Alongside research and teaching, professional service to one’s institution, community, and field was an important part of my being a faculty member, particularly in the context of a library and information studies (LIS) school and profession that places significant value on service and volunteer work. While service may officially have been only 20% of my work, I valued and continue to value it through connections to and promotion of the development of LIS research, teaching, and as an academic field; and as establishing and supporting my place in that field and community. In my constant if recently more selective commitment to service, I ensure it remains (a) relevant and connects to my career, research, and teaching; (b) valuable for the university, field, and/or community; (c) active in terms of my participation in all of these; and (d) meaningful and valuable for me as an academic citizen and human being.
Service is both necessary for employment and a responsibility faculty members should fulfill, to help in the running of their department, faculty, and university and in supporting their communities. The University of Alberta specifically calls out supporting “the public good” in its ongoing strategic plan, a vision supported by the School of Library and Information Studies and Faculty of Education I work in, and I believe my service must fulfill this same spirit. To be engaged and responsible I must care about my surroundings; a relatively unsuccessful institution that is not transparent with and accountable to students, staff, and faculty negatively impacts them and my own job role and life as an academic. As someone who does my best to be a positive force in the world, my service philosophy goes beyond job requirements and my own job satisfaction to trying to make the institution, its units, and the LIS profession and field better, stronger, and more successful communities for all involved. I aim to be a positive force for such improvement in my service.
My service has included, among other examples:
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Chairing the Scholarships, Awards, and Bursaries Committee at the University of Alberta School of Library and Information Studies for three years (2016-2019)
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Serving as a Review Editor for (with membership on the editorial board of) the Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology (since 2017)
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Peer review for the Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology (JASIST), Canadian Journal of Information and Library Science (CJILS), the Journal of Education for Library and Information Science (JELIS), Library and Information Research, Journal of Information Science, Aslib Journal of Information Management, New Media and Society, and Library Hi Tech
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Conference peer review for for two of the biggest LIS academic conferences, the Annual Meeting of the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T) and the iSchools-organized iConference, every year since 2012, and for the three most recent years of the Canadian Association for Information Science (CAIS) conference and three Social Media and Society (SMSociety) conferences
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Serving as Awards Coordinator (since 2019), and formerly Social Chair (2016-18), Communications Officer (2012-15), and Secretary (2011-12) for ASIS&T's SIG SI, the special interest group for Social Informatics
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Being a member of the University of Alberta Faculty of Education's Technology Advisory Board (2016-18), HT Coutts Library Advisory Committee (2015-17), and Graduate Scholarship and Awards Committee (beginning July 2020)
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Membership on search committees for an assistant professor hire (2017) and a postdoctoral fellow (2016) at the University of Alberta School of Library and Information Studies, as well as an assistant professor hire (2019) in the Faculty of Education
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Current membership in the Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIS&T), Canadian Association for Information Science, Association for Library and Information Science Education (ALISE), American Library Association (ALA), and Association of Internet Researchers (AoIR)
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Serving as a member of the Task Force on ASIS&T's Web Presence (2013-14) and the ASIS&T Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion (2020-present)
Please read my service statement for more details of my service philosophy and my current and future service activities and goals.