Inside SOIS - Fall 2011

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Fall 2011UW-MILWAUKEE, SCHOOL OF INFORMATION STUDIES

In this issue... learn about SOIS’ commitment to exploring new educational and research opportunities and meet some of our alumni who are leaving their mark on the information profession!

Inside SOIS is published twice a year by the School of Information Studies Interim Dean: Dietmar WolframInterim Associate Dean: Gwat-Yong LieAssistant Dean: Chad ZahrtAssistant Dean: Joey Zafra

Executive Editors:Chad ZahrtScott Lenski

Writers:Dave BloomScott LenskiChad Zahrt

Art Direction / Design:Rebecca Hall

Photography:Natalie Puariea, PhotographerRebecca Hall, Contributing PhotographerUWM Photographic Services: Pete Amland, Peter Jakubowski, Alan Magayne-Roshak

nsidensidSOISSOISeeeeeSF a l l 2 0 1 1 V O L . 3 N o . 1

SCHOOL OF INFORMATION STUDIES | UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN - MILWAUKEE

IN THIS issueDean’s Note ....................................................................01New SOIS Faculty ..........................................................02SOIS Post Doc Fellows .................................................04SOIS Welcomes New PhD Students ............................05Students Customize Their Programs ..........................06A Passion For The Profession - Jennie Stoltz ...........08Carving Out A Career - Dan Rude ................................10BSIST Graduate - Orlando Hernandez ........................12ALA Student-to-Staff Program .....................................13SOIS & UWM Grad. School Make Travel Easy ...........14New SOIS Grant Writer - Jeremy Simon .....................16Save the Date .................................................................16New SOIS Systems Admin. - Jim Schultz ................... 17Staff Profile - Laura Meyer............................................ 17

Research Center Update: CIPR .................................... 19Research Group Update: rgIR ...................................... 16Recent Scholarship ....................................................... 19Mu Receives RGI Grant ................................................ 19Research Group Update: IOrg ..................................... 20Professional Development Institute ............................ 21SOIS Silent Auction ....................................................... 21UWM PantherProwl ....................................................... 22Taiwan Student Interns Visit SOIS ............................... 22Archives Student Lora Davis Honored ....................... 23UWM In New Orleans .................................................... 23Information. Connection. Philanthropy. ...................... 24New Technology Resources @ SOIS .......................... 25SOIS Student Organization Information ..................... 25

Keep us Informed!

We invite all students and alumni to send us

your updates and news for future issues of

Inside SOIS. We’d love to hear from you!

ADDRESS CORRECTIONS AND UPDATESUW-Milwaukee, School of Information StudiesAttn: Inside SOISPO Box 413Milwaukee, WI 53201Phone: 414-229-4707 | Fax: 414-229-6699Email: [email protected]

Inside SOIS is printed in limited quantity. Electronic issues are available online at: www.uwm.edu/Dept/SOIS/Inside. Please share this publication with colleagues and please recycle!

“May you live in interesting times.” I was reminded of this proverb upon stepping into the role of SOIS interim Dean in February.

The state budget has been a topic of great interest and controversy this year. Fortunately,

SOIS remains in a financially sound position due in large part to the strength of its programs.

Enrollments in our Bachelor of Science in Information Science and Technology program, for

example, are up. I am also pleased to report that donations to the School to support schol-

arships have reached an all-time high. It is particularly heartening to see our alumni and

employee’s continued generosity during these economically challenging times.

DEAN’S note

Powerful Ideas. Proven Results.

SOIS continues to explore new educational and research opportunities. In the spring, a coordinated MLIS and MA in Women’s Studies

was approved, the ninth coordinated degree program in the School. SOIS is also one of the founding units of the recently approved

Biomedical Health Informatics Research Institute (BHIRI).

In January 2012, the School is scheduled to move, at least temporarily, from its current location in Bolton Hall to “surge” space in the

newly acquired Columbia Hospital complex, now called the Northwest Quadrant. The move has been prompted by the need to renovate

the Bolton Hall heating/cooling system. SOIS is currently reviewing options to determine if it will return to Bolton Hall after the space has

been renovated, or if it will occupy an area of the Northwest Quadrant to accommodate the growth in faculty, staff, and students it has

experienced in recent years.

In this issue of Inside SOIS we highlight the accomplishments of several recent and not so recent graduates of the BSIST and MLIS

programs. These graduates are already leaving their mark on the information professions.

Living in interesting times isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

Thank You!Interim Dean Dietmar Wolfram

PROVEN...

3INFORMATION our focusINTERNATIONAL our scope

INTERDISCIPLINARY our mindset

Fall 2011 | 01

Welcome to SOIS!N E W F A C U L T Y J O I N S O I S T H I S F A L L


02 | Inside SOIS

Dr. Anderson, a winner of a 2010-2011 Eugene Garfield Dissertation Fellowship from Beta Phi Mu, recently received her PHD from UCLA. During her studies, Dr. Anderson’s research examined how archivists learn to appraise through social interaction. She received her MLIS with a specialization in archives from UCLA in 2007.

Her early experiences working at the Cline Library in Flagstaff, Arizona helped to shape Dr. Anderson’s educational path and career. While working in Special Collections and Archives as she pursued her BA in Humanities at Northern Arizona University, she enjoyed the dialogue of professionals that included ethical and moral considerations for those working in the field.

One of her first responsibilities as Assistant Professor at SOIS will be teaching two courses,

L&I Sci 650 Introduction to Modern Archives Administration and Arrangement and L&I Sci 750 Description in Archives. Dr. Anderson is truly excited about teaching and says it’s very reward-ing to work with students and then have them make their mark in the field. While at SOIS, Dr. Anderson will also continue to research appraisal and archivists, along with LIS pedagogy and sociocultural aspects of records and record keep-ing.

Dr. Anderson, who grew up in Fresno, California, is enthusiastic about her move to Milwaukee and finds the natural features of the city very appeal-ing. She also looks forward to working with many of the local historical organizations. Starting at the end of August, Dr. Anderson will also become chair of the Appraisal and Acquisitions section of the Society of American Archivists.

Originally a student of chemistry, Dr. Babu received both an Undergraduate and Master’s degree from Sambalpur University in India. After losing his sight, he migrated to the United States and received a Master’s degree in Information Systems from Central Michigan University in 2005.

This past June, he successfully defended his dissertation and received his PHD in Information Systems from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. His dissertation fills the knowledge gap on the nature of accessibility and usability problems that blind people face in interacting with information and communications technolo-gies to accomplish academic tasks.

Dr. Babu was drawn to SOIS partially because of the complementary research already being carried out at the school, and he hopes to also work with researchers in other disciplines such

as education, psychology and computer sci-ence. A winner of multiple grants, including one from the National Science Foundation, Dr. Babu will continue his research on finding solutions on making the web more usable for those who are blind, while at the same time developing train-ing programs on effective use of the Web for the blind so they can better participate in the education system. While interest and awareness is increasing in the area of technology for those who are visually impaired, Dr. Babu says there is still a long way to go. Dr. Babu will also be the instructor for L&I Sci 410 Database Information Retrieval Systems.

Dr. Babu is excited about making Milwaukee his home. While researching and teaching at SOIS, he also looks forward to working with the various blind communities, industry and organizations in Wisconsin and beyond.

Kim ANDERSONASSISTANT PROFESSOR

Rakesh BABUASSISTANT PROFESSOR



Fall 2011 | 03

Dr. Moyer attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and received a Bachelor’s in European Military History. She contin-ued her education at Illinois and in 2003 she received her Master’s of Library and Information Science.

After graduation, Dr. Moyer worked at a community college in Decatur, Illinois, where she was responsible for everything from catalog-ing to instruction. She also worked as the liai-

son for the education department at the SUNY College at Oneonta in New York.

In May 2011, Dr. Moyer was awarded her PHD in Literary Education from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Her dissertation was titled “’Teens Today Don’t Read Books Anymore!’ A Study of Differences in Interest and Comprehension Based on Reading Modalities”. Dr. Moyer’s research interests also include adult leisure reading, and she is the author of Research-Based Readers’ Advisory and also The Readers’ Advisory Handbook.

Dr. Moyer was named one of Library Journal’s “Movers and Shakers” in 2008. In addition, she was awarded an Alumni Leadership Award in 2010 from the University of Illinois Graduate School of Library and Information Science.

In fall, Dr, Moyer will be the instructor for L&I Sci 501 Foundations of Library and Information Science and L&I Sci 890 Introduction to Research Methods. While at SOIS, Dr. Moyer will continue her research on leisure reading along with reading on digital devices.

In her spare time, Dr. Moyer is always reading. She reads a lot of fiction, mystery, young adult, and science fiction and writes book reviews for Booklist. She is really excited about relocating to Milwaukee and trying all the different restaurants the city has to offer.

