National organization recognizes librarians Kumar, Beall

Kumar

Beall

Beth Kumar, e-resources and serials librarian at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, has received the 2012 First Step Award-A Wiley Professional Development Grant from the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services (ALCTS).

In addition, the association gave the Outstanding Publication Award to Jeffrey Beall, metadata librarian at Auraria Library, University of Colorado Denver, for his article  “Academic Library Databases and the Problem of Word-Sense Ambiguity” published in The Journal of Academic Librarianship, vol. 37, (January 2011), p. 64-69.

The awards will be presented June 24 during the 2012 American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference in Anaheim, Calif.

Kumar was reference, research and government information sources assistant at the University of Illinois Library from August 2009 through mid-2010 and began her current position in August 2010, providing daily management and troubleshooting of subscription databases and individual journals, both print and electronic. She was involved in the Education and Behavior Sciences Section of ACRL in the past. And now, as the sole librarian managing continuing resources in her library, Kumar expressed a strong desire to network with, and learn from, other librarians at ALA conference and become involved similarly in the ALCTS Continuing Resources Section.

Kumar graduated from University of Wisconsin, La Cross, with a bachelor’s in history. She earned her master’s in library and information science from the University of Illinois in 2006. In addition, she obtained a Certificate of Advanced Study in Library and Information Science at University of Illinois, 2006-2007, and earned a master’s in educational organization and leadership in higher education, with a certificate in the foundations of teaching, from the University of Illinois, 2009-2010.

John Wiley & Sons sponsors the $1,500 grant, which offers librarians new to the serials field an opportunity to broaden their perspective by attending an ALA Annual Conference and by encouraging professional growth through participation in ALCTS Continuing Resources Section activities.

The Outstanding Publication Award honors is given to the author or authors of the year's outstanding monograph, article or original paper in the field of technical services, including acquisitions, cataloging, collection management, preservation, continuing resources and related areas in the library field.

Beall, who will receive a citation and $250, said the article emphasizes “the importance of high-quality metadata to efficient information retrieval.” The problem created by the inability of search engines to differentiate between multiple meanings of a word or phrase creates a considerable obstacle to the ability of searchers to retrieve relevant materials. Beall’s article “brings to light a long-standing problem in information retrieval that remains to be solved — one that librarians and users encounter on a daily basis. The article provides an overview of the problem and brings readers up to date on current practice and progress toward a solution.” Beall addresses issues relevant to a range of technical services operations, particularly in the current full-text environment, and presented high-quality scholarly research in an engaging and informative style.

An academic librarian for more than 21 years, Beall has published extensively in the areas of metadata, full-text searching and information retrieval. In the last two years, his research interest has expanded into the field of scholarly open-access publishing.

The Association for Library Collections & Technical Services (ALCTS) is the national association for information providers who work in collections and technical services, such as acquisitions, cataloging, collection development, preservation and continuing resources in digital and print formats.