Dear SOIS Friends,
Greetings from the School of Information Studies at Dominican University! We are
j
ust beginning to feel the cool fall weather here in River Forest. The leaves are
turning colors at their edges, and as each day goes by there are fewer moments of
daylight. Growing up in Texas, I rarely experienced the seasonal cycles that we have
in Illinois, and I never cease to appreciate and enjoy them.
These seasonal changes also make me reflect on the passage of time. At the end of
this semester, I will have been the administrative head of our SOIS for nine and a
half years, having started as GSLIS Dean in July of 2013. In that time, we changed
our school name, expanded our degree offerings, revised our MLIS core curriculum,
and joined the iSchools international consortium of information schools. This
semester, we will complete another round of accreditation Self-Study work
associated with the American Library Association’s MLIS degree accreditation. That
seems an ideal point for a leadership transition. Thus, I will be stepping down as
SOIS Director at the end of 2022, returning to faculty for the Spring semester, and
retiring in May 2023.
Working with the outstanding faculty, staff, students, Advisory Board, and Alumni
Council of SOIS has been an amazing privilege as well as a joyful professional and
personal experience. Many thanks to each of you for your ongoing support of our
programs and the information professions more broadly.
Warm wishes to you all!
Kate Marek
Director and Professor
WELCOME NEW SOIS DIRECTOR DR. DON HAMERLY
Welcome to Dr. Don Hamerly as the new Director of SOIS, effective January 2023.
Don comes to this position having served as the director of the School Library Media
Program since 2009 and as the founding director of the undergraduate Informatics
program since 2015. During his thirteen years in the School of Information Studies,
Don has taught courses in school librarianship, web design, informatics, research
methods, and writing, and he has published in the areas of school librarianship,
professionalism, and library history. “I am excited to step into the role of director and
serve our students alongside my amazing colleagues in this time of challenge,
change, and opportunity for our profession.”
ACCREDITATION VISITING PANEL – Please Join Us
Please consider participating in a social evening on campus with our External
Review Panel for MLIS degree continued ALA accreditation. We are inviting
Advisory Board members, alumni, adjunct instructors, and employers in the area to
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oin us on campus on Sunday afternoon, October 16, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. to meet
with our five External Review Panel members as they learn more about our program.
The first hour together will be a social hour, followed by breakout groups for Q&A
and discussion. We will gather on the first floor of the Rebecca Crown Library, in the
newly remodeled Contemplation Space within the Learning Commons. This would
be a great time for you to visit campus and see the library’s new look, as well as
meet some old friends and contribute to our accreditation process. If you are able to
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oin us, please RSVP to Janette Torres Arellano at [email protected].
FOLLETT CHAIR DR. CUTCHA RISLING BALDY
This year’s Follett Chair, Dr. Cutcha Risling Baldy, will be in residence at Dominican
during the period November 7-18. There will be various presentations and events
associated with Dr. Baldy’s visit, which is focused this semester on Indigenous Food
Sovereignty. We plan to hold an event on Thursday, November 17 that will look at
alternate ways of thinking about Thanksgiving food and traditions in the United
States. In the Spring semester, Dr. Baldy will focus on issues surrounding
indigenous land acknowledgment and land return. The annual Follett Lecture will be
held in April.
Watch the Follett Lecture page for more details of events in November and in April.
BUTLER BOOK SALE
It’s not too early to plan for our annual Butler Book Sale! The Book Sale will take
place this year on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, December 8-10, with specific
open times during that period still to be announced. Don’t miss this annual
opportunity for finding gift books as well as new books at a low cost for your library
collections.
ALUMNI NEWS
Bethany Bates (MLIS 2018) is Database Coordinator at The HistoryMakers.
Doris Cardenas (MLIS 2015) is now Director of Archives at the Claretian
Missionaries Archives USA - Canada.
Kristen Gravelin (MLIS 2018) is now Associate Archivist at the Claretian
Missionaries Archives USA - Canada.
Heidi Knuth (MLIS 2012) was spotlighted in The Illinois Library Association’s
Newsletter on August 22, 2022. Heidi is the assistant department head for youth
services at Bloomingdale Public Library.
