ACRL College & Research Libraries News

Association of College & Research Libraries

News from the Field

Maureen Gleason

Mary Ellen K. Davis named ACRL executive director

ALA is pleased to announce that, effective August 1, Mary Ellen K. Davis is the executive director of the ACRL. A veteran of the largest ALA division, Davis replaces Althea H. Jenkins, who will join the Florida State University staff as director of the University Libraries.

Employed with ACRL since 1985, Davis has served as senior associate executive director of the division since 1993- In this position, she has managed all aspects of ACRL’s last four biennial National Conferences, adding programming at each conference, and setting new attendance and exhibitor records at the 2001 conference.

Davis also has been responsible for all professional development programs and ACRL’s monthly news magazine, College & Research Libraries News. Under her direction, C&RL News underwent a major redesign, increased advertising revenue, and became the first ALA magazine on the Internet in 1993-

“Mary Ellen K. Davis has proven that she has outstanding abilities as an association leader.

Mary Ellen’s extensive knowledge and her breadth of experience will serve the ACRL extremely well,” said ACRL President Mary L. Reichel.

“Best of all, I have watched Mary Ellen work with members and staff in ACRL and ALA and have admired her genuine ability to get along well with others and to move forward priorities and goals. ACRL is indeed fortunate to have Mary Ellen Davis as its new executive director.”

Davis also has served as the director of communications and systems and the publications program officer during her tenure with ACRL. She joined ALA in 1984 as the assistant director of “Let’s Talk About,” a national $1.5 million reading and discussion program sponsored by ALA and funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Davis came to ALA from Central Michigan University, where she worked as a reference librarian and bibliographer. She received her MLS from the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign and her master’s in education from Central Michigan University. Her honors include Beta Phi Mu, Phi Kappa Phi, and the Girl Scouts Outstanding Volunteer Award. She is a member of various professional organizations, including the Professional Convention and Meeting Planners Association, the Society of Scholarly Publishing, and the American Society of Association Executives.

Reflecting on the search process, ACRL immediate past president Betsy Wilson said, “ACRL enjoyed the superlative leadership of Althea H. Jenkins as its executive director forthe past ten years. When Althea announced her resignation to become the director of libraries at Florida State University, the ACRL Board launched a process to find a worthy successor and leader.

“We were delighted, but not surprised, to identify an outstanding candidate in Mary Ellen K. Davis. With Mary Ellen’s extraordinary talents, in-depth knowledge of ACRL member needs, record of program innovation and effectiveness, and leadership and management capacity, ACRL will continue its momentum as the premier association of academic librarians into the 21st century,” Wilson concluded.

ACRL to offer two Immersion Programs in 2002

Whether your institution is just beginning to think about implementing an information literacy component or whether you have a program well underway, ACRL’s Institute for Information Literacy Immersion Program provides instruction librarians with the intellectual tools and practical techniques needed to build or enhance instruction programs.

ACRL will offer two Immersion Programs in 2002 (dates and locations will be announced shortly). The Immersion ’02 programs will be four-and-one-half days of intensive training and education for instruction librarians and will offer two tracks— Track I: Librarian as Teacher and Track II: Librarian as Program Manager. Attendance will be limited to 90 at each program to ensure an environment that fosters group interaction and active participation. Watch www.ala.org/acrl/nili/immersion.html for complete details and application materials.

Applications sought for editor of Publications in Librarianship series

ACRL Publications in Librarianship,which began in 1952 as ACRL Monographs, is a series of monographic and edited volumes that reports research and scholarly thinking in academic and research librarianship.

Together with a four-to-seven-member editorial board, the editor is charged with encouraging research and writing that is appropriate for the series, identifying topics and authors for new books, refereeing submissions, and editing manuscripts for publication. The current editorial board is developing a number of promising proposals, and the new editor will oversee some of these to publication and develop others.

ACRL membership is required. Candidates should have experience in research and writing, the ability to evaluate submissions and edit manuscripts, skills in working with authors, and an understanding of publishing. The editor is expected to chair two editorial board meetings a year at the ALA Midwinter Meeting and Annual Conference.

