AALL President Holly M. Riccio

Transcription

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AALL Spectrum
Volume 19 No. 1
■
September/October 2014
AALL: Maximizing the Power of the Law Library Community Since 1906
In This Issue
08
23
25
Getting to know AALL’s
2015 Executive Board
candidates
Networking, mutual
assistance, and more:
the Attorneys General
Librarians’ Initiative
Mentorship:
the AALL push
AALL President
Holly M. Riccio
Harnessing the Power of Connection
www.aallnet.org
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Vol. 19, No. 1
September/October 2014
AALL Spectrum ®
from the editor
By Catherine A. Lemmer
Editorial Staff
Marketing and Communications Manager
Ashley St. John
astjohn@aall.org
Editorial Director
Catherine A. Lemmer
calemmer@iupui.edu
Copy Editor
Graphic Designer
Robert B. Barnett Jr.
Kathy Wozbut
2014–2015 Law Library Journal
and AALL Spectrum Committee
Chair
Vice Chair
Members
Ashley Ames Ahlbrand
Andrew Christensen
Shaun Esposito
Elizabeth A. Greenfield
Andrew W. Lang
Deborah S. Dennison
Grace Feldman
Morgan Stoddard
Alyssa Thurston
James E. Duggan (Ex-Officio)
Catherine A. Lemmer (Ex-Officio)
Donna Nixon (Board Liaison)
2014–2015 AALL Executive Board
President
Vice President/President-Elect
Secretary
Treasurer
Immediate Past President
Executive Director
Holly M. Riccio
Keith Ann Stiverson
Katherine K. Coolidge, Esq.
Gail Warren
Steven P. Anderson
Kate Hagan
Members
John W. Adkins
Femi Cadmus
Amy J. Eaton
Kenneth J. Hirsh
Donna Nixon
Suzanne Thorpe
AALL Spectrum (ISSN: 1089–8689) is published monthly except
January and August with a combined September/October issue by the
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The Best Defense is a Good Offense
“I’ve always challenged myself and the people who work with me to take new approaches to
traditional business challenges, to push the envelope and constantly ask whether our sacred cows are
still producing great milk.” —Irene Rosenfeld, chairman and CEO, Mondelez International, Inc.
A
colleague recently asked me where I preferred living upon learning that my tworésumé family maintains residences in both Chicago and Indianapolis. Deliberately
misinterpreting the intent of the question, I replied, “On the tip of an envelope.”
The status quo has never held much appeal for me; it’s why I sometimes get into trouble for
causing creative destruction. I like to think out loud, generate ideas, cajole some interested
parties into helping bring them to fruition, nurture them for a bit until stable, and then give
them to someone else to manage and make their own while I go on to start the process again.
As members of the legal profession, we are challenged on two major fronts. First,
technology has profoundly changed, and will continue to change, the practice of law. Second,
harsh and, in many cases, vitriolic criticism continues to be leveled at the legal profession for
its failure to adequately prepare students for legal practice, deliver high-quality, cost-effective
legal services, and equally serve all segments of society. It is reasonable in times of change,
distress, and attack to respond defensively. Our greatest challenge may lie in suppressing this
natural instinct. My view of our environment may be foolhardy or overly optimistic, but, at
this point, it appears that our best defense may be a good offense. That is to flip the paradigm;
rather than expending our intellectual energies and resources to craft a defense of our past
actions in response to our critics, let’s go out and create new experiences and opportunities
that advance our organizations.
As law librarians, we can and should play a vital role in the design and implementation
of these new experiences and opportunities. Given this, I further suggest that now is not
the time to wait to be offered a seat at the table. A scary thought for many librarians for a
number of reasons!
First, a seat at the table comes with a responsibility to come prepared with opinions and
ideas that will require developing new skills and restructuring aspects of our libraries. This
will layer on top of our already full professional days. But, as David Lankes reminds us in
The Atlas of New Librarianship, “Innovation is not a time slot, it is an attitude.”
Second, we aren’t always comfortable taking responsibility for our own destiny. Our
orientation has long been one of symbiotic service; it is a comfortable shoe that we know and
like. As Christine Brock wrote in her 1974 Law Library Journal article, “Law Libraries and
Librarians: A Revisionist History; or More than you ever wanted to know,” “Historically,
more than any other type of library, the American law library has been bonded to the
profession it serves. The development of law, the legal profession, legal education, and
government in this country have been controlling factors in both the technical and physical
growth of law libraries. This bondage has, to a great extent, hampered the development of
institutional American law libraries and prevented them from reaching the level of
development their potential would have allowed.”
Third, librarians are perfectionists at heart. Rarely do we finish a project with a
“just good enough” attitude. Change and innovation require that we create within our
organizations a culture that permits failure. If our organizations create a culture that allows
us the freedom to fail, it will encourage us all to keep tinkering until we get it right . . .
well, right at least for that one halcyon moment in time until circumstances change.
Last, we unconsciously project that we haven’t earned a seat at the table. Many times we
fail to do a good job of claiming credit for our work and the work of our libraries. AALL Past
President Jean Wenger once graciously reminded me that it diminishes the value of our work
to tell a patron “It’s nothing” in response to an expression of appreciation. I carry that
important reminder with me at all times.
I urge you to have the courage to push past these and other barriers! A quick skim of the
2015 AALL Annual Meeting’s “must-have programming” indicates that many of us are well
aware of the need to innovate and rebrand ourselves. It will not be a comfortable process
as we evaluate and question every aspect of our libraries and ourselves. In the end, how we
design and navigate this transformational rebranding will be determined in part by how we
envision ourselves next week, next year, and so on.
Again, I urge you to have the courage to think big! Courage, as Mark Engsberg shared
with us in the July issue of AALL Spectrum, occurs as often in small, incidental ways as it does
in life and death situations. Innovation is within all of us! If you are in need of a supportive
shoulder, take David Lankes’ advice and create a crazy idea mailing list (i.e., that group of
colleagues, friends, mentors, or whoever that you can bounce your ideas to for advice and
opinion). I’ve got one and can vouch for its value.
Our libraries and ourselves are works in progress. The comforting thought is that
librarians have survived upheavals in the past and will survive again. The discomfort comes in
knowing that those past survivals came with deep reflection and change. Our goal should be
to have a seat at the table so that we can manage, control, and own our transformation. ■
Catherine A. Lemmer
calemmer@iupui.edu
www.aallnet.org/Blogs/spectrum-blog
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contents
FEATURES
06
San Antonio: A Year to Remember
A look back at this summer’s Annual Meeting
08
Catching Up with AALL’s 2015 Executive
Board Candidates
The election approaches—get to know
your candidates!
23
Networking, Mutual Assistance,
and a Whole Lot More
The Attorneys General Librarians’ Initiative (AGLI)
By Kathy Carlson, Margaret (Peggy) Landwehr,
Anne McDonald, and Carol Ottolenghi
25
By Ashley St. John
Mentorship: The AALL Push
Why it’s important to the profession and
what’s in it for you
By Elizabeth Christian
12
Public Relations: Outstanding Achievements
Congratulations to the 2014 AALL Excellence
in Marketing Award winners
28
By Nicole P. Dyszlewski
Student Service Librarians: My Quest
for Understanding
Student services librarian? What is that?
By Hadas Livnat
15
The Dog Bite Accusation
Evaluating the similarities of the accusation
in the film The Wizard of Oz and one in a
19th century case
30
By Tracy L. Woodard
Out With the Old, In With the New
Two perspectives on implementing LibGuides
at an academic and a public law library
By Danielle A. Becker and Shamika D. Dalton
19
The Four (Well, Three and Two Halves)
Languages of Encouragement in the
Classroom
A mindful approach to building rapport
with students
By Andrea Alexander
21
Stop Me If You’ve Heard This Before
Transitions in teaching legal research
By Patricia Morgan
Connect with Spectrum Through
My Communities
Interested in writing for Spectrum or the Spectrum Blog? Join the
Spectrum Volunteer Pool, where you will receive announcements
seeking authors for possible article topics, as well as book titles
that are available for review on the blog.
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32
Changing Spaces
Our library spaces are being reconfigured.
How can we use this opportunity for our
patrons’ benefit?
By Lauren M. Collins
Correction: In the article “Gen X/Gen Y in Transition,” published
in the July 2014 issue of Spectrum, the image included on page
13 should have been credited to the designer, Holly Swenson.
We apologize for this oversight.
next issue of spectrum
Here’s a taste of what you can look forward to in the November issue
of Spectrum:
• Why law librarians (and law schools) should care about altmetrics
• Catching up with attendees of the 2014 AALL Leadership Academy
• The design of library subject guides
• Structured writing: what is it, and what are the benefits?
• Notes on millennials . . . from a millennial
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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COLUMNS
AD INDEX
From the Editor
01
Admirality Record Publishing
37
From the President
04
Bernan Company LLC
18
Washington Brief
05
From the Secretary
06
Bloomberg Law/
Bloomberg BNA
The Reference Desk
38
BRILL
11
Cassidy Cataloguing Services
37
DEPARTMENTS
Member to Member
36
Views from You
40
inside front cover
CUNY Journalism Press
inside back cover
Oxford University Press
14
Thomson Reuters
back cover
Want Publishing Co.
10
West Academic
18, 39
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Next Issue of Spectrum
02
Memorials
22
AALL Says Thank You
37
The 2014 AALL Election Schedule
and Candidates
39
Online Only! Read More Spectrum Articles Online
Skillfully Employed
By Kathryn E. Crandall
and Katrina M. Miller
tinyurl.com/ond3m23
A look at how an in-class memo assignment can change
student perceptions of the value of legal research and
embrace the future of practical legal education.
32
Online Only! Read More Spectrum Articles Online
Thinking Outside the (Print) Book: Creating an Online Textbook for Your Legal
Research Course
By Terrye Conroy and Alyson Drake
tinyurl.com/pucp3xr
At the end of our spring 2013 semester, after reading student evaluations, we found ourselves evaluating possible textbook options.
Shockingly, our students did not like reading about legal research! None of the existing textbooks on the market truly met our specific needs
because we cover state materials in the fall and federal materials in the spring, while the typical legal research textbook focuses primarily
on federal materials. Furthermore, most of the textbooks we reviewed included materials, like legislative history, that we do not cover in the
first year. Our solution? Creating our own online textbook!
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from the president
By Holly M. Riccio
Harnessing the Power of Connection
No one can whistle a symphony. It takes a
whole orchestra to play it.
I
came across this quote recently and
think it captures the essence of
AALL. We all have unique
experiences, great ideas, and valuable
insights that, alone, are not as powerful
as they become when we share them.
At the 107th AALL Annual Meeting in
San Antonio, we were challenged to go
“Beyond Boundaries.” I hope that those
of you who attended did just that,
whether by participating in programs
that provided innovative solutions and
strategies, sitting in on Coffee Talks to
gain a new perspective from a colleague,
or making connections with fellow
attendees through casual conversation.
Connections. That’s a word you’ll
hear me use a lot. When I ran for office,
I identified myself as “an unapologetic
Connector”—a Malcolm Gladwell
term—and I continue to maintain a
deep appreciation for and understanding
of the importance of connection.
The theme for the 2015 Annual
Meeting in Philadelphia is “The Power
of Connection,” and it will also serve
us well in our planning and goals for
the coming year. If we can all learn to
harness the power of connection, we can
build relationships and trust with others,
making us more effective when we need
to propose new initiatives, undertake
difficult yet essential conversations
about tough topics, or motivate others to
shine and succeed. By forging stronger,
trust-based connections with others—
fostering truly authentic interpersonal
connections—each of us can have a more
positive impact in our jobs, institutions,
and professional careers.
The Legacy of Leadership
Under President Steve Anderson’s
leadership, various task forces and special
committees spent the past year gathering
information that will lay the groundwork
for additional activities and innovations
this year . . . and in years to come. I look
forward to continuing the work of these
groups while also undertaking some
new initiatives to keep our Association
strategic and provide the education and
resources that our members need.
• Return on Investment
When the Return on Investment Study
is complete and its research report and
recommendations have been issued,
we can begin to devote ourselves to
applying these findings—identifying
strategies for our members to use when
communicating the value they provide
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Sept/Oct 2014
to their organizations. I look forward
to working with the AALL Executive
Board and all of our entities and
chapters on implementing a successful
course of action.
• Digital Preservation
The Digital Library Initiatives Special
Committee submitted its final report
and recommendations for the 2014
summer AALL Executive Board
meeting. To contribute to the goal
of increasing the digitization of legal
information, the special committee
urged the creation of a Law Library
Mass Digitization Task Force that
would develop a strategic digitization
agenda, work toward the coordination
of existing digital registries, and
recommend solutions for enhanced
discoverability of legal information
collections already in major national
mass digitization projects. This task
force is in the process of being
appointed, and I look forward to
seeing what its members can
accomplish in the coming year.
• CLE Task Force
The CLE and Practice-Oriented
Education and Publications Task Force
produced a comprehensive report that
provides recommendations for AALL
and chapter members to increase our
visibility by making CLE presentations
and writing for legal publications.
This task force has been extended
for one more year to allow it to bring
its recommendations to fruition and
encourage more participation by
information professionals in these areas.
• Business Skills Education
The business of law is more important
than ever. Law librarians aspiring
to assume director-level positions or
increased leadership roles need to be
business-savvy and possess a strong
command of business concepts—
finance, marketing, change
management, project management,
communication, innovation, and
leadership. By gaining a mastery of
these skills, law librarians can fortify
their professional toolboxes and develop
new ways to advance their careers.
I will be appointing a task force that
will work on developing the curriculum
and format for this new educational
opportunity.
• AMPC Content Area Teams
We should continue to work toward
making the Annual Meeting Program
Committee more strategic and forwardthinking and including more members
in the content selection and curation
process. To accomplish this, I have
created and implemented six Content
Area Teams, tasked with working
with the AMPC to develop “must
have” programs and review submitted
proposals to ensure that our
educational offerings are delivering
the maximum value to our members.
I am excited to see these teams in
action this year, and I look forward to
the final slate of programs that they,
along with the AMPC, assemble for
Philadelphia in 2015.
The Art of Possibility
A few years ago, I was fortunate enough
to be afforded the opportunity to attend
the World Business Forum and, as part
of that experience, to have the pleasure
of seeing Ben Zander speak. The
conductor of the Boston Philharmonic
and author of The Art of Possibility,
Zander has the unique ability to use
music to help people open their minds
and create joyful harmonies that bring
out the best in themselves and their
colleagues. His enthusiasm and passion
about music and life are infectious
and make his messages that much more
powerful.
In his book, Zander writes that
“[i]n the measurement world, you set a
goal and strive for it. In the universe of
possibility, you set the context and let
life unfold.” In one of his many TED
talks, he shared his views on the role of
the orchestra conductor, saying that the
conductor “doesn’t make a sound. He
depends, for his power, on his ability
to make other people powerful.”
In my year as your AALL president,
I want to lead us all by example and live
in the world of possibility. I will strive to
find opportunity in every situation, to
remind myself that for every obstacle
we encounter, a new avenue opens.
I am so exhilarated and honored to have
this opportunity to spend the year
connecting with all of the amazingly
talented, motivated, and energized
members—or, dare I say, orchestra
players—of this Association and to
hopefully fulfill the role of the orchestra
conductor, empowering members to
accomplish great things for AALL and
the profession. ■
Holly M. Riccio
(hriccio@omm.com), AALL
President and Director of
Library Innovation, Library
Manager San Francisco,
O’Melveny & Myers LLP
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washington brief
By Emily Feltren
Midterm Mayhem: A Law Librarians’ Guide to Election Season Advocacy
W
ASHINGTON, D.C., August
27, 2014—With midterm
elections just around the
corner, the coming months will present
many opportunities for law librarian
advocacy in your home state or district.
Make the most of the election season by
imparting your knowledge and exerting
your influence to advance AALL’s policy
agenda even before ballots are cast.
The following is excerpted from the
Government Relations Office August
27th online advocacy training, “Making
the Most of Midterms: Opportunities
for Advocacy at Home.”
Election Opportunities
With the flood of campaign commercials
and scourge of lawn signs, you’ve
likely noticed: it’s election season.
On November 4, voters across the
country will visit the polls for the 2014
midterms, in which all seats in the U.S.
House of Representatives and one third
of the seats in the U.S. Senate are up for
election. With so much ground at stake,
midterm elections are often regarded as a
referendum on the sitting president’s or
incumbent party’s performance; over the
past 21 midterm elections, the president’s
party has lost an average 30 seats in
the House and an average four seats in
the Senate, and in only two of those
elections has the president’s party gained
seats in both chambers. (Gerhard Peters.
“Seats in Congress Gained/Lost by the
President’s Party in Mid-Term Elections.”
The American Presidency Project. Ed. John
T. Woolley and Gerhard Peters. Santa
Barbara, CA: University of California.
1999-2014. Available from the World
Wide Web: www.presidency.ucsb.
edu/data/mid-term_elections.php.)
2014 Midterm Elections by the Numbers
House of Representatives
Up for election: all 435 seats
Current makeup: 233 republicans, 199
democrats, three vacancies
What it means: With a net gain of 17 seats
necessary for a democratic takeover, it is
unlikely the majority party will flip.
Senate
Up for election: 36 seats, including three
special elections (Oklahoma, Hawaii, South
Carolina)
Current makeup: 21 democrats, 15 republicans
What it means: A change in party control is
much more likely, where republicans will need
to pick up just six seats currently held by
democrats in order to gain the majority.
So what does all this politicking have
to do with law librarian advocacy?
With so much riding on this year’s
races, the midterm elections offer an
important occasion for constituents—
like you!—to weigh in on important
policy issues like access to information,
patron privacy, and government
transparency. The months leading up to
an election provide ample opportunities
to get your concerns in front of the
candidates vying for your vote, as
candidates are hyperaware of public
opinion and are frequently available for
face-to-face interaction. When you work
to inform a candidate about AALL and
the issues we support, you’ll solidify the
support of your current members of
Congress and form new relationships
with candidates vying for those contested
seats, accomplishing a number of
advocacy goals at once.
Relationships as Currency
The election season brings your
lawmakers and candidates out in the
open. Candidates frequently host events
in their districts or states where you
can ask questions, solicit opinions, and
form relationships. These may include
structured Q&A sessions, town hall
meetings, Twitter conversations, coffee
hours, or meet and greets. These events
are informal opportunities to introduce
yourself and pitch information about law
librarianship or a specific policy position.
Show up with a well-researched, wellrehearsed question and a personal story to
share. Candidates hold public events like
these to get firsthand accounts of the
impact of policies on their constituents—
so take advantage!
You can also use the election season
to schedule an in-district or in-state
meeting with your member of Congress
when it would be particularly helpful
to talk about issues they’re facing in the
lame duck, such as surveillance reform.
You’ll want to contact the scheduler
in the district office to set up an
appointment. Explain your purpose, the
one issue you want to discuss, and who
you represent. Most importantly, let
them know that you are a constituent!
As law librarians, you are experts on
the issues facing law libraries. You
should bring materials with information
supporting your position to leave behind
with the member of Congress or his/her
staff, such as AALL’s advocacy onepagers, available at www.aallnet.org/gro.
Have a legislative “ask” to make of your
member of Congress—i.e., the specific
action you want your senator and
representative to take. This is a great
opportunity to get to know the district
office staff, too.
I highly recommend inviting a
member of Congress to tour your
library, an option that’s particularly
suitable for those of you who work in
public or federal depository libraries.
