August 5, 2013, Wiesbaden, Germany – HARRASSOWITZ, international booksellers and subscription agents, is pleased to award the 2013 Charleston Conference Scholarship to Laura DeLancey, Electronic Resources Librarian at Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green. Ms. DeLancey was awarded the $1,000 scholarship to attend the Conference, which takes place November 6 – 9 in Charleston, South Carolina.
In support of the 2013 conference theme of “Too Much Is Not Enough!”, applicants for this year’s scholarship were asked to submit a short essay on the topic “What does ‘Too Much Is Not Enough’ mean to libraries and vendors?”
In her winning essay, Ms. DeLancey notes that “patrons don’t want to be overwhelmed by information choices. They want just ‘enough’”, and concludes that
“… librarians are ideally positioned to get direct feedback on our users’ search experiences, and vendors are ideally positioned to respond to this feedback. We already provide “enough”: the information equivalent of a glass slipper, but we need to ensure it is not obscured by a sea of irrelevant results, passwords, incompatible devices, and deeply nested webpages. If our users are confused and overwhelmed, we have failed our mission.”
Judging the submissions were: Clint Chamberlain, Coordinator for Information Resources, University of Texas at Arlington; Lynda Fuller Clendenning, Head of the Acquisitions Division at Indiana University in Bloomington; and Tina Feick, HARRASSOWITZ’s Director of Sales and Marketing for North America.
“Again this year the objective was to provide this travel scholarship to someone who has never been to the Charleston Conference”, Tina Feick said. “The judges were impressed with Ms. DeLancey’s well-researched essay and congratulate her on her achievement. We hope she finds the Charleston Conference to be a rewarding experience.”
The complete essay can be viewed here.
For more information on the Charleston Conference, registration and this year’s program, please visit the conference website.