Conferences Attended

Hosted by Roosevelt Weeks, the director of the Austin Public Library, this inspiring presentation reminded me that our staff is our most important investment. His advice on talent development rang true, speaking to the importance of making people feel valued from the interview process, through onboarding, and continually working with staffers to help them grow. In the same way, partnering with people and businesses in the community can build your own organization in a variety of ways, facilitating communication and broadening services.

I was excited to attend this session as it was taught by two librarians from my alma mater, the University of Missouri. But it came through that Jeanette Pierce and Navadeep Khanal were not convinced that their service, MU Connect, truly improved their connections with students. Without more advertising, it seems that students reach out via email more than through this system, which is meant to help at-risk students before it’s too late. It sounds like a labyrinth of links and connections that would overwhelm such students rather than help them. I hope the librarians at Mizzou find new ways to help students succeed, as I wasn’t impressed by this program.

This panel with three librarians from Texas A&M University-Central Texas didn’t give a lot of practical advice on how to collaborate, but had plenty of examples of ways that academic libraries could bring in the community and connect with other organizations through book clubs, workshops, cultural events, and more.

Familiar to most US audiences as the host of his eponymous talk show in the UK, Norton spoke to librarians about his experience as a writer, both as a novelist and the author of two memoirs. While the discussion focused on his upcoming book, Forever Home, Norton spoke a great deal about his experience as a writer, which felt all too true. He encouraged fellow writers to persevere through the phase of writing where a piece becomes “word molasses” and to push through to complete the manuscript.

I was curious to see what these two lawyers, both affiliated with the ALA’s Freedom to Read Foundation, would have to say about the past year in legislation and censorship. Certainly seeing the stats was disheartening — 151 bills were introduced in the first half of 2023 to censor or restrict access to information of library services, and 28 of them were here in Texas.

That said, the presenters demonstrated to the audience through several cases that restricting the right to information is unconstitutional, as it’s guaranteed by the First Amendment; it’s been upheld multiple times by the Supreme Court, most recently in 2021. The challenge for libraries is having to bring these cases before the courts, eating up time and budgets. But the presenters ended on a positive note, predicting that the latest bill creating headaches for Texas librarians, HB 900, would be challenged in court. Within an hour of my watching this presentation (a month after the conference), a suit brought by booksellers had been announced.

Taught by consultant Kristin Crockett, the session sought to build attendees’ use of empathy, particularly as leaders. Crockett argued that good leaders can be both strong and empathetic, holding people accountable while also acknowledging that personal and work lives may overlap now and then.

Presenter Betsy Manning made a compelling argument that leaders create the environment that causes people to stay or go – most employees leave due to poor leadership or a negative culture. She encouraged attendees to be encouraging, supporting managers who see employees as active contributors that want to take initiative and grow in their jobs.

Whitthorne, a leading public speaker on health, wellbeing and productivity, asked attendees to consider what one can do to thrive rather than just be sufficient. Discussed the three layers of behavior change:

• Identity: What you believe
• Processes: What you do
• Outcomes: What you get

By focusing on identity rather than outcomes, you can focus on making better choices and changing your habits.

Presenters Jewell Smith, a wellness coordinator, and Lacy Wolff, a health promotion administrator, led a short session on practicing self-compassion. The 15 minutes ended with a quote from Emma Lovewell: “You cannot hate yourself into better health; you have to love yourself into better health.”

The presenter, Charles Robinson, works in the judicial system but evaluates how to incorporate change within any given system. His approach to DEI is to eventually get to the point where DEI is a part of a company’s business goals, leveraging diverse and inclusive teams to maximize business benefits. He reminded attendees that diversity without inclusion equals turnover. Inclusion should be the priority, allowing for a diverse staff to create equitable outcomes for both employees and the bottom line.

Presentation on the Portal to Texas History, covering the various digital resources available for Texas teachers. Emphasis was placed on both the quality of resources and their accessibility. Presented by Dreanna Belden, University of North Texas.

