A Name to Know

I was starting to prepare for serials add/drop when I noticed that one of the editors of the Progressive Librarian is Kathleen de la Peña McCook. Dr. McCook, the Distinguished University Professor, University of South Florida, Department of Library & Information Science was just awarded the 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award at FLA. She was also the Director of the USF library school while many of us earned our degrees there. Her specialties are adult services and disenfranchised populations. The March issue of American Libraries chose her blogs for inclusion in the article, "Mattering in the Blogosphere (available through WilsonWeb)." She is one of the most cited librarians and one of the most prolific. One of Dr. McCook's greatest strengths is needs assessment and community enrichment.

I studied Library Administration and Adult Services with her and in one of the classes, we discussed the evaluation of neighborhoods and how to ensure that the needs of patrons are met. She said to look at the number of check cashing, furniture rental, used appliance, and used tire stores that are in an area and that will tell you more than some of the expensive demographic studies. More of those stores have cropped up in the 12 years since she made that comment in my class. In line with her community focus, perhaps her most important book is A Place at the Table: Participating in Community Building. She details how and why libraries and librarians form the central core of a community and should help shape the community by building partnerships and alliances at all levels. She says that libraries as "information nerve centers can serve as both access points and as interpretive points." Even though this book is already 7 years old, it seems to be more and more true. We have several of Dr. McCook's books:

• Adult Services: An Enduring Focus for Public Libraries
• A Place at the Table: Participating in Community Building
• Developing Readers' Advisory Services: Concepts and Commitments
• Introduction to Community Building
• Libraries: Global Reach, Local Touch
• Library Services to Youth of Hispanic Heritage (Regional Juv. Ref.)
• On Account of Sex: An Annotated Bibliography on the Status of Women in Librarianship, 1982-1986