Wilhelm Peekhaus has been hired as an Assistant Professor in SOIS. Dr. Peekhaus hails from Brantford, Ontario and has been undertaking his post-doctoral work at SOIS since August 2010. Dr. Peekhaus received his Honors Bachelor’s in Political Science and History, with a minor in German from McGill University in Montreal in 1992. At Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Dr. Peekhaus received his MLIS in 2003 and was nominated for Beta Phi Mu.

For his PHD studies, Dr. Peekhaus studied at the University of Western Ontario. His dissertation focused on the Canadian biotechnology agriculture industry from a Marxist perspective. His dissertation is titled “Canada’s Biotechnology Strategy; Struggles on the Knowledge Commons”. After a successful defense of his dissertation in 2008, Dr. Peekhaus has contin-ued with his research interests in the biotechnology industry.

Dr. Peekhaus recently took a research trip to South Africa, in which he was examining seed companies and the access of information dispute. He was working with small subsistence farmers on education and information dissemination.

SOIS was attractive to Dr. Peekhaus, in part due to the Center for Information Policy Research. He says that SOIS is very supportive to newly hired faculty and staff. In addi-tion to his research here, Dr. Peekhaus is the instructor for two courses, L&I Sci 891 (Anti)Political Economy of Information and Communication and L&I Sci 661 Ethics and the Information Society.

Jessica MOYERASSISTANT PROFESSOR

Wilhelm PEEKHAUSASSISTANT PROFESSOR

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Share Your News!We’d love to hear from you! We invite all SOIS stu-dents, alumni and friends to send us your news and updates for possible inclusion in future issues of Inside SOIS. Do you have an idea for a story? Let us know! Visit the Alumni & Friends website to contact us and share your news! www.uwm.edu/sois/alumni_friends/update.cfmor Email: [email protected]


Nadine KozaK will begin her post-doctoral work at SOIS this fall. She re-ceived her Undergraduate degree in Honors History from the University of Calgary, Canada. In 2000, she received her Master’s in Communication from Car-leton University in Ottawa, Canada.

For her PHD studies, Nadine attended the University of California-San Diego. She graduated in 2010 with a PHD in Communication and Science Studies. Her dissertation is titled “On the Last Mile: The Effects of Telecommunications Regulation and Deregulation in the Rural Western United States and Canada.” It examined how telecommunications poli-cy is made along with whether rural areas have access to broadband service.

Nadine has received a number of awards, including a doctoral fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and also a 2004-2005 Summer Graduate Teaching Fellowship from UC San Diego.

Since 2005, Nadine has been teach-ing courses at San Diego and in Janu-ary 2010 she was hired on as an Adjunct Lecturer. She has taught courses on the information age, the history of U.S. tele-communications, and communication law.

She is excited to continue her research interests at SOIS, expanding on her dis-sertation and examining how success-ful government grants are on extending broadband access. In the spring, she is also slated to teach a graduate course.

Originally from Calgary, Canada, Nadine is looking forward to spending some time in Milwaukee. She enjoys moving from region to region, but says she loves the age, character, and beauty of the city. In her free time, she enjoys cooking, spend-ing time with friends, and traveling. She has always wanted to be an academic, and is excited to continue teaching and researching her interests.

Charles-Antoine Julien is currently pursuing his post-doctoral work at SOIS. He received his Undergraduate degree in Industrial Engineering from Polytechnique Mon-tréal, one of Canada’s leading engineering schools in 1998. After graduating, Charles-Antoine worked as a business software consultant in parts of Europe and the United States.

After five years of working in the private sector, he returned to university and received a Master of Applied Science with a focus on educative technologies in 2004 from Polytechnique. Charles-Antoine went on to receive his PHD in 2010 from McGill University in Montréal. While working on his PHD, Charles-Antoine’s research involved examining information retrieval tools and information organization. The specifics of his research included simplifying information organization structures in order to make information retrieval tools easier to use.

Charles-Antoine has received a number of awards, including a doctoral grant from the Québec Fund for Research in Soci-ety and Culture. He was also awarded 2nd prize for a poster competition in a peer-reviewed conference.

Charles-Antoine JULIEN

POST-DOC FELLOWSPOST-DOC FELLOWS

Nadine KOZAK

04 | Inside SOIS



Fall 2011 | 05

Pierre Tirilly is originally from Britta-ny, a region in the west of France. He has been pursuing his post-doctoral work at SOIS since September of 2010. Pierre is accomplished with two master’s degrees. The first he received in computer engi-neering from the Institut National des Sci-ences Appliquées de Rennes in France in 2006. That same year, Pierre received a Master of Science with a concentration on artificial intelligence and image process-ing from the University of Rennes 1.

Pierre continued on at the University of Rennes 1 and received his PHD in July 2010. The Centre National Pour la Re-cherche Scientifique (CNRS) funded his PHD studies, where his focus was on information and image retrieval. While pursuing his PHD, his research included the use of natural language processing to improve image retrieval, classification and annotation systems.

At SOIS, Pierre is currently working on two research projects. The first project involves the study of the perception of similarities and differences between im-

ages. Pierre hopes this study will be used to improve image retrieval systems. His other project involves the study of medical image retrieval to improve image search results for professionals in the field. In ad-dition to his research here at SOIS, Pierre is also an instructor for L&I Sci 410 Data-base Information Retrieval Systems.

When Pierre arrived in Milwaukee, his first impressions of the city were that the peo-ple were extremely friendly. He also likes to see live music, and said that Milwau-kee has many venues to choose from. In his free time, he plays the bass guitar and also really loves to cook. One challenge Milwaukee presented for Pierre was that it was impossible to find ingredients that he enjoyed cooking with.

After finishing up at SOIS, Pierre originally thought he would travel back to France to find a professorship at a university there. He is now thinking about staying some-where in North America to find a position, perhaps in the United States or Canada.

T his fall SOIS welcomes five new PHD students who received fellowships from Overcoming Barriers to Information Access (B2A). The B2A fellow-ships were awarded to students with research interests that address barri-

ers to information access as they relate to one of the three areas of specialization within the doctoral program: information organization, information policy, and in-formation retrieval. Jennifer Thiele has interests in researching how tech-nology can be used to increase literacy in information poor areas. Adrianna McCleer will focus her research on addressing obstacles related to information policy. Renee Kapusniak is interested in how the user retrieves information in the library environment. Jeannette Robinson wants to focus on how cataloging and classification systems are used in libraries. Tina Jayroe is inter-ested in bibliometrics and metadata applications, policies, models and standards.

These doctoral fellowships are funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Ser-vices (IMLS) Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program.

SOIS also welcomes a sixth PHD student beginning this fall, Tyler Smith. Tyler has research interests in the digital divide, along with examining digital collections and ways in which these collections are made accessible to patrons.

While at SOIS, Charles-Antoine is continuing his research interests in information organi-zation and information retrieval in the field of medical information. He is also an onsite and online instructor for L&I Sci 511 Information Organization.

Charles-Antoine has enjoyed his stay in Mil-waukee. He says the neighborhood is ex-tremely welcoming, and he loves the fact that you can walk to nearly everything. He also enjoys conversation over a local brew. To keep sane, Charles-Antoine likes to per-form physical activity, and in the past he has trained for triathlons. During his time here at SOIS, Charles-Antoine has found the faculty, staff, and students very friendly. He will miss the comfortable atmosphere when he leaves in December of 2011. He will return to Mon-tréal and his alma mater McGill University, where he has been hired as a full time faculty member.

s or Canada.

Pierre TIRILLY

Six New PhD Students Join SOIS This FallWelcome Scholars...

06 | Inside SOIS


Students Customize & Tailo

At SOIS, graduate students can customize and tailor their stud-ies to meet individual needs. This customization can include a transcript designated concentration, coordinated degree or a certification.

SOIS offers three official areas of concentration: Archival Studies, Information Organization, and beginning this fall the new Public Library Leadership Concentration. Students also have the option to customize their experience by completing a coordinated degree program. The coordinated degree programs provide students the opportunity to obtain two master’s degrees simultaneously. While

pursuing a coordinated degree, the number of credits needed for each master’s degree is fewer than the number of credits needed if the degrees were completed alone. Currently there are nine coordinated degree options, including the new MLIS/MA in Women’s Studies.

For educators interested in working as a school library media specialist, SOIS offers a complete program to attain the required certification. In addition, students can specialize in academic, spe-cial, public, or digital libraries as well as information technology, information literacy, and information law, policy and ethics.

The newest concentration offered by SOIS is the Public Library Leadership (PLL) Concentration. The PLL Concentration totals 21 credits. The courses cover a variety of topics and helps students prepare for the wide range of oppor-tunities confronting the post-modern public library. Assistant Professor Joyce Latham says “the Public Library Leadership Concentration is about engaging with broad concepts of public service and public scholarship that is based in local community assessment. In other words, instead of just learning about children’s books and adult programs, the PLL concentration looks at the value of those services to develop-ment of the community.”