Hosting your elected official or a
candidate for a tour of your library is a
Advocacy Made Easy
You’re interested in setting up a meeting with
your senator or her staff during the September
22-26 Rosh Hashanah break to discuss the
USA Freedom Act. Follow these simple steps
for success:
• Check Congress.gov to see if Senator X is a
co-sponsor. You learn she is not. The perfect
opportunity for an “ask”!
• Contact Senator X’s district office and ask
for a meeting with the senator or her staff.
You confirm the date and time of the
meeting.
• Recruit a couple of friends from your AALL
chapter to go to the meeting with you.
• Arrive at your meeting, and learn you’re
meeting with a staff member, who brings
you to the small conference room.
• Tell the staff person a little bit about yourself
and your library. Use AALL’s advocacy
resources to explain the importance of
surveillance reform and privacy of library
users.
• Present the ask: Will you co-sponsor the
USA Freedom Act, S. 2685? Whatever the
response, let the GRO know.
• Don’t forget to follow up with the allimportant thank you note!
great way to educate him or her about
the importance of law libraries, the work
that you do, and the resources you
provide to attorneys, judges, pro se
litigants, students, and members of the
public. Candidates value opportunities
for interaction with constituents because
constituents are the ones who vote for
them and keep them in office. Library
tours are an opportunity to really show
the value of your library and not just tell
a candidate about it.
In each of these circumstances,
you’ll want to do your homework
before meeting with a candidate. Have
a question ready to ask or an elevator
pitch about your library and the
legislation that most concerns you.
After you meet a candidate, follow up
with a thank you note or email materials
about what you discussed. The GRO’s
Advocacy Toolkit (www.aallnet.org/mainmenu/Advocacy/aallwash/AdvocacyToolkit) provides detailed advice to help
you prepare for any advocacy interaction.
(continued on page 36)
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San Antonio
AALL 2014
ANNUAL
MEETING
The Mid-America Association of
Law Libraries (MAALL) had
representation in the Exhibit Hall's
Activities Area.
(Above) 2013-2014
AALL President Steven P.
Anderson congratulates an
Exhibit Hall drawing winner.
The Thomson Reuters/AALL Member Appreciation Event, held at
Knibbe Ranch, was a great time for members to kick back and
have some fun.
(Right) Public Printer of the
United States Davita E. VanceCooks speaks during Tuesday's
Association Luncheon.
The Cool
Tools Café,
held Monday,
July 14.
Members applaud the AALL award winners during the Association Luncheon.
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Photos courtesy of Brant Bender Photography
The AALL Hackathon: Building the
Information Future was a new addition to
this year's Annual Meeting.
The 2015 Executive Board candidates (read more about them on page 8!)
Steven Weber, of Quarles & Brady LLP in
Milwaukee, poses in front of the Law
Librarians Association of Wisconsin
(LLAW) Activities Area table.
April Hathcock, of the
University of South Carolina,
talks with fellow members
during CONELL's speed
networking session.
Fun at the Member Appreciation Event.
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Catching Up with AALL’s 2015 Executive Board Candidates
The election approaches—get to know your candidates!
By Ashley St. John
T
he slate of candidates for the
upcoming AALL Executive
Board election is, as usual, a
group of exceptional and talented people
dedicated to our Association, to their
personal careers, and to law librarianship
as a whole. Learn a bit more about your
candidates below. And don’t forget to
check AALLNET for each candidate’s
statement and biography, which will be
posted this fall before the official start
of the election on November 2.
Candidates
Carol A. Watson
Director, Alexander Campbell King Law
Library, University of Georgia School of Law,
Athens
What are the most important issues
facing law, our members, and the
profession right now?
Information technology is evolving at an
unprecedented pace and affects every
aspect of our lives. Our
traditional notions of
business, education, and
information are being
reinvented. Creatively
and collaboratively
defining the role
of law and law
librarians as
our global society
adapts to the digital
revolution is the most
important issue
we are facing.
Who or what has had the greatest
impact on your professional life?
I have had the good fortune to work
with an incredibly talented and
professional group of librarians at
the University of Georgia for many
years now. They inspire me daily.
What’s the best advice you have
ever received?
It takes time to save time.
What is the greatest opportunity
available to law librarians right now?
Research and knowledge organization
skills are more valuable than ever before
in history. We possess the keys to the
kingdom.
8
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
What is your favorite book?
To Kill a Mockingbird
What don’t we know about you?
I can twirl fire.
What is your favorite comfort food?
Hands down . . . mac & cheese!
Ronald E. Wheeler, Jr.
Director of the Law Library
and Information Resources,
Suffolk University Law Library,
Boston
What are the most
important issues
facing law, our
members, and the
There are several
important issues facing
our members right now.
The entire legal profession
is evolving rapidly as
technology is employed in new and
unforeseen ways in legal practice, in law
teaching, and in law libraries; as clients
exercise more control over law firm
billing practices than ever before; as
the number of people entering
the legal profession continues to
shrink; and as funding for
public law libraries continues
to disappear. All of these
issues impact our members
and the opportunities
available to them.
Who or what has had the
greatest impact on your
professional life?
Without a doubt, the person who
has had the greatest impact on my
professional life is my former boss from
Georgia State University, Nancy Johnson.
Nancy mentored me in the truest sense
of the word mentor. I was given broad
supervisory responsibilities and the
independence to develop as a manager,
I was given the leeway to develop my own
unique vision for law libraries, and I was
pulled into opportunities to write and to
develop a scholarly research agenda. She
gave me all of these things while at the
same time making it all really fun.
The events that have had the greatest
impact on my professional life are having
lost so many good friends to AIDS in the
late ‘80s and early ‘90s. Seeing so many
© 2014 Ashley St. John
of my close friends die at such
young ages left me with an urgent
preoccupation (more like a compulsion)
with setting personal and professional
goals, with figuring out what I most
want from life, and with taking risks
and stretching myself in order to achieve
some level of fulfillment.
ever received?
The greatest advice I ever
received was when Nancy
Johnson told me to “just sit
down and write!” Whenever
I begin fretting over a
writing piece, I follow that
advice. It always works.
What is the greatest
opportunity available to
law librarians right now?
The greatest opportunity
available to law librarians right
now is figuring out how to position
ourselves, in light of the challenges facing
the legal profession, as problem solvers
who truly add value to our organizations.
It is figuring out what our organizations
need in order to thrive and becoming an
integral part of any effort to meet that
need. It is figuring out how to be a
central player in each and every facet
of our organizations as they continue
to evolve and change to keep pace
with changes in the legal industry.
I love fiction, so it is really hard for
me to choose just one. I recently read
The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri, and
I loved it. I love books that make me
cry, and it’s an incredibly sad story.
Of Human Bondage is also one of my
favorites.
Oh . . . well . . . there is so much that
you will NEVER know! You may not
know, however, that I worked for AIDS
nonprofits for several years during the
1990s after law school and before library
school.
I think I’ll go with turkey chili over rice
with lots of melted cheese and onions
topped with sour cream. Yum!
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
9/23/14
12:57 PM
Page 9
Board Member Candidates
Scott D. Bailey
Global Research Services Director,
Squire Patton Boggs LLP,
Washington, D.C.
While increased
competition and
globalization may be the
main factors influencing
the legal industry, our
members and our
profession are challenged
by lack of visibility.
While we provide a
valuable service, we are
on the threshold of a choice
between transforming our
traditional business model and
extinction.
I have been fortunate enough to have
mentors in the academic, court,
corporate, and firm communities who
have revolutionized the way I think
about our profession and the service we
deliver. Our people are our most valuable
asset. As a specialized research and
intelligence community, we deliver
more than resources; we produce and
propagate insight. Our challenge in the
years to come is to leverage that unique
experience, develop new knowledge
products, and market ourselves as a
developing force for the legal industry.
What’s the best advice you have ever
received?
Don’t be afraid to experiment.
What is the greatest opportunity available
to law librarians right now?
We’ve heard it all before, but now we
have to act on it. Law librarians are
cost-effective knowledge workers who
can meet a wide array of challenges in a
competitive environment. Opportunity
is realized when our experience and skill
meet ingenuity and marketing. As
technology generates versatile tools and
provides larger searchable data sets, we
can tap into new areas of analysis and
organize our product into more valuable
forms that new customers will recognize
and demand. For example, mobility of
students, faculty, attorneys, and other
stakeholders presents an opportunity to
be mobile ourselves. Less tied to physical
location and its associated costs, we
can deliver our services directly to users
on the go, service more customers in
customized ways, and elevate our
position as strategic partners in the
framework of our institutions.
I like the Sesame Street Little Golden
Book called the Together Book. It explains
that everyone has something to offer to
complete the picture. Much like our law
library community, built of many types
of members, customers, and information
providers, we all hold a piece of
the puzzle to deliver excellent
service and advance our field.
When Big Bird needs help
with a wagon, we see
dozens of characters rush
in with various solutions.
Grover brings the wheels
in that save the day,
but it takes the whole
community to continue to
find answers for everyone.
I was a pole vaulter in high school and
kept at it despite the fact that I was not
very skilled. I kept trying in the face of
achieving a typical height in the high
jump range. My teammates referred to
me as Captain Ahab because I seemed
to be randomly harpooning the runway
against insurmountable odds.
I’m a southerner, so it is a bit hard to
choose. Grandmother’s biscuits and gravy
were hard to beat. Comfort extended
far beyond the food in her presence, and
I am still searching for something that
comes close.
Emily R. Florio
Manager of Library Services,
Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett &
Dunner LLP, Washington, D.C.
Falling law school
enrollment numbers,
fewer associate jobs,
and the mergers and
right-sizing of law
firms all translate
into big challenges
for the legal industry
and for our profession
today. These times of
transition challenge us to
serve the client-base more
efficiently while remaining
effective and simply doing more with
fewer staff and smaller budgets. Thus, we
must work even harder to keep the
profession strong by showing that we are
forward-thinking, innovative,
compassionate, and gutsy professionals.
My colleagues, both those with whom
I have worked within libraries and
those I have met throughout my career.
Through these professional connections,
I remain invigorated, involved, and
excited by the opportunities for all law
librarians to work together for the greater
goals of the profession. Every type of law
librarian has his/her own difficulties;
through the support and guidance of
my peers, colleagues, and friends, I have
been able to tackle various stressors and
problems head-on.
ever received?
Do not ever become complacent in your
job or career, because the moment you
become complacent, you are letting
yourself, your colleagues, and your
institution down by not providing the
best you can offer. I have taken this
statement to mean that though I should
always be proud of my accomplishments,
I should never forget that the goal is
to progress and always strive for more
experiences, achievements, and overall
growth. This mantra allows me to
remain engaged, tackle thoughtprovoking questions, and provide new
solutions to old problems, all while
avoiding the risk of hitting a plateau or
losing interest in this important work.
The greatest opportunity available to
law librarians right now is our active
involvement in shaping the profession to
be ready for whatever the future has to
offer. We cannot assume the status quo
will remain forever, so it is absolutely
crucial that we work together to
showcase our growing and adaptable
skillsets in order to ensure we remain
critical components of the legal industry.
The Little Prince/Le Petit Prince by
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry has
always been a favorite of mine,
both as a child and as an
adult. The book addresses the
importance of establishing
ties, being responsible for
what one has created, and
being proud of one’s work,
along with many other themes
still relevant today.
I am an avid equestrian and have been
riding for 20 years. It is a welcome
break from the fast-paced city life and
allows me to enjoy the beautiful Virginia
countryside.
My favorite comfort food is my Mom’s
crêpes because they remind me of family,
friends, and Vermont.
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
9
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
9/23/14
12:57 PM
Page 10
Mary Matuszak
Director of Library Services, New York County
District Attorney’s Office, New York
Economics. Law firms,
law schools, and
government/notfor-profits are
all undergoing
rapid change.
Globalization and
competition are
forcing law firms
to become more
efficient while law schools
are faced with declining
enrollment, rising tuition, and
pressure to produce practice-ready
graduates. Government and not-forprofits want to take advantage of
technology to help them do less with
more, but the funding crisis is impeding
their ability to do so. Luckily for us,
librarians do it faster, better, and cheaper
and can assist their parent organizations
in becoming more efficient and costeffective.
Linda Corbelli brought me to my first
LLAGNY meeting in 1988 and strongly
encouraged me to join a committee.
At my first AALL meeting in Boston in
1993, it was Linda who showed me the
ropes. She has been a mentor and friend
ever since and has taught me everything
I know.
received?
Get involved and have fun!
Changes in the way information is
created, procured, and utilized have
created many opportunities for law
librarians. Law librarians can use
their skills to guide attorneys through
social media, mobile applications,
E-Discovery, new search tools,
knowledge management, competitive
intelligence, big data, legal project
management, data security, and
privacy.
Little Witch by Anna Elizabeth
Bennett, a children’s librarian.
It was the first book I ever
loved and it began a life-long
love affair with reading.
What don’t we know
about you?
I was a balloon handler at the
Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Chocolate chip cookie dough!
Francis X. Norton, Jr.
Head of Public Services,
Law Library of Louisiana,
Louisiana Supreme Court,
New Orleans
What are the most
important issues facing
law, our members, and the
Shrinkage. The entire
economy has been
contracting for several years, and
there’s no real indication that it will
end anytime soon. As a result, law firms
will continue to shed attorneys, law
schools will see fewer applicants, and
courts will face bigger budget problems.
Under these conditions, it isn’t really
possible to “do more with less.” Instead,
we need to change much of we do and
also decide what we can do without.
This can be disruptive and scary, but it
can also be handled with skill and
aplomb.
As we move forward, we can assist
each other with transitioning to new
modes of operation. There should be
greater collaboration between institutions
of all types. As the amount of print
recedes, technical services staff will have
time for new tasks. Directors need to
reimagine workflow within their libraries.
Who or what has had the greatest impact
on your professional life?
Mentors. Fortunately for me, when
I have asked others for advice or to
proofread something that I am writing,
they have always been willing to assist
me and offer constructive advice.
received?
Life is a journey, not a destination.
As always, it is to serve our patrons.
Older lawyers don’t want to be bothered
with learning multiple new databases.
New lawyers don’t even know
what they don’t know.
We are the bridge between
the way legal information
has been created and
organized in the past
and the ever-shifting
electronic platforms on
which it is stored today
and tomorrow.
Catch-22.
I’m on a mission to bring back polyester.
Biscuits. ■
Ashley St. John
(astjohn@aall.org),
Marketing and
Communications Manager,
AALL Headquarters, Chicago
New edition now available. Order your copy today. Relied on
by attorneys and staff for speedy access to nation’s federal,
state and county courts. Now featuring free online updates.
10
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
NationsCourts.com
Visit our website to “Look Inside” new edition
Court Reference Publishers Since 1975
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
9/23/14
11:28 AM
Page 11
Online resources available for free trial
Yearbook of International
Organizations Online
International Maritime
Boundaries Online
United Nations Convention
on the Law of the Sea Online
Edited by the Union of International
Associations
Coalter G. Lathrop, Sovereign
Geographic, co-publication with the
American Society of International Law
Edited by Myron H. Nordquist,
Satya Nandan, and Shabtai Rosenne†
brill.com/yioo
The yearbook provides a comprehensive
database of intergovernmental (IGOs)
and international non-governmental
organizations (INGOs) worldwide. Free from
print restrictions, the Yearbook Online covers
over 64,000 international organizations –
federations, scholarly societies, associations
and transnational actors of all types. The new,
flexible interface presents fully searchable
content, and provides extensive hyperlinks
between organization profiles and websites.
• E-ISSN: 2211-2847
• Annual subscription: US$ 3,030.-
Also available in print via six thematic volumes:
Vol 1A and 1B: Organization Descriptions and
Cross-References
Vol 2: Geographical Index — A Country
Directory of Secretariats and Memberships
Vol 3: Global Action Networks — A Subject
Directory and Index
Vol 4: International Organization Bibliography
and Resources
Vol 5: Statistics, Visualizations and Patterns
Vol 6: Who’s Who in International Organizations
brill.com/mboo
International Maritime Boundaries is an
unmatched comprehensive reference for
international state practice concerning
maritime boundary delimitation, and is used
and referenced widely by practitioners and
scholars of international law.
The 2013 update added over 20 new reports,
maps and treaty texts to this unique
publication, as contributing authors provide
expert analysis and first-hand knowledge of
newly delimited maritime boundaries in the
Atlantic Ocean, Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean,
Persian Gulf and the Caribbean Sea.
• E-ISSN: 2214-8388
• Annual subscription: US$ 880.• Outright Purchase: US$ 3,310.-
• ISBN: 9789004255197
• List price: Six-volume set US$ 3,346.-
For more information, a free 30-day institutional trial, consortia deals and pricing options,
please contact the Brill Sales Department at sales-us@brill.com
brill.com/loso
These Commentaries are based almost entirely
on the formal and informal documentation of
the Third United Nations Conference on the
Law of the Sea (UNCLOS III, 1973-1982), coupled,
where necessary, with the personal knowledge
of editors, contributors, or reviewers, many
of whom were principal negotiators or UN
personnel who participated in the Conference.
The scope and duration of the “Virginia
Commentary” project is without precedent
as an academic undertaking in the field of
international law. The project was conceived
by its editors to meet the need - particularly
essential in the absence of an official legislative
history for the Convention - for an objective
and comprehensive analysis of the articles
in the Convention and in the Agreement
relating to the Implementation of Part XI of the
Convention that entered into force in 1996.
• E-ISBN: 9789004249639
• Outright Purchase: US$ 2,890.-
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
9/23/14
11:28 AM
Page 12
Public Relations
Outstanding Achievements
Congratulations to the 2014 AALL Excellence in Marketing Award winners
By Nicole P. Dyszlewski
T
he marketing strategy or public
relations initiatives that work
well for one library might not
necessarily work well for another. One
of the most impressive qualities shared
among the 2014 Excellence in Marketing
Award winners is that they each
evaluated their patrons and their unique
communities and creatively produced
marketing materials that were able
to speak to their audiences and
stakeholders. AALL’s Excellence in
Marketing Award honors outstanding
achievement in public relations activities
by an individual, group of individuals,
library, chapter, special interest section,
consortium, caucus, or any other group
affiliated with the Association. This year’s
winners include a law firm library, a
federal court library, a chapter, a public
academic/county law library, and a
private academic law library.
importantly, was used as a tool in the
successful advocacy by the library
director for funding for a new position
in the 2014 library budget.
readers to historical idioms (such as
pussle gut) as a way of highlighting a
five-volume historical dictionary from
the library’s collection. In addition to
drawing readers’ focus to a selection of
online historical collections by using
screenshots and links, the newsletter
spotlights The Needle, a newsletter from
the McCornack General Hospital, a
convalescent hospital for Army officers
during World War II and a previous
tenant of the Richard H. Chambers
Court of Appeals Building. In fact, one
of the library’s patrons, a judge, was
admitted to the hospital in the 1940s.
According to Branch Librarian Joy
Shoemaker, his response to the content
of the newsletter “turned into a research
opportunity to help the judge track
down his personal admittance
information.”
Best Brochure
Thompson Coburn LLP
@YourLibrary Infographic
Best Newsletter
Ninth Circuit Library–Pasadena
Branch
Library News—Summer 2013:
The History Issue
While the infographics in the winning
entry for Best Brochure (pictured below)
are impressive, even more impressive are
the breadth and depth of the underlying
statistics on which the infographics were
based. Most remarkable was the response
of the target audience to the brochure.