Discussed the building of a LibGuide on suffrage for women of color, especially in Texas, at Texas Woman’s University. Presenters Susan Whitmer, Veronica Popp and Amanda Zerangue talked about the challenges of building finding aids and research guides on archival materials, including insensitive language in primary resources and metadata that may not always reflect what you are looking for.

The librarian team at Texas A&M International University discussed ways that librarians and the marketing department teamed up with other campus units to co-host events and share resources. Their first project was working with the Office of Equal Opportunity and Diversity to create events and a research guide for Consent Week in February 2022. This led to other collaborations with the Office of Financial Aid on financial literacy and the Student Rec Center for events during Pride month.

Presenter David Montequin from Collin College discussed how to redefine information literacy with a queer lens. He suggests that current approaches to IL put marginalized communities under a microscope rather than seeing them as communities. He suggests students should consider the following questions as they research identities:

• Is this identity socially constructed?
• How is it defined in the text?
• Is it a scientific phenomenon or something more discursive?

Business librarian Melissa Johnson discussed some of the ways SMU made virtual learning more engaging after the pandemic sent us all home. In particular, she suggested using the Remote Control option available to Zoom hosts, which allows attendees to take over the controls of the host’s computer and enables them to actively practice whatever skills are being taught during the virtual workshop.

The presenters, a team from the University of North Texas, began by reviewing their DEI efforts over the last couple of years and introducing the Trans Accessible Libraries Initiative. They then went into detail about how to approach collection assessment through diversity audits and developing an infrastructure for continuous assessment and improvement of the diversity, equality and inclusiveness of library collections.

Presented by librarians from three separate academic libraries — Alexa Hight, Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi; Laura Waugh, Texas State University; and Amanda Zerangue, Texas Woman’s University — this presentation focused on accessibility for digital collections. I was hoping to get their perspective on accessibility for other digital tools like LibGuides or tutorials, but it was a very narrow scope.

Yet another presentation about how five different Texas libraries reacted to COVID. While it can be informative to learn how libraries shifted their services during the pandemic, it would have been even more helpful to learn how they had determined what services to pivot to during the pandemic, especially if they had been polling their patrons to learn what was needed in their communities.

A storyteller who writes about her Ojibwe community in Michigan, Boulley recently published her debut novel, Firekeeper’s Daughter, a groundbreaking young adult thriller about a Native teen who must root out corruption in her community. Her story connects Ojibwe “hero” stories to Western hero narratives like Harry Potter or Star Wars, framing a traditional hero’s journey within the Ojibwe medicine wheel to create a unique narrative.

Boulley spoke of the importance of authenticity and representation in books. As a young woman, Boulley often felt questioned about her ethnic identity frequently as she is light-skinned. While she would ask herself if she was “Native enough,” others often identified her as the token Native representative on work teams. As she wrote her novel, she realized her story was one of identity, claiming her identity as an Indigenous person, and finding her place in the world, particularly her tribal community.

In concluding her presentation, she urged librarians:

• Own who you are
• Your story matters
• Write the story only you can tell

Her experience underscored the need to not only build more diverse collections, but to make sure that patrons are exposed to such works, whether through book clubs, blog or social media posts, or even featured displays that draw attention to Indigenous or Native experiences.

• Angeline Boulley [angelineboulley]. (2021, May 17). [Photograph of author Angeline Boulley holding up a copy of her book, Firekeeper’s Daughter.] [Image] Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/p/CO-UuFmrC7Z/

Taught by Shatha Baydoun and Ava Brillat, teaching librarians at the University of Miami, the presentation argued that even in one-shot instruction, librarians can integrate anti-racist ideas that tie directly to the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy. They suggested talking about information privilege, how peer-reviewed work and paywalls can limit who can access and who can publish information, leading to discussion of evaluating information that is found outside these structures, particularly in cultural resources. They also noted that research can also include bias in the data — what is represented and what is not? This must be kept in mind when evaluating resources, even those published in scholarly or peer-reviewed journals.

