OPENING GENERAL SESSION

At the Opening General Session, ALA president 2024–2025 Cindy Hohl welcomed attendees with her promise to spend the conference celebrating the impacts of libraries of all kinds. She came on and off the stage during the session to introduce other speakers who wanted to welcome the attendees. 

The Free Library of Philadelphia board chair, Folasade A. Olanipekun-Lewis, called Philly a “city of grit, grace, and free libraries.” Mayor Cherelle Parker—the city’s 100th mayor, first woman mayor, and first Black woman mayor—said she was thrilled to host 15,000 library leaders from across the country and was proud to head the city that launched the first library in the U.S. She also mentioned that ALA was created in Philadelphia in 1876. Karla Trout, president of the Pennsylvania Library Association, emphasized that it was fitting to be gathering in a commonwealth, which is dedicated to the free and open sharing of ideas, as libraries are. Kelly Richards, director of the Free Library of Philadelphia, noted that he was looking forward to connecting with fellow librarians so they could support each other in working toward the vibrant future of libraries. James Lewis, who bequeathed ALA with a $25 million donation to support need-based scholarships for aspiring librarians, offered his thanks for how librarians lift up communities and expressed his admiration for the profession.

Then it was time for some ALA business. Hohl got understandably emotional when she had to bring up the federal government’s treatment of IMLS, noting that ALA’s Public Policy and Advocacy Office brought forth a lawsuit that is working its way through the courts. Hohl spoke about the launch of the Steve and Loree Potash 150th Anniversary Challenge; the Potashes will dollar-match up to $500,000 in donations to ALA, she said. Hohl also mentioned her presidential term accomplishments, including the All Nations LibGuide. Then she thanked ALA’s interim executive director, Leslie Burger, for her service and introduced the new executive director, Dan Montgomery. Montgomery said he was excited to get to work in supporting libraries. Hohl returned to the stage to present a few awards and then nodded to some milestone anniversaries for 2025, including the fifth anniversary of Core.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer (D-Mich.) was the final speaker, but I wasn’t able to stay to see her. (ALA conferences are much like vacations to Walt Disney World—there is so much to do that it’s impossible to see everything!) You can learn what she talked about from American Libraries.

FACING CHALLENGES TO FREE EXPRESSION

Deborah Caldwell-Stone, executive director of the Freedom to Read Foundation and director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, moderated Free Expression in 2025: Challenges for Libraries. The speakers were Martin Garnar, director of the library at Amherst College; Marcellus Turner, who has worked in libraries; and Lisa Varga, associate executive director of ALA’s Public Policy and Advocacy Office.

Garnar spoke about issues at academic libraries, including Title VI challenges against universities, the loss of grants, threats to shut down ERIC and MEDLINE, and how people can file complaints about programming even if they aren’t part of the school; he said the False Claims Act is hurting institutions. Turner noted that the federal government doesn’t understand libraries, so library directors need to be proactive about going after what they need. The public feels entitled to say anything they’d like, and he wants library staffers to feel safe at work. He’s also concerned about the lack of editorial review in collections and what’s become known as AI slop.

Varga said that although libraries are at the center of a culture war manifesting in book banning, there are success stories. She shared one state bill that aimed to implement adult rooms for ages 18 and older in public libraries. An ALA lobbyist had a conversation with the state senator who introduced the bill, and he dropped it. Caldwell-Stone talked about how the government is trying to censor library collections and criminally prosecute librarians for providing books, which attempts to undermine the professionalism of librarians. 

The session split into small group discussions centered on free expression challenges that attendees have experienced, and when the large group came back together, the speakers invited them to share. One attendee from Texas said a storytime celebrating different kinds of families prompted violent comments on social media, so the library held it at a local brewery, and no one was harmed. An attendee from Florida said they had to remove a display of LGBTQ+ books because the library commissioner’s wife disapproved. An attendee from Iowa said they’re prohibited from mentioning DEI, so the library had to find way around it; for example, the library staffers would advertise that they were throwing out some DEI-related materials that could be inconspicuously trash-picked by patrons. Another attendee, this one from Australia, had to resort to sneaking around too—they renamed a Banned Books display Staff Recommendations. 

