Chieh-Li "Julian" Chin, visiting research scientist at the iSchool's Center for Digital Inclusion (CDI), is a co-organizer of the Smart Gigabit Communities Reverse Pitch competition at this weekend's HackIllinois.

Strategic collaboration among the University of Illinois, the City of Champaign, a student-driven hackathon and two National Science Foundation programs—the US Ignite Smart Gigabit Communities Program and the Midwest Big Data Hub Program—kicks off this weekend.

The University has been awarded a $20,000 grant from US Ignite to host the Smart Gigabit Communities Reverse Pitch Challenge in our community. The community will provide matching contributions in cash and/or in-kind, totaling $40,000 in available resources for the Reverse Pitch event to support the development of smart gigabit applications.

Marianne Martens (MS '06) will deliver the 2018 Gryphon Lecture on Friday, March 2, at the iSchool. Sponsored annually by The Center for Children's Books (CCB), the lecture features a leading scholar in the field of youth and literature, media, and culture. It is free and open to the campus and public.

The Center for Digital Inclusion (CDI) at the iSchool will close as a separate entity effective July 1, 2018, subject to the approval of the Senate of the Urbana-Champaign campus. Its programs and initiatives will continue in the form of a distributed research model.

Connect with iSchool faculty and staff next month at the 2018 ALISE Annual Conference and the ALA 2018 Midwinter Meeting in Denver. ALISE 2018 will be held February 6-9, and ALA Midwinter will be held February 9-13. A reception to honor the Kansas City Public Library, recipient of the 2017 Downs Intellectual Freedom Award, will take place on Saturday, February 10, from 5:30-7:00 p.m. in Ellingwood Rooms A and B at the Crowne Plaza Downtown Denver. The award is sponsored by the iSchool and Libraries Unlimited.

Enrollment at the iSchool has risen to record levels, due to unprecedented growth in the master's programs. Almost 650 applications were received for the Fall 2017 semester in the master's in library and information science (MS/LIS) and master's in information management (MS/IM) programs. Enrollment in these programs currently accounts for 686 of the School's total student enrollment of 746.

Allen Renear, dean of the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, will step down from his role in August 2018 and return to the iSchool faculty.

Eight iSchool instructors were named in the University's List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent for Summer 2017. The rankings are released every semester, and results are based on the Instructor and Course Evaluation System (ICES) questionnaire forms maintained by Measurement and Evaluation in the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning.

Twenty-four iSchool instructors were named in the University's List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent for Spring 2017. The rankings are released every semester, and results are based on the Instructor and Course Evaluation System (ICES) questionnaire forms maintained by Measurement and Evaluation in the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning.

A travel fund has been established at the iSchool in honor of an alumna who loved to travel and lived in many places, making friends with people around the world. Although she lived in ten states and three foreign countries, Molly Dolan (MS '04) considered Champaign-Urbana "the true home of her heart."

Assistant Professor Jana Diesner taught a course on network analysis to Chinese students participating in the Information Science and Engineering Summer Program sponsored by Global Education and Training (GET) at the University of Illinois. Eighty undergraduates from five Chinese universities took part in the two-week program held last month on the Urbana campus. 

Jessica Williams (MS '13) joined the School on August 16 as a graduate student coordinator and academic advisor. In this role, she will provide academic advising and program planning for students enrolled in the MS/IM program, as well as work with Michael Twidale, professor and MS/IM program director, and others to continue to evolve the program. 

Alumna and longtime staff member Jill Gengler (MS '99) has been named director of alumni affairs for the iSchool. In her new role, she will manage alumni engagement and programming, collaborating closely with other units in the iSchool and on campus.

The iSchool at Illinois is involved in a partnership that has received a research grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services for an extension of the Data Capsule service, which enables remote access by the HathiTrust Digital Library to other collections managed by research libraries. The partnership is led by the School of Informatics and Computing at Indiana University. 

The iSchool welcomed two new lecturers this summer. Elizabeth Wickes (MS '16) began her position as lecturer on June 16, and John Weible began his position as senior lecturer on July 16. They will contribute to the development and teaching of information technology-related courses for both the MS/LIS and MS/IM programs.

Thanks to a summer program at the University of Illinois, Melanie Nernberg, an undergraduate student from California, can work with an iSchool faculty member and learn about the graduate school experience. 

The K-12 LIS licensure program hosted its third annual Summer Getaway: Professional Development for School Librarians from June 12-14 at the School. Over forty Illinois school librarians and iSchool MS students attended this unique professional development opportunity.

Last month five iSchool students traveled to Moscow with their instructor, Ellen Knutson (MS '02, PhD '08), to learn about community engagement in Russian libraries and to experience Russian culture. They completed the trip as part of the Community Engagement course (IS 418), which explores the multiple ways that information professionals in libraries and other settings learn about, collaborate with, and provide service and outreach to community members.

The iSchool at Illinois seeks nominations for the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award. The deadline for nominations has been extended to October 10, 2017.

Each year, the School recognizes a group of outstanding students for their achievement in academics as well as a number of attributes that contribute to professional success. The following student awards were presented at the School's Convocation ceremony on May 14, 2017.

The iSchool Scholars-in-Residence program allows international researchers the opportunity to work with faculty and students on specific research projects, offer guest lectures, and participate in research activities at the iSchool and University of Illinois. Current scholars-in-residence include Ya Gao, Chul Wan Kwak, Han (Hannah) Liu, Jing Yuan, Xi Zhang, and Yigang Zhou.