Presented by Bridgette Sanders and Denelle Eads, who have been leading a Diversity and Inclusion Committee at UNC Charlotte since 2017. The committee suggests inclusive and diverse approaches and creates diversity and inclusion programs, activities and practices for J. Murray Atkins Library. The programming discussed included:

• Committee discussions around the definition of diversity
• Diversity Day, a day-long event on campus with presenters from UNC Charlotte, the Charlotte community, and across the nation
• Presentations at monthly staff meetings to inform about diversity and diverse people
• Global Diversity Awareness Month, suggesting ways to celebrate diversity to the UNC Charlotte community
• A book club for faculty, staff and students highlighting diverse books
• Hosting a traveling exhibit on migrant workers from the Smithsonian

The presenters concluded that diversity and inclusion is not a one and done initiative. It takes continual work — and support from library administration — to amplify inclusivity.

Taught by a former colleague and fellow intern at SMU, Ramón Garcia, this succinct presentation explained how our internship was inclusive and empowering, while asking probing questions about minority voices and empowerment on our campus.

These authors opened the conference with an introduction to their new book, Four Hundred Souls. The book represents the movement that all libraries should be embracing, the need to see the diversity of voices and experiences of Black people in America. Kendi referred to their 90 contributors as a choir that celebrates this diversity, introducing readers to 400 years of experiences of Black people in America, starting in 1619, when the first African slaves landed on the shore at Jamestown, Virginia. was a call to action for all librarians, and Blain noted that contributors were having conversations in the pages of the book of different experiences in different generations, like the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s as compared to the Black Lives Matter movement of today. Kendi ended the session noting that he hopes this book lives on in libraries for a long time, introducing readers to the plethora of Black voices here in the U.S.

• Ianson, C. (2016). Photo of Keisha N. Blain at the Global Garveyism Symposium, Virginia Commonwealth University, 2016 [Image]. Wikimedia, Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Keisha_Blain_Headshot.jpg
• Tony Turner Photography. (2019). Ibram X. Kendi: How to Be an Antiracist [Image]. Flickr, Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license. https://www.flickr.com/photos/77549586@N03/48625099058

Moderated by Loida Garcia-Febo, International Library Consultant; presented by Twanna Hodge, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Librarian at University of Florida George A. Smathers Libraries in Gainesville, FL, Nicole A. Cooke, Ph.D., M.Ed, MLS, Augusta Baker Endowed Chair and Associate Professor at the School of Information Science at University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC, Tasha Nins, Children’s Librarian at Ramsey County Library, St. Paul, MN, and Shauntee Burns-Simpson, Associate Director at the School Support & Outreach at The New York Public Library, New York, NY

Nina Hodge began the 90-minute conversation by defining such terms as diversity, equity, and inclusion, while reminding attendees that none of these terms or ideas is the same as anti-racism. Statements condemning racism and white supremacy are great, but they need to lead to action — repeated actions over a long period of time. Nicole Cooke emphasized that overuse of certain buzz words (like multiculturalism in the recent past) can water down their meaning. We need to make sure that we stay true to the current meanings of terms like equity and inclusion or anti-racism, and stay true to the movement they imply: taking action and working for social justice. We need to make sure that equity, diversity, and inclusion need to be discussed (repeatedly) in classrooms and workplaces, not just in webinars and voluntary conferences.

Tasha Nins pointed out that many libraries still do not recognize that libraries represent whiteness as the norm, and have not asked about ways to reach out to voices of color, representing the diverse voices of their community. And this includes when working with children; the earlier we can talk about celebrating the differences of our peers, the more accepting they will be as they grow older. Shauntee Burns-Simpson asked attendees to challenge the issues that do not match the core values of our profession: Challenge your personal bias at the individual level to make sure that you are bringing diverse voices into your library, both in the collection and the personnel; waive fines that affect those that struggle the most in your community; create inclusive programming and broaden the types of voices heard at your institution; and consider how frequently and why you police patrons of color in your library.