The new editor will serve on a volunteer basis and succeed John Budd, whose term ends in July 2003- Interviews of candidates will take place at the 2002 Midwinter Meeting. Following approval by the ACRL Publications Committee and ACRL Board, the person selected will serve as associate editor from July 2002 to July 2003 before assuming the editorship.

Persons who would like to be considered for the five-year term of editor should communicate their interest by submitting a resume, a statement of qualifications, and names of three references by December 1, 2001, to: Hugh Thompson, ACRL Director of Publications, 50 East Huron Street, Chicago, IL 60611, (312) 280-2517, e-mail: hthompson@ala.org.

Additional information about the Publications in Librarianship series is available from John Budd, University of Missouri-Columbia School of Information Science and Learning Technologies, 221M Townsend Hall, Columbia, MO 65211, (573) 882-3258, e-mail: BuddJ@missouri.edu.

NCES library reports released

NCES has just released a library report entitled “Academic Libraries: 1998,” based on information from the 1998 IPEDS Academic Libraries Survey.

The tables in this publication summarize library services, library staff, library collections, and library expenditures for libraries in degree-granting, postsecondary institutions in the 50 states and the District of Columbia.

This report can be downloaded, viewed, and printed as a pdf file by visiting http:// nces.ed.gov/pubsearch/pubsinfo.asp?pubid= 2001341.

Robert Martin confirmed as IMLS director

The appointment of Robert S. Martin as director of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) has been confirmed by the Senate.

Directorship of the IMLS is alternately held by leaders from the museum and library communities. Martin will be the first director of IMLS who comes from the library world. He is currently interim director of the School of Library and Information Studies at Texas Woman’s University in Denton.

Reed Elsevier successfully completes Harcourt tender offer

Reed Elsevier Inc. announced today the successful completion of its tender offer for Harcourt General, Inc.

Crispin Davis, chief executive officer of Reed Elsevier, said: “We are delighted to welcome to Reed Elsevier the management and staff of Harcourt and we will be working closely together to combine our businesses.”

ACRL National Invitational Conference on Information Literacy Best Practices

The ACRL Institute for Information Literacy's Best Practices Project will hold an invitational conference June 11-13, 2002, prior to ALAs Annual Conference in Atlanta.

Teams from eight-to-ten institutions and members of the Best Practices Project Team and Advisory Council will gather to refine the characteristics of best practices of information literacy programs by closely examining existing information literacy programs. The result will be in-depth descriptions of model programs.

Invited participants must agree to attend the conference and read other participants’ program descriptions prior to the conference. Each team of three-to-five people invited will receive up to $2,500 for allowable travel expenses.

Applications must be received by November 16, 2001; decisions will be made by the Best Practices Project Team in January 2002, and applicants will be notified in early February.

Questions may be addressed to Terese Heidenwolf, heidenwt@lafayette.edu; Margit Misangyi Watt, watts@hawaii.edu; or Tom Kirk, kirkto@earlham.edu.

Big 12 Plus Libraries Consortium adopts new name

The Big 12 Plus Libraries Consortium (http:// www.bigl2plus.org) has announced that it will change its name to Greater Western Library Alliance, effective October 1, 2001. Founded more than a decade ago, the not-for-profit organization now consists of 29 research libraries in 15 states stretching from Illinois to the Pacific coast, and from the Great Plains to the Gulf coast of Texas.

Organized originally around the universities of the old Big Eight Athletic Conference in the central plains, it became the Big 12 Plus (BTP) in 1996 after the Big Eight Conference expanded to become the Big 12. Since 1998, the library consortium has grown from 17 members to its current strength.

“As we continued our expansion to the west over the past couple of years, it became apparent to the board of directors that the name ‘Big 12 Plus’ no longer described who we were as a member-driven organization,” said James F. Williams II, dean of libraries at the University of Colorado at Boulder and current chair of the consortium’s board of directors.

“We needed a name that reflected the fact that we have become a large consortium with members in many states west of the Mississippi Valley.” ■