The general consensus from the session was that it’s important to speak to others who have experienced similar challenges to free expression and see how they’ve handled them instead of reinventing the wheel.

HOSTING AN ACADEMIC INTEGRITY WORKSHOP

Everything Is All Reused: Teaching Academic Integrity Through the Lens of Pop Culture featured two University at Buffalo librarians—Beth Carpenter, undergraduate engineering and instruction librarian, and Mary Kamela, student support and engagement librarian—presenting on an academic integrity workshop they taught to students. They opened by describing the current landscape of academic integrity, which encompasses being fair, being honest, and taking responsibility for one’s own learning. They want to focus the conversation less on simply “not cheating” and more on “taking honor in your own work.” The latter focus offers an opportunity for students to be part of the academic integrity conversation and makes them open to learning.

Carpenter and Kamela’s workshop stemmed from their mutual love of pop culture. They mapped out the core concepts they wanted to cover, such as plagiarism, fair use, and information literacy, and they searched TikTok and social media to understand how college students currently engage with those topics. The workshop opened with students providing their perspectives on academic integrity, noting that the concept thrives when everyone feels supported.

Then the workshop was divided into three sections: plagiarism, fair use, and power dynamics. Carpenter and Kamela gave multiple real-world situations for each. For example, in the plagiarism section, they discussed the controversy that “Deja Vu” by Olivia Rodrigo plagiarized “Cruel Summer” by Taylor Swift. Swift was added as a co-writer on Rodrigo’s song, which they connected to the importance of citations. Then they discussed Weird Al’s song parodies as legitimate examples of fair use.

Carpenter and Kamela displayed differences in power dynamics by discussing a scene from the movie Hairspray when a group of white singers steals a song from a group of Black singers. This led to a discussion of what is appropriation versus what is appreciation. In conclusion, Carpenter and Kamela noted that they keep the workshop updated as related court decisions occur, and they continue to focus on connecting academic integrity to a practice that can happen outside of school.

GETTING STUDENTS INVOLVED IN LEARNING ABOUT THE PAST

Hyping History: Highlighting History in a High School Library was a session on how to engage students in understanding the histories of marginalized groups. Lucy Podmore and Sheryl Stoeck (at right), high school librarians at two schools in Texas, set out to expand their partnerships with the English department into the history department because they wanted to share their love of history. They described initiatives they each led, and the following are some examples. 

Native American History Month led to an event called Native American Mythbusters. In the school courtyard, stations displayed facts about modern Native Americans and provided true-or-false games, matching games, and more. There was a screening of a documentary on American Indian boarding/residential schools that students could attend for extra credit. 

The Breakfast With a Professor series featured professors from a local university speaking on a specific topic before school began. The history club catered breakfast, and students could attend for extra credit. 

To mark Holocaust Remembrance Week, another event featured stations (this time in the library) that focused on what happened in Germany in the 1930s to lead to the Holocaust. History classes came to the library to view the stations and to hold discussions. 

During Hispanic Heritage Month, Spanish classes did research to create a Hispanic Hall of Fame for the library. They made Did You Know? posters and performed music in the library.

Podmore and Stoeck also mentioned the citizen archivism they engage students in, such as doing transcriptions for the National Archives, the Smithsonian, and the Library of Congress.

PRESIDENT’S PROGRAM

The ALA Awards Presentation & President’s Program began with Hohl presiding over what ALA calls awards “celebrating noted authors, distinguished members and outstanding library programs,” including the ALA/Information Today, Inc. Library of the Future Award. (Learn more about it in the upcoming September/October issue of Information Today.)