According to the entry form, submitted
by Mary Kay Jung, Thompson Coburn’s
director of library services, not only did
the winning brochure raise awareness
of library services, but it also led to
increased use of those services and, most
The Summer 2013 issue of the library’s
quarterly newsletter, Library News,
(pictured above) was written to welcome
and orient new law clerks, as well as to
celebrate the library’s new partnership
with the Pasadena Digital History
Collection. The so-called History Issue
starts by introducing, or reintroducing,
o
oogle
wers;
Google
can bring you back 100,000 answers
answers;
“G
a librarian
librarian can bring you
ou back the right one.
e.”
Best Use of Technology
-- Neil Gaiman,
Gaiman,
man, Author
Author
ADMINISTR
AT
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TIVE OPERATIONS
OPERAT
ATIONS
T
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ADMINISTRATIVE
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61,254
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H
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75
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KM
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USERS
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1,491
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#1
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11888,,511
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200
#4
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27

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LLEGISLATION
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N

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31 = 3,445
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C
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220 = 30,047
LLITIGATION
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1000

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*BAS
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12
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
© 2014 Nicole P. Dyszlewski
Chicago Association of Law Libraries
Call CALL in the Exhibit Hall
1,5
572
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, 21
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rojects
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51
FOR FIRM LI
BRARIES
LIBRARIES

SA
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SEARCHED
By combining a variety of technologies,
among them a desktop audio recording
program, an MP3 player, and the nearly
extinct wall-mounted telephone, the
Chicago Association of Law Libraries
(CALL) made an old-school phone into
a fresh, new marketing tool. In an effort
to reimagine the typical Exhibit Hall
display for the AALL Annual Meeting
in 2013, this chapter outdid itself by
creating an eye-catching and engaging
display steeped in Chicago pride (see
photo above). The exhibit featured a
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
9/25/14
2:30 PM
Page 13
phone receiver mounted into a booth
decoupaged with pictures and logos
of Chicago landmarks and regional
ephemera for authenticity. Those
interested in learning more about
CALL or the city of Chicago could
pick up the phone and listen to one
of 10 recorded scripts. This display not
only caught the attention of meeting
attendees, but it also provided bits of
information in a creative and fun
manner. No wonder the chapter chose
to bring the display home and roll it out
again at the chapter’s September business
meeting.
Best Campaign
Emory University School of Law
Hugh F. MacMillan Law Library
Stress Busters
Best PR Toolkit
University of Arkansas at Little Rock
William H. Bowen School of Law
Library
The Library is More Than a Place
to Study
The librarians at the University of
Arkansas at Little Rock William H.
Bowen School of Law Library have as
many different tools in their PR toolkit
as they do different types of patron
groups at the library. Because the library
serves as both the law school library and
the Pulaski County Law Library, it serves
patrons with diverse needs and abilities.
The toolkit successfully addresses various
patron groups and does so in both print
and digital media with bathroom
newsletters; Facebook posts; a Pinterest
page; separate brochures for students,
faculty, recent graduates, and attorneys;
large monitors/media screens; displays
inside and outside the library (see photo
above); and swag. All of the materials
convey a harmonious branded message
to patrons, and some of the items
have interspersed humor and fun. The
brochures, in particular, emphasize the
friendly staff with text descriptions
of available services and prominent
photographs of the staff on nearly every
page. One item of swag that stands out
in the toolkit is a branded coaster used as
a promotional giveaway when the library
changed its policy to allow food and
drinks. Overall, the toolkit emphasizes
library services and provides many ways
for patrons to interact with the library,
engage with available resources, and
provide feedback for future services.
From the way the campaign was
described and documented in the entry
materials, it sounds like it would be
impossible not to feel less stressed about
exams after engaging in all or part of
the Hugh F. MacMillan Law Library’s
Stress Busters program. It would also be
impossible to overlook the library as a
source of caring and comfort for future
exam studying. This two-week campaign
designed to help law students cope with
exam pressures was piloted in 2012 and
was a full assault on stress and exam
anxiety in the spring and fall of 2013.
The library staff worked diligently to
promote the campaign through the
existing law school communication
channels, the library bathroom
newsletter, social media, word of mouth,
posters, a display, fliers, and the library’s
homepage. Holistic, non-traditional law
library services and resources were
featured, such as board games; therapy
dogs; healthy snacks and junk food;
comfortable seating, including beanbag
chairs; exam-taking tips; a relaxation
room featuring music therapy; coffee
and hot cocoa breaks; and relaxation
tips. Also, students could schedule chair
massages with a massage therapist!
Our Gratitude and Congratulations
Recognizing that public relations and
marketing are important to all law
librarians and all law libraries, AALL,
through its Excellence in Marketing
Award, seeks to highlight and celebrate
outstanding achievements in marketing.
If you would like to learn more about
the award, the award committee, the
previous winners of the award, or details
about the submission process, please
visit www.aallnet.org/main-menu/
Member-Resources/AALLawards/
award-eim.html.
The Excellence in Marketing
Subcommittee of the AALL Public
Relations Committee would like to
express our gratitude to all who
submitted entries for this year’s award,
and we congratulate this year’s winners.
Finally, we encourage future submissions
for this award. The entry deadline for
the 2015 Excellence in Marketing Award
is February 1, 2015. ■
Nicole P. Dyszlewski
(nicole.dyszlewski@
legislature.maine.gov), Senior
Law Librarian, Law &
Legislative Reference Library,
Augusta, Maine
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Evaluating the similarities of the
accusation in the film The Wizard of Oz
and one in a 19th century case
By Tracy L. Woodard
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The Dog Bite Accusation
BX
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T
he 1939 classic American film
The Wizard of Oz opens with a
dramatic theme, the dog bite
accusation of a presumed dangerous dog.
In the opening scene, Dorothy claims
that her dog Toto was attacked by Ms.
Gulch. The audience does not see the
attack occur, but Dorothy tells the
audience about it. She says, “Ms. Gulch
hit Toto right over the back with a rake
just because she says he gets in her
garden and chases her nasty old cat every
day.” Based on Dorothy’s discourse, it
appears that Ms. Gulch attacked Toto
with a rake. However, Ms. Gulch’s
version of the incident is theatrically
different. Ms. Gulch claims that Toto
bit her, and she successfully obtains a
sheriff ’s order to have the dog destroyed.
Ms. Gulch’s dog bite complaint,
backed by the sheriff ’s order to destroy
Toto, is the catalyst that ultimately sends
Dorothy to Oz. In a law journal article
titled L’Oz, Emily Albrink Hartigan
discusses the correlation between the dog
bite and the sheriff ’s order in the film.
She writes that, “The Wizard of Oz . . .
is set in motion by the legal document
that Miss Gulch waves at Uncle Henry
and Auntie Em. That law-proclaiming
© 2014 Tracy L. Woodard
document is an order allowing Miss
Gulch to take Toto away from Dorothy.”
Clearly, the dog bite sequence, including
the sheriff ’s order to destroy Toto, serves
as an important and foreboding literary
device that sends Dorothy on her
journey to Oz.
The absence of this biting literary
device in the 1900 book by L. Frank
Baum and its inclusion in the film
caused me to wonder why the script
writers, Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson,
and Edgar Allen Woolf, added the
formidable scene. I wondered if there
was a court case that inspired the dog
bite sequence, and I set out on a research
journey to find the case that inspired
the dog bite accusation in the film.
I used Bloomberg Law and searched
for New York cases from 1856-1939—
the state and year of L. Frank Baum’s
birth through the release date of the
film. I chose Baum’s state and year of
birth as the starting point because he
authored the book that the film was
based on. My search terms were the
following: (dog P/ bite OR bit!) AND
(order OR ordinance) P/ mayor OR
sheriff. The search strategy retrieved cases
from the designated jurisdiction and
time frame that included the word “dog”
within the same paragraph as the word
“bite” or words beginning with “bit”
(I used the root expander after “bit”
to capture words that begin with the
letters bit, like bitten or biting ) and
also contained the word “order” or
“ordinance” within the same paragraph
as the word “mayor” or the word
“sheriff.” The search found two cases:
People ex rel. Dillon v. Board of
Metropolitan Police (1862), hereafter
Dillon, and People ex rel. Shand v. Tighe
(1894), hereafter Shand.
Both of these cases took place
seemingly light years before the release
date of the 1939 Hollywood film. The
Dillon case took place almost 80 years
before the film, and the opinion in the
Shand case was written approximately
40 years before the film. The large gap
in time between the cases and the film
may certainly be evidence that the script
writers had no knowledge of the cases
at all.
Ultimately, I found the dog bite
accusation in the Shand case to be
dissimilar to the dog bite accusation in
the film based on the status of the dogs.
The status of the dog in the Shand case
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was changed to “not dangerous,” and
Shand’s dog was legally allowed to live
(see pop-out below), whereas the dog
in the Dillon case and the dog in the
film were marked for destruction, by
municipal order, and the orders were
unrevoked.
Although the dog bite
accusation in the Dillon case
has more in common with
the dog bite sequence in
the dog did not bite the child, and,
therefore, he does not transport the
dog to the station nor does he destroy
the dog. The police officer is fired for
disobeying the order, sues for damages,
and loses his case.
Certainly, there are critical
differences between the dog bite scenario
in the film and the Dillon case. One of
the biggest discrepancies is that the dog
bite complaint in the film is fantasy,
The opinion reads that “The complaint alleges no attack by the dog, and when I come to
read the evidence given by Croke [defendant, Thomas Croke] . . . I find that he swears that
the dog was on the street with the owner’s boy, and that (to use his exact words) ‘I got
hold of the boy and the dog bit me,’ so that instead of the dog making an attack, Croke
seems to have attacked the boy and the dog defended him.” Shand’s dog bit a person
while defending its owner. This is different from the fate of the dog in the Dillon case and
the dog in the film The Wizard of Oz. The status of the dog in the Dillon case and the dog
in the film are not changed in favor of preserving the dog’s life; by municipal order, both
dogs are marked for destruction.
The Wizard of Oz, the Shand case is
noteworthy because it summarizes the
law and explains what happens when a
dog bite accusation occurs. For example,
the Shand opinion reads, “The common
council many years ago passed an
ordinance that if any dog shall ‘attack
a person’ at any place . . . upon a
complaint being made to the mayor, or
a police justice, he shall inquire into the
complaint.” The opinion continues to
summarize the law by stating that “and
if satisfied of its truth, and that such dog
is dangerous, he shall order the owner
or possessor of such dog to kill him
immediately.”
Dissecting Dillon
Far from the glamour and film
perfection of classic Hollywood, the
Dillon case takes place in Brooklyn, New
York, during the American Civil War,
one year before the violent Draft Riots
in New York City. Recall the film Gangs
of New York; that is the approximate
time frame and location in which the
Dillon case takes place.
The Dillon case involves a dangerous
dog bite scenario, as well, but the case
weighs on a police officer’s ability to
determine the merit of the dog bite
accusation. A woman named Ms. Lynch
testifies that a dog bit her child. She
obtains a mayor’s order to have the dog
destroyed. The presiding sergeant at the
Metropolitan Police Department testifies
that he issued Police Officer Patrick
Dillon an order to bring the dog to
the police station or destroy the dog.
Alternatively, Police Officer Patrick
Dillon testifies that the order was to
bring the dog to the police station or
destroy the dog on the condition that the
officer determined that the dog bit the
child. The police officer determined that
16
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Sept/Oct 2014
whereas the dog bite complaint in the
Dillon case is reality, a part of a lawsuit.
Another contrasting point is that the
jurisdictions where the alleged dog bites
take place differ. The Wizard of Oz takes
place in Kansas, and the Dillon case
takes place in New York. Another
difference is that Ms. Gulch claims that
a dog bit her, whereas in the Dillon case,
Ms. Lynch claims that a dog bit her
child. (It is interesting to note, however,
that in one of the script versions written
by Noel Langley, Ms. Gulch is a mother
who has a son named Walter, and she
claims that Toto bit her son (Aljean
Harmetz, The Making of the Wizard of
Oz, [1984]).
The differences are present, but the
basic similarities prevail: the dog bite
accusation, the meritless complaint, the
municipal order, the desire to destroy
the dog, and the competing eyewitness
testimony.
Dog Bite Complaint
There are basic similarities between the
dog bite claim in the film and in the
Dillon case. In the film, Ms. Gulch rides
a bicycle on to the property of Dorothy
Gale’s home and announces that Toto bit
her. She states, “I’m all but lame from
the bite on my leg!” patting her thigh
directly as she makes her allegation. Her
accusation is that Toto bit her, and, as a
result of the injury, she almost lost the
ability to use her leg. Maybe Ms. Gulch
patted her thigh for no reason or because
she was tired from bicycling or because
she intended to show where the alleged
dog bite had taken place. Could she ride
a bicycle if she sustained a severe dog
bite on the thigh, a bite that “almost
made her lame?” Nevertheless, Ms.
Gulch’s claim that she was bitten by
Toto is seeded in the film.
Ms. Lynch also makes a dog bite
complaint in the Dillon case. She
testifies that a dog bit her son. She says,
“On Sunday evening my little boy was
playing at the door; there was a dog
there with a bone near by [sic]; he
dropped the bone and bit the child on
the neck and on the arm.”
Ms. Lynch describes a disturbing dog
attack involving her child. To be sure,
the film The Wizard of Oz is fantasy
and the Dillon case actually happened;
therefore, comparing the severity of the
dog bites is null because one is fiction
and the other is a part of historical
reality. Nevertheless, the similarity
prevails that a dog bite complaint is
established in the film and in the Dillon
case.
Meritless Complaint
A second comparison is that both dog
bite accusations are viewed as meritless.
Uncle Henry dismisses Ms. Gulch’s
dog bite assertion by sarcasm and
nonverbal communication (see pop-out
below). He sarcastically asks whether
Dorothy bit Ms. Gulch by asking,
“You mean [Dorothy] bit you?” He
then asks whether Dorothy bit
Toto: “So then [Dorothy] bit
her dog ay?” Uncle Henry also
shows his disbelief in Ms.
In a 2006 article titled “Gaining
Compliance through Non-Verbal
Communication,” Pamela Peters
discusses the relevance of nonverbal
communication and the law. She shows
that nonverbal communication exists
and writes that “interpreting non-verbal
communication is not a rigid scientific
process.” The author continues by
stating that there is some flexibility in
interpreting nonverbal communication.
She writes that, “the ‘rules’ of nonverbal communication are helpful,
yet flexible guidelines.” She validates
the importance of nonverbal
communication.
Gulch’s dog bite complaint through his
use of the nonverbal action of letting
the picket fence door slap Ms. Gulch
on the backside. Maybe Uncle Henry
accidentally loses his grip on the fence
door or maybe he deliberately releases
the fence door to let it hit the woman
on the backside. Either way, the action
triggers an effect that looks like corporal
punishment or at least a penalty for Ms.
Gulch’s meritless dog bite complaint.
Although Uncle Henry and Aunt Em
correctly surrender Toto after Ms. Gulch
presents a sheriff ’s order, it is Uncle
Henry’s sarcastic questions and his
involvement in the symbolic slap of
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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Page 17
the picket fence that shows that Uncle
Henry found Ms. Gulch’s dog bite
accusation to be meritless.
Comparable with Uncle Henry’s
disbelief in Ms. Gulch’s dog bite
complaint, Police Officer Patrick
Dillon also finds Ms. Lynch’s dog bite
complaint meritless. Dillon testifies that
he has a history of obeying the order to
destroy dogs that bite people. He testifies
that, “I have always acted on such orders
[to destroy a dog that bit a person],
when I found the dog had bitten any
one.” By stating “when I found the dog
had bitten any one,” he shows that he
did not find that the dog bit Ms. Lynch’s
child. Furthermore, the police officer
explains his reasoning as to why he
determined that Ms. Lynch’s accusation
was meritless. He testifies that the dog
was a three-month old puppy, that the
bite mark was barely noticeable, and
that he discerned the complaint was
fabricated. The police officer testifies
that, “The dog was about three months
old; I have always acted on such orders,
when I found the dog had bitten any
one; I found a scratch about the size
of a head of a pin.” The police officer’s
testimony shows that he found Ms.
Lynch’s dog bite claim to be meritless.
In addition, the sworn testimony of
Sergeant Terry also confirms that Police
Officer Dillon found Ms. Lynch’s dog
bite claim meritless. Terry testifies, “I
sent the defendant, and he came back
and said there was nothing in the case.”
Sergeant Terry’s use of the phrase
“nothing in the case” shows that Officer
Dillon determined that Ms. Lynch’s dog
bite complaint was without merit.
Municipal Order
Both incidents are backed by the
authority of a municipal order to
have the dog removed and destroyed.
Ms. Gulch presents a sheriff ’s order to
remove and destroy Dorothy’s dog.
She says, “That dog’s a nuisance to the
community. I’m taking [Toto] to the
sheriff and make sure he’s destroyed.”
Ms. Gulch also threatens to file a
lawsuit. She says, “If you don’t hand over
that dog, I’ll bring a damage suit that’ll
take your whole farm! There’s a law
protecting folks against dogs that bite!”
She announces, “Here’s [the sheriff ’s]
order allowing me to take [Toto]. Unless
you want to go against the law.” Uncle
Henry and Aunt Em read the sheriff ’s
order and surrender Toto to Ms. Gulch,
by the authority of the sheriff ’s order.
The sheriff ’s order is the definitive piece
in the story that gives Ms. Gulch the
authority to remove and destroy Toto.
Similarly, Ms. Lynch obtains a
mayor’s order to have the dog that bit
her child destroyed. She testifies that,
“I went to the mayor and got an order
to have the dog killed.” Ms. Lynch’s
testimony shows that she obtained a
mayor’s order to have the dog destroyed.
The orders give both Ms. Gulch and
Ms. Lynch the authority to have the
respective dogs removed and destroyed.
Focus on Destroying the Dog
Both Ms. Gulch and Ms. Lynch
specifically articulate their determination
to have the dog destroyed. Ms. Gulch
poignantly declares, “That dog’s a
nuisance to the community. I’m taking
[Toto] to the sheriff and make sure
he’s destroyed.” It is important to note
Ms. Gulch’s resolve to ensure Toto’s
destruction. She doesn’t just say that
Toto will be destroyed by the authority
of the order. Instead she emphasizes
that she will “make sure” or that she
will personally see to it that Toto is
destroyed. Her articulation shows her
determination to destroy the dog.
Likewise, Ms. Lynch’s testimony
shows her determination to have the dog
destroyed. She testifies, “I went to the
mayor and got an order to have the dog
killed. I said I wanted the dog killed;
I asked the defendant [Police Officer
Patrick Dillon], finally, if he was going
to kill the dog.” Ms. Lynch’s discourse
is focused on making sure that the dog
will be destroyed.
Competing Witnesses
Finally, both dog bite scenarios involve
competing versions of the story. There
are no witnesses to the dog bite incident
in The Wizard of Oz except Ms. Gulch
and Dorothy. It is no wonder that their
versions of the story would be different,
opposite to be sure. Ms. Gulch says that
Toto bit her, an unprovoked attack.
Dorothy says that Ms. Gulch hit Toto
with a rake, not in self-defense. Either
Ms. Gulch attacked Dorothy’s dog with a
rake without being attacked first, or Toto
attacked Ms. Gulch for no reason. Both
competing versions of the story can’t be
true, and each version of the incident
appears to cancel the other out.
