By Maddy Vericker, DLIS Student & eNewsletter Editor
In November 2014, the Division of Library and Information Science at St. John’s University was awarded a $10,000 grant by the H. W. Wilson Foundation created to support ALA-Accredited LIS programs, such as our own. The H. W. Wilson Foundation was established in 1952 by the H. W. Wilson Company, a library content company specializing in indexing services, to provide “financial assistance to causes having the greatest impact on improving the spirit, mind and body of the greatest number of people through aid, support and cooperation with charitable, benevolent, educational and religious institutions.” Historically, the Foundation has focused on libraries and library education as instruments of their Mission, which fits with the H. W. Wilson Company’s industry and goals.
DLIS faculty voted that the funds from the Wilson Grant should be utilized to provide $500 scholarships to DLIS students who participate in professional development activities such as:
- Poster or paper acceptance at a professional conference
- Recipient of an award from a professional organization
- Acceptance to participate in a panel discussion organized by a professional association
- Service to a national professional organization as an elected advisory board or committee member
The first two DLIS/Wilson Scholarships were awarded at the 7th Annual DLIS Symposium in 2015 to Emily Griffin and Tess Morisson-Colwel; this year, four H. W. Wilson Scholarships were presented to DLIS students Sara Alcorn, Kevin Quinn, Ian Ustick, and Madalaine Vericker at the William A. Gillard Lecture on April 25, 2016.
Ms. Alcorn, Mr. Quinn, and Mr. Ustick received their DLIS/Wilson Scholarships for their work on a panel titled “Wham! Bam! Thank you Ma’am: Gender Roles and Sexuality in Graphic Novels,” created in partnership with DLIS faculty member Dr. Shari Lee for the 2016 Long Island PopCon in April. Ms. Vericker received her DLIS/Wilson Scholarship for her poster, “The Student Project Problem: Identifying Opportunities for Use of Collections Digitized by LIS Students at St. John’s University,” which has been accepted for presentation at the 2016 SUNY Librarians Association Conference in June.