Lori Moody (MLIS 2019) is the Manager, Photo Assets and Archivist Manager, of
Photo Assets and Archivist, Expedia Group.
STUDENT NEWS
For this issue of Off the Shelf, we are offering you a closer look at some of the
student work within SOIS. First, news about coursework tied to community service,
and next a feature about an MLIS/MAYL dual degree student. Our students are
doing great things, under inspirational faculty leadership!
Pictured are Todd Miller, MLIS student, and Kayla Perkins, the Cook County
Community Impact Manager for PCs for People.
Todd Miller, a current MLIS student, hosted a computer giveaway on September 26
at the Niles-Maine District Library in partnership with PCs for People, a national
nonprofit that works to get low-cost quality computers and internet into homes and
nonprofits with low income. Todd works at the Niles Library and pitched the PC
giveaway as an extension of his community-based project for the summer course
LIS 710/INF 430 Information Divides with Professor Don Hamerly. The course
requires students to find a community partner whose mission wholly or partly
focuses on mitigating digital divide issues and work directly with the partner to learn
what they do and strategize potential new ways to address divides.
Todd and students James Simon and Breshayia Kelly went beyond the requirements
of the course to commit to sustained work toward addressing divides in Chicago.
James, a current MLIS student, attended a Chicago Digital Equity Council
community conversation in Garfield Park and has plans to continue his relationship
with the Chicago Area Broadband Initiative and the Quilt Corporation to help with
digital divide mitigation efforts in the Chicago Lawndale neighborhood. Breshayia
Kelly, an undergraduate informatics major, has challenged her church, Apostolic
Faith Church of Chicago, to start a digital literacy program for the community it
serves.
STUDENT FEATURE: EILIS CORCORAN
eye-leash kor-kor-uhn | she/her/hers
Current MLIS/MAYL Dual Degree Student
What got you interested in the dual MLIS/MAYL?
I worked as Professor Del Negro's graduate assistant in 2019 and 2020 and helped
research to prepare the proposal for the program. I had also been interested in
MAYL programs when initially applying for my MLIS but chose Dominican knowing
there wasn't a program at the time. So, it worked out well for me!
Do you see it helping you in your future work?
Other than the obvious benefits with readers advisory and collection development,
there are also benefits should I decide to pursue reviewing, awards committees, or
something similar in the future.
A
ny new directions you see open to you with the MAYL focus?
At this time, I'm still going to be working as a youth librarian but might try to take on
some reviewing or similar projects as well. In the future though, I'd be interested in
pursuing future research or other academic pursuits.
For the MAYL, you have chosen to do a thesis as your final project. Talk a little
about your focus on diversity, and how you will develop that in your thesis.
I'm writing about representations of disability and chronic illness in YA speculative
fiction. This allows me to explore how disability representation has been impacted by
the recent push for diversity in youth literature, which has been especially interesting
regarding We Need Diverse Books' decision to move away from using #OwnVoices,
as the term made authors feel like they needed to reveal personal information about
themselves, including private health information. Currently, I've also been writing
about how we can distinguish good representation from authors just by including
disabled characters in their books.
Did you consider choosing a creative project for your thesis?
I did not. It's great that students have the option to do either, but I definitely knew
that I was going to go the academic thesis route. I'd love to see what others do with
the creative option though!
What has been your favorite part of the dual degree experience for you?
I’ve enjoyed getting to do a deeper dive into the literature, especially through literary
theory. It strengthened my evaluation skills and allowed me to examine youth
literature from a variety of perspectives (other than just the library world!). It’s also
been great to be able to apply my studies to my specific interests with my thesis.
What advice or suggestions do you have for people considering the Master of
A
rts in Youth Literature?
I'd recommend that you start keeping a list of ideas for final project topics early! I had
a hard time deciding what I wanted to focus on because I had so many interests that
felt varied. I can't even imagine how much harder it would have been if I had wanted
to do a creative thesis! Keeping good records and track of topic ideas makes a huge
difference across the board.
SUBMIT YOUR NEWS
Please send news for future "Off the Shelf" newsletters to [email protected].
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