A similar comparison can be made
in the Dillon case. Excluding Ms. Lynch,
there are two other eyewitnesses to
the dog bite incident. In one sworn
testimony, the dog is placed in the
violent action of biting a child. In the
other testimony, the dog takes no action
and is observed as being on the sidewalk.
For example, Elizabeth McDonald
testifies that she saw the dog bite Ms.
Lynch’s child: “I saw the dog bite the
child.” According to McDonald the
dog undoubtedly bit Ms. Lynch’s child,
whereas Bridget Lynch testifies to the
location of the dog and does not address
any action taken by the dog. Bridget
Lynch testifies that, “I saw the dog on
the sidewalk.” According to Bridget
Lynch, the dog took no action except
being on a sidewalk.
It is possible that the dog was on the
sidewalk and then bit Ms. Lynch’s child.
However, why doesn’t Bridget Lynch
testify to that point exactly, that the dog
was on the sidewalk and then bit Ms.
Lynch’s child? If Bridget Lynch didn’t see
the dog bite the child, then why doesn’t
she testify clearly to that point? Instead,
Bridget Lynch only testifies that she
saw the dog on a sidewalk. There is a
dramatic difference between seeing a
dog in the action of attacking someone
and seeing a dog on the sidewalk. The
testimonies of Elizabeth McDonald and
Bridget Lynch seem to cancel each other
out.
Similar, but the Same?
The basic similarities between the dog
bite accusation in the film The Wizard
of Oz and the Dillon case have been
weighed out and presented. I assert that
there are several differences between the
two, as well. However, in my opinion,
the similarities prevail, and they provide
a noteworthy exercise in discursive
comparison.
Several newspaper articles
summarized the elements of the Dillon
case in 1862 and the Shand case in
1894. The court cases were also reported
during their respective time frames.
However, there is simply too much time
between the court cases, the newspaper
articles, and the release of the film to say
definitively that the script writers were
aware of the legal record.
Were the script writers aware of the
Dillon case, the Shand case, or newspaper
articles about the cases? Perhaps, but
probably not. I suspect that, like us, the
script writers were at least aware of the
“rules and customs” of their culture (see
“Home is Where the Law is: A Humbug
Reading of the Wizard of Oz” by Maria
Aristodemou). Perhaps the culture of the
script writers in 1939, and extending
back to the Dillon case, had at least one
common dramatic theme that could
be used as a compelling device to
psychologically push Dorothy to despair
and ultimately on her journey to Oz: the
dog bite accusation of her beloved Toto. ■
Tracy L. Woodard
(tracy.woodard@
kattenlaw.com), Legislative
Librarian, Katten Muchin
Rosenman LLP, Washington,
D.C.
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Reference Awards!
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18
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The Four (Well, Three and Two Halves)
Languages of Encouragement in the Classroom
A mindful approach to building rapport with students
By Andrea Alexander
R
ecently, I read The Five Languages
of Appreciation in the Workplace,
one of the many titles in Gary
Chapman’s popular Five Languages
series. Chapman’s focus is typically
on personal relationships, but in
The Five Languages of Appreciation in
the Workplace, he collaborates with a
co-author, Workplace Relationship
Consultant Paul E. White, to turn an eye
to how the same principles can (usually)
apply in the workplace. As I read,
though, I found myself increasingly
thinking not about my coworkers but
about a recently completed stint in
the classroom and how well many of
Chapman and White’s ideas can apply to
an academic law librarian’s relationships
with students. I realized that the
principles that the authors suggest for
interacting with co-workers and
subordinates can easily be applied in a
classroom setting and can be highly
effective as a way to build the kind of
relationships with students that make
them comfortable seeking help and
asking questions, which is a priority for
me as both a librarian and a teacher.
This year, I had the opportunity to
teach as an adjunct in our law school’s
intense three-week January term course,
Legal Problem Solving and Analysis.
Although I had taught before in several
different contexts, this was my first time
as a capital-P Professor, responsible for a
classroom of law students and delivering
grades and comments on assignments.
I’ll be the first to admit that when it
comes to my teaching style, I much
prefer to be the “good cop.” I can and
will deliver critiques and low grades
when they’ve been earned, but, whenever
possible, I prefer to turn a poor
performance into a teachable moment
and leave the student feeling encouraged
about the possibility of applying the
lessons from that assignment to another
in the future. I like to think that most of
my fellow academic librarians approach
teaching in a similar way, at least
inasmuch as they attempt to help
students find the lesson in a given
experience.
The crux of the “five languages”
concept is that each person has one
or two main “languages” (which I’m
not going to put in quotes henceforth
because those quotation marks will get
annoying pretty quickly) that he or she
© 2014 Andrea Alexander • Photo courtesy of
Florida Coastal School of Law
uses to express positive emotions.
In Chapman and White’s book, that
positive emotion is appreciation. In
the classroom, I prefer to think of it as
encouragement—building a strong
rapport with students so they feel that
I am personally invested in their learning
experiences, approachable, and a resource
if they have questions later on. I believe
that most of us are probably doing at
least some of these things already,
but consciously acknowledging the
different languages can improve your
communication with students by making
you more mindful of the different styles
of expressing encouragement and can
help you understand when your students
are trying to communicate with you in
a language that is not “native” to you.
While I recommend reading the book
itself for a more comprehensive set of
ideas and implementation suggestions,
what follows is my own interpretation
of how the languages can be used in
a law school classroom, along with some
insights gleaned from fellow librarians.
Language 1: Words of Affirmation
Words of Affirmation are what many
would consider the typical way to express
encouragement. These can take different
forms—spoken positive statements
regarding an individual’s performance,
delivered either privately or publicly, or
written statements addressing similar
topics. Brian Anderson,
reference librarian and
associate professor at
Ohio Northern
University, says,
“Responding to a
student’s participation
in a positive way, even
if the student is not
quite on track, can
help keep him engaged
and also keep a ‘safer’
environment than the
more traditional
doctrinal classes. For
example, statements
like ‘that’s not a bad
idea, but how can we
build on that?’ can
help keep students engaged despite
giving a ‘wrong’ answer.”
Following up with a student outside
of class can be similarly motivating.
Anderson notes, “If a student makes a
good contribution in class, I’ll let him
know later that day or week if I see him
in the hallway or in the library outside
class.” This kind of additional contact
can go far in demonstrating to students
that your student-teacher relationship
is not confined to the classroom.
Another approach pointed out by
Chapman and White is to acknowledge
not only actions but also traits; for
example, instead of telling a student that
she noticed something important in
class, tell her that she is perceptive and
offer her contribution as an example. It’s
a small shift, but to someone whose first
language is Words of Affirmation, it can
make a big impact.
Language 2: Quality Time
It’s easy to think that Quality Time
is fulfilled by conferences and
conversations with students during
class and office hours, but I think it’s
something different. Of course you need
to put in the time as an instructor, but
speakers of this language respond best to
your decision to spend some nonacademic time with them. I’ve had
students who seem to love brief chats in
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the library about our shared love of
guilty pleasure television, their children
or pets, or where someone got a
particularly nice handbag. Those topics
are in my wheelhouse; someone else
might have better luck chatting about
sports or current events. For a person
whose primary language is Quality Time,
it’s those moments when you don’t have
to give them your attention but you
choose to do so anyway that are really
meaningful and help build a stronger
bond. If your students are receptive,
stop to talk for a moment in the hallway.
Invite them to lunch once in a while.
You’ll quickly develop a sense for who
appreciates these gestures and who
wants to keep their free time clear of
professorial intrusion, and once you’ve
found commonalities with your Quality
Time students, it’s easy to build on
those.
Other Quality Time expressions
include those that center on academic
issues but go “above and beyond.”
In an evaluation, a student noted that he
(and even though the evaluations were
anonymous, I remember the incident
and so feel confident in the pronoun)
had really appreciated it when he came
to my office with a question, found me
eating lunch at my desk, and was invited
in to discuss his concerns while I tried
not to slurp my soup. I had felt very
bad that he had to ask me his questions
about an assignment in an office redolent
of black beans and spinach, but from his
perspective, it was a gift of Quality Time
because it was outside of normal office
hours.
Michelle Hook Dewey, reference
librarian and assistant professor of library
service at the University of Illinois, says,
“On the first day of class I have my
students fill out notecards with their
background information. I ask them to
include at least one hobby or outside
interest. I use this information to help
learn something about them so I can
easily facilitate a genuine hallway
interaction. (It also helps me learn their
names!) I share with the class my answers
to the same questions. This year in my
intro I included correlating photos with
my background info, and as a result of
showing pics of my pups, I had several
students come up to me to chat about
dogs. I think some people who like to
express themselves through the language
of Quality Time might also struggle
with how to engage; by providing your
students with some info about yourself,
you can open the door to those
exchanges.”
Language 3: Acts of Service
As a reference or instructional librarian,
you are probably used to providing
plenty of services to students and other
library patrons. But, just as with people
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for whom Quality Time is their primary
language, those who best understand
encouragement in Acts of Service are
impressed by the extras. The services
that you owe students in your roles as
a librarian and/or an instructor are par
for the course; the extras are what make
an impact on Acts of Service people.
Opportunities for Acts of Service outside
of the standard ones might not always
present themselves, but when they do,
they are an excellent way to express
encouragement to some of your students.
Environmental Law Librarian and
Adjunct Professor of Law Taryn
Rucinski, Pace Law Library, agrees:
“Extras are what will make students use
your library services more and encourage
them to maintain connections with the
school well after graduation. They also
may help your students work through a
difficult time, succeed in an interview,
get a job, or get something published.
Things I have done in this area include
helping students with their résumés and
writing samples, conducting a mock
interview with a student applying for a
position with her dream firm, and
encouraging and assisting students with
getting their scholarship published (three
so far!). I also had a student whose wife
was pregnant and who missed several
research classes. Here I took the time to
do one-on-one makeup sessions to help
him get through so he didn’t miss
anything.”
Language 4A: Tangible Gifts
This is one of the “half-languages”
referenced in this article’s title. In some
kinds of relationships, tangible gifts can
be a great expression of positive emotion.
In many romantic relationships, they
play a key role (e.g., giving flowers or
jewelry in a courtship), and as Chapman
and White point out, a supervisor
can certainly reward a high-achieving
employee with a material or experiential
item like a gift card to a local store
or tickets to a sporting event. Those
gestures have their places, but generally
speaking, the student-teacher
relationship is not one of them. Giving
gifts to students, even to those who have
Tangible Gifts as their primary language,
will often be perceived as existing
somewhere on the spectrum between
eccentric and creepy.
As a general policy, I prefer to limit
my Tangible Gifts expressions to food—
and I’m not alone in that. Every law
librarian with whom I discussed Tangible
Gifts mentioned bringing food to class
or keeping a candy dish on their desk.
I’m always happy to offer up my own
candy dish when students visit my office,
and during my recent course I brought
in homemade chocolate chip cookies,
which were used in a very clever example
of analogical reasoning that an instructor
of another section had designed. Beyond
the gastronomical, however, tread lightly
here.
Language 4B: Physical Touch
This is the other “half-language.”
I was tempted to even refer to it as a
“1/4 language,” but there’s no point in
getting that specific for our purposes.
Like Tangible Gifts, Physical Touch has
a central role in many love relationships.
Chapman and White acknowledge that
due to the realities of sexual harassment
allegations and the increased formality
of the workplace, Physical Touch is
generally not a good language of
appreciation in the workplace. In some
situations, very minor physical touch
is acceptable as encouragement; a
fist-bump or back-pat is generally
well-received, and I find it downright
rude to leave someone hanging when
they go in for a high-five. Maybe, if
you’re absolutely certain a student
would be receptive, you could give a
congratulatory hug at graduation or
in response to a huge milestone like
passing the bar. Otherwise, skip the
Physical Touch encouragements. Even
those who understand Physical Touch
as their primary language do not expect
it as an expression from someone in a
professorial role, and many will likely
find it unacceptable.
Fluency to Move Forward
Many of these ideas—complimenting
students on their achievements, taking
time to chat with them outside of class,
doing small favors—will come naturally
to people, especially helpful people like
librarians. But consciously recognizing
the different ways that you can build
rapport with your students will give you
more options and perhaps help you
reframe unsuccessful interactions with
students; maybe they’re not unreceptive,
but they just don’t understand the
language in which you’re speaking to
them. This approach may even help you
recognize students who are attempting
to reach out to you, if they are doing so
in a language that doesn’t come naturally
to you. By becoming fluent in more ways
of expressing your encouragement to
students, you can become a trusted
partner in their learning experience and
hopefully increase your own sense of
accomplishment in your reference and
instruction. ■
Andrea Alexander
(andrea.m.alexander
@law.vanderbilt.edu),
Reference Librarian and
Lecturer in Law, Vanderbilt
Law School, Nashville,
Tennessee
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Stop Me If You’ve
Heard This Before
Transitions in teaching
legal research
By Patricia Morgan
n November of 2008 I arrived at
the University of Florida (again).
After having attended both college
and law school at UF Levin College of
Law, I had worked as a public librarian,
a judicial staff attorney, an attorney in
private practice, and in-house. During
my time away, I had done many
things—with the exception of classroom
teaching. Happily, my introduction
to teaching was (1) delayed a year and
(2) in a team-teaching format with
a colleague (who happens to be a
superstar). Once things got going,
I became comfortable with our classes,
which were generally limited to 15
students due to our library’s classroom
size. Generally, each librarian taught one
two-credit advanced legal research (ALR)
class every two or three semesters.
Between 2009 and 2013, the
librarians at UF Law had a pretty
comfortable rotation of teaching (this
said in hindsight). Because our classes
were taught in isolation from one
another, we could design our own
curriculum, including assignments and
overall evaluations of the students. Some
of us gave exams (midterm and/or final),
some required an annotated bibliography
or a research journal. As instructors, we
each did what we believed to be most
effective.
On the positive side, our classes were
not difficult to plan or coordinate; we
could enjoy academic freedom and play
to our strengths as instructors. It seemed
to work well, and even though we
sometimes attempted to reconfigure
things to include team-teaching (in an
attempt to accommodate more students),
we decided to stick with the singleinstructor model. Our evaluations were
generally positive, and students really
seemed to value the things they learned
about doing better legal research.
I
© 2014 Patricia Morgan
Then There Was That Study
Studies have been done in recent years
on the lack of research skills possessed
by new law school graduates. Thomson
West did a study that led to the
influential white paper “Research Skills
for Lawyers and Law Students,” which
presented information from roundtable
and other discussions with those in the
legal profession (during 2006-2007).
There have been many other studies,
surveys, and the like lamenting the lack
of research skills in new law school
graduates. How, they wonder, will we
prepare our new lawyers for their careers?
The facts of the existing situation:
• New attorneys lack research
skills.
• Law firms are not as willing to
spend time and money on
training new lawyers.
• Old-style legal research and
writing classes often contain little
or no research training that
approximates real world
experience.
The UF Levin College of Law took
this information seriously. Input from
law firms indicated a desire for graduates
who are “practice ready” when they begin
their jobs, whether summer internships
or permanent associate positions. As is
characteristic of librarians, we offered to
do whatever we could. We were already
accustomed to teaching ALR, so one
more step would be teaching the firstyear class in conjunction with their usual
legal writing class.
1L Research Class
In 2012-2013, we undertook the task
of teaching about 300 first-year law
students basic legal research. This
required several things: collaboration
among the five instructors (librarians)
who participated in this effort; creating
the curriculum for the course;
coordinating our efforts with the legal
writing instructors; and deciding the
“core competencies” we wanted to make
sure all students came away with (and
a way to measure those outcomes).
In terms of the curriculum, much
of the course content came from our
existing ALR course, especially the more
basic material in terms of case finding,
statutes, digests, and some civics
instruction. It was appropriate to put
much of that material in the new firstyear course.
ALR Revisited
Through much cooperation and hard
work, the first-year course was an overall
success. We created an exam testing core
competencies, and all of the students
passed. They also had the challenge
of a research-based, essay-format
final exam. All of this, plus a lot of
homework, was required for this onecredit course. If there was one complaint
common among many students, it was
the amount of work required. While
I sympathize, I cannot change the fact
that research training is training and
requires doing actual assignments to
improve. It is a skill, after all.
Hooray! Oh, Wait
In terms of our teaching rotation, it
was my turn to teach ALR the following
spring. I was pretty ecstatic. Why? Well,
I had a few reasons for being so happy.
First, I did have a semester (fall 2013)
where I did not have to teach at all.
This is becoming a luxury for us at the
University of Florida lately . . . we teach
a lot. A whole lot. The second reason
I was glad for my ALR rotation was that
I would have fewer students. ALR is now
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capped at 24 (still more than the 15 we
used to have but less than the 30 or so in
each 1L class). My next happy thought
. . . I get to do this by myself. Why is
that so great? In short: fewer meetings.
Don’t get me wrong: I like the people I
work with, and I am pretty good about
collaborating. But it can does slow things
down. Often, you can accomplish more
if you work alone. Which leads to
the last happy factor: much of my
curriculum already existed—I had raw
material from which I could craft my
class.
My elation, however, was short lived.
It turns out that things were not the
same as I had remembered back in the
“good ol’ days” when ALR was our
only course offering. I did have only
22 students—better than the 64 I had
while teaching the first-year class. The
hard part was planning the content for
the course. My colleagues and I had
taken content from ALR and used it for
the first-year course. So I created new
content, including new assignments.
While preparing for class, I realized
that I had an additional challenge.
In my class of 22 students, five were
second-year students. Generally, about
three-quarters of ALR students are thirdyear students, and the remainder are
second-years. In years past, this did not
cause any additional concern. This time,
however, was different. My second-year
students had passed the first-year
research course, but my third-year
students hadn’t had research training as
part of their law school curriculum.
One particularly astute young woman
who had been in my section for the firstyear class signed up for my ALR class.
Not only was she versed in much of the
material, she also knew my personality
and teaching style. I became concerned
about the issue of a possibly uneven
playing field.
Or was the playing field uneven?
And if so, was it more or less uneven
than in times past? After all, my “usual”
roster includes a mix of second- and
third-year students. In that situation, the
third-years generally have an advantage
in that they are more likely to have
worked in externships and other jobs.
In addition, they have had more of an
opportunity to work on journals where
they would participate in research.
Maybe my playing field was more level,
just at a higher level.
I did feel somewhat responsible for
any imbalance that could have resulted
from the first-year teaching, as I was part
of that. The upside of this is that it also
gave me more insight to what the 2Ls
in my class should know from that
experience (retention notwithstanding).
The Good News
Taking the combination of the known
educational experience of my 2Ls plus
the overall experience of my 3Ls, I was
able to do less lecturing on the basics
of legal research. We did discuss cases,
statutes, and basic research. In this class,
though, I was able to move forward
more quickly, providing more of a review
of the basics, additional information on
free sources, and practical exercises.
One of the perpetual woes of legal
research students, as I mentioned, is that
there is too much homework. Sadly,
there is just no other way to get good at
legal research. Because I spent less time
lecturing this semester, the class did
some work during class. This allowed
me to interact more with the students
while they were doing their assignments.
I found this to be very beneficial. Back
when we held our class in the physical
space of the library, we could spend time
during every class working together (in
part) because of our proximity to library
materials. This semester, my classroom
was on the 3rd floor of the law school,
far from the library. On two occasions,
I divided my class in half, allowing us to
hold class in the library. During these
sessions, we utilized books to get a feel
for how information is organized. These
class sessions were extremely popular
(now that books are novelties) and
helped students recognize a visual
structure for their research activities.