SOIS has been working on the PLL Concentration for over two years. Catherine Hansen, a lecturer at SOIS, says “we devel-oped the Public Library Leadership concen-tration because we know from data that we collect that about half of our incoming students

are interested in working in the field of public libraries. We knew that one way to better pre-pare our students in the ever-evolving library environment would be to develop a track for library leadership skills.” And although students’ interest in public libraries continues, Latham points out that across the country “public library tracks are disappearing and we see a possibility to fulfill an emerging gap. This concentration is a commitment by faculty to affirm the value of public libraries in a school of information studies and raise the visibility of public librarianship as an honorable profession.”

Professor Latham states, “I think public librari-anship is one of the most dynamic professions available. It engages practitioners in community work, political advocacy and social advance-ment.”

Their Paths to Their Paths to Success!

“having a designation of PLL on your transcript means that the student has given serious thought to their career path, and the kind of contribution they want to make to society within the field of public librarianship. Employers will know that students have prepared themselves for leadership roles and have a mindset and a commitment that sets them apart from other applicants.” Catherine Hansen, Lecturer

concentrationstranscript designated

Archival Studies

Information Organization

Public Library Leadership

Public Library Leadership Concentration

Sukrani Gray is pursuing the Coordinated MLIS/MS Anthropology, and concentrating in Archival Studies.

The field of library and information science is vast. Working in an archives is a lot different than working in a public library, and the skills needed to perform these jobs vary greatly.

By Scott Lenski

MLIS/MS Anthropology

MLIS/MA English

MLIS/MA Language, Lit., and Translation

MLIS/MA Geography

MLIS/MS Health Care Informatics

MLIS/MA History

MLIS/MM Music

MLIS/MS Urban Studies

MLIS/MA Women’s Studies

coordinateddegrees



Undergraduates in the BSIST program can also customize their program with a minor or certificate. Students have the flexibility to choose up to two minors in other areas of study including computer science, inter-national studies, business, and health care administration.

There are currently three certificates that can be added to the BSIST as well. Academic advisor Angela Sadowsky says, “IST stu-dents have a great opportunity to maximize their credits and get the most bang for their buck by earning certificates along with their bachelor’s degree.” The certificates include:

HEALTH CARE INFORMATICS

DIGITAL ARTS & CULTURE (DAC)

WEB DEVELOPMENT

SOIS currently offers nine coordinated degree programs, the newest being the MLIS/MA in Women’s Studies.

Students interested in academic libraries might consider the coordinated MLIS/MA in Women’s Studies. As Professor Hope Olson says, “people with both degrees will have a role in academic libraries where collec-tion management and information literacy instruction support study and research in women’s studies. As with other academic fields, a subject master’s in addition to the MLIS is typically preferred when academic libraries hire”.

Gwynne Kennedy, Associate Professor in the Department of English and Director of the Women’s Studies Program thinks that the MLIS and “Women’s Studies is a good fit for several reasons. Librarianship is a female-intensive profession, and a number of librarians have a professional or practical as well as an intellectual interest in the kinds

of gender-based analysis undertaken in our discipline.”

Amanda Smith, a student in SOIS, is current-ly pursuing the coordinated degree in Music History and Literature along with her MLIS. Smith feels that the coordinated degree is beneficial because, “by combining two degrees that are completed simultaneously, it helps me maintain balance with my studies, and ultimately with myself.” Smith goes on to say “though I have not completed my degree yet, I still think the rewards, the opportuni-ties, and the experiences, far outweigh the challenges.”

Professor Olson also points out that “col-lectively coordinated degree students add to the richness of SOIS’s interdisciplinarity. It also demonstrates SOIS’s commitment to interdisciplinary education.” So no matter what area of interest students have, SOIS has powerful ideas that get proven results.

rUNDERGRADUATECERTIFICATES

“certificates help make a

degree more valuable and

marketable in the field af-

ter graduation”

Success!Their Paths to Success! UUNDERGRADUATE

Coordinated Degree Programs

Angela Sadowsky, Academic Advisor

“There are many MLIS graduates joining the job market each year. Students who customize their experience and have that little some-thing extra on their resume will not only help them stand out from the crowd, it will also demonstrate that they are focused, dedicated, and an expert in their field.”

Amanda Smith is currently pursuing the Coordinated MLIS/MM Music program and is gaining practical experience working in Music Reference at the UWM LIbraries.

Jessica Hutchings, Academic Advisor Fall 2011 | 07

Jennie Stoltz


Director, Pewaukee Public Library

Stoltz didn’t initially know that she wanted a career in libraries. For her undergraduate work, she studied at Marquette Univer-sity and received a BS in Business Administration. Even then, libraries were appealing to her. She worked part-time at the Me-morial Library at Marquette while pursuing her BS, however it would be some years later until she worked in a library again.

After graduating from Marquette, Stoltz entered the world of bookselling. Her resume is filled with independent bookstores including Webster’s, Audubon, and Harry W. Schwartz Books. She was also co-owner of the bookshop Grey and Dudley. Any-one familiar with the Milwaukee book business knows these shops don’t exist any longer. When asked about her decision to go for her MLIS, Stoltz replied, “It kind of saved my life. You can’t survive as a full-time book seller anymore.”

Who were some of Stoltz’s favorite instructors in the program? “Alexandra Dimitroff and Tom Walker both were excellent teach-ers and I learned a lot from them. Also Jim Sweetland, I still use stuff that I learned from him today.” Why does Stoltz think a degree is important? “A MLIS is so valuable because it teaches philosophy along with the practical experience.”

After graduating with her MLIS, Stoltz worked briefly as the de-velopment coordinator at Messmer High School. After less than a year at Messmer, Stoltz went on to become the Children’s and Young Adult Librarian at the Hales Corners Library. Stoltz

Stoltz’s dedication to the profession

goes beyond her position as director.

She is an active member of the SOIS

Alumni Chapter. She is a member of

the SOIS Advisory Council. She is a

co-chair of the Children’s Program-

ming Committee for the Southeast

Wisconsin Festival of Books and is a

liason for the library on the Pewaukee

Area Historical Society Board...just to

name a few!

Jennie Stoltz is the Director of the Pewaukee Pub

Stoltz received her MLIS from SOIS in 1994 (at th

Stoltz performs the usual director responsibilities:

writing policy and maintaining the budget, and keep

sure to work some shifts at the reference desk. “

skills up and see how things work at the service d

A PSOIS Alum’s Dedica

08 | Inside SOIS

Fall 2011 | 09

worked at Hales Corners for 4 years, and then she took a position at the Frank L Weyenberg Library, serving the communities of Mequon and Thiensville. While at the Weyenberg Library, Stoltz was first the Head of the children’s department and later she became the Patron Services Manager overseeing both adult and children’s services.

What does she like most about serving as Director at Pewaukee? “I like being able to evaluate the needs and wants of our patrons and try to fill those needs/wants for our community as much as possible. At a time when there are such budget constraints, you need to be creative”.

And what’s one thing she found challenging about her job? “I hadn’t had previous director experience, and the most challenging thing was working on developing relationships with the stakeholders of the library, such as the City Council and the Village Board.” In addition to serving as the Director at Pewaukee, Stoltz is also currently the Interim Director of the Elm Grove Public Library.

Stoltz continues to be involved at SOIS as a member of both the Advisory Council and also the Alumni Committee Board. She also finds time to serve as the co-chair of Children’s Programming for the Southeast Wisconsin Festival of Books and as a liaison for the library on the Pewaukee Area Historical Society Board.

To those students currently pursuing their MLIS, Stoltz suggests that students first figure out “what type of library they want to work in, all

libraries are different. For public librarians, it’s important to get some actual experience, such as a fieldwork or internship”. She mentioned that sometimes she receives applications from new librarians who have no prior experience and says that “those applicants will have a significant disadvantage over those who have library experience.”

What does the future hold in store for libraries? “Libraries need to adapt but there will always be a demand for library services such as programming, reference, reader’s advisory, and materials”. She says that people have been saying that public libraries are becoming ob-solete for some time, but libraries will always serve a particular need for the community.



blic Library, a position she’s held for five years.

hat time the school was known as SLIS). Sure,

she oversees nearly thirty employees, helps in

ps up on legislative issues, but she also makes

I think it’s important for directors to keep their

esk level.”

Passion for the Profession:ation Impacts Her Community and Ours!

I like being able to evaluate the needs

and wants of our patrons and try to

fill those needs/wants for our com-

munity as much as possible. At a

time when there are such budget

constraints, you need to be creative.‘‘a significant d

lik

d

‘‘tiv

Jennie Stoltz, SOIS Alumna ‘94

By Scott Lenski


10 | Inside SOIS

What does Dan Rude like about his current job? “That’s easy: Working with librarians every day. Having my MLIS has made a lot of difference in my position.”