The panelists then opened a discussion with all five women that noted the importance of inclusion in workplace culture. Are we considering the implications of being the only person of color on the staff? Do our policies and expectations take into consideration cultural differences? Are we expecting the voice of one person of color to represent the voices of all people of color? These ideas need to be considered, written into policy, and acted on across the workplace and with patrons.

This session featured Harjo in conversation with her editor at Norton, Jill Bialosky. They spoke about her poetry, and the role of writing and poetry in our modern society. Harjo noted that poets are the truth tellers, telling the story of a culture; she said that poetry is a great doorway into other cultures. She also discussed her latest project with the Library of Congress as Poet Laureate, a story map of First Peoples Poetry, titled Living Nations, Living Words.

Acho joined the ALA to discuss his recently published book, Uncomfortable Conversations With a Black Man, based on his YouTube channel of the same name. (The first video in that series is linked to below.) Acho says that his goal is to bridge the gap between Black culture and white culture, to help more people understand the experiences of Black people in America. As a former athlete who saw a locker room full of men united to defeat a common enemy in their opponents, he wants to help Americans embrace their similarities as humans to defeat the common enemy of racism. Acho also wants to inspire individuals to take action to make change, helping our society change as a whole to dismantle systemic racism.

Acho, E [Emmanuel Acho]. (2020, June 3). Uncomfortable conversations with a Black man [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h8jUA7JBkF4

Presented by Nicole Cooke, Associate Professor at the School of Information Science at the University of South Carolina; introduction by Miguel Figueroa, President and Chief Executive Officer of Amigos Library Services

Both Figeroa and Cooke discussed the importance of actively considering equity, diversity and inclusion in our spaces. Such true inclusion will require conscientious assessment of policy and programming, and, as Cooke emphasized, considering the language used in communication from daily interactions to formal policies across your institution. We need to re-envision and re-imagine what our institution would look like if it’s equitably accessible to all of our patrons, and if we are actively pursuing change in order to achieve that.

Presented by William Helman, Information Technology Librarian, and Julia Caffrey-Hill, Web Services Librarian, both at Towson University, Towson, MD

This presentation discussed how accessibility should be an important part of any library’s approach to not only digital collections, but also facilities, print collections and services. Accessibility is not only a core value for librarians, but also a legal and ethical imperative, as Caffrey-Hill pointed out. But accessibility should be driven by empathy rather than directives. Everyone in the library (and throughout campus) can be a part of this approach to accessibility, which also helps to distribute the work across the library as it should not just be one person’s job.

The speakers ended the session with time to brainstorm what we all can do to improve accessibility. They used the graphic below to prompt discussion of the following ideas, encouraging such discussions in our own libraries, to remind ourselves that we can all do small things to help improve accessibility.

• What do I control?
• What do I contribute to?
• What can I influence?
• Where do I have no influence?

Presented by Brianne Anderson, Youth Services Librarian, and Kiki Kramer, Intern, both at the Ames Public Library, Ames, IA

Anderson and Kramer have run three diversity audits of their children’s collections in the past few years to determine whether their collections include a wide variety of points of view, experiences and representations. These audits help to identify gaps in the collection, as well as where implicit bias may be affecting book selection.

They advocate a simple plan of action for any diversity audit:

• Prep the collection by wedding old materials, which allows the team to save time and effort on a smaller number of resources. (Others advocate for weeding afterward.)
• Set the parameters of what you expect to measure: What demographics will you be looking for? Ethnicity? Gender? Characters with disabilities? Be sure to look at your own community too, to understand who is reading your books.
• Collect data on your collection. The speakers advocated using a randomizer to collect a sample of the collection; their most recent audit looked at about 1/3 of their collection.
• Analyze the data using Excel tools, online software like Dedoose, and other graphic representations of the information like through Infogram.
• Adjust your buying patterns to make data-informed decisions moving forward.