Another leveling technique I used
was assigning more group work. My
thoughts: (1) group learning optimizes
students learning from one another;
(2) this allows for a combination of skills
to improve the overall outcome; and
(3) group work more resembles “real”
work and collaboration with one’s peers.
I separated the class into six groups and
had three scenarios (environmental law,
trademark, and wrongful death related
to off-label pharmaceutical use).
The scenarios were chosen based
on the interests of the students that I
determined from a questionnaire during
the first class. The scenarios served as
a thread throughout the class, having
the groups work on statutes, cases,
digests/citators, and regulations all
related to their particular topics. I think
it was useful for camaraderie and
learning.
I emphasized the nature of the course
to my class in terms of what I hoped
they would gain. I always have an
extreme open-door policy . . . my goal
is to guide students to improve their
research skills. My goal is their success.
I saw several of my students at other
times to help with their work
assignments, other schoolwork, and
even just to discuss current events from
a research perspective.
This class turned out to be my most
engaged. We had a very practical class,
and I think the students enjoyed the
learning experience. The evaluations
were positive overall. What will happen
in the future? I don’t know, but it will
never be exactly the same as this. Now
all of our current students have had/will
have the first-year research class, so we
anticipate at least the same educational
background for any future ALR classes.
I am thankful for the opportunity to
have taught this “bridge” class. ■
Patricia Morgan
(morganp@law.ufl.edu),
Head of Access Services &
Outreach, The University of
Florida Lawton Chiles Legal
Information Center, Gainesville
Memorials
AALL Spectrum has been advised of the deaths of Marie Canada and Sylvia E. Castano.
Ms. Canada, of Dallas, was library manager at Baker Botts LLP. She passed away June 25.
Ms. Castano, of Houston, was a longtime member of AALL. She passed away June 5.
AALL Spectrum carries brief announcements of members’ deaths in the “Memorials” column. Traditional
memorials should be submitted to James Duggan at Law Library Journal, Tulane University Law Library,
6329 Freret St., New Orleans, LA 70118-6231 or emailed to duggan@tulane.edu.
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Networking,
Mutual Assistance,
and a Whole Lot More
The Attorneys General Librarians’ Initiative (AGLI)
By Kathy Carlson, Margaret (Peggy) Landwehr, Anne McDonald, and Carol Ottolenghi
(Insert dramatic mood music here . . . )
It Arose from the AALL Crucible . . .
A small group of Attorneys General
Office (AGO) librarians gathered
informally at AALL’s 2009 Annual
Meeting in Washington, D.C. The talk
turned to explaining what we do and
how it differs from what other law
librarians do. Mark Mackler (California
AGO) and Jonathan Chagat (Ohio
AGO) said to each other, “Let’s do an
article for Spectrum!”
The idea lay dormant until the
July 2010 issue of Spectrum featured a
Member-to-Member question asking
for suggestions for future articles.
Anne McDonald (Rhode Island AGO)
responded, “I would like to see an article
on attorney general librarians . . . we are
a hybrid among law librarians.” This
prompted Mackler and Chagat to write
“State Attorneys General and their Law
Librarians” which was published in
the September/October 2012 issue of
Spectrum.
In the article, Mackler and Chagat
eloquently described the multi-faceted
roles of AGO librarians.
“We are public librarians that may
not interact with the public,” they wrote.
“We provide private firm research, but
also do in-depth academic research.”
They acknowledged the pride we
take in our roles, noting, “Whatever
awaits us, we know that we are an
integral part of the office. We know that
we make a difference for the office and
for the state. These are the things that
keep us coming back to work each day.”
Kent McKeever, director of the
Arthur W. Diamond Law Library at
Columbia University in New York,
could not resist passing the article to Jim
Tierney, director of the National State
Attorneys General Program at Columbia
University Law School. (The National
State Attorneys General Program is
separate and different from the National
Association of Attorneys General
[NAAG]. The former is a research and
education program of the Columbia
University Law School. NAAG is a
membership organization made up
of state attorney generals. The two
organizations often collaborate but
have independent missions, funding,
and memberships.)
© 2014 Kathy Carlson, Margaret (Peggy) Landwehr, Anne McDonald, and Carol Ottolenghi
Tierney was intrigued. He contacted
Mackler and Chagat to propose a
dynamic gathering of AGO librarians.
Soon Tierney and a core group of
librarians from Arizona, California,
Florida, Massachusetts, Ohio, and
Washington were phoning, emailing,
and planning the fledgling conference.
First Flight
On Wednesday, August 7, 2013, Tierney
and AGO librarians from 18 states
and the District of Columbia officially
gathered for the first time at Bistro
Ten 18 in New York City. We proved
again that the stereotype of librarians as
quiet bookworms is totally incorrect. A
number of us had connected in the hotel
lobby and, as a group, took the subway
to the restaurant. By the time we arrived,
we were already discussing our offices’
similarities and differences and sharing
ideas. It was difficult for Tierney to get
us to stop talking long enough to do a
round of introductions.
The next morning, we met in a
faculty conference room at Columbia
University Law School. After a warm
welcome by McKeever, we began our
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two-day summit. The agenda had
two foci. The first was a series of
educational programs touching upon
issues affecting AGOs. Programs covered
the evolution of state AGOs, NAAG,
AG responsibilities to defend laws they
believe to be unconstitutional, recent
decisions of the United States Supreme
Court, the interstate program established
by State Department of Transportation
Libraries (a possible model for our
group), copyright law, regulation of
nonprofit organizations (often a job of
the AG’s office), and healthcare law.
The second and more important
focus was the discussion about
establishing an Attorneys General
Librarian Initiative (AGLI) within
NAAG. The group determined that to
best achieve its goals, it should petition
to become an actual part of NAAG.
Before adjourning, we developed a
Statement of Mission and Purpose
for the AGLI and a plan of action to
present it to NAAG.
Following the meeting, we had a
private reception with 2009 Pulitzer
Prize-winning author Elizabeth Strout
(Olive Kitteridge) where she discussed
the role of fiction and answered audience
questions. AGLI attendees left New York
tired but with a firm action plan and a
new network of colleagues.
emails from colleagues on topics as
diverse as:
• Obscure publications
• AGO involvement with Internet
safety
• Contract issues
• Aural access to the U.S.
Supreme Court
• Unclaimed dormant funds
• Water rights
• Jury instructions
• Human trafficking
• E-discovery
• Unreported caselaw
• Tips on building digital/virtual
libraries
• Robert’s Rules.
Perhaps it comes with the nature of
the profession, but the librarians in this
group are always willing to help. The
topics are not always directed specifically
to libraries and librarians, such as
Internet safety or whether an AGO has
an electronic document management
system. But we are in a position to know
and understand what is going on within
the AGO, no matter how big it is.
We are an integral part. And, because
we are such an integral part, each of our
AGOs benefit from our organization
and our networking—we are exchanging
information and cultivating productive
relationships for our AGs.
Networking
Whither Forward?
Merriam-Webster.com defines
networking as “the exchange of
information or services among
individuals, groups, or institutions;
specifically: the cultivation of productive
relationships for employment or
business.” Well, the AGLI network has
done exactly this. It is amazing to see
how so many of us jump right in to
answer (sometimes within a few minutes)
The AGLI network has proven to be
a convenient and efficient means of
sharing information and a super-easy
way to dazzle our bosses. It is going to
get even better. By the time this article
is published, AGLI will have a webpage
live on the NAAG website. This page
holds document libraries and discussions
pertinent to our specialized duties as
AGO librarians. It gives us a way to
electronically “shelve” information
on issues that only one state may be
litigating at that moment but that more
of us may face down the road. For
example, Ohio and Pennsylvania need
fracking studies now, but fracking might
not become an issue for Missouri until
next spring. The information will be
waiting on the AGLI NAAG page when
Missouri needs it.
Teaming with NAAG also gives us a
new venue to educate our agencies’ staff.
NAAG sponsors seminars on emerging
issues, trial techniques, e-Discovery, etc.,
for AGOs around the country. As part
of NAAG, AGLI will provide seminarspecific resource guides. In addition,
whenever possible, the closest AGLI
member to the seminar will give a brief
talk on how AGO librarians can help
with that particular topic.
Networking and seminar
participation lets us combine our skills
and knowledge to help our offices.
Seminar participation is also a subtle
promotion of our libraries. It allows
us to show, not tell, our offices that
librarians are relevant and that we are
knowledgeable in the latest technologies
and emerging issues. It quietly
underscores the fact that many attorney
generals have—and value—librarians.
And it encourages the attorney generals
who do not have a librarian to say, “So
that’s what librarians can do. I want one
of those, too.” ■
Kathy Carlson
(kathy.carlson1@wyo.gov),
Legal Review Administrator,
Wyoming Attorney General’s
Office, Cheyenne
Margaret (Peggy) Landwehr
(margaret.landwehr@
ago.mo.gov), Project
Manager for eDiscovery and
Legal Technology, Missouri
Attorney General’s Office
Anne McDonald
(amcdonald@riag.ri.gov),
Law Library Coordinator,
Rhode Island Attorney
General’s Office, Providence
Carol Ottolenghi
(carol.ottolenghi@
ohioattorneygeneral.gov),
Director of Library Services,
Ohio Attorney General’s
Office, Columbus
AGO librarians attend the 2013 two-day summit in New York.
24
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ship
r
Push
L
to
L
AA
The
Me
n
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
Why it’s important to the profession and what’s in it for you
By Elizabeth Christian
■ Got What it Takes?
A
ALL believes in mentoring.
Exploring the various aspects of
the AALL website confirms that
it is currently one of the major tenets of
the organization and with good reason.
Law librarianship is sometimes a
misunderstood and underappreciated
profession. Many people do not really
know what we do, so it’s important to
show them. Every day is game day for
us, and we should remember that. A lot
of things are happening, both in law
firms and in academia. We can’t control
these changes, but we can make sure that
our profession is ready to respond to and
manage these changes.
One of the best ways to do this is to
make sure that all AALL law librarians
are operating at optimal capacity. An
important part of this involves building
confidence and giving newer members
someone to lean on and guide them in
the profession. Having a J.D. plus an
M.L.S. is great, but many library schools
have only one class focused on legal
research. A J.D. is a plus, but this is just
one aspect of law librarianship. A law
library internship helps, but not
everyone has the benefit of one. In the
words of physics . . . we as a profession
need to be able to recognize potential
energy and turn it into kinetic energy.
We need to spot the embers in someone
and fan the flame. In doing so, we
confirm to new librarians that it is OK
to be “green” and to ask for help.
Law librarians, I’m sure, all think our
profession is great, but to survive, we
need other people to think we’re great
too. We need librarians to be seen as
critical members of any team, a group of
people who can help figure things out,
analyze an issue, and produce much
needed research; as confident, competent
“brains for hire,” if you will, and in
academia, the people you want to train
the next generation of lawyers to be
“brains for hire” too. Mentorship is how
we do this. It’s a tool we can use to
harness the passion of newer members of
the profession, to run along beside them
and eventually ride their coattails.
© 2014 Elizabeth Christian
“mentor,” and nine times out of 10 you
will find out that they had one. Tap into
your ability to “care” and become a
mentor, and who knows: something
extraordinary might just happen to you.
You may not just grow old; you could be
basking in someone else’s glory long after
you’ve experienced your own. You could
be applauding like crazy at their
accomplishments, which you know you
had a hand in making happen. You
could feel appreciated, respected, and
proud of someone else many years after
you retire.
What would this country be like if
Thomas Jefferson had not had a mentor
who encouraged him and guided him to
maximize his potential? What if he had
just focused on reading, learning, and
agriculture instead of starting and
leading a new country? Mentors move
the world forward, and they can have a
big role in keeping AALL moving
forward too. AALL mentors can help to
give us all staying power. They can help
maximize and guide the energy, passion,
and ideas of the next generation of law
librarians.
So what does it take to be a mentor? Less
than what you might think. You don’t
have to have decades of experience. You
also don’t have to be the smartest or the
best librarian in AALL. The most
important thing is that you need to care.
Maya Angelou said, “In order to be a
mentor, and an effective one, one must
care. You must care. You don’t have to
know how many square miles are in
Idaho, you don’t need to know what is
the chemical makeup of chemistry, or of
blood or water. Know what you know
and care about the person, care about
what you know and care about the
person you’re sharing with. So if you
know how to change a tire and that’s all,
that’s good. But teach them by caring
that they know these things.”
Bill Clinton had obstacles to
overcome in his early life, but he had a
mentor who helped set his life’s course.
His mentor wasn’t the best or the
brightest; he was merely someone who
cared.
“My high school band director,
Virgil Spurlin, had a huge impact on my
life, “Clinton has said. “Not because he
■ What’s in it for You?
was a particularly great band director. He
Mentoring can have big personal
was quite good, but he was a world-class
benefits for the person doing the
human being. He took a personal
mentoring. Mentoring can give your
interest in people and seemed to
life a sense of purpose. You keep
instinctively
your value, and you leave a
know when they
legacy. Longevity studies show
were having
that people with a sense of
“Being an AALL mentor can
trouble and
purpose live longer lives.
give you a way to make your
always to know
Having a sense of purpose,
professional life more meaningful.”
what to say to
a reason for being here, adds
them and more
years and predicts a longer life
importantly what
across the board for all ages.
questions to ask to find out what was
Having positive relationships also
really going on in their lives.”
helps to keep you above ground. It’s
Mentoring matters. It makes a
been proven that social isolation carries
difference. Many accomplished and
health risks. We are herd animals. We
well-known people had mentors who
need to have people who we mean
helped them get started and gave them
something to in our lives. Studies have
guidance along the way. Oprah Winfrey
shown that social isolation is a risk factor
was mentored by her 4th grade teacher,
and a predictor of premature and
Mrs. Duncan. Martin Luther King was
avoidable death that rivals even smoking
mentored by Dr. Benjamin Mays. Bill
and high blood pressure.
Gates was mentored by Dr. Ed Roberts.
So being a mentor can help you stay
Steve Jobs was mentored by Robert
physically healthier, but it can also make
Friedland. Thomas Edison was mentored
you happier. People can fritter their lives
by Franklin Pope. Thomas Edison
away being “busy” and then feel that
later became a mentor to Henry Ford.
they have little to show for it in the end.
Winston Churchill had a mentor. Albert
Being an AALL mentor can give you a
Einstein had a mentor.
way to make your professional life more
The connection between people who
meaningful. It can give your professional
achieve and who also had a mentor is
life another way to bear fruit. Happy
astounding. Just try Googling almost
people have twice as many meaningful
anyone you admire and the word
AALL Spectrum
■
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conversations as unhappy people.
A 2010 Psychology Today article on the
benefits of helping others makes a very
strong case for mentoring: “Kinder
people actually live longer, healthier lives.
People who volunteer tend to experience
fewer aches and pains. Giving help to
others protects overall health twice as
much as aspirin protects against heart
disease. People 55 and older who
volunteer for two or more organizations
have a 44 percent lower likelihood of
dying.”
This may be due to the “helper’s
high” that researchers have identified and
that people get when they help others.
Some researchers think that helping
others may trigger the reward center in
the brain and cause a dopamine release
that increases a sense of well-being,
similar to what happens when people
make a financial donation to a charity
or a cause they care about.
People who give of themselves feel
less depressed, calmer, and have an
increased sense of self-worth. They feel
valuable and needed, but it is important
to also feel appreciated for these benefits
to happen. So mentor someone as a gift
to them and also as a gift to yourself, but
if you have selected or been matched up
with someone who you feel does not
appreciate you and your time, be nice,
but move onto someone who will.
■ AALL Mentoring Options
Now that you know why you should
get involved in AALL mentoring, how
do you do it, and which is the best
program fit for you? AALL offers many
opportunities for its members to both
receive mentoring and to become a
mentor. Signing up for AALL’s Mentor
Match program is probably the easiest
way to get involved. The AALL
Membership Development Committee
is charged with making sure mentoring
resources are available to all AALL
members including long-time members
who are undertaking new endeavors or
need career guidance. The committee
sponsors the Mentor Match program,
which is available to all AALL members.
With the Mentor Match program,
members can sign up to be either
mentors or mentees and post online
profiles on AALLNET. Participants
can view the profiles, find their best
match, and reach out and contact that
person to start a mentoring relationship.
Participants are given tips and
suggestions for how to get started, such
as scheduling monthly phone calls, some
sample questions and topics to discuss,
tips to make sure expectations are clear
upfront, etc. There are also short-term
assignments available to help mentees
who are working on projects with a finite
duration for people who want to help
but have less time to devote. Previously
26
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
with the official AALL mentorship
program, AALL mentors were assigned
to mentees, but the new matching model
is in its second year and allows more
control in who you get paired up with.
The model seems to be working well,
especially when the mentors initiate
contact and reach out to the mentees,
welcoming them to the profession,
answering any questions, or offering
guidance.
The AALL Leadership Academy also
has a mentorship program to help its
participants build relationships. The
Leadership Academy is a two-part
program. There is a biennial weekendlong training session that AALL
members have to apply for, but the
Academy’s benefits last much longer
than a weekend with the ability to
participate in its mentorship program.
The Leadership Academy Mentorship
Program is more structured than AALL’s
Mentor Match program. Academy
mentors and mentees are assigned to
each other and participate in a year-long
series of exercises and discussion topics.
The assignments require the mentees to
post their work on My Communities
and may require mentees to work with
their mentors to complete the work. The
assignments are designed to promote
leadership, thinking ahead, and problem
solving. For example, the first exercise is
focused on a discussion of goal-setting.
While most special interest sections
(SISs) do not have formal mentoring
programs, several do promote and
advocate mentoring. The Academic Law
Libraries SIS (ALL-SIS) has successfully
launched a Scholarly Writing Mentor
Program which last year paired 40 newer
writers with mentors to assist them in
their writing projects. The ALL-SIS also
has a committee titled ALL-NEW, which
is dedicated to helping new academic law
librarians. ALL-NEW does not have a
traditional formal mentoring program,
but, in the future, it may be working
more with the AALL Membership
Development Committee to do more
personalized greeting of new members
and possibly offer them an informal type
of mentor who could answer some basic
questions. While not a formal mentoring
program, in the past, ALL-NEW worked
with the Gen X/Gen Y SIS to set newer
members up with a “conference buddy”
to help them more fully enjoy their first
conference experience. ALL-NEW hopes
to explore this initiative for future
conferences.
The Private Law Libraries SIS (PLLSIS) supports mentoring too. It used to
have a formal mentoring program, but its
efforts have been usurped by the AALL
Mentoring Committee, and the PLL-SIS
now strongly encourages all interested
PLL members to seek out and support
the Mentor Match program instead.
The State, Court, and County Law
Library SIS (SCCLL-SIS) has talked
about creating a “Mentorship Bureau”
where there would be “one SCCLL
mentor coordinator for each state or
region,” according to Kathy Carlson,
who serves on the SCCLL-SIS’s
Membership and Mentoring Committee.
“The thought is that not only do
new members benefit by a mentoring
relationship, since everything is new to
them, but there are times when even
long-term members can be faced with
new challenges, and having someone to
talk to who has faced a similar challenge
and could give advice would be of great
value.” For example, someone who has
experienced the challenges in dealing
with a library move might be of value
to another law librarian facing a move.