His current role with the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) — a division of the American Library Association and the largest organization dedicated to the support and enhancement of library service to children—is to promote and market ALSC to librarians and children’s literature enthusi-asts. “Some of my responsibilities include developing marketing campaigns for our initiatives like El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Children’s Day/ Book Day) and Every Child Ready to Read. I’m also the liaison to our profes-sional award committees and maintain our social media sites.”

When asked to elaborate on how the MLIS has made a difference in his current position, Rude is quick to respond: “The MLIS is a really versatile degree. In my case, it’s obviously a huge benefit that I’m familiar with the basic principles of librarianship. When I talk to ALSC members, I like to talk about the planning and structure that goes into their libraries as well as their programs. That’s all stuff that I gleaned from my time at SOIS.”

Additionally, Rude says that although he’s not working a reference desk every day, he still gets the opportunity to talk to children’s librarians about what’s going on in their libraries and hear about what programs are working. Part of what he does is to “facilitate the conversation about services” by working with members to advocate for strong youth readership.

Like any job, this one has its challenges. “Preparing for our Annual Confer-ence in New Orleans was fun but challenging. It was my first Annual Confer-ence as an ALA staff member, so it was a little nerve-wracking, but I think many people would agree that it was a terrific event.”

Rude earned his MLIS from SOIS in December 2009. The road to his MLIS was circuitous, but all too familiar. Like many librarians, he was an English major in his undergraduate days. He tried teaching English abroad, “which was fun,” but ruled out ever being a permanent teacher. He also did some copywriting at a marketing firm. After a few years, he decided that librarian-ship seemed like “the right choice for me.”

Carving out a Career PatRecent Alum’s Classroom and Life Experien

Dan RudeMarketing Specialist, Association for Library Services to Children (ALSC)

By Chad Zahrt

Fall 2011 | 11



Rude wasn’t always going to be a librarian, but he seemed destined for public service. “For a long time, I wanted to follow in my father’s footsteps and become a banker. Sadly, being a banker today does not have the same ring to it as it did long ago. I also considered becoming an Episcopal priest. I’ve always enjoyed working directly with the pub-lic, so librarianship and teaching were two areas that have appealed to me for a long time. I think that’s why you see many librarians who were teachers or vice versa. I’ve also run across more than one clergyper-son who became a librarian.” Rude chose SOIS because, as a Wisconsin native, he could get in-state tuition and the program seemed pretty dynamic. “The price of the education fit my budget and I had heard a lot of great things that were going on at SOIS academically. It absolutely did not disappoint.”

Rude hit the ground running in his MLIS program, making immediate connections with both faculty and staff at SOIS. Rude’s academics were strong, too. “I really enjoyed (then) Associate Dean Hope Olson’s 511 Organization of Information course. It was one of those classes that force you to re-examine your pre-conceived notions. Before 511, I had no intention of liking cataloging. I left the class with a new perspec-tive and interest in the subject.” The connection was mutual. Future semesters would find Rude acting as course assistant for Dr. Olson.

Professor Olson wasn’t the only faculty member to impact Rude. “I have a lot of respect for Dr. Tom Walker. He takes pride in getting toknow his students and making them feel like part of a SOIS family. I remember being close to graduation and being nervous about finding a job. Tom bought me a cup of coffee and gave me some really good

pointers for my job search. He was great to work with and was always willing to go above and beyond expectations. The students liked him, too.”

His initiative and enthusiasm was further rewarded with opportuni-ties to write press releases and articles about students, staff, faculty and visiting scholars for Inside SOIS and the SOIS website. Once he earned his degree, he was offered a full-time position with the School as Communications Specialist, a job he held before taking his current position with ALSC. Now that Rude has moved to Chicago, there is one thing he definitely misses about Milwaukee: “It’s cheesy, but I have a great affinity for the library system in Milwaukee. There are so many really nice branches. Two of my favorites are Bay View and Washington Park. They’re both new and have a lot of natural lighting. Kudos to all of the librarians in the system as well: I always received my ILL materials in a quick, friendly manner.”

As Rude moves through his career, he definitely sees himself taking on roles of leadership and making an impact on the profession. He jokes that he’d like to be the Assistant Dean at SOIS. Regretfully, that posi-tion is currently filled. “I can wait.”

Rude’s sense of humor serves him well. When asked what course, if any, SOIS should add to the MLIS curriculum he is unflinching: “593 Not Being a Timid Librarian.” It is no coincidence that it would be a core course.

When asked what course, if any, SOIS

should add to the MLIS curriculum he

is unflinching: “593 Not Being a Timid

Librarian.”

th:nces Help Mold His Career

g

Dan Rude, SOIS Alumni ‘09


12 | Inside SOIS

What did you like most about the BSIST program?What I liked the most about the BSIST program is that it takes a different approach to IT. Unfortunately nowadays programmers can be outsourced, and with virtual technologies emerging, system administration can be done from anywhere in the world. I then realized that computer science was not for me. Any position can be outsourced, except the ones where client inter-action is required. That’s what BSIST is all about: business analysis, user design analysis, design and use of information systems, project manage-ment, web design/development, etc. Those are some of the most valuable skills I wanted to gain.

Tell me about your overall experiences in SOIS.I loved it! Coming from a technical college, the SOIS approach was very dif-ferent from what I was used to. I like that the program focuses a lot in how to organize information in a better, more adaptable way, and the processes that can be used to help companies make better use of technology.

What did you think about the professors and instructors in SOIS?The professors in the IST program know their stuff pretty well and if you ask them a question or advice, they really do their best to get you what you need. I remember asking a professor one simple question and thanks to that I ended up with tons of web development experience which definitely made my resume stand out.

Discuss some of your previous work experience in your field.Previous to joining UWM, I did a six month internship at Heartland Information Research where I worked as a Network Administrator Intern. While pursuing my degree I worked at the UWM Help Desk as a Consultant and at the Data Center as an Infrastructure Support Assistant. I found that working in UITS is the perfect choice if you want to pursue a career in IT

after you graduate and you don’t want to bother with short term internships.

Tell me about your new job. What are some of your responsibilities?I work as an Application Support Specialist for Fieldglass, Inc. The company that I am working for is a SaaS (Software as a service) company located in downtown Chicago and with offices all over the world. I will be responsible for learn-ing their web based application, more specifically, its capa-bilities, design, technical specifications, usability features, etc. Once I am ready to go, I will be assigned the interna-tional clients and will be their point of contact.

Orlando Hernandez is a recent graduate of the Bachelor of Science in Information Science & Technology (BSIST) program. He has been hired by Fieldglass, Inc. and has relocated to Chicago. Orlando, who is originally from Mexico City, discusses his experiences in the program along with his new position.

OrlandoHernandezApplications Support Specialist

Fieldglass, Inc.

tet r

TTTerrrerII I wIInaaaswwwwwiinbbbeeetttti

By Scott Lenski

In June, I attended the American Library Association’s Annual Conference through the Student-to-Staff program. The program allows for forty library students to attend the conference in exchange for twenty hours of volunteer work. The department I was assigned to was the Associa-tion for Library Service to Children (ALSC), which is also the department that I intern for in Chicago.

Volunteer duties mainly consisted of greeting workshop attendees and helping distribute surveys. In between vol-unteering, I had the opportunity to listen to many engaging workshops. These workshops included listening to panels that had past Newbery Medal-winning authors, best-sell-ing children’s authors and illustrators, and an expert in the field of autism. Also, as part of volunteering for ALSC, I was invited to attend the Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder ban-quet, where I heard award winners give speeches about their path to success.

The Annual Conference also allowed me to meet up with some of my fellow UWM classmates. After connecting and planning on D2L’s student lounge, seven MLIS students met for dinner at Coop’s Place in the French Quarter. As most of us are completing the program online, it was nice to discuss classes, comps and career paths in-person.

Being a Student-to-Staff representative was a rewarding experience that offered many opportunities that I would not have been able to have without the help of ALA’s pro-gram and UWM SOIS, who provided my travel to and from the conference. Thank you, ALA and UWM!

~Allison Payne



Fall 2011 | 13

What else can you tell me about Fieldglass?The company I work for has almost every single IT position you can think of: project management, help desk, application support, applica-tion development, web design, system administration, etc. My plan is to learn and interact with all the other departments in the company and start choosing a career path from there.

Where do you see yourself in 5-10 years?I don’t know, the future is so uncertain. If it was up to me, I would like to remain at Fieldglass and take advantage of all the growth they are experiencing right now. If they open an office in Mexico, or Brazil, then my bilingual skills would give me an edge to be the head of one of those offices. Only time will tell, and if I invest my time at work properly, my dedication for my job will yield fruitful results.

Is there anything about Milwaukee that you will miss?I have always said that Milwaukee is the best city to be in during the summer. The festivals, the nightlife, the social gatherings, love them all. I will definitely miss walking around campus, Bradford beach, and most importantly, my friends. The one thing I won’t miss, but I am stuck with either way, is the cold winter weather.

