Five San José State University School of Information students representing ALASC recently received the “Design-a-Program” award from the San Andreas Chapter of the Special Libraries Association (SLA). They designed a professional program of interest to SLA members, and the winning program will be offered to SLA San Andreas members and MLIS students later this year.

ALASC officers Abby Dansiger, Gayle Pellizzer, Susie Quinn, and Rowena Weger collaborated with fellow iSchool student Mia Jaeggli to develop the winning submission, “Creating Digital Exhibitions Using Open Source Solutions.”

The program will explore how special libraries can highlight their collections and reach beyond base clientele by creating digital exhibitions with open source tools. The presentation will highlight the recent collaboration between UC Berkeley’s Environmental Design Library and Environmental Design Archives to create digital exhibitions using the open source software Omeka.

The keynote speaker will be Mia Jaeggli, Technical Services Workleader at the Environmental Design Library and a May 2010 MLIS candidate from the iSchool. Jaeggli was responsible for selecting the appropriate software and working with Web administrators to bring the project to its final and successful completion, which she did partially as a INFO 292 Professional Experience: Project. Her presentation will explain how she initially approached the project and what obstacles she encountered along the way. She will also discuss the benefits of using open source software and future plans for publishing digitized collections and exhibitions. Following the presentation, the audience will be invited to participate in an interactive discussion forum.

As winners of the “Design-a-Program” challenge, the five iSchool students will have the honor of seeing their program idea come to fruition. They will also receive free admission to the program they designed, along with two additional chapter events. In addition, the chapter is sponsoring each of them for a one-year paid SLA membership, including extra dues to cover one extra chapter in addition to San Andreas chapter membership. This enables winners who don’t live in the Bay Area to also join a chapter closer to their home base.

The award recognizes the program’s creativity, feasibility of production, cost effectiveness, relevancy to the profession, and level of interest to information professionals.

To find out more about the event designed by SLIS students, including the date and location, watch the San Andreas SLA blog.

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