ACRL 2009 Virtual Conference

Blogger Bios

Ann Whitney

Ann Whitney is the Head of Systems for the Health Sciences Libraries at the University of Washington where she has been since 2007. Ann graduated from the University of Rhode Island with a MLIS in 2005. Prior to that she worked in the technology field in K-12 education for many years. Ann is a native of Seattle and will be blogging on all things technical, especially new and innovative resources for libraries.

Anna Carlin

Anna Carlin is an Assistant University Librarian at Florida Gulf Coast University in Fort Myers, FL. She has worked in libraries for 5 years, and earned her MS in Library and Information Studies from Florida State University in 2007. Her work at FGCU focuses on creating web-based or technology-assisted library and information literacy instruction. A native of south Florida, you can probably spot Anna in Seattle as the person wearing inappropriately warm clothing. Anna enjoys hanging out with her husband (also a librarian) and two dogs, playing video games, cooking, and knowing a little about a lot of things. Anna is a first-time ACRL conference attendee.

Brian McManus

Brian McManus: I am a first semester LIS student at SJSU, in their SLIS program. I full-time for WSU Libraries in the Access Services Unit at the main library on the Pullman Campus. When I have time, I like to go rockhounding, cycling, and I am a huge Yellowstone National Park enthusiest!

At the conference I am hoping to connect with more LIS students and gain a better perspective of the issues that face academic libraries.

Carissa Tomlinson

Carissa is an Emerging Technologies Librarian and liaison to Nursing, Health Science, Gerontology and Cultural Studies at Towson University outside of Baltimore. Her background is diverse with an undergraduate major in Women’s Studies and a minor in Global Studies from the University of Minnesota. She completed her Masters in Library and Information Science degree from Dominican University in 2007 and followed her studies with a post-graduate internship at Vanderbilt’s Eskind Biomedical Library in Nashville. She is now enrolled in a Masters program in Instructional Technology at Towson University. Carissa is currently working to bring emerging instructional and research technologies to the College of Health Professions through collaboration with teaching faculty and an increased library presence in the department and it’s classes. Also, Carissa co-authors the academic library technology blog, www.libtechtalk.wordpress.com. Her areas of interest include health sciences librarianship, emerging technologies, instructional design, and information literacy for millennials.

Eamon Tewell

Eamon Tewell is Library Intern at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. He has a background in reference and access services, and completed his MLIS at Drexel University in 2008. He’s excited to be attending his first ACRL conference this year, and will be blogging on both the conference and seeing the sights in Seattle.

Jack Bullion

A 2008 graduate of the School of Library and Information Science at the University of North Texas, Jack Bullion is the Instruction Librarian at the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth, Texas. In addition to his reference and instruction duties, Jack is the course director for Medical Informatics, a credit-bearing information literacy course for first-year medical students at the Texas College of Osteopathic Medicine, a division of UNTHSC. Jack also holds a master’s in creative writing, and his short fiction has appeared in the Texas Review and Superficial Flesh, an online journal that he also edits. He is currently at work on a novel-in-stories, and is looking forward to seeing Sherman Alexie, one of his favorite authors, at ACRL. A native of Missouri, Jack now lives in Arlington, Texas, with his wife Rachel and their cavalier King Charles spaniels, Tex and Belle.

Jackie Belanger

Jackie Belanger is a Reference & Instruction/Arts & Humanities librarian at the University of Washington Bothell (UWB) and Cascadia Community College (CCC). UWB and CCC share a campus, and the library serves both institutions. Jackie received her Master’s degree in Library & Information Studies from University College London, and previously worked as an Academic Liaison Librarian at the University of Bedfordshire in the UK. She lived in the UK for 15 years and just started her job at the University of Washington Bothell and Cascadia in September 2008. She is a first-time ACRL National conference attendee.

Jennifer Sippel

Jennifer (jenny) Sippel can trace her passion for working in libraries back to her sweet tooth. In the summer of 1995, Ms. Sippel took a job at the local grocer’s bakery. She was barely there a week before she realized she couldn’t resist snacking on all the bakery treats. So, she got herself a job where there would be no such temptations—the public library.
A lot of other stuff happened in between, but in August 2006, Ms. Sippel completed her Masters in Library and Information Science and she eventually found Minneapolis Community and Technical College willing to take a risk on a fresh library school graduate. Since joining the MCTC faculty, jenny has taught numerous sections of a 2-credit required information literacy course both online and face to face. Her professional interests include e-learning best practices, teaching to the first-year college student, and something she has loosely dubbed “the intersections of information and the internet.”
This is jenny’s first time attending ACRL and she couldn’t be more thrilled about it!

Josh Hogan

My name is Josh Hogan, and I’m a librarian at Spokane Falls Community College in Spokane, WA. My wife, Catherine, and I moved to the Inland Northwest last August after I completed my M.S. in Information Science at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. I grew up in East Tennessee near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and have lived most of my life in that area. I’ve also traveled in Turkey, Morocco, Spain, France and Britain. I lived for a short while in Istanbul, where I met my wife, who comes from the northeast of England. We currently live in the South Hill area of Spokane with our two ornery cats, Rufus and Suki. We’re both avid campers and hikers, and we’re looking forward to getting out in the Selkirk, Cascades and other mountains once the weather becomes a bit more clement.

Lauren Jensen

Lauren Jensen is currently the Public Services Librarian at Hewes Library at Monmouth College, IL. She earned her M.S. in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2006. Jensen’s research interests include social technologies, patrons’ perceptions of the library, and user experiences. This will be her first time attending the ACRL National Conference and she looks forward to blogging about her experiences.

