Laura Hibbler, Editor
Genealogy Preconference Planning
An audience of about eighty librarians and archivists filled the conference room at the Free Library of Philadelphia for the RUSA History/Genealogy section ALA Midwinter preconference event. Sponsor ProQuest provided refreshments and a delightful lunch. Fourteen top ranking speakers addressed popular topics including free genealogical online resources, future and current directions for NARA, producing genealogical webinars, Quaker sources, and government documents. Guest speaker Curt Witcher, Allen County Library Senior Manager for Special Collections addressed “Making the Financial Case for Genealogical Librarianship.” His dynamic presentation was taped and will be made available later this year. We look forward to another cutting edge event at Las Vegas on Friday, June 27.
Melinde Lutz Byrne, Chair
History Librarians Discussion Group
The RUSA History Librarians Discussion Group met on Jan. 26, 2014 from 1:00-2:30 PM. We had an excellent panel presentation on the roles of humanities librarians in Digital Humanities! The three speakers for the event were Sarah How, the European Studies Librarian from Cornell University Library; Nick Okrent, History Librarian, University of Pennsylvania Libraries; and Virginia Cole, the History and Medieval Studies Librarian from Cornell University Library. They discussed their participation in digital humanities related initiatives on their campuses. The presentation was followed by a very lively discussion. We had more than sixty attendees who participated and it was a successful event! The PowerPoint presentation from Sarah How and Nick Okrent can be accessed on ALA Connect. We welcome comments or feedback about the discussion. Please e-mail them to cvaidyan@jhu.edu
Chella Vaidyanathan, Chair
Please check out the Information Literacy Guidelines and Competencies for Undergraduate History Students. These guidelines and competencies were developed by the History Sections’ Instruction and Research Services Committee and were approved by the RUSA Board of Directors last year.
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