A person could place their name in
the Mentoring Bureau as someone who
has dealt with library moving issues,
and anyone needing to talk about a
move could contact that person for
experienced advice.
The Foreign, Comparative, and
International Law SIS (FCIL-SIS) does
not have a formal mentoring program,
but it basically has everything but. The
SIS is all about helping anyone who is
stumped on a foreign or international
legal research question or is interested in
their area of practice. Their Jumpstart
Research Guide is so helpful that even an
intimidated novice could gain confidence
in this type of research. It even has a list
of 106 types of foreign and international
legal research questions you could have
and contact information for the FCILSIS member who can help you with it!
Before completing this section of my
article, I had already decided that FCIL
would be the “warm and fuzzy” AALL
SIS. I then encountered one of their
members at the Mentorship Reception
in San Antonio, and her behavior
confirmed it. She was working the room,
asking people if there was anyone who
needed a mentor. She became one right
in front of me! She told me she already
had four mentees and genuinely loved
helping people. She said it really didn’t
take that much time and that it was very
fulfilling. She had already exchanged
contact information and was still
listening and giving tips to her new
mentee when I left.
■ The Possibilities are Endless
The best kind of mentoring relationship
is one that turns into a life-long
friendship. I call this kind of mentorship
the “Yoda Mentor.” I am lucky to have
one. My mentor was assigned to me
through the original AALL mentorship
program in 2010. She is a director of
a large academic law library. She is
formidable and intelligent, but she is also
funny, wise, and kind. She once told me
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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Page 27
that what she enjoyed about being a
mentor is that she could help someone
in her profession and at the same time be
able to relax around them. Mentoring
can also be done with employee
librarians who show promise, but just by
the virtue of being their boss, the mentor
is still an authority figure. By being a
mentor to someone outside of your
organization, you can play a more
nurturing role. You get the joy of
teaching, but you also can develop a
friendship and get satisfaction from
watching someone improve at their job
and know that your encouragement had
something to do with it. Several other
AALL members I have spoken with also
have mentors who turned into life-long
friends, so it is entirely possible and even
a goal to aim for.
Not everything I learned from
talking to various mentees was positive,
however. Some mentees had met up and
had dinner with their assigned mentors
at an AALL conference and then never
heard from them again. The mentees felt
like the mentors assigned to them were
just checking off a box. This is not good,
but we can learn from this experience,
fix it, and even grow the organization
through it. A box-check mentality
can breed disappointment and
disillusionment with those new to the
profession, but, luckily, it can be avoided
entirely.
Mentorship doesn’t take that much
time—possibly a lunch or coffee, a
couple of emails, and a phone call each
month in the beginning. Mentorship is
really about being a guide and implies
a relationship, but not everyone has the
time or is cut out for it. Recognize this
and realize that there are other ways
to benefit newer members too. AALL
members who have less time to devote to
being a mentor could participate in the
short-term projects the Mentor Match
program has available or perhaps an
AALL Helpline or a Conference Dinner
“Date” Program could be created to still
be able to tap into the knowledge that
these non-mentor members could share.
A helpline could possibly be based on
the SCCLL-SIS Mentorship Bureau idea
or on how the all-embracing Foreign,
Comparative, and International Law-SIS
conducts its website and demonstrates
knowledge sharing and camaraderie
among its members.
An AALL Dinner Date Program
could take its idea from a Breakfast
Buddy mentoring program that I
participated in while practicing law.
For a school year, I had breakfast every
Wednesday morning with a 10-year-old
at-risk little girl named Anastasia in her
South Carolina elementary school lunch
room. We sat in tiny chairs and ate off
lunchroom trays and read all of the Harry
Potter books together and discussed
them. It wasn’t much, but just eating
with her and listening to her, even for a
little while, seemed to make a difference.
AALL can take the basic premise that
having knowledge and sharing a meal
with somebody and caring about what
they have to say can make a difference.
Pare down the program, and AALL
Dinner Date participants could have a
different new dinner companion each
conference. The focus of the dinner
conversation could be help and guidance
to those new to the profession or to
those encountering new law library
endeavors. There is a payoff with very
little time invested; we could even
call the program “Just Dinner!”
It’s a thought. ALL-NEW has had a
conference buddy program in the past to
initiate new AALL members and make
sure they have fun. Maybe this concept
can be limited to one meal and be
retooled to focus on mentoring and
expanded to allow all AALL members
to participate.
■ A Note to Mentees
It is important to remember that
mentees have some work to do in this
too. It’s a two-way street. To have a
successful relationship with a mentor, the
mentee needs to take an active role in his
or her professional development and be
proactive. Nothing ventured, nothing
gained. If no one reaches out, then
mentees should be prepared to make the
first move.
It’s true that mentors with years of
experience can be intimidating, and
several mentees told me as much when
I spoke with them in San Antonio, but
try to look past that. The mentors know
you don’t know everything, or you
would not be looking for a mentor. Take
a deep breath and just call them or press
“send.” You have nothing to lose, and
you might gain something great.
Be open and sharing, and be willing
to work around a mentor’s busy
schedule. It’s also a good idea in the
beginning to take notes when you speak
with a mentor on the phone. The things
you don’t know, you can look up later.
I had no idea what a “symposium issue”
was when I first started talking with my
mentor. I had to look it up, and now I’m
the wiser. You can be the wiser too, and
if you strike out with somebody, you can
try again with someone else.
■ The Sky is the Limit
Mentorship is important. The majority
of people who make a difference in the
world have had some kind of mentor.
AALL’s mentees benefit, of course, but
so do the organization and the mentors
themselves. The mentors even get
the added bonus of improvements in
physical and psychological well-being.
There are multiple ways to get
involved in AALL mentoring. To once
again quote the late Maya Angelou, all
you need to do is care. There is strength
in numbers, but we all are only as strong
as our weakest link. Mentoring can
move AALL forward and help to ensure
a future for all of us, but in AALL,
as in life, you only get what you give.
So please give! ■
Elizabeth Christian
(elizabeth.christian@
emory.edu), Assistant Law
Librarian for Reference, Hugh
F. MacMillan Law Library,
Emory University, Atlanta.
Many people spoke with me
about their mentoring experiences to assist me
in writing this article, but I would especially
like to thank Trina Holloway for her help,
excitement about my article, and encouragement.
You Make the Match in
AALL’s Mentoring Program
Based on comments from members, AALL
changed its mentoring program in 2013.
Rather than having third parties match
up mentoring partnerships, the current
program allows you to make your own
matches. Instead of having one set
deadline for enrollment, the program now
may be joined and left fluidly throughout
the year just by updating your profile.
To learn more about or participate in the
AALL mentoring program, visit Mentor
Match on AALL My Communities at
community.aallnet.org/mentoring/about
mentormatch.
• Create a profile: Choose to enroll as a
mentor or mentee. Provide information
about yourself and the dates you are
available for a mentoring relationship.
• Find a match: Search the other profiles
for someone with the skills, experience,
and responsibilities that interest you.
• Request a match: From the person’s
mentor or mentee profile, click on the
big green “Click here to contact”
button to initiate an email invitation.
• Check your messages: Monitor your
email and AALL My Communities
profile messages for notices and
invitations.
• Make the most of the match: The rest
is up to you and your partner. Be
honest about your expectations, and be
responsive.
Additional valuable information and tips
are available at: community.aallnet.org/
mentoring/mentormatchfaqs.
AALL Spectrum
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Student Service Librarians: My Quest for Understanding
Student services librarian? What is that?
By Hadas Livnat
I
attended the AALL Seattle
Conference in June 2013. I was
visiting Seattle for the first time, and
a spell of sunny weather made the green
and watery sights of Washington State
a fantastic treat. This was also my first
conference, and one presentation struck
me in particular. It was about student
services, and the presenter, Maureen
Cahill, was a “student services librarian.”
I could not recall ever stumbling
across a job posting with the title of
“student services librarian.” This
position’s more well-known sibling,
“faculty services librarian,” seems to be a
reasonably popular niche job; but closely
scouring the Internet with the almighty
Google produced a total of about 20
librarians nationwide who hold the title
“student services librarian” (or a related
variation).
At first glance, this is puzzling.
Students are an important clientele of
the law school library and are certainly
the most numerous and frequent users
of the library’s physical space. They use
the library to study, research, check out
materials, catch up with friends, eat,
sleep, and space out. Occasionally, they
even consult a librarian! Also important
is the fact that students graduate and
become alumni that give back based on
their experiences—and one of their
experiences is the library. So it would
make good sense to have a student
services librarian at hand.
“Having a librarian with the student
services title is an easy way to show
students that we think about them too,”
says Deborah Schander, coordinator
of digital projects and outreach at the
Georgia State University College of Law
Library. “It means there is someone who
is responsible for always thinking of the
students’ interests in meetings and
planning sessions.”
The Student Services Librarian Survey
So what do these student service(s)
librarians actually do? In January, I sent
out a survey to the AALL Academic
Libraries list to find out. Statistics
reasonably indicated that I should expect
10 responses at most, depending how
flexible people are with the perception of
their duties. Sure enough, of the initial six
responses, half included “student” in their
title; the others were essentially librarians
on the public services team who were the
primary student contact for their library.
(Additional marketing efforts produced
28
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
better results for the student services titles.
I thank my colleagues for their patience
and cooperation.) So I would like to note
that this article also acknowledges student
outreach specialists who are the focal
point for student service activities within
their law school library and who are
student services librarians in all but name.
I received a total of 13 responses,
so the statistics that follow should be
taken as a sample. However, some of
these responses were greatly detailed
and provided some illuminating insights
about the relationship between students
and the library.
Who Are They and What Do They Do?
Titles for the position of a student
outreach specialist vary, and while many
include the words “student services,”
others consist of reference and other
librarians who are the focal point for
student contact. As we shall see, the
trilogy of duties of reference, instruction,
and student services often exist within
the student services job position. But
whatever title these librarians might
hold, most have this in common: they
engage in reference and research at least a
third of their time; spend an additional
third on instructional duties; and use the
final third on student marketing and
outreach, research into student needs,
and activity planning. Mileage may
vary according to the emphasis in the
librarian’s exact title (some may spend
more than 50 percent on reference, for
example), but the common emphasis
had been on these three activities.
Reference and Instructional Duties
These librarians spend at least 15 percent
of their time providing reference and
research, the upper number given being
60 percent. With rare exceptions, these
librarians use social media, most citing
blogging, Facebook, Twitter, and creating
YouTube tutorials as part of their regular
reference (and outreach) duties. Pinterest
use was cited at least once.
Instructional duties, at an estimated
range of 10-30 percent, constitute the
second significant component of these
librarians’ time. These duties include
specialized one-time classes requested by
students and faculty and semester-long
courses such as advanced legal research
and advanced international and foreign
legal research. The one-time on-demand
classes include (1) substantive legal
research for classes and seminars for
© 2014 Hadas Livnat
professors; (2) scholastic activities
(Bluebook and legal citation, law
review and journal activities, and test
preparation classes); (3) classes related to
students’ work life (getting ready for a
summer job, researching employers,
researching in the real world, free and
low-cost resources for solo/small-firm
practitioners); and (4) specialized-topic
one-time classes conducted at the request
of a student association.
On-demand classes are valuable for
students, who are happy to have the
opportunity to request classes geared
toward their interests.
“My law review students are not
shy about requesting specific workshop
topics,” says Patricia Dickerson, student
services and reference librarian at North
Carolina Central University School of
Law. “Nor are my regular students, who
like to let librarians know what they
want in workshops.” She adds that
“Students are also very interested in
practical skills research workshops.”
Outreach and Marketing Duties
According to the survey, outreach and
marketing can take 5-25 percent of
the time of the librarian responsible
for student contact and involves an
astonishing breadth of activities.
Marketing and outreach may involve
considerable research about student needs
and the occasional use of surveys and
participation in the activities of student
groups and committees. The line between
outreach and marketing activities tends
to blur, but both fall into two categories,
one being traditional participation in
teaching and using the physical space of
the library to advertise its services and the
second being student-specific activities
that uniquely focus on bringing the
library to the students.
I can’t begin to recount the variety of
student outreach and marketing activities
identified by the survey. In addition to
traditional teaching, outreach via electronic
communication, and the use of the
physical library (with signs, flyers, etc.), the
survey results identified these interesting,
student-focused outreach efforts:
• Library rewards program
• Personal librarian program
• Serving on student advisory
council or board
• Attending social functions hosted
by the law school during student
orientation
• Training journal members
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• LibGuides based on student
topics
• Annual Fall Fest (an open house
with free food and prizes)
• Library Week activities
• Pet therapy
• Table events
• Contests and prizes.
But is there a difference between
“regular” library outreach and outreach
to students? Dickerson explains that
“Students need to be convinced your
workshop or program is worthy of their
time since they have so many classes to
study for and lives to try and lead.” She
adds that students “also need materials
that have more flash than general
outreach materials. For example, students
will overlook a black and white flyer but
pay attention to a flyer with a funny
picture on it or a humorous caption.”
Schander explains that it’s important
to remember that students are not “just
one nebulous group . . . . You have
students who are in the library, those who
don’t use it and who you want to come
in, students who want a place to hang
out, and those who want a quiet place to
study. Marketing efforts should also take
these factors into account and create
outreach efforts that meet each interest.”
holiday decorations, pumpkin painting,
a movie night, and even a video game
tournament. Opinions conflict about
whether non-legal activities are
appropriate to the library (an argument
which extends to public libraries). Ito
voices a commonly expressed opinion
when he cautions that “Mission creep
could be an issue here . . . (The office
of the) Dean of Students handles leisure
activities for students. The library should
be focused on meeting the research needs
of the students.” However, he adds that
“There is a limited role for the library
in leisure activities for students.”
Dickerson agrees, explaining that
their value is that “they can go a long
way toward building goodwill and
support from students.” Schander adds
that “It’s another way to let students
know you’re thinking about more than
just their check-out stats. But not every
program will work for every library.”
Surveys and Student Concerns
Surveys are used to collect student
opinions and concerns about the library.
Librarians cited the use of both an
annual survey and non-regular and
occasional one-off surveys on specific
topics, as well as sessions that solicit
feedback from specific student groups.
“Students can tell when we aren’t being genuine. The best way to forge relationships
with students is to show that you are a real person with passions outside of the law
library. They start to identify with you on a different level and are more likely to want
to work with you when they have legal research needs. I have also learned it helps to
be a little crazy. If I’m not excited about programs or resources, students won’t be—
so sometimes I have to let them laugh at my expense to get student buy-in.”
—Patricia Dickerson, Student Services and Reference Librarian
And successful outreach goes beyond
reaching out; it delves into forging
personal relationships.
“Go to student organization programs,
buy a cupcake at a bake sale,” says
Dickerson. “Students appreciate you
wanting to know about what they are
interested in and will oftentimes show you
the same respect when you want to teach
them something.”
And according to Todd Ito,
coordinator of instruction and outreach
at The University of Chicago, “Word
of mouth goes a long way in most law
schools.”
Non-Legal Activities
Some outreach activities are designed to
draw students to the library and create
a more leisurely, casual atmosphere.
The survey results divulged such diverse
activities as free coffee during exams,
contests, raffles and prizes, scavenger
hunts, tables with puzzles and games,
Some librarians participate in the student
advisory council or board to keep an
open communication between student
representatives and the library.
Ito explains that his library has a
student advisory board made up of
student volunteers, which meets
approximately five times per academic
year and acts as a regular focus group for
library-related issues. As the outreach
librarian, he meets with this board to
learn about their concerns. Some
concerns that students note are
communication between the library and
the students; legal research instruction
issues; collection concerns (e-books and
reserves); library hours; and building
issues such as lights, the physical space
of the library and library seating, and
the ever-popular temperature issues.
Other Activities
If reading all of the above didn’t
make you exhausted by sympathetic
association, these student service/contact
librarians also participate in at least some
of the following duties: serving as liaison
to legal research and writing faculty;
collection development; coordinating
vendor services and trainings for students;
creating instructional materials; serving
as liaison for clinics and centers; serving
as liaison for vendors; maintaining the
college’s digital archives and digital
signage; supervising the student workers;
maintaining the website; and serving on
the institution’s library committee. Very
likely, they do all of these at once.
In Conclusion
Whether coming under the title of a
“reference” librarian, an “instructional
services” librarian, an acknowledged
“student services” librarian, or any other
job title, library staff members who are
designated as the principal student
contact and outreach person are multiduty reference, research, instruction, and
student outreach professionals. In fact,
since student services librarians’ job
duties overlap quite a bit with the duties
of both reference and instructional
services librarians, it would not be too
difficult to slap “student services” in the
title of the usual reference librarian (or
perhaps the slightly snazzier instructional
services librarian) vacancy, modify their
workload to reflect the additional
marketing, outreach, and coordination
duties, and hey! You’ve created a student
services librarian, and some 80 percent
or more of the law library’s clients are
officially acknowledged.
The bottom line for student services
librarians—and other librarians who are
the focal point for student outreach—is
to make the law library more than just a
study and research space for students.
“We are aware that students use the
library as more than just a place to study
or get books,” Schander says. “It’s a place
to hang out, to relax, to kill time between
classes, to be quiet, and more. So we take
the time to make it a welcoming place,
regardless of the reason they’re there. We
offer free coffee when they’re tired and
leisure movies for when they want to zone
out. By building personal relationships
with the students and making them feel
like their opinions matter, we create
a warm atmosphere in which to then
promote the library and its services.”
If you would like to discuss,
improve, or advocate for student services
in law libraries, join the recently created
Student Services Forum on AALLNET.
Your participation will help to ensure
that libraries can successfully address this
important issue. ■
Hadas Livnat, (livnath@
uchastings.edu), Associate
Reference Librarian, UC
Hastings College of Law
Library, San Francisco
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OUT WITH THE OLD, IN WITH THE NEW
Two perspectives on implementing LibGuides at an academic and a public law library
By Danielle A. Becker and Shamika D. Dalton
L
ibGuides can be a great tool, as many librarians in
various types of institutions will testify. But there are
some considerations for their use. Following, Danielle
A. Becker, electronic services librarian at Minnesota State
Law Library, and Shamika D. Dalton, assistant university
librarian at University of Florida Levin College of Law,
provide their insights on working with the tool in their
respective institutions.
Before (left) and after University of Florida Levin College of Law’s
LibGuides makeover
Creating Your New Look is Easy!
Becker: The look of Minnesota State Law Library’s website was
stuck in the late ‘90s, and something had to be done to make an
immediate change. As the electronic services librarian, it was my
charge to tame the matted mess that the Legal Topics Guides
had become. Our Legal Topics pages get a lot of use by the
public and our reference librarians, so untangling the mess was
critical. Having worked with LibGuides in my previous position
at an academic library, I knew it was the perfect tool for the job.
Dalton: While LibGuides are a great tool to disseminate
information globally, it takes a lot of time to create and
maintain them. With the many hats that we wear on a daily
basis, it is easy to “set it and forget it.” Here at the Legal
Information Center, we were guilty of just that. In December
2012, I volunteered to lead a project to revamp our LibGuides.
Our goal was to make our LibGuides more accessible. To do so,
we set out to determine which guides could be deleted or
consolidated, organize the information to make it more userfriendly, and find ways to market our LibGuides.
