which will take place online from March 17-31.

For MS/LIS student Eunice Kang, receiving the Carl Volkmann Scholarship from the iSchool allowed her to focus on learning and "taking advantage of all the opportunities that the University has to offer," while also lightening her financial burden. Kang realized soon after earning her bachelor's degree in advertising from the University of Illinois that she did not belong in that field. After spending time teaching English to lower income children in Korea, she decided to pursue a career where she could help children.

A record fifteen iSchool master's students were named 2020-2021 Spectrum Scholars by the American Library Association (ALA) Office for Diversity, Literacy, and Outreach Services. This "Spectrum Scholar Spotlight" series highlights the School's scholars. MS/LIS student Luisa Leija holds a BA in Chicana/o studies with an emphasis in Xicana art history from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MFA in writing from the California College of the Arts, San Francisco.

Doctoral candidate Natã Barbosa successfully defended his dissertation, "Exploring Algorithmic Realism in the Data Economy," on January 14. His committee included Associate Professor Yang Wang (chair); Professor Michael Twidale; Gang Wang, assistant professor of computer science at Illinois; and Blase Ur, assistant professor of computer science at the University of Chicago.

In the fall semester, three iSchool students worked on a 3D scanning service project and software development project as part of their practicum experience at the Innovation, Discovery, Design, & Data Lab (IDEA Lab). Located in Grainger Engineering Library, the IDEA Lab serves as a demonstration and prototyping site for exploring the interface between design learning, informatics, visualization, and data analytics. Students who completed the practicum include PhD student Yingying Han, MS/IM student Xiaohan Yin, and MS/LIS student Nathan Moore.

This semester, students in the Business Information Group (BIG), the student consultancy group associated with Associate Professor Yoo-Seong Song's Applied Business Research class (IS 514), worked with clients in the areas of facial recognition technology, digital healthcare, telemetry-based marketing automation, cybersecurity, and market entry strategy.

Doctoral candidate K.R. Roberto successfully defended their dissertation, "Description Is a Drag (and Vice Versa): Classifying Trans Identities," on December 11. Their committee included Associate Professor Kathryn La Barre (chair and research director), Associate Professor Carol Tilley; Toby Beauchamp, Gender and Womens Studies, University of Illinois; and Melissa Adler, Faculty of Information & Media Studies, University of Western Ontario.