Lisa Wallis

Lisa Wallis is the Web Services Librarian at Northeastern Illinois University in Chicago, IL. After receiving her MS from the Graduate School of Library & Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, she moved to the Bay Area and took her first library position at San Francisco State University. Lisa then worked at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Library of the Health Sciences, where she was able to take advantage of her 2nd masters in public health. Lisa spent a couple of years as a member of the Medical Library Association, where she was the Webmaster and then Chair of the Public Health/Health Administration section prior to rejoining ACRL this year. A fabulous opportunity at Northeastern Illinois University opened up in 2007, and she has been there since. As Web Services Librarian, Lisa oversaw the redesign of the Library’s website and has signed the Library up for more social networking sites than she can remember. She has had the good fortune of attending ACRL in Charlotte, NC and Minneapolis, MN, and believes it’s the best library conference out there for practical, take-it-home-and-make-a-difference content.

Liz Rodrigues

Liz Rodrigues is a Reference & Instruction Librarian at Grinnell College in Iowa. She is a first-year librarian and a first-time ACRL attendee. She received her MLIS from the University of South Florida in 2008 and also has an MFA in Poetry from Florida Atlantic University. She hopes to spend her time in Seattle being inspired by librarians who are thinking hard about how to best serve students and faculty in a Web-driven yet people-centered world and drinking coffee.

Margie Ruppel

Margie Ruppel is the Reference & Interlibrary Loan Librarian at the University of Southern Indiana Rice Library, where she focuses on information literacy skills for education, social work, and history students, online resources, reference, Library 2.0, collection development, active learning, outreach, and ILL. She received her MLS from Indiana University in 2000. Margie enjoys writing book reviews for library journals, and has published articles about virtual reference, usability studies, library instruction, and citation analysis. In her spare time, Margie takes history courses, decorates her new digs, lifts weights, takes photographs of architecture, and travels.

Margot Hanson

Margot Hanson is a reference and instruction librarian at the University of Hawaii - West Oahu, where she is a member of lots of committees. She graduated from the University of Hawaii at Manoa with her MLIS in 2007. This is her first time attending ACRL, third time visiting Seattle.

Michele Mizejewski

Michele Mizejewski is Emerging Technologies Specialist at the University of California, San Francisco where she focuses on the intersection of web services and reference and instruction. She has also taught online workshops on social software for Five Weeks to a Social Library and for Simmons GSLIS CE, as well as in-person workshops all around CA for The Infopeople Project. She has spoken on Web 2.0 topics too, most recently at The Future of Libraries conference in San Francisco. Michele holds an MS from Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Science in Boston. Her professional interests include social software, user experience, mobile content, and distance education. This will be her first time attending the ACRL National Conference, and she looks forward to blogging about her experiences.

Naomi Bishop

I am a first year MILS student at the University of Washington. I was born and raised in Arizona. I graduated from the University of Arizona in May 2008 with a degree in German Studies and Political Science. I currently work as a student reference assistant at the University of Washington Engineering Library. I love my job! When I am not doing homework, in class, or helping engineering students; I like to watch sports, visit public libraries, and explore Seattle!

Rebecca Miller

Rebecca Miller is the Digital Technologies & Information Literacy Librarian at Louisiana State University. Although she received her MSLS from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2007, she has been working in libraries for the past 10 years. At LSU, Rebecca teaches several sections of LIS 1001, a for-credit information literacy class geared towards undergraduates at LSU. She also serves as the library liaison to the Women’s and Gender Studies, Human Ecology, and Human Resources Education departments, and is responsible for seeking out and championing new technologies for LSU Libraries to incorporate within their various services. A native Virginian, she is enjoying living in and learning about the Deep South. Rebecca lives with her Cajun kitty, Pip, and is very excited about attending her first national ACRL conference!

Robert Perret

Robert Perret is a Reference/Instruction Librarian at the University of Idaho. He earned a BS in Journalism at the University of Colorado and a MLS at the University of Denver.

Sarah Laleman Ward

Sarah Laleman Ward is the Outreach Librarian at Hunter College in NYC. Sarah hails from Normal, IL (yes, it’s true) and she received her MLIS from Dominican University in River Forest, IL in 2005. Before moving to New York to become a librarian, Sarah had a career in theatre production and design in Chicago. In addition to serving as the Outreach Librarian at Hunter, Sarah is also pursuing an MA in Educational Psychology. This is her first time attending ACRL.

Stacey Shah

Stacey Shah is a new librarian who received her M.S. in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign last May. She is greatly enjoying her new position as the Distance Learning Librarian at Elgin Community College in Illinois. Prior to starting at Elgin, she worked as a Multimedia Department Assistant at Northwestern University Library. This is her second time at the ACRL National Conference and her first time as an official librarian. She is looking forward to a wonderful experience!

Zola Mumford

I am a second year student in the MLIS program of the Information School at the University of Washington. I work on campus in the Film Collections department of UW Libraries Special Collections. I am also interested in academic libraries,research libraries and digital libraries.

I’m enthusiastic about reading, film, music, the arts in general, science/speculative fiction, Victoriana, day hikes, and travel. Last summer I studied abroad in the Dutch Designs program based in Rotterdam. I sell vintage stuff on eBay. In my non-library work life, I curate a small film festival (www.langstonblackfilmfest.org /http://lhaaffbside.blogspot.com/). I am a member of the American Library Association and the Society of American Archivists (SAA); I will present a student poster at the August 2009 SAA national meeting.

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