Thanks to a new scholarship at the iSchool, David Alegre has been relieved of some of the stress in financing his education. Alegre, a junior from Chicago, is the inaugural recipient of the CNH Industrial Information Sciences Scholarship, which supports continuing BS in information sciences (BS/IS) students who have financial need. He chose the iSchool for his undergraduate study because of his interest in becoming a data analyst.

Mayank Vijaywargia (MS '19) credits his iSchool coursework with preparing him for managing, cleaning, and interpreting data to make strategic decisions; prototyping for data products; and building data warehouses in his job at Ernst & Young LLP. He encourages current students to choose their courses wisely, keeping in mind what they want to do in their future careers.

Ruth Shasteen (CAS '13) has been appointed as school librarian program coordinator after providing interim leadership in this role. Her duties focus on advising students interested in pursuing licensure or endorsement as a school library information specialist and supervising teacher-librarian candidates during their student teaching.

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.

Teaching Assistant Professor Jill Naiman has received a Fiddler Innovation Faculty Fellowship from the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). The fellowship is part of a $2 million endowment from Jerry Fiddler and Melissa Alden to the University of Illinois in support of the Emerging Digital Research and Education in Arts Media (eDream) Institute at NCSA.

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."

Students in the second-grade classroom at Villa Grove CUSD #302 are enjoying 80 new culturally diverse books, thanks to the fundraising efforts of their teacher. For Kelly Vail, an iSchool MS/LIS online student, the best part of her teaching job is reading with her students, encouraging the discovery of "books that help them fall in love with reading."

A crossroads for critical inquiry, professional training, and educational outreach, the iSchool’s Center for Children’s Books (CCB) is celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. In its dual role as research collection and educational community, the Center has a national impact on the future of reading and readers. The CCB supports its mission by providing space, staff, and other support to affiliates; housing collections and other research tools; and sponsoring outreach, scholarly conferences, and instructional activities. Affiliates include School and University faculty and academic staff, The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, and the iSchool’s School Librarian Licensure Program.

Assistant Professor Madelyn Rose Sanfilippo will present her research at The Research Conference on Communications, Information, and Internet Policy (TPRC), which will be held virtually on February 17-19. TPRC's mission is to promote "interdisciplinary thinking on current and emerging issues in communications and the Internet by disseminating and discussing new research relevant to policy questions in the U.S. and around the world."

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).