Starting the Makeover
Becker: I contacted Springshare and got a free trial to show my
colleagues how simple LibGuides is to use and how professional
the results are. Some of the features of LibGuides that helped
make our decision to begin a subscription were:
• No downloads. LibGuides is a CMS, so all the user has
to do is sign in with a username and password, from any
computer or mobile device, and he or she can use it
anywhere. Content creators are assigned usernames and
passwords so that multiple people can contribute to the
site simultaneously.
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• WYSIWYC (what you see is what you get) menus.
Customizing the look and feel of the pages is user friendly.
Users can upload multimedia content like chat widgets,
videos, audio, and more. It also integrates with social
media by enabling you to make your guide available on
Facebook, post guide updates on Twitter, and link right
back in the guide using the appropriate icons (provided).
• Mobile friendly. It uses responsive design so it looks good
on desktops, laptops, and all mobile devices.
• User statistics. The basic subscription runs reports using
date parameters providing results on how many visits each
guide and each page within a guide gets.
After a month trial we were convinced and began our basic
subscription. The next phase of the project was moving our
current Legal Topics pages into LibGuides.
Dalton: My first line of business was to advocate for our library
to purchase our own LibGuide platform to increase accessibility
for our users. Until now, our LibGuides were a part of the
University of Florida’s LibGuide platform. Our guides were
hidden among hundreds of research guides from numerous
disciplines, making it hard for our users to find them. I met
with UF’s LibGuide administrator to find out how we could
purchase our own platform and the amount of work required
to set everything up. I presented the information to the law
librarians and they were on board, so we purchased our own
platform in June 2013. Springshare was able to transfer our
guides from the old platform to the new platform with little
effort on our part. Now, with our own platform, our research
guides will be easily accessible to our users.
Ditch the Old Pages
Becker: When I began the migration, I went through the
directory page of the Legal Topics and decided which guides
to combine and which to delete. Then, as I created the new
© 2014 Danielle A. Becker and Shamika D. Dalton
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LibGuides, I weeded the information from the Legal Topics
pages as I went.
Dalton: With a fresh start on a new platform, it was the perfect
time to weed through our guides and determine if some could
be deleted or consolidated. We had approximately 50 guides,
which may not seem like a lot, but the maintenance can be time
consuming. After meeting with each librarian, we chose to
delete guides such as Using Shepard’s Citators because no one
updates case law in print anymore. We chose to consolidate
guides that were about similar subjects. For example, we created
one comprehensive guide for federal legislative history instead
of having separate guides for committee briefs, committee
resolutions, and committee debates.
Designing Your New Look
Becker: I used information architecture as my guide through
the entire migration. If each guide used the same structure, it
eliminated the need to rethink my design each time I migrated a
guide. I created a basic template that all of the guides were
going to follow using these tabs: Home, Basics, Forms,
Publications, and Legal Help. Each page has a set of boxes that
will be consistent throughout all of the LibGuides. For example,
the Home page will always have a box that links back to the
Legal Topics Directory, a Contact Us box, Minnesota State
Law Services, and a Disclaimer box at the bottom. I also
created a style sheet that established the fonts, color schemas,
terminology, line spacing, and box ordering. Whenever possible
I tried to reuse boxes by using the “Reuse Existing Box” feature,
which gives the designer the option to link to boxes that exist
on other LibGuides. This feature is also useful when making
universal changes as edits that happen in the parent box flow
to all the children boxes throughout the site. We reuse our
Disclaimer box, as that language changes from time to time.
Springy News, an online newsletter published by
Springshare, provides tips and best practices to help you
create an effective LibGuide.
Show Off Your New Style!
Becker: The Minnesota State Law Library reports to the
Minnesota Supreme Court, so when the Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court specifically requested we put more appellate
resources online, we jumped at the directive. Unfortunately,
our current website didn’t support that effort, so we had to
come up with another way to make appellate resources available.
The goal was to cull all relevant court resources into one place,
creating a “one-stop shop.” Using the LibGuides platform,
we accomplished that goal. Since then, the Appellate LibGuide
has been included in the appellate court presentation at the
statewide bar association meeting. Every judicial district in the
state was given a demonstration on it, and the feedback has
been fantastic. The exposure has since grown; with other
websites linking to this LibGuide (among others we’ve created
since this first one) our usage statistics are steadily growing.
Dalton: We try to introduce our new platform at every chance
we get. During the 1L library orientation, we show students
where they can find LibGuides that we think will be useful
to them in their first year, in particular, our Student Printing
LibGuide and 1L Survival Guide. In our 1L Legal Research
course, some librarians assign students to review a particular
LibGuide as a part of class preparation. To reach 2Ls, 3Ls,
and undergrads, we create LibGuides to help them with their
research papers and introduce them during our guest lectures.
We also use LibGuides to archive programs we present at
conferences. This gives attendees and people who are unable to
attend an opportunity to access the material we discussed and
links to the resources we used during the program. Hopefully,
Before (above) and after Minnesota State Law Library’s LibGuides
makeover
Dalton: There is no best way to organize information on a
LibGuide, but we focused on three issues to start:
• Simplicity. One of the main issues with our guides was
the overwhelming amount of information we put on each
guide. Our guides were organized in paragraph format
with several tabs per guide making the information
overwhelming to our users. So we cut down on the text
and included more direct links to resources. This also cuts
down on the amount of scrolling users will have to do.
• Consistency. As a team, we agreed on Arial 12-point font,
an orange background, and dark blue tab colors for all of our
guides. We also agreed that each guide would consist of print
resources and online sources, Lexis, Westlaw, Bloomberg
Law, and free or low-cost databases, if applicable.
• Ease. We created five different ways for users to find the guide
they are looking for on the homepage. We have a table of
contents with all of our guides listed, a general keyword search
box, and a LibGuides CMS Browse Box, a three-column box that
allows users to find our guides by group, librarian, or subject.
when users visit our platform, they will browse through and see
all of the guides we have to offer. ■
Danielle A. Becker
(Danielle.Becker@courts.state.mn.us), Electronic Services Librarian,
Minnesota State Law Library, St. Paul
Shamika D. Dalton
(sdalton@law.ufl.edu), Assistant University Librarian, University of
Florida Levin College of Law, Gainesville
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Changing Spaces
Our library spaces are being reconfigured. How can we use this opportunity for our patrons’ benefit?
By Lauren M. Collins
A
s print collections shrink in favor
of the electronic delivery of
information, library space—once
needed to hold the volumes we counted
on to justify our existence—is no longer
necessary for that purpose. Those of us
who manage law libraries with large
footprints are regularly asked to justify
the continued maintenance of space that
houses much smaller collections. Even
those with smaller library spaces find
themselves, at the very least, with more
space than they had before and facing
decisions about its use.
In his article, “Designing a Law
Library to Encourage Learning,” Lee
Peoples writes about effectively using
leftover law library space to encourage
and improve student learning and
help the law school meet accreditation
requirements. However, these spaces
can be expensive, and, despite benefits
that are obvious to us, law school
administrators may require a great
deal of convincing to support them.
Librarians are left to become creative
about the continued use of library
space in ways that are affordable and
of obvious benefit—or be willing
to surrender it. Space can be
“commandeered,” as many know
anecdotally and as Professor Peoples
points out in his article. Fortunately,
commandeered space isn’t always poorly
used, and both planned and unexpected
space changes can add positively to our
students’ learning, comfort, and
convenience.
Furthering the Law School Mission:
Law Schools Creep into Library Spaces
The support of other law school
functions is a more frequent use for
available law library space. For example,
the Sarita Kenedy East Law Library at St.
Mary’s University houses the law school
Career Services Office. Other libraries
house classrooms, faculty offices, and
facilities for law school journals.
“Having classes held here in the
library helps create more library traffic,”
observes Ronald E. Wheeler of his
former library, the Dorraine Zief Law
Library at University of San Francisco
School of Law. As resources are more
frequently accessed remotely, getting
students into the library to meet faculty,
take classes, or participate in favored
student activities helps them discover or
remember our information services and
social spaces. Where our tradition was
to reserve our reading rooms for . . .
well . . . reading, several schools have
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An event held in honor of the 30th Anniversary of the Sarita Kenedy East Law Library at
St. Mary’s University. Photo courtesy of Bethbiriah Sanchez.
recognized that these make excellent
gathering spaces.
“We have a big, bright reading room
in the library that is regularly used for
speakers, meetings, luncheons, and
receptions,” says St. Mary’s University
Law Library Director Robert H. Hu.
This means changing our thinking about
noise, food, and drink in the library,
but that is a battle many of us stopped
fighting long ago.
A space sharing arrangement that is
increasing in popularity is one between
clinics and the library. The University
of Cincinnati College of Law Library,
for example, is home to the Lois and
Richard Rosenthal Institute for Justice,
a part of the Ohio Innocence Project.
Another example is the newly renovated
space that has been developed for
Concordia University Law School where
space-sharing between the library
and the clinic was part of the initial
construction plan. The law library at
Concordia houses a portion of its clinical
staff offices and student work carrels,
while other clinical space stands alone in
the law school building. Phillip Gragg,
director of the George R. White Law
Library at Concordia, finds that the
space arrangement “keeps the library
relevant by supporting the law school
at every level.” To address the unique
challenge of clinical space in open
areas—client confidentiality—the
Concordia clinical space has a separate
entrance. This issue is minimized at the
Rosenthal Institute since Innocence
Project clients must be met away from
the law school. The space that houses the
Institute requires card swipe access,
which prevents non-law school affiliates
Outside of Concordia University Law School Library showing the separate entrance for
clinic offices and student workspace housed within the law library. Photo courtesy of
Phillip Gragg, law library director.
© 2014 Lauren M. Collins
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from entering the area.
Reconfigured library space may
also uphold the law school mission by
supporting job placement for recent
alumni. When I arrived at ClevelandMarshall College of Law, construction
was underway on a Solo Practice
Incubator. The project, a 10-suite office
space for recent graduates to hang their
own shingles, was being constructed in
3,755 square feet of library space with
a separate entrance off the main street.
The space, with floor to ceiling windows,
had been occupied by some student
carrels, but mostly stacks. The incubator
displaced just over 30 ranges and
required a great deal of weeding and
shifting. Though it required a lot of
work, in a library as large as ours,
displacing stacks to support our law
school’s access mission by providing
space and some limited services to
entrepreneurial new graduates is an
obvious win. Arguably, the Incubator
in the library furthers the concept of
the library as the laboratory of the
law school. Practically, it gives us
opportunities to examine the legal
information needs of our alumni who
opt for small firm or solo experiences
after law school and develop supporting
services.
documents newsletter announcing the
need for new facilities. Space that had
formerly been used to house part of the
technical services staff was dedicated to
A graphic illustrating the capabilities of the
Recording and Collaboration Rooms at
Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Library.
Image courtesy of Dan Thomas, assistant
director, technology operations.
The Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Library Solo Practice Incubator
Spaces of Convenience: Sometimes
Opportunities Come from out of the Blue
Some of the most interesting space
projects in law libraries have focused
not on student learning, but on their
convenience. The Charles B. Sears Law
Library at SUNY Buffalo Law School
provides space for two non-traditional
services from outside partners. The first
is a passport acceptance facility that has
been housed in the law library since
2005. The idea came from a government
the facility after a staff reduction. The
library did not pay any renovation costs,
and the State Department, according to
Law Library Director Beth Adelman,
“did a nice job of integration,” so the
integrity of the remaining space for
library use was not disturbed. The
facility’s services include taking
photographs, which has turned out well
for students sitting for any standardized
test, such as the MPRE. As an added
Denniss Ingrassia working at the Morton
Lane Credit Union branch in the Charles B.
Sears Law Library, SUNY Buffalo Law
School. Photo courtesy of Beth Adelman,
director of the law library and vice dean
for legal information services.
bonus, housing the facility, which
requires no costs to the library in
addition to those already associated with
maintaining the space, generates income
from the State Department’s execution
fee of $25 for all new passport applicants,
which goes directly to the library.
The creativity doesn’t stop there for
the Sears Library space. While banking
at the Morton Lane Credit Union’s main
branch in a suburb near the University
at Buffalo’s South Campus, a casual
conversation between Adelman and the
credit union manager led to the idea to
open a branch in the law library. The
credit union’s plan to find a space on
campus had just fallen through, and,
according to Adelman, “The Law
Library’s central location on the North
Campus ‘spine,’ a second-floor walkway,
allows access to many buildings without
having to brave the harsh Buffalo winter.
This is a convenient location for the law
school community and the university
community.” Both the credit union
and the passport acceptance facility
draw students, faculty, and campus
administrators into the law library.
Though no statistics are available,
Adelman says there is strong anecdotal
evidence of success, including the fact
that the facility has brought both the
university president and the provost in
as customers.
Designing to Encourage Learning: What
About Those Student Learning Spaces?
There is a wealth of literature on the
evolution of library space. Although
most focuses on undergraduate academic
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libraries, the change in focus to what
have been labeled “learner-centered”
spaces applies to law libraries as well.
In “Libraries Designed for Learning,”
a 2003 essay written on behalf of the
Council on Library Information Services,
Scott Bennett found the “changing
character of student study space needs”
to be the second strongest motivator
of investment in new or renovated
academic library space between 1992
and 2001. (At that time, the highestranking motivator was the growth of
collections, which we now know was
not well predicted by those investing in
construction and renovation projects in
the 1990s.)
As early as Bennett’s 2003 essay,
many of the factors legal educators are
currently encouraged to focus on were
discussed as goals for library space.
These include social learning,
collaborative student activity, and
experiential course material. In planning
library spaces in support of these
activities, Bennett stressed the need
for spaces that accommodate the
technology needed for information
literacy instruction and learning.
Professor Peoples’ article brings Bennett’s
research into the law library and the 21st
century, suggesting space design that
encourages learning as a way to not only
support students but to exceed the ABA
standards for physical facilities at the
same time. ABA standards, Peoples
points out, have historically driven an
increase in our collection sizes and,
thereby, the size of our library spaces.
Peoples highlights the potential we have
to strengthen our roles in the law school
by driving the development of spaces
that encourage learning in the library.
In support of collaborative learning,
many schools already provide group
study rooms or computer clusters
outfitted with webcams, DVD players,
monitors, smart boards, and other
technology. This allows students to share
the information on a laptop with a group
or take impromptu notes that can be
uploaded to a computer and saved.
These spaces, though valuable and
heavily used, tend to be more formal,
often requiring reservations for use and
subject to rules about group size. Current
thinking suggests we should now be
considering the less-formal commons to
encourage student learning. Whether an
information commons—connecting
information professionals, technology,
and learners in a social setting—or a
broader learning commons with the goal
of sharing of knowledge more generally,
these spaces, it is argued, fit students’
social learning styles and, when
supported by teachers and technology,
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improve modern students’ educational
experiences. Unfortunately, this
reconfiguration of space, which normally
requires increased electrical outlets,
updated furniture, and reliable security,
can be expensive.
Peoples’ article cites two law libraries
with plans for a learning commons at the
time the article was written—Florida
State University College of Law, which
planned to update a portion of its library
space, and the Oklahoma City University
Law School, which had plans to move
into a new space later that year. To that
number, I can add our own plans, similar
to those at Florida State, to turn our
microfilm area into a commons and the
new construction at Georgia State
University College of Law. The success in
completing these projects has been varied.
In our own library, funds made
available by the university from
technology fees collected from all
university students and awarded on a
competitive basis allowed us to start
our project by developing two recording
and collaboration rooms. Inspired by a
conversation with our career planning
director about the declining interview
skills of students, we applied for funding
to upgrade two study rooms. These
rooms are equipped for self-service
recording and afford students an
opportunity to practice for mock trials
or clinical work, classroom presentations,
or job interviews. Working with career
services and the clinic, we will have
volunteers, both staff and alumni, who
will review students’ practice
presentations and provide feedback using
CALI’s free MediaNotes software.
The first phase of our project was
relatively inexpensive and supported
by an internal grant. Developing a
broader, multifunctional commons
area with technology to encourage
students to explore experiential learning
opportunities has proven cost
prohibitive. We have completed
architectural plans but have not been
able to fully fund the remainder of the
project. Even with the buy-in of law
school administration and faculty who
see the benefit of a learning commons
space, funding priorities in a climate of
decreasing law school application and
admission rates can thwart the best of
ideas for new uses of library space.
The Florida State University College
of Law Library has been working on
developing a learning commons for
several years. Their plan includes an
open seating lounge, several tech-heavy
study rooms, a large room that can
accommodate a 60-person class or
lecture while remaining flexible enough
to reconfigure for smaller break-out
groups, and an interactive lab that allows
the instructor and learners to exchange
the information on their devices in view
of the entire class. The development of
the commons at Florida State has also
progressed more slowly than planned.
The main challenge, again, is funding.
Still, Elizabeth Farrell, associate director
at Florida State, isn’t deterred. In fact,
rather than consider pitching the project
on a smaller scale, they have decided to
do what they can, when they can.
“It’s alright to deliver something
good in stages,” Farrell says. “Then
the powers-that-be will hopefully say,
hey, that’s working and students are
responding and support the completion
of the project.” In the meantime,
they are garnering student interest by
expanding their lunchtime offerings to
cover law practice management tools
and surveying students about their
technology skills and needs.
“Word is getting out that you need
a broader skillset than you get in
doctrinal classes,” Farrell says. Building
incrementally and surveying students
for interest now will likely encourage
financial support.
While selectively upgrading space
to develop commons areas can be
challenging, renovation or new
construction presents a better
opportunity to develop these spaces.
Plans for both Georgia State University
College of Law, which is currently
constructing a new building, and
Oklahoma City University Law School,
which is renovating a historic high
school for its new location, include
commons areas. These areas are slated to
meet the recommendations for learning
areas, including (1) domestic areas,
which are informal and welcoming
spaces, usually permitting food and
drink, that draw students and encourage
“collisions” with staff and faculty; (2)
plentiful, comfortable seating; and (3)
connections for mobile devices that
invite students to use their preferred
technology to share information and
ideas. These flexible spaces can be used
for both formal instruction and informal,
student-driven interaction.
At Oklahoma City University,
student and faculty polls taken before
the initial plans for the new space made
way for the commons area. Students
made it clear in surveys that they like
a library that includes spaces that are
completely quiet as well as communal
spaces where they can work together.
With a café already planned for the law
school building, Professor Peoples, who
is also the library director at Oklahoma
City, thought it would be great to bring
the communal library space students
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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Page 35
requested and the café together. To make
the commons central to law school
activities beyond the library, the space
includes a large collaboration desk that
he will invite faculty to reserve for review
sessions and other departments, such as
the clinics and Academic Support, to use
to deliver services to students.
Peoples, who was considering a
commons area long before the move was
planned, says a project like this is easier
when you are starting with a new space.
“Existing library space is up for question,
as we know, and assumptions people
have about the building you are in may
get in the way of new ideas,” he says.
“New construction is an opportunity
to make the case for the library as an
integral part of the law school.”
The lack of a large-scale renovation
project and limited funds do not have
to stop the initiation of spaces that
encourage learning—there are versions of
the commons concept that can be started
with less funding. At the University of
San Francisco, a commons area was
developed at the cost of new furniture
and a few additional electrical outlets.
Wheeler says, “We took out a bunch
of shelving and installed a ‘commons’
type area with soft seating, couches, large
ottomans, and lots of electrical outlets in
the floor. Students use this area heavily
now.”
