Jevin D. West was awarded $110,000 from JSTOR to continue his research on improving access to scholarly literature. He also gave one of the keynote presentations at the "Future of Facts in a 'Post-Truth’ World” meeting held at the The Phillips Collection Museum in Washington DC. This was a meeting sponsored by The Future of Information Alliance and the University of Maryland.  

J. Elizabeth Mills, Katie Campana, Claudia Haines (MLIS 2013), and Dr. Marianne Martens at Kent State University have been commissioned by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) to re-administer the “Young Children, New Media, and Libraries” survey that was last conducted in 2014. The team has developed additional questions to explore areas of inquiry that include: attitudes and knowledge, evaluation of diverse media, and use of media in outreach programs with underserved communities. The survey will be administered in August 2018. 

Michelle Martin and J. Elizabeth Mills taught the workshop “Reading Life Between the Lines: Using Children’s and Young Adult Literature to Have Tough Conversations About Diversity” twice at the School Library Journal Leadership Basecamp on May 5^th. This week the School Library Journal featured the workshop in its Picture of the Week.

Annette Goldsmith will lead a "deep-dive" session about nonfiction in the library at the  2018 Children's Literature Council of Southern California Spring Workshop. The session is titled, "Sharing Hard Truths in Nonfiction for Children and Young Adults." The workshop will take place tomorrow at the Glendale Public Library. 

Karen Fisher just returned from four weeks as an embedded field researcher in support of UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at UNHCR Za’atari Camp, Jordan. Her recent publications and presentations include:

• “Information Worlds of Refugees” in Digital Lifeline? ICTs for Refugees and Displaced Persons (MIT Press).
• “Syrian youth in Za’atari Refugee Camp as ICT wayfarers: An exploratory study using narrative storytelling and LEGO” at ACM Compass 2018 in Menlo Park, CA.
• “Young hackers: Hacking technology at Za’atari Refugee Camp” at ACM CHI in Montreal, along with Katya Yefimova.
• “Lives in the balance: Conversations on reflective research and practice in information provision and information needs of refugees and asylum seekers” at the 17th conference of the International Association for the Study of Forced Migration (IASFM) in Thessaloniki, Greece.
• “How libraries abroad address the worldwide refugee crisis” at the 2018 Annual Meeting of the American Library Association in New Orleans, LA.

She also gave the following invited presentations:

• “Za’atari Camp Life Project: A Reflection of Resilience and Innovation through Food, Art and Community” at:
  • UNHCR Za’atari Camp, Mafraq, Jordan. It was attended by staff from UNHCR, HI, UNFPA, SRAD, AMR, NRC, IRD, WFP, Save the Children, and UNOPS.
  • Embassy of Finland. Amman, Jordan.
  • Embassy of United States, Political and Refugees Sections. Amman, Jordan.
  • Embassy of Canada. Amman, Jordan.
  • Embassy of Sweden. Amman, Jordan.
  • Abdul Hameed Shoman Foundation/Arab Bank. Amman, Jordan.
  • International Development Research Center (IRDC). Ottawa, Canada.
  • Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL), British Institute in Amman. Amman, Jordan.
• “Designing for Resilience: Za’atari Camp Life Project” at the School of Social Work, German Jordanian University. Amman, Jordan.
• “Research Methods and Project Management in Forced Migration Settings.” School of Business, German Jordanian University (GJU). Madaba and Amman, Jordan.