Then Hohl sat down with research professor and author Brené Brown (at left), who was excited to share her “library love story,” which began in earnest when she was a teaching assistant who was breastfeeding her infant on a remote floor of her university library during study breaks. She said the librarians there set her up with a private room so she wouldn’t feel so vulnerable out in the open. This fed into her lifelong study of shame, vulnerability, and courage and how they’re connected. She set out to learn whether courage exists without vulnerability, and she discovered that it doesn’t. 

Brown noted that with librarians living in such uncertain times, showing up to work is an act of courage that they do every day. She went on to speak about how democracy depends on education and virtue—on an informed citizenry and the integrity of the leaders. Hohl joked about Brown running for office, but Brown insisted she’s on a good path now. Brown embeds herself in organizations to study what makes a good leader. She’s finding that situational awareness and anticipatory thinking are key attributes.

Hohl asked Brown how librarians should approach leadership, and Brown said taking care of yourself should be the priority because “you can’t give what you don’t have.” This recovery from the daily news cycle should be “deliberate and intentional,” with a mandate to “find joy and wonder” often. She stressed that not all information is useful; limiting your intake of the news is important because “overwhelm is part of the plan.” She spoke about hope being the antidote to despair—librarians should believe in their ability to make change and celebrate the small wins, because big wins are a collection of small wins. Brown’s rallying cry was, “You can take our books, but you can’t take our integrity.” 

EMPOWERING COMMUNITIES VIA ENVIRONMENTAL COLLECTIONS

Resilience in the Stacks: How Librarians and Archivists Respond to Climate Change and Environmental Disasters featured moderator Rebecca Lloyd, research services librarian at Temple University and co-chairperson of the RUSA History Section (the session’s sponsor), introducing two librarians who have engaged with collections related to environmental justice.

Acacia Thompson, environmental justice coordinator at Brooklyn Public Library’s Greenpoint Library and Environmental Education Center, spoke about being the coordinator of the Greenpoint Environmental History Project, a digital archive that is part of the library system. She defined environmental justice as everyone having the right to a clean environment and described her role as an environmental justice coordinator, which involves making her community aware of environmental issues by informing patrons, hosting programs, and engaging patrons in sustainability efforts. Thompson provided background on industrial pollution in Brooklyn and Greenpoint’s history of activism around it. She’s working on an oral history project, Our Streets Our Stories, which comprises more than 60 interviews so far that are available in the library catalog.

Heidi Abbey Moyer, archivist and humanities reference librarian and coordinator of archives and special collections at Penn State–Harrisburg’s Madlyn L. Hanes Library, has been collecting materials for an archive about Three Mile Island (TMI). Her university was established in 1966—not long before the TMI nuclear power plant was built—and it is located fewer than 4 miles from TMI, so she wanted to establish a collection for the graduate school that explores TMI’s history, the nuclear power plant itself, and “the worst nuclear accident in U.S. history.”

She shared a little of TMI’s background before describing the accident; it occurred in 1979 when both equipment failure and human error led one of the cooling towers to overheat, which caused a partial meltdown of the reactor core. In the 1980s, TMI underwent cleanup and changed ownership hands. Now the nuclear power plant is in the process of reopening: It is scheduled to be operational again in 2027. 

Moyer stated that it’s a common belief in her field that archives cannot be neutral or objective. The community had initial concerns about her archive; she notes that there was a psychosocial impact after the accident that caused widespread post-traumatic stress, especially because there are correlative-but-not-causative data linking TMI and cancer diagnoses. Moyer wanted to provide a place where people could donate documents and materials, giving them a stake in their history.

The current collection features artifacts, books, T-shirts, and other ephemera related to TMI. Moyer hosts exhibitions of it to commemorate anniversaries, and she’s shared photos of it on Flickr. Faculty members bring their students to view the collection, and she believes it’s now so popular in the local community because it shows that someone is listening. She encourages anyone to view the collection online.

Photos by Brandi Scardilli; slide from Hyping History from bit.ly/hypehistory