Library Office Notes

 Kathleen M. Kluegel received the RUSA (Reference and User Services Association) MARS (Machine-Assisted Reference Section) Achievement Recognition Certificate at the 1999 Annual Conference of the American Library Association in New Orleans, Louisiana.   This honor, better known by its informal name, My Favorite Martian, is to recognize excellence inservice to MARS.  The certificate was presented to Kathleen at the MARS annual meeting by Lise M. Dyckman, chair of MARS, with the following citation.  This honor is awarded to Kathleen Kluegel for her active support and leadership in the work of MARS; for bringing a commitment to excellence in machine assisted reference to the leadership both of MARS and RUSA; for forthrightly addressing the challenges and opportunities facing reference librarians in the electronic age. 

Kathleen has a history of active support and leadership in the work of MARS since her first committee appointment to the Costs and Finance Committee on which she served from 1982-1986, including a year as chair.  Other committee level involvement has included membership on the Planning Committee from 1988-1995, serving as chair from 1991-94, membership on the 1986 and 1991 Program Committees, and chairing the Discussion Group on Issues and Ethics from 1987-88.  She also served as MARS chair in 1990-91.   Since that time, her work has taken her to the Division level including a term as president of the Reference and User Services Association in 1996-97.

Her commitment to excellence in machine-assisted reference work has been the focus of her leadership within ALA and her professional publishing.  Her presidential columns in RQ comprised a series of reflections on the change to the virtual reference departments with which we now work; this was also the focus of her presidents program.  She is responsible for the material on electronic reference in Richard Bopp and Linda Smith's Reference and Information Services:  An Introduction, 2nd ed (Libraries Unlimited, 1995), a standard text for library school students, for which she is now writing new chapters for the third edition.

Kathleen received a B.A in linguistics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, and an
M.A. in library science from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.  She is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Beta Phi Mu.  She is currently reference librarian and networked resources coordinator for reference at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign.  Before that she was a reference librarian at the University of California at Riverside.

(Beth S. Woodard)

Present:  A. Bendel, J. Gammon, F. Huang, H. J. Kim, P. Lindell, L. Roberts,
E. Schroeder, G. Witte

I. Minutes of the July 28, 1999 meeting were approved as revised.

II. Reports

A. Admin. Council - no meeting

B. Faculty Meeting - no meeting

C. Library Reconfig. - no meeting

III. Updates

IV. Discussion

A. Alvan Bregman will be invited to a future meeting to discuss issues of importance to staff.  (The date was set for September 8).

V. New Business

A. L. Roberts forwarded comments from Tech Services Division to address to Alvan Bregman when LSSC meets with him.  An announcement will be sent to Libnews calling for input from all staff.  Input to be compiled at the August 25 meeting.

B. Tech Services Div. voiced a need for security personnel during the day, not just at night.

Jane Gammon
Transcriber