A staff training session being conducted by Hollie White, digital initiatives librarian at Duke
University J. Michael Goodson Law Library’s Digital Initiatives Library (DIL). Photo
courtesy of Alexandra Calevaro, digital initiatives intern.
potential for changes in technology and
even human factors adds another layer of
risk that can find a library regrouping to
protect an investment. The Digital
Initiatives Laboratory (DIL) at Duke
University’s J. Michael Goodson Law
Library started with a different purpose.
One of the law school’s professors
routinely required a final student project
that required video production. The
space was intended to equip students
with sophisticated technology to
facilitate these final projects. As fate and
Students use the commons area at University of San Francisco School of Law.
Photo courtesy of John Shafer, research librarian and adjunct professor of law.
Still, something like this is only
relatively inexpensive and, in times of
recession, may be as far out of reach as
a more elaborate renovation of space.
Investing in New Space Uses:
Remaining Flexible is Imperative
If the initial expense in developing
learning spaces is not a deterrent, the
progress would have it, the professor
stopped assigning the video project, and
technology improved, making video
production easy and inexpensive from
most laptops. A quick refocus kept the
space vital to the law school and the
library. A digital initiatives librarian was
hired, and the space became a place to
work on technology-based, collaborative
projects that had begun or were
percolating. Now the DIL is being
used to capture history through the
digitization of all of the law school’s
many photographs, to upload video to
pages in the institutional repository that
commemorate past conferences and
symposia, and to serve as an instructional
and collaborative space for discussions
about the use of educational technology
in the classroom.
Duke Senior Associate Dean for
Information Services Dick Danner
appreciates the ability of the space design
to withstand the changes that have
occurred since the 2007 renovation
that resulted in the original plan.
“The space was designed with a
different purpose, but, though changed
circumstances have altered that purpose,
it allowed us to focus our plans for
tech-based projects by providing a place
where we can work collaboratively that is
flexible enough to adapt as our digital
initiatives evolve,” Danner says.
There are likely as many viable
options for the use of newly available
library space as there are law libraries.
Law school mission and objectives,
funding, and unexpected opportunities
all affect the types of projects any
particular law library can and should
pursue. We can find ideas in literature
and from our colleagues, but we must be
creative and remain open, flexible, and
responsive to our own environments
to choose the best course for our own
library spaces. ■
Lauren M. Collins
(l.m.collins36@csuohio.edu),
Law Library Director and
Associate Professor, Cleveland
State University’s Cleveland
Marshall College of Law
Library, Cleveland
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member to
member
What was your biggest
takeaway from the 2014
AALL Annual Meeting?
Librarians do it
better, faster,
and cheaper!
—Mary E. Matuszak,
Director of Library
Services, New York
County District
Attorney's Office,
New York
Mary E. Matuszak
As much as I enjoyed
the content of the
presentations at this
year’s meeting, I
think the point that
struck me the most
was the diversity
Lacy Rakestraw
present in the law
library community. I
found myself people-watching throughout
the conference, noting the differences in
age, race, geographic region, etc., among
the librarians. I absolutely love how diverse
our profession is!
results. Libraries of
the future will be
entirely different,
as institutions
disappear and things
become linked by the
Internet. The initial
program I attended,
Phoebe Ruiz-Valera
the Opening Session
program with
speaker Andrew Keen, left me optimistic
that librarians would still be needed, if only
to organize the massive amount of data
available and protect privacy. The next
programs that I selected mentioned the
subject and classification developments
necessary for this data management
process. The final program that I went to
addressed the “bookless library” and the
media necessary to use it. In summary,
exciting changes are ahead.
—Phoebe Ruiz-Valera, Catalog Librarian,
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP, New
York
From the
presentation skills
program: “What
questions do you
have about _____?”
Fill in the blank and
wait 10 seconds
before using the
Mark E. Estes
first of two possible
questions to pose to
yourself: “I often get asked _____.” I used
the first question while moderating the
Members Open Forum.
—Mark E. Estes, Law Library Director,
Bernard E Witkin Alameda County Law
Library, Oakland, California
—Lacy Rakestraw, Law Librarian, St. Louis
County Courthouse, St. Louis
Literally the biggest
thing I took away
was the cowboy
hat from Thomson
Reuters. Yee-haw!
—Eve Ross,
Assistant Librarian/
Research Specialist,
McNair Law Firm,
P.A., Columbia, South Carolina
Eve Ross
My biggest takeaway was that librarians
have a future; no matter how much
libraries change, there is still a need for
knowledgeable people to organize and
administer the process and evaluate the
36
AALL Spectrum
■
Sept/Oct 2014
I came away from
the Annual Meeting
with ideas and
inspiration. I met
great people and
now understand
what people mean
when they say that
Rebecca Katz
"law librarians know
how to party." My
heart was warmed by the commitment that
our profession has to access to justice. But
I would have to say that my biggest
takeaway is the value of social media—
Twitter, especially—in making what could
be a large, impersonal (and kind of
overwhelming) event into something more
like a family reunion.
—Rebecca Katz, Washington, D.C.
My takeaway was
the reminder that
librarians are
generous people who
are willing to share
their knowledge and
insights with others.
Meg Martin
They are also
responsive to
change, working hard to adapt to new
technologies, contracting budgets, and
shifting expectations. I'm proud to be a
librarian or whatever becomes our new
descriptor: knowledge manager, digital
legal researcher, rabble-rousing supporter
of free access to verified information . . .
—Meg Martin, Branch Librarian, Robert J.
Dole Courthouse, U.S. Tenth Circuit Court
Library, Kansas City, Kansas
washington brief continued from page 5
Consult us for more information on
our priority issues, talking points, and
materials to bring along to your meeting,
town hall, or tour.
Election Outcomes and Advocacy Ahead
There are several possible outcomes of the
midterm elections, each presenting its
own opportunities and challenges. Your
district or state may elect a new member
of Congress. The majority party may
change in one or both chambers. New
leadership, committee chairmanship, and
committee memberships may be assigned.
Like it or not, the midterm elections will
result in changes to your advocacy
relationships. Such changes will require
your skills and expertise to educate and
engage new elected officials, whether we
win or lose allies or adversaries.
Whether or not the candidates you
engage end up in office, your election
season advocacy efforts aren’t for naught.
As you work to inform a candidate
about AALL and the issues we support,
you’ll help to advance an array of issues
that are increasingly relevant with the
rapid changes in digital technologies.
In doing so, you may also raise
awareness and support from other
constituents, like patrons of your law
library or other allies. ■
Emily Feltren
Director, AALL Government
Relations Office, 25
Massachusetts Avenue, N.W.,
Suite 500, Washington, D.C.
20001 • 202/942-4233
• fax: 202/737-0480 • email:
efeltren@aall.org • www.aallnet.org/gro
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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Page 37
announcements
AALL Says Thank You
AALL would like to thank the following contributors for their support of the Association and its activities. These individuals and organizations contributed to
the 2014 AALL Annual Meeting and/or any one or more of the following funds: Alan Holoch Memorial Grant, Centennial, FCIL Schaffer Grant, George A. Strait
Minority Scholarship, Government Affairs, Grants, Marla Schwartz Grant, Morris Cohen Essay Competition, Research Endowment, and Scholarships.
Corporate Sponsors
Gold Level ($65,000 or
more)
Bloomberg Law/
Bloomberg BNA
LexisNexis
Thomson Reuters
Wolters Kluwer Law &
Business
Bronze Level
($5,000 to $25,000)
Fastcase
Innovative Interfaces Inc.
Oxford University Press
and Oxford Legal
Research
William S. Hein & Co., Inc.
Contributors
$1,500 or more
Richard A. Danner
James E. Duggan
Catherine Lemann
$1,400 - $1,499
Shannon Hein
Ellen G. Schaffer
Jean M. Wenger
$100 - $249
Joan L. Axelroth
Donna K. Bausch
Black Caucus
Kathleen Brown
Lauren Collins
Joseph Custer
Jack S. Ellenberger
Carla Evans
Martha Goldman
Sherry Leysen
Lyonette Louis-Jacques
David Mao
Teresa Miguel-Stearns
Carol Avery Nicholson
Janet L. Oberla
Holly M. Riccio
Miriam G. Sargon
Mary Sexton
Cossette T. Sun
Suzanne Thorpe
Leonette Williams
$500 - $999
Donald L. Ford
Mary A. Hotchkiss
Ellen G. Schaffer
Mary Whisner
$250 - $499
Carol Bredemeyer
Amy J. Eaton
Mark Estes
Kate Hagan
Sarah G. Holterhoff
Ruth L. Levor
Margaret K. Maes
Deborah Rusin
Richard J. Spinelli
Gail Warren
Ronald E. Wheeler, Jr.
I ntroducing
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Up to $49
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AALL Spectrum
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the reference desk
Q:
I work as a librarian at a law
school and enjoy working with
students—or at least, I used to.
These days, I sort of need to force myself to
keep my office door open. There is so much
that needs to get done, and it seems as if
I can never do that. My co-workers have
stopped asking me to join them after work,
and, when I can avoid them, I’ve pretty
much stopped attending the social events
at work. I don’t think I’m depressed, but
I just don’t have the energy I used to have.
I feel overwhelmed. I don’t want to bother
my supervisor and honestly don’t know
what he can do anyway. I know that I
should be grateful that I have a job (and
I am). More and more, I find that once my
day is over, I just want to be left alone, go
home, and turn my phone off. I can’t be
the only one who feels like this, and I wish
I didn’t. What can I do to change things?
Although I can’t cite statistics,
I think I can safely assure you
that you aren’t alone in feeling
overwhelmed. We’re all struggling to
manage our jobs, our lives, and, basically,
our time. In recent years, numerous
continuing legal education seminars have
concerned time management and work/life
balance. CLEs aside, many employers are
providing their employees with literature
and professional development opportunities
on this topic. They are recognizing that
workplace stress may lead to burn-out,
anxiety, insomnia, etc. So I commend you
for recognizing that something isn’t “right”
and being willing to share that. Although
I can empathize with you, I think we would
benefit from an expert’s perception.
A:
The law school for which I work employs
full-time health and wellness counselors,
and I have asked Jeremy McCleery to share
his insights. Jeremy has more than 17 years
of experience in the medical and mental
health fields, having worked in a number
of settings including the United States Air
Force, Air National Guard, a communitybased outpatient mental health program,
an international NGO, and a local
nonprofit.
McCleery says: “The first part of any
recovery or self-help program is awareness.
Awareness brings insight and helps us to
understand exactly what is wrong. The lack
of awareness facilitates reactions that do
not serve us well. Think of how you react
when stressed. What is your automatic
go to? Is it isolating, alcohol and drugs,
38
AALL Spectrum
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Sept/Oct 2014
By Susan Catterall
vegging out for hours in front of the TV?
These types of automatic reactions are
negative and compound stress. If we are
not aware, then we react to life out of
habit without thinking. You may need to
investigate when you notice behavioral
changes, such as increased isolation. Take
into account that we all have unique
personalities. Introverts need downtime
from people and may feel drained from
too many social situations. Extroverts
tend to feel energized by spending time
with people. It’s important to take this
into account and to be aware of your
personality type so that you can measure
what is ‘normal’ for you.
“It’s also important to remember that
feelings are NOT facts, they are feelings.
Look at your situation objectively, without
judgment, as a scientist would. This will
help you gain some perspective. If you
are feeling left out or alone, it’s a feeling.
Looking at the situation objectively, you
may discover that you are not alone
because you have people who care about
you. Put the objective facts down on paper
because they will help keep you grounded
and balanced when your feelings are
intense. It also doesn’t hurt to reach out
to a friend for some encouragement when
you start to notice these feelings.
“Focus on what you can control and
accept what you cannot. If it takes effort
to manage your behavior, such as snapping
at a co-worker, you may have some
personality issues to examine. If you work
in a customer-service environment or a
place where collaboration is necessary,
you have a few options. You can change
industries to something that is less peopleoriented; you can learn to manage and
cope with your negative feelings, moods,
and emotions; or you can do nothing and
face the consequences when you snap at
a customer or co-worker. Your company
may have an open-door policy with the
expectation that customers can drop in
whenever they want. If so, you need to
accept this as something you may not be
able to control. The lack of acceptance for
a situation creates frustration and stress.
Acceptance does not mean you ‘like’ or
‘approve,’ it just means you come to terms
with the person, place, or thing. Another
question to ask is ‘what is triggering the
anger or urge to snap?’ We can’t always
control people, places, or things. The only
thing we can control is our response.
“Some of us may have thinking patterns
or belief systems that may distort our
perspective. In the world of psychology,
these are called cognitive, or thought,
distortions. Feeling that your opinion is not
heard may be overgeneralizing or jumping
to conclusions. Overgeneralizing is coming
to a general conclusion based on a single
piece of evidence or an isolated incident.
Jumping to conclusions is when we ‘know’
what people are feeling, thinking, and
why they act the way they do without
them saying so. We humans are complex
creatures. We have various problems that
can affect our behavior toward one
another. Take this into account before
personalizing the behaviors of others. This is
when it comes in handy to use our frontal
lobe (rational mind) to look at situations
objectively. Do you have concrete evidence
and consistency about how others perceive
you?
“One of the best indicators of your
well-being is your social support network.
Studies have shown that people with
strong social networks have better wellbeing. We are not meant to be islands
or lone rangers. We need the support of
others who care about us to get through
life. When feeling the need to isolate, do
yourself a favor and reach out to someone.
At times, this will take great effort,
especially if you are an introvert. Having
others to confide in can also help us gain
some perspective into our patterns and
behaviors. Our perception of self has its
limits when it comes to looking at our
flaws. We tend to have blind spots and
bias. Receiving input from a friend can help
provide some objectivity for your current
situation.
“You may need to consider whether you
are suffering from clinical depression. Some
of the key criteria for depression are:
• Depressed mood (i.e., feelings of
sadness)
• Lack of interest (in activities that you
usually enjoy)
• Feelings of worthlessness
• Poor concentration
• Thoughts of death.
“If you meet three or more of the criteria
above, you need to see a professional
clinical therapist. When in doubt, it would
be wise to see a professional clinician
anyway. Most workplaces have an
employee assistance program (EAP) that
will cover a set number of visits to a
therapist. If your workplace does not offer
an EAP, it would still be in your best
interest to see a counselor. Your health
insurance provider may also cover a certain
percentage of the visit. If your body is sick,
you see a physician. The same goes for
problems with your mental health.”
AALLSept/Oct2014:1
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11:30 AM
Page 39
Jeremy, thank you for your thoughtful
perspective. It seems as though we are all
being asked to do more with less these
days. Thank you, especially, for reminding us
of how important we are as a resource to
each other.
Jeremy has also emphasized both: (1) it is
important to talk to someone, and (2) there
is no set response or reaction to what
is going on with an individual; we are
complex and react to stressors in a number
of ways.
At the recent AALL Conference in San
Antonio, there was a session on “Learning
to Lead Yourself and Others Through the
Unexpected.” For me, there were two
valuable takeaways from the session, and
I hope you will reach out to someone you
have confidence in. I also trust that you’ll
be able to find your energy again because
you’ve taken the first steps toward doing
so.
announcements
Susan Catterall
(scatterall@charlottelaw.
edu), Reference Librarian,
Charlotte School of Law, North
Carolina
Are you in a sticky situation with a
colleague? Looking for ways to discuss
advancement with your supervisor? Send
your questions to columnist Susan
Catterall at scatterall@charlottelaw.edu.
The 2014 AALL Election Schedule and Candidates
November 1, 2014
Ballots distributed electronically to all voting members.
December 2, 2014
Deadline for receipt of electronic ballots at AALL. Ballots tabulated at
AALL and results of elections announced immediately. Biographies and
statements of all AALL Executive Board candidates will be posted on
AALLNET in the fall.
For members who do not have email or who do not wish to participate
in an online election, please contact Hannah Phelps Proctor,
membership services coordinator, at AALL by October 14, and
headquarters will provide paper ballots. She can be reached at
hphelps@aall.org or at 312/205-8022.
2014 Candidates
The AALL Nominations Committee nominated the following individuals
for office in AALL:
Carol A. Watson, director of the law library, Alexander Campbell King
Law Library, University of Georgia School of Law, Athens
Ronald E. Wheeler Jr., director of the law library and information
resources, Suffolk University Law Library, Boston
Executive Board Members
Scott D. Bailey, director of global research services, Squire Sanders
LLP, Washington, D.C.
Emily R. Florio, library services manager, Finnegan, Henderson,
Farabow, Garrett & Dunner LLP, Washington, D.C.
Mary E. Matuszak, director of library services, New York County
District Attorney's Office, New York
Francis X. Norton Jr., head of public services, Law Library of
Louisiana, New Orleans
AALL Spectrum
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views from you
Share Your Views with Spectrum
What views of your library are meaningful to you? Whether it’s the atmosphere surrounding your reference desk, a striking scene outside your window,
a unique event taking place in your library, or a moment captured on your morning commute, this is your chance to share it with AALL.
In order to be publishable, pictures must be of relatively high quality. Digital submissions are preferred and must be high resolution (300 dpi).
Submit your photos to AALL Marketing and Communications Manager Ashley St. John at astjohn@aall.org.
The staff at Northwestern Mutual’s Law Library in Milwaukee has a wonderful view each day of
historical columns in the building’s atrium, and over Memorial Day weekend, the American flag was
proudly displayed. According to Library and Information Services Research Specialist Shelly Scheel,
“Not only is it a great company to work for, the view is pretty inspiring as well!”
40
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Page 3
“SUBPOENA ALL THOSE BASTARDS AND BRING THE
CASE…DESTROY THE TIMES” — Richard M. Nixon
The Weekly Standard: “Nixon poisoned a well…Some of that poison
is evident in…Goodale’s book”
Fighting for the Press: The Inside Story of
the Pentagon Papers and Other Battles
By James C. Goodale
TWICE NAMED BEST NON-FICTION BOOK
OF THE YEAR
Alan Rusbridger – Editor, The Guardian
Alan Clanton – Editor, Thursday Review
The New York Times: “deeply informed, even gossipy”
The New York Review of Books: “a fascinating inside story”
Columbia Journalism Review: “a message for journalists: Wake up!”
The Paris Review Daily: “a fascinating blow-by-blow account”
New York Law Journal: “packs a real wallop”
New York Observer: “reads like a political thriller”
Chicago Tribune: “just in time for a new wave of leak-plugging questions”
The Atlantic: “has significant persuasive strength”
New York Magazine: “an esoteric issue…suddenly…into the national conversation”
Publishers Weekly: “lays out information cleanly and carefully”
Thursday Review: “strikingly relevant—even prescient”
Gateway Journalism Review: “a story that has just as much importance today as it did in 1972”
British Journalism Review: “tells the story vividly and briskly”
Committee to Protect Journalists: “a landmark legal case on press freedom”
“This is a story worthy of John Grisham, except this one actually happened; it is fact, not fiction—and it’s
still unfolding… James Goodale is an American treasure and so is his book.” — Dan Rather
“An engaging work which underlines the importance of fighting for a free press. Without press freedom,
informed public debate is curtailed and democratic accountability diminished” — His Excellency Kofi Annan,
former Secretary General, United Nations
Available at CUNY Journalism Press and Amazon.com
ISBN 978-1-939293-08-4 paperback $20
ISBN 978-1-939293-12-1 hardcover $35
www.jamesgoodale.net
ISBN 978-1-939293-09-1 e-book $10
ASIN: B00GGS7BIO Audible book $11.95
9/23/14
8:38 AM
Page 4
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