Annual Report PAM International Relations Committee 2005-2006

Members: Debra Bailey (Chair), Sunita Barve, Christina Birdie, Nancy Diana Gomez, Kiem Dung T. Ta, Uta Grothkopf, Zahra Kamerei, Umran Yaman Kandemir, Jeanette Regan, Marie Antoinette Villafor, Mangala Krishnamurthy, Awasom Cornelius Ngang, and Demissew Tsigemelak Gebreyohannes, 2006 International Membership Award Winner.

The IMA award activities started earlier this year than in previous years, with the announcement going out on August 1st of 2005. We, along with the PAM Board, hoped this would alleviate some of the problems with the winner obtaining the visa as we had experienced last year. I sent the announcement on SLAPAM-L, PAMNET, IFLA, and to foreign international library organizations as listed in Bowker Annual. The initial deadline was October 31st. This deadline was extended to November 18th, with approval from the PAM Board, after only two applications were received. The new deadline did encourage several more applicants, and the total pool was 6 applicants. This was way down from the previous years’ 19 applicants. Out of the six applicants, one was from Malaysia, one from Ethiopia, two from India, and one from Sri Lanka. In previous years we have had many more applicants from India. The winner, Demissew Tsigemelak Gebreyohannes was notified on December 1st, 2005, and accepted with "Thank you so much for this opportunity."  He was very excited to learn from all of the PAM members, and to share his experiences. Demissew is currently a Science Librarian at Addis Ababa University in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. However, the earlier start still did not lead to a positive outcome on the visa: after sending an additional letter to Demissew, as well as, phone calls to the consulate in Addis Ababa, his visa was denied twice. Also, support from the Board was given in early December 2005 to fund last years winner to the conference, Awasom Cornelius Ngang, if he could get visa approval, with final approval coming from SLA in early January. Award letters were not sent out from SLA headquarters to Laurel Kristick until late January, and I received them in early February to mail and fax to Demissew and Ngang. Additionally, conference programs were sent for them to take to their appointments, but this did not seem to help. Demissew was denied at his 1st visa appointment on February 22nd. His second appointment, April 26th, proved to have no better outcome. Demissew reports “They have said, since you are single, etc. and there is no change from the previous one,” so the visa is denied.

Ngang’s first appointment was set for April 25th; he said the “counsellor at the embassy refused to give me the visa saying she could not understand how I was going to stay for just one week. I was even more embarrassed when the young lady said that she had never heard about the SLA.” Ngang’s second appointment was set for May 18th. His experience the second time was not any better than the first, with the consulate saying “that SLA is a big association and the quality of the award shows that I would be a hot cake in the US. The level of interest shown by SLA for me proves that when I get to the states, I will surely get a job and not return to Cameroon where our salaries are peanuts. That my qualifications make me a case for an immigrant visa and not the tourist visa. That they are not sure when I go to the states, I will return. And I asked  what about my wife and kids? She said the money I will be making in the states will take care of them. I just could not say any more and was so dumbfounded at their reasoning.”

Regarding the 2006 SLA Annual Conference in Baltimore Maryland: The session was on June 14th, from 1:00-2:30 pm. Zahra Kamerei was the moderator and at the beginning of the session presented a brief slide show prepared by Debra Bailey highlighting the 2005 and 2006 International Member Award winners, Awasom Ngang Cornelius and Demissew Tsigemelak Gebreyohannes, Science Librarian at Addis Ababa University in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The three speakers for the session were excellent: Gordana Stokic was born in Split (Croatia) in 1960. In 1997 she started her PhD studies at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Philology. Her dissertation was on Jesse Shera, a leading USA library theoretician and was titled Jesse Shera in the Theory and Practice of 20th Century Librarianship. In 2001 Gordana Stokic was awarded a PhD and in 2002 she was promoted to assistant professor at the Faculty of Philology. Her dissertation was adapted and published as a monograph in 2002. Also, Dr. Stokic co-authored with Eljko Vuckovic a book on Library Management and published it in 2003. For the contribution to the field of librarianship the book was awarded the Serbian Librarian Association's STOJAN NOVAKOVIC yearly prize. Her professional services include serving as a member of the Students Cultural Center administrative committee, the National Library of Serbia exam committee, the National Organization for Standardization Committee for Documentation and Information, the CLIO publishing house editorial board, journal of PANCEVACKO CITALISTE editorial board, president of the Working group for standardization of the quality of library services. Dr. Stokic is president of the Serbian Librarian Association Public Relations Committee. Dr. Stokic is an assistant professor at Belgrade Faculty of Philology LIS Department She teaches courses in History of the Book and Libraries, History of Serbian Libraries and Library Management. In addition, she is a visiting professor at the Belgrade University of Arts Postgraduate Studies in Cultural Management and Cultural Policy in the Balkans, teaching Publishing Industry and Library Management.

Innocent Awasom was born and raised in the former West Cameroon. He attended the University of Ibadan and the African Regional Center for Information Science (ARCIS) where he obtained a Masters in Information Science. He worked at the University of Ngaoundere in Cameroon where he coordinated the LIS option in the faculty of Art and was Head of the Research Library from 1996 - 2002 when he moved to the United States and was attached to the University of Minnesota Libraries courtesy of the Scholars at Risk Network. He is currently Science Librarian at Texas Tech University, Lubbock with liaison responsibilities for Agriculture, Chemistry and Mathematics.

Desmond Reaney has over 30 years of experience in publishing and has worked for publishing companies in the UK, Europe and the USA. He has spent the past ten years at Institute of Physics Publishing (IOP) where he is Head of Business Development, Journals Sales and Marketing. He is also responsible for managing IOP's programme of free online access for institutions in poor and developing countries. Desmond is a Vice-Chair of the Council of the Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers (ALPSP), and a member of the Serials Publishers Executive of the Academic and Professional Division of the UK Publishers' Association.

Looking to the future: Zari and I, and the committee, believe the purpose of the award is not necessarily to have "THE MOST QUALIFIED PAM LIBRARIAN," but to reach the developing nations that their physical sciences librarians have never had a chance to learn in an international library organization, and to interact with them.  We now have 2 representatives in South America, two in India, one in Turkey, one in Phillipines. We should relax the rules to include more physical sciences librarians from many more developing nations, because our criteria of Physics Astronomy Math CS librarian specialization just does not work in very poor countries.

Additionally I was asked by the Sci-Tech Division, “Will PAM be fully funding your 2006 Inter'l Membership winner (Demissew Tsigemelak Gebreyohannes) so that he can attend the Baltimore conference in June?  Or do you only fund up to a certain amount?  He has applied for the Sci-Tech Division's Intern'l Award but was told last year that our requirement was that the nominee/winner be a current member of SLA already.  So he has applied again this time telling us that you have paid for his membership. So my other question is when does his membership begin?  I did not find any membership records for him as of yet.” We need to better coordinate the International member awards among the divisions. Jeanette Regan had the excellent suggestion of providing a grant of a specified amount, say $500.00, for the winner to spend on leadership/professional training when the winner is unable to attend the session.

Member Activities: Marie Antoinette Villaflor: attended the 13th Congress of Southeast Asian Librarians in Manila. Mangala Krishnamurthy: winner of the 2006 SLA SLDP award. I would like to take this opportunity to thank PAM leadership for giving me the opportunity to serve as Chair of IRC for the past two years. It has been a fulfilling experience working with all of the IRC members.

Best Regards, Debra Bailey

Page last updated: Oct 2005