This introduction to the conference was a call to action for all librarians. ALA Executive Director Tracie A. Hall advocated for justice across the organization, “inviting us to explore the construct of the library as both the vehicle and driver of justice, as both a means to justice and an arbiter. To support this movement for justice, she called for

1. More access to the Internet and digital services for all patrons
2. A more diverse field of accredited librarians and library workers to ensure equitable access to knowledge and resources
3. More investment in libraries, both from government funding and private partnerships

The keynote, featuring dancer Misty Copeland, was presented as an interview by Kirby McCurtis, the President of the Association for Library Service to Children, as well as the Library Manager of Multnomah County. Ms. Copeland spoke about her new children’s book, based on her first dance classes as a child, which encourages diversity within and outside of the dance community, including gender as well as race. She also spoke of the importance of the mentorship of other African Americans who were “firsts” in their field, which gave her the courage to strive for success within the ballet community.

• Squire, G. N. (2013). Book Cover for Life In Motion memoir [Image]. Wikimedia, Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Life_In_Motion_(cropped).jpg

Moderated by Sherre Harrington, Director of Memorial Library, Berry College, Mount Berry, GA
Speakers: Emily Drabinski, Interim Chief Librarian, The Graduate Center, CUNY, New York, NY; Dalena Hunter, Librarian/Archivist for Los Angeles Communities and Cultures, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA; and Teresa Y. Neely, Professor and Assessment Librarian, CULLS, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Ms. Harrington started the session with a brief history of feminism within the field, and Ms. Drabinski agreed that it is a field that has been both feminized and racialized, and that the organization continues to work to diversify both through gender and ethnicity across the board. She encouraged all of us to see the library as a site of struggle, where we can pull together and push for a more equitable library in the hopes to see more equality across the board outside the library. Ms. Hunter gave the history of two Black librarians as a way to highlight how we need to celebrate all of the women that have come before us in librarianship, not just the white women.

Dr. Neely approached feminism through intersectionality in activism, noting that Black female librarians are doubly oppressed, and hoping to propel libraries toward a more equitable environment. In particular, she argued that by labeling protected groups and minorities as “women and/or people of color,” it denies that Black women and other women of color are treated differently than white women, essentially silencing them. Ms. Hunter asserted that libraries are a part of a system built on racial inequity, and that our responsibility is to acknowledge our privileges in the library and work toward equitable access.

As part of an academic library at a private university, I think that is particularly true. It has been challenging to witness the events of the past few months without being able to discuss them in person with colleagues. While the university administration has released statements about combating racism on campus, I am curious to see what actually comes about whenever we are able to return to campus.

Presented by Camille Chesley, Reference Librarian; Amanda M. Lowe, Outreach and Marketing Librarian; and Lauren Puzier, User Experience Librarian; all at the University at Albany, State University of New York, Albany, NY

This sounded very fitting given our current status of all students learning from home, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that we had already integrated many of the suggestions into our offerings at SMU Libraries. As soon as we began working from home, we transitioned to virtual consultations via Zoom. The one challenge we had with this was awareness — there were not as many opportunities to suggest these consultations to students; I would often suggest consultations when students came to the reference desk in person and needed more help, which of course has not been happening. The marketing options they suggest in the presentation are the biggest benefit I can see that we could use moving forward in helping students from a distance, as well as their proposed assessment options.

Presented by Mandi Goodsett, Performing Arts & Humanities Librarian, and Copyright & OER Advisor, at Cleveland State University, Cleveland, OH.

This was an excellent presentation on evaluating various ways to teach critical thinking when discussing IL. The author gives a variety of useful tools and suggestions throughout the presentation, and she introduces attendees to different technologies that can be used to stimulate conversation and discussion from a distance, like Padlet.