Is there anything else you would like to add?Yes. Although the SOIS department employs professors from all over the world, I think most students don’t realize what globalization is and there-fore have trouble jumping to an internationalized company. Students should take advantage of the unique perspectives that many of the international professors offer and students should really focus on thinking global as opposed to local. The diverse faculty can help in this capacity.

“Any position can be outsourced, except the

ones where client interaction is required. That’s

what the BSIST is all about: business analysis,

user design analysis, design and use of informa-

tion systems, project management, web design/

development, etc. Those are some of the most

valuable skills I wanted to gain.”

Orlando Hernandez, BSIST ‘10

ALA Student-to-Staff ProgramMLIS Student Allison Payne Shares Her 2011 Conference Experience With Us.

To learn more about Allison, her trip to the 2011 ALA con-

ference and her intern experience at ALSC, Check out her

blog post: http://www.alsc.ala.org/blog/?p=2675

For more Information


14 | Inside SOIS

Although the students discovered travel funding opportunities in various ways, they agreed that the application processes were relatively simple. “Each funding source required you to fill out an application form,” Burns said. “These forms had to include where you were going, why you were going, if you were presenting, what you were presenting, who you were presenting with and when you planned to travel. For the SOIS Travel Award you have to do a short reason statement about why attending this confer-ence will benefit you.”

In addition, the SOIS form requires that students agree to either write a blog entry for each day that they attend the conference or present on the experi-ence after their return. Student blog entries are posted at http://soisblog.uwm.edu/.

SOIS Travel Awards are intended to assist BSIST, MLIS, and PhD students whose poster or paper proposals have been accepted by a conference or meeting of an accredited, nationally-recognized professional or academic organization. Student Travel Awards are also available for students who simply wish to attend a SOIS-approved professional conference. SOIS evaluates other travel fund requests on a case-by-case basis.

Funding amounts are based on destination (domestic vs. foreign, major “hub city” or otherwise) and are provided as reimbursements. For present-ers, this may include airfare, board and lodging, meals, ground transporta-tion, conference registration and poster printing costs. SOIS will notify appli-cants of acceptance within 10 days. UWM Graduate School travel funding has a separate set of criteria that can be found here: http://graduateschool.uwm.edu/students/financial-support/graduate-student-travel-award/

Burns, who was awarded both SOIS and Graduate School funding, cred-ited SOIS with advising her on using both awards to her advantage. “Once I found out that I had received funding from both SOIS and the Graduate School, it was a matter of figuring out how to make them work for me,” she said. “I made an appointment with Laura Meyer in the SOIS office to discuss

SOIS and the UWM GraSOIS and the UWM Graduate School Make Travel EasyIn the Spring 2011 semester, SOIS provided

seven students—Alexis Logsdon, Kali Davis,

Amanda Burns, Judy Jones, Cletus D. Kuuni-

faa, Marilyn Manross and Percy Wise—with

$750 travel awards to attend conferences this

spring and summer. Logsdon, Burns, Jones

and Kuunifaa received additional travel awards

from the Graduate School.

Logsdon presented her paper “The Archives in the Library: Preserving GLBT Periodicals While

Providing Access” at the third annual Archives, Libraries, Museums & Special Collections (ALMS) 2011 International LGBT Conference at UCLA in West Hollywood from April 12–15, 2011

Manross attended the Special Libraries Association (SLA) in Philadelphia from June

12–15, 2011

Burns and Jones presented their paper “Multicultural Children’s Literature from Theory

to Practice” at the Diversity 2011 Conference held in Cape Town, South Africa from June 20–22, 2011

Davis and Wise attended the ALA conference in New Orleans from June 23–28, 2011

Kuunifaa will present his paper “Access to Information: An Index for Transparency in

Ghanaian Governance vis-à-vis the Jamaican Experience” at the World Library & Information Congress: 77th IFLA General Conference & Assembly held in San Juan, Puerto Rico from August 13–18, 2011

SOIS STUDENT TRAVEL FUNDING IS AVAILABLE!If you would like to learn more about travel funding op-portunities available to SOIS students, please contact the School of Information Studies for more details. All travel proposals are considered.

Complete details available online:www.uwm.edu/sois/resources/aid/travel

By Dave Bloom



Spring 2011 | 15

this with her. Laura and I used all my receipts—you must keep them all—to fill out the paperwork and turn it in. It was a smooth and easy process.”

Getting a jump on conference experience can be a boon to students, Burns said. “As an academic librarian, it is expected that you will do presentations and get published,” she said. “This conference [Diversity 2011] gave me the opportunity to do both, although I am still waiting to hear if they are publishing my paper.”

Burns and Jones were part of a panel presentation on theory and practice in multicultural literature for children and young adults, a topic they studied with SOIS Associate Professor Laretta Henderson. “Discussion by panel members included an overview of the class, an overview of SOIS and recruitment of diverse stu-dents, critical race theory, selection criteria and resources, and representation of body image in children’s and young adult mate-rials,” Jones said. “Our session was 90 minutes, we had a very small audience and, instead of a traditional presentation, we had a more intimate discussion in the round seating with the audience.”

Davis, who attended the ALA Conference in New Orleans, notes that simply attending a conference has its benefits, particularly to those students not accustomed to interacting with their peers. “As a distance education student, I am not able to have the in-person interaction with my professors and peers as I would in a traditional classroom setting,” Davis said. “I saw this as an opportunity to meet some of my fellow students, UWM SOIS faculty and admin-istrators, and participate in-person in a setting that complimented my schooling.”

Conferences can also be ideal places to network, as Manross dis-covered when she met another attendee of the SLA Convention. “It turned out that his background and job is in financial services (my last long-term job),” she wrote in her SOIS blog. “As the sole librarian at an East Coast hedge fund, he manages their resources and research. And, hearing of my job search, after we ate, he walked me over to a recruiter he knew who was there as an exhibi-tor. She asked for my resume and, yes, I had one with me!”

Kuunifaa, who has yet to attend the IFLA conference, has addition-al reason to be excited. “It is humbling to have a proposal accepted first of all at this level, given the strong competition from other par-ticipants,” he said. “And second, it is even more encouraging that this paper won the IFLA-LIS 2011 Student Paper Award.”

There are some things that travel funding can’t provide, however. “The reality is that there is never enough time to do all that you want, especially at a professional convention,” Manross wrote. “I would have liked to have visited and engaged on a more per-sonal level with more attendees and vendors, met up with other Wisconsinites, had impromptu lunches with new acquaintances, attended the job search seminars, and found the energy to party every evening.”

aduate School Make Travel EasySOIS and the UWM Graduate School Make Travel Easy

Photos by Amanda Burns

Suppose you wanted to attend or present your work at that great out-of-state conference, but funds are short. You’re a student, after all, and traveling costs money. Hotels cost money. Even conference reg-istration costs money. SOIS and the UWM Graduate School want to make sure you’re not out of luck.

“As a distance education student, I am not able to

have the in-person interaction with my professors

and peers as I would in a traditional classroom

setting. I saw this as an opportunity to meet some

of my fellow students, UWM SOIS faculty and ad-

ministrators, and participate in-person in a setting

that complimented my schooling.”

Photos by Amanda Burns

must was a

oon to xpected

aid. “This do both

P

Cape Town Central Library and Cape Town Waterfront.

Kali Davis, MLIS Student

Jeremy Simon earned a Bachelor of Arts in History and a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations from St Cloud State University in 2005.

Following his studies, Jeremy served for three years as a Peace Corps Vol-unteer in the nation of Honduras. Jeremy managed a variety of international development projects, with a special emphasis within the education, health, and commerce sectors. Prior to joining SOIS, Jeremy has spent the past three years as the Grants & Special Initiatives Coordinator for Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater Milwaukee. Within this role, Jeremy successfully built sev-eral funding relationships with Federal Agencies, local government partners and foundations to create and manage youth development projects for Mil-waukee’s disadvantaged youth.

Jeremy will be joining SOIS as the Grants & Contracts Specialist. In addi-tion to grant-writing and management duties, Jeremy will assist with copy-editing of manuscripts, feature articles for SOIS’s website, and content for print publications such as Inside SOIS.

Jeremy grew up in New Prague, Minnesota, and his path to Milwaukee speaks to his personality and love of diversity – “home” has been everything from a medieval castle in England to a mud hut in Honduras. In his spare time, Jeremy is an avid traveler, audiophile, and long distance runner. When he isn’t lamenting the medi-ocrity of Minnesota’s sports teams, he also volunteers with disadvantaged youth and is active with the Milwau-kee Shambala Center.

Meet JEREMY SIMONSOIS’ New Grant Writer


16 | Inside SOIS16161616 || Insnssideidee SOSOS ISSSS

Save the Date!Mark Your Calendar For These Fall Events

Aug. 29 - South Campus Fall Kick-Off

Sept. 07 - Welcome Week Kick-Off

Sept. 09 - PantherFest

Sept. 15 - SOIS Student Fall Welcome

Oct. 06 - All Majors Career Day

Oct. 09 - PantherProwl

Oct. 12-14 - MLA Conference: Duluth

Oct. 18 - IOrg Lecture Series

Oct. 18-20 - ILA Conference - Rosemont

Oct. 28-29 - UWM Open House

Nov. 1-4 - WLA - Milwaukee

Nov. 02 - Student & Alumni Reunion

Nov. 11 - MLIS Orientation

Nov. 12 - Student Research Symposium

Dec. 01 - SOIS Silent Auction

Dec. 16 - Fall Recognition Ceremony

Dec. 18 - Graduation - December 18, 2011

Jan. 20-24 - ALA Mid-Winter Meeting

“The opportunity to work for a premier

school in the Information Studies field

is a dream come true – and I can tell by

the people I’ve met that this is the perfect

place for me.”

Jeremy Simon, SOIS Grant Writer

Laura handles many personnel and financial aspects of the school, which include payroll, working with newly hired students, and also working with scholarship recipients. She also helps plan many of the events hosted by SOIS, and those who attend the graduate school orientation have the opportunity to meet her there. Prior to her work at SOIS, Laura was a student worker at UWM, working in Academic Affairs and also the Peck School of the Arts while she was pursuing her degree in Theater Studies. Laura, who is originally from De Pere, Wisconsin, says she re-ally enjoys working with all of the staff and faculty in the school. In her free time, Laura likes craft-ing, knitting, and crocheting, and she loves spending time with family and friends.

Laura Meyer is the Human Resources Assistant in the business office of SOIS and has been working here since 2003.

Faculty/Staff Profile:



Fall 2011 | 17

Meet LAURA MEYERHR Assistant Extraordinaire!

It’s Offi cial!

Jim has had a passion for technologies his entire life, dat-ing back before he even attended high school (he started his professional IT career managing IT operations for his father’s business). His high school IT curriculum wasn’t quite enough so Jim enrolled himself in the Waukesha County Technical College (WCTC) where he completed the majority of an As-sociate’s degree before finishing high school. High school and college credits laid the foundation for Jim; he also launched his own technology firm.

After high school Jim selected SOIS for his undergraduate degree in Information Science and Technology. His decision was based on the School’s reputation and the flexible trans-fer agreements which allowed all of his credits from WCTC to transfer into the IST program. Before starting the program, Jim was offered a position as a student IT Technician after meeting with Assistant Dean Zahrt at a new student orientation. Assis-tant Dean Zahrt, recalling the meeting had this to say: “He was impressive. I hired him on the spot.” Jim has provided frontline IT support for SOIS faculty, staff, and students to solve technol-ogy issues for his full three years at UWM. His duties also in-cluded managing select servers and supporting the computer labs. During his undergraduate career Jim also co-founded the SOIS Undergraduate Student Organization, a forum that gave students the opportunity to provide feedback on the IST pro-gram and get involved with SOIS.

This fall, in addition to starting his official IT career with SOIS after earning his IST degree with honors, Jim will begin the MLIS program. In his current role, Jim will be responsible for overseeing the day-to-day operations of the SOIS IT depart-ment and leading the vision and direction of technology within the School. In his free time Jim enjoys researching and read-ing about new technologies, playing around with new gadgets, and networking with his friends and colleagues. We’re happy to keep Jim in the SOIS family.

On August 3, 2011, Jim Schultz became the Information Technology Systems Administrator for SOIS. And the School is lucky to have him!


18 | Inside SOIS

Dr. Zimmer and Dr. Latham bring unique perspectives and differ-ent backgrounds to CIPR. Dr. Zimmer says, “Dr. Latham has an extensive professional career in library technology and administra-tion, with current research interests in public libraries, intellectual freedom and library history. I bring CIPR my interdisciplinary focus on information policy and ethics, ranging from privacy, access to knowledge, and ethics in information technology.”

The co-directors plan to continue to focus on theoretical and applied approaches to ethics and information policy. Recently CIPR was a co-sponsor of a conference, the 2011 Computer Ethics Philosophical Enquiry. The event was an international conference focusing on computers and information ethics, and was attended by scholars worldwide.

CIPR also launched a re-designed website this past spring. The new site gives CIPR the opportunity to highlight all the activities, events, and people involved with the organization.

CIPR also introduced their 2010-2011 Fellow, Luciano Floridi, a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Hertfordshire in the United Kingdom. Professor Floridi, a leading expert in his field, recently spent a week in Milwaukee holding seminars meeting with SOIS PhD students discussing his theories and ideas.

So what is CIPR planning for the future? CIPR will be holding a panel discussion called “Tell Me What Democracy Looks Like.” The discussion will be held in Milwaukee on November 1st as a pre-

conference event before the annual Wisconsin Library Association meeting. The panel will feature Barbara Jones, Director of ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom, Sandra Braman, Professor in the Department of Communication at UWM, Loretta Gaffney, PhD Candidate in Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois, and Dr. Latham.

CIPR has other plans as well. Dr. Zimmer says, “One of our primary goals for the coming year is to make CIPR the campus center for studying the impacts of information on society, and we will be tak-ing steps to involve other schools and faculties in our programs and research efforts. We plan to offer both student and faculty fellow-ships that will be open to the entire university community.”

The Center for Information Policy Research (CIPR) is a multidisciplinary research center that focuses on the interaction of different aspects of the global information society including policy, ethical, political, social and legal issues. CIPR is under new leadership, as Dr. Michael Zimmer and Dr. Joyce Latham are currently the co-directors for the organization.

“One of our primary goals for the coming year

is to make CIPR the campus center for studying

the impacts of information on society, and we

will be taking steps to involve other schools and

faculties in our programs and research efforts.”

Michael Zimmer, Assistant Professor

Dr. Michael Zimmer & Dr. Joyce LathamCo-Directors, Center for Information Policy Research

By Scott Lenski

rgIR Project Explores Image Retrieval



Recent research advances have given birth to effective search engines when it comes to finding specific landmarks, as done by Google’s Goggles, or duplicates of a specific image, as proposed by the Tineye search engine. However, the techniques used in such systems do not actively meet the searching and browsing needs of general-purpose image collections. Doing so requires taking into account the similarity - common points and differences - existing between images, to organize them in a manner that users can understand and exploit intuitively. This notion of image similar-ity is critical but not well understood by search engine developers.

The SOIS rgIR is currently conducting a study involving human subjects to shed some light on the notion of image similarity.

Participants are presented images in two different settings, and asked to indicate which images seem similar or different to them and why. Is it the presence of objects, background, colors, locations, artistic value...? All these criteria constitute basic elements of the natural perception of similarity between images, and, although they can vary from one person to another, general patterns emerge. These patterns will help, on the theoretical side, to define formally a model of image similarity, and, on the practical side, to develop a prototype of an intuitive image browsing interface.

This study is a first step towards defining a rough sketch of image similarity. Subsequent studies, based on these initial results, will aim at refining the understanding of this notion.

RESEARCH GRO

UP F

OR IN

FORMATION RETRIEVAL

rgIR How do you find the best image from the web to illustrate your

paper? Or the best photo from your collection to create your own

personalized greeting card?

Research Group Project Members Include:Dr. Wooseob JeongDr. Xiangming (Simon) MuDr. Dietmar Wolfram

Dr. Iris XieDr. Jin ZhangChungsheng Huang, PhD Candidate

Research Project Leader: Pierre Tirilly, SOIS Post-Doc Fellow

Mu Recieves RGI Grant AwardAssistant Professor Xiangming Mu, along with Assistant Professor of Computer Science Tian Zhao and Professor of Electrical Engineering Jun Zhang, have been awarded a grant from the Research Growth Initiative (RGI) from the Graduate School at the University of Wiscon-sin-Milwaukee.

The grant was awarded for their research involving different technologies such as natu-ral language processing and machine-learning to aid physicians in identifying possible par-ticipants for breast cancer trials using free-text medical reports. Currently, finding candidates for medical trials involves examining many multiple factors and can be extremely time consuming for physicians. However, this research can help physicians narrow down a larger pool of applicants. With this grant funding, the researchers will continue their work on this subject as well as using these same technologies and applying them to other health information retrieval processes including medical imaging.

Bell, Suzanne S. “Fostering Student Engage-ment in an Online IR Course.” In: Teaching and Learning in Information Retrieval. Efthimiadis, E.; Fernández-Luna, J.; Huete, J.; MacFarlane, A. (Eds.) Springer, 2011.

Bell, Suzanne S., & Sarr, N. (2011). “Re-Engineering the Institutional Repositories to Engage Users”. ALCTS Webinar.

Henderson, L., Identity Matters: A Call for Bibliotherapy to Support Racial Identity Devel-opment. Illinois English Bulletin, 98(2), 69-86. 2011.

Henderson, L., Multicultural Children’s Litera-ture: From Theory to 2011 Practice. Interna-tional Conference on Diversity in Organiza-tions, Communities and Nations. Cape Town, South Africa.

Recent Scholarship

Fall 2011 | 19

Richard Smiraglia presented a paper titled “Epistemic Presumptions of Authorship”, co-authored with Hur-Li Lee and Hope Olson, at the iConference, Seattle, February 8-11, 2011.

Steve Miller was invited by Newberry Library in Chicago to give a 3-day metadata work-shop to their library staff in March 2011. Steve also attended the two-day ALA preconference on RDA, Resource Description and Access, in New Orleans in June 2011.

IOrg invited Jennifer Bowen, Assistant Dean for Information Management Services, River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester, and Co-Executive Director of the eXtensible Catalog Organization, to give a lecture titled “The eXtensible Catalog: Empowering Librar-ies to Take Control” on April 11.

SOIS Distinguished Researcher in Informa-tion Organization and Full Professor at the University of Toronto, Lynne Howarth, visited UWM April 5-8. She gave a talk titled “Mining the Collective, Reconsidering Warrant” on April 7.

José Augusto Chaves Guimarães, Professor, Universidade Estadual Paulista, Brazil and his doctoral student: Suellen Oliveira Milani visited SOIS in June for a research consulta-tion with Hope A Olson and other members of SOIS’s Information Organization Research Group (IOrg). Ms Milani’s research is con-cerned with the representation of gendered topics in subject access. Doctoral students Ji-hee Beak and Melodie Fox exchanged ideas about the commonalities between Ms Milani’s work and their own.

The Third North American Symposium on Knowledge Organization was held at Ryerson University in Toronto, June 16-17, 2011. This biennial conference of the International So-ciety for Knowledge Organization’s Chapter for Canada and the United States (ISKO-C/US), was chaired by Richard Smiraglia from SOIS and Abby Goodrum from Ryerson Univ. IOrg members were prominent contributors to the conference as well. Jihee Beak and Hope Olson presented a paper titled “Analysis of Metadata Schemas for Children’s Libraries,” Melodie J. Fox’s paper “Prototype Theory: An Alternative Concept Theory for Categoriz-

ing Sex and Gender?” was one of the four highest-ranked papers at the conference, and has already been published in KNOWLEDGE ORGANIZATION v. 38 no. 4 (2011): 328-34. Margaret Kipp gave a paper “Controlled Vo-cabularies and Tags: An Analysis of Research Methods,” and Richard Smiraglia participated in a panel developed from the Idea Col-lider Project, titled “Elementary Structures, Universe of Knowledge or Universe of Con-cepts?” (with Charles van den Heuvel and Thomas Dousa). Richard also was co-leader of a workshop on “Instantiation” with Jane Greenberg of the Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Another SOIS doctoral student Soohyung Joo presented a poster “Dimen-sions and Types of Consumer Vocabulary in Health Information Organization.” IOrg has been invited to host the next biennial NASKO in 2013.

Steve Miller will attend the DC-2011 Interna-tional Conference on Dublin Core and Meta-data Applications at The Hague, Netherlands in September 2011.

Hope Olson will be one of three keynote speakers at the first Information Society for Knowledge Organization-Brazil conference in Brasilia in October.

IOrg is planning two events in the Fall: Marjorie Bloss, veteran librarian and retired Lecturer at Dominican University, to speak on the developments of RDA, October 18; Lynne Howarth, SOIS Distinguish Researcher in Information Organization and Full Professor at University of Toronto, will visit SOIS the second time in late October.

Building on the success of the first SOIS Eth-ics of Information Organization (EIO) confer-ence held in May 2009, IOrg is planning the second EIO conference for May 2012.

SOIS Postdoc Fellow Charles-Antoine Julien recently accepted an offer from McGill Univ-eristy and will begin his new job as Assistant Professor in January, 2012.

IOrg members continue to contribute to LIS scholarly and professional literature. The following is a list of some recent pub-lications:Kipp, M. E. I. (2011). User, author and professional indexing in context: An explo-ration of tagging practices on CiteULike. Canadian Journal of Library and Informa-tion Science, 35(1): 17-48.

Kipp, M. E. I. (2011). Tagging of biomedi-cal articles on CiteULike: A comparison of user, author and professional indexing. Knowledge Organization, 38(3): 245-261.

Lee, H.-L., & Lan, W.-C. (2011). Proclaim-ing intellectual authority through classifi-cation: The case of the Seven Epitomes. Knowledge Organization, 38(1), 25-42.

Miller, S. J. (2011). Metadata for Digital Collections: A How-To-Do-It Manual. New York: Neal-Schuman. http://www.neal-schuman.com/mdc

IOrg awarded $500 to each of three MLIS students to attend conferences: Ann Graf, Association of College & Research Librar-ies annual conference in Philadelphia, March 30 to April 2, 2011; Wendy Ron-deau, Canadian Library Association 2011 National Conference, Halifax, Nova Sco-tia, May 25-28, 2011; Kimberly Schwenk, Society of American Archivists annual conference, Chicago, August 22 – 27, 2011. Another $1,000 was awarded to a doctoral student, Soohyung Joo who pre-sented a poster at the Third North Ameri-can Symposium on Knowledge Organiza-tion, Toronto, June 16-17, 2011.

IO Concentration in MLISA new email discussion list has been cre-ated for SOIS Information Organization Concentrators and anyone in the SOIS community interested in IO news, an-nouncements of jobs, conferences, work-shops, scholarships, events, and other information. Any non-concentrators who would like to be added, please contact Steven Miller [email protected].

Activities

Future Activities Publications Student Conference Support

IOrg New WebpageVisit the newly constructed IOrg Webpage at: http://www4.uwm.edu/sois/research/iorg/. Information about our members, events (including podcasts and conference abstracts from past events), and student conference reports can be found there.

20 | Inside SOIS


PDIPDI

www.uwm.edu/sois/CE/www.uwm.edu/sois/CE/Explore our Online & Onsite Professional Development Opportunities!

Resource Description and Access: An Introduction to RDA, FRBR, and Linked Data

RDA is the new set of cataloging rules that will replace the current Anglo-American Cataloging Rules (AACR2). The workshop will focus on the two models that underlie RDA, the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) and the Functional Requirements for Authority Data (FRAD). The work-shop will also introduce participants to the structure of RDA, the use of the online RDA Toolkit, how to catalog using RDA, how to create RDA MARC records, along with how RDA may be applied in enhanced database structures and in the Linked Data environment. The workshop is intended for people with a working knowl-edge of AACR2 and MARC, but not necessarily RDA.

7-Week Online WorkshopOctober 3 – November 18, 2011Instructor: Steve Miller

Catherine Hansen, Professional Development Institute Director

The Fundamentals of Map Librarianship

Map libraries can be found in many different types of libraries including academic, public, federal, and special. Maps and other geographic information are specialized with a vocabulary all their own. With the increase in digital technology, maps are also widely available on the web. This course will provide a basic foundation on map librarianship including projections, scales, map types, classifications, how to locate geo-graphic information and datasets, web mapping sites, and what Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are and what they can do.

Instructor: Meagan Duever

Professional Development InstituteProfessional Development Institute



Fall 2011 | 21

“Let’s See What We Learn”SOIS and UWM Libraries Sponsor Interns from the National Taiwan Normal University Four students from the National Taiwan Normal University spent the summer interning at the UWM Gold Meir Library sponsored by SOIS and the UWM Libraires. The students worked in the Digitization Unit where they scanned and processed nearly 1,500 images supervised by Krystyna Matusiak and Meng Ling. While at UWM, the students took the course L&I Sci 646 Library Materials for Young Adults with Mary Wepking. They also had the opportunity to meet with Interim Dean Dietmar Wolfram and their academic advisor Professor Iris Xie, who helped arrange their activities. While in Milwaukee they also vis-ited the Medical College Library of Wisconsin and Marquette Law Library with Twyla McGhee.

Visiting International Student Interns Share Their Experience On August 2, Chia-Hui Liao (Doris), Liyn Hsu (Lynn), Yi-Ying Lin (Jen-ny), and Yu-Chun Pang (Sherry), presented “Let’s see what we learn! Library science education in Taiwan” at the UWM Golda Meir Library. For the presentation, Jenny introduced Library and Information Sci-ence programs in Taiwan and discussed some LIS events in recent years. Doris discussed how to pursue a LIS career and some of the challenges facing professionals in Taiwan. Sherry examined how uni-versities in Taiwan include Library and Information Literacy courses in the Liberal Arts Education programs. Lynn finished by demonstrating the training modules which are designed for instructors who teach Li-brary and Information Literacy courses in universities. After the pre-sentation, Library Director Ewa Barczyk awarded each student with a certificate for successfully completing their internships.


22 | Inside SOIS

Stay Informed!There are many ways for you to stay informed and up to date with the news and events at the School of Information Studies.

Email ListsSubscribe to the SOIS News list and receive the SOIS Electronic

Newsletter and announcements in your inbox. Learn more online at:

www4.uwm.edu/sois/resources/maillists.htm

FacebookFollow us on facebook!

www.facebook.com/uwmsois

TwitterStay connected with us on twitter!

www.twitter.com/uwmsois

National Taiwan Normal University Interns with UWM Libraries Staff. Ling Meng, Digitization Librarian, Ewa Barczyk, Library Di-rector & Krystyna Matusiak, Digitization Librarian.

Lora Davis is the winner of the 2011 Theodore Calvin Pease Award which is given to students in archival studies for excellence in writ-ing. The award was given for Davis’ paper “Providing Virtual Ser-vices to All: A Mixed-Method Analysis of the Web Site Accessibility of Philadelphia Area Consortium of Special Collections Libraries (PACSCL) Member Repositories.” In the paper, Davis examined the websites of repositories in PASCL to see if they meet the needs of users with disabilities.

Amy Cooper Cary, Lecturer and Director of the Archival Studies Pro-gram at SOIS, says “In the most recent 10 years, over half of the winning essays have addressed topics that discuss the use of tech-nology in archives. There have been no submissions, as yet, that

have addressed the important subject of serving our users with dis-abilities. Lora Davis fills this gap and serves the profession by open-ing a significant area for exploration in the professional literature.” The award was created in 1987 in honor of Theodore Calvin Pease who was the first editor of the publication the American Archivist.

Theodore Calvin Pease AwardArchives Student Lora Davis Honored



Fall 2011 | 23

UWM In New Orleans

The UWinteriM in New Orleans is a great opportunity for graduate and undergraduate students. You can earn credit by participating in a residency program in New Orleans. UWinteriM courses, sched-uled for January 2012, will be offered through the School of Informa-tion Studies (SOIS) and/or College of Letters and Science (Anthro-pology). These courses will take UWM students to New Orleans for a combined research and service opportunity. Students will have a concentrated focus in the Lower 9th Ward. Service Learning field placements/internships with community partners in New Orleans will focus on return, restoration, relief, and recovery efforts.

Scholarships are available for both undergraduate and graduate students through SOIS. Course sign-up and scholarship applica-tion deadline for UWinteriM 2012 is Monday, November 28, 2011. There will be information sessions in the months of September, Oc-tober, and November on campus. This information will be posted online at the UWM in New Orleans website (www.uwm.edu/uwminneworleans/) and reminders are sent out through our listserve.

“There have been no submissions, as yet, that have

addressed the important subject of serving our us-

ers with disabilities. Lora Davis fills this gap and

serves the profession by opening a significant area

for exploration in the professional literature.”

SOIS Participates in UWinteriM residency program

For general information please contact:Monique Hassman, Project AssistantPh: 414-229-1159 | Email: [email protected] http://www4.uwm.edu/uwminneworleans/

Did you know?

Amy Cooper Cary, Archival Studies Program Director

Archival Studies Concentrators and CAS in Archival Studies Students interested in learning more about this program can contact: Amy Cooper Cary, Archival Studies Program DirectorEmail: [email protected] | Ph: 414-229-6929

Timothy L. Ericson Scholarship in Archival StudiesWe are very proud to announce that the Timothy L. Ericson Scholarship in Archival Studies is now a $1,000 award! Our thanks to the generous donors who are mak-ing this annual scholarship possible.

The Archival Studies program is YOUR program. We seek your continued support to help attract very talented stu-dents. Your gift of $25, $100 or $1,000 will help students who have the desire to become an archivist, but have concerns about the cost of their education. Your donation to the Ericson Scholarship will help foster the program.

To donate, visit http://sois.uwm.edu/give. Please specify that your gift is for the “Timothy L. Ericson Scholarship in Archival Studies.” Thank you!

Many people think of philanthropy as a large dona-tion… but don’t realize that $50, $100 or $250 annu-ally over several years is a big gift that really makes a big difference!

Philanthropy is about making it work for you and your family; it’s about putting thought into how you want to make a difference, in any way you can. Then working with us or your fi nancial advisor on creative ways to make that happen!

Talk with me for more information!Katie Sparks, Office of Development & Alumni Relations, SOIS 414-229-3080 [email protected]

Information. Connection. Philanthropy.

Connectwith SOIS!

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We have many ways for you to connect with SOIS. Here are just a few of the upcoming opportunities:

SOIS Student & Alumni ReunionWhether you’re attending the Wisconsin Library Association (WLA) conference, live in Milwaukee, or just visiting for the day, come join us at this year’s SOIS Annual Reunion! This year, we’re also inviting current, former and emeritus professors, Deans, Directors, instructors and staff to take part in the festivities.Features:• Make a custom READ poster • Get UWM SOIS Giveaways• Visit the past faculty profile gallery • Tour the Pabst Mansion• Meet old friends and network with new ones!

Wednesday, November 2 | 5:30-8:30PMPabst Mansion2000 W. Wisconsin Avenue, Milwaukee, WI 53233A trolley will run nonstop from 5:00 - 8:00 PM between the Frontier Center (WLA conference location) & the Pabst Mansionhttp://sois.uwm.edu/wla2011rsvp Please RSVP by October 19, 2011

We’re excited that WLA is hosting their annual conference in down-town Milwaukee. The last time this happened was 2003! We hope to see you there!

2nd Annual Silent Auction Scholarship FundraiserHelp the SOIS Scholarship program thrive. Join us at our 2nd Annual Silent Auction Fundraiser for all SOIS Scholarships!Features:• Hear from some of our amazing students!• See some of your favorite SOIS people! • Bid on great gifts! (Get some holiday shopping done!)• Enjoy good food & beverages!• Support our bright students!

Thursday, December 1 | 5:00-7:00PMUWM Golda Meir Library4th Floor Conference Room, 2311 East Hartford Avenue, Milwaukee, WI 53211

To donate an item to the silent auction, to make a gift to SOIS scholarships, to RSVP, or for more information, visit http://sois.uwm.edu/auction2011Thank you!

24 | Inside SOIS

Katie Sparks, SOIS Development Director


Donate to SOIS Scholarshipshttp://sois.uwm.edu/give

LinkedInhttp://linkedin.com(UWM-SOIS:Student Organization)Facebookhttp://facebook.com/soisstudentorgTwitterhttp://twitter.com/soisorgFlickrhttp://flickr.com/soisorg/vimeohttp://vimeo.com/soisorg

STUDENT ORG SOCIAL MEDIASOIS Student OrgsP A R T I C I P A T E !The SOIS Student Organizations plan social and academic events, help develop academic programs, bring student issues to administrators’ attention and much more! Examples of past events and activities include: LAN Parties, SOIS Town Hall Meetings, Summer BBQs, Resume Building Workshops and the mighty SOIS Dodgeball Team!

If you have an idea for a new event or just want to get involved, now is the time! Contact the SOIS Student Orgs online at soisorg.uwm.edu or by email at [email protected].



Fall 2011 | 25

Cool New Tech Resources

SOIS iStreamSOIS has a new Video on Demand service, iStream. With this service SOIS delivers HD video from past events and lectures to students through an interactive portal. This media is available not only through a web interface, but also available in App stores. Yes, SOIS does have an App for that.

http://sois.uwm.edu/istream

SOIS DesktopSOIS now has an online virtual computer lab for our students. Students are able to access expensive licensed software at no cost. In fact, this virtual computer lab contains all of the software that is available in SOIS’ physical computer labs. SOIS Desktop is accessible from Mac, Windows, iPad, iPhone, Linux, ChromeOS, and many other platforms.

http://sois.uwm.edu/virtuallab

Student Web SpaceSOIS now offers student web space to its students. This space, which is for coursework only, is powered on a Linux, Apache, PHP, MySQL (LAMP) environment. Students can sign up for space via the SOIS website.

http://sois.uwm.edu/webspace

SOIS MSDN Academic AllianceSOIS has invested in the Microsoft Development Network Academic Alliance (MSDNAA). We are now able to provide licensed software to all SOIS students, faculty, and staff at no cost. This software includes Windows 7, Microsoft Project, Visio, Access, Visual Studio, and much more. All SOIS students will receive an account at the beginning of each term. If you do not receive an account, please contact SOIS Tech.

http://sois.uwm.edu/virtuallab

SOIS is pleased to announce the availablity of a few new technology resources for students, faculty and staff!

For more information please visit the SOIS IT website:http://www4.uwm.edu/sois/resources/it/

PO Box 413Milwaukee, WI 53201

Documents

Inside SOIS - Fall 2011