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Scholarships awarded to 69 prospective minority librarians

The year 2006 was a banner year in the Spectrum Scholarship Program, the ALA’s diversity and recruitment effort designed to address the issue of under-representation of ethnic librarians within the profession.

Since its inception in 1997, the Spectrum program has supported 415 students with scholarships worth more than $2.5 million. Spectrum has also served as a model for ways to bring attention to larger diversity issues, and many library schools and professional associations have built on Spectrum’s efforts by providing matching funds and development opportunities for scholars.

In June, the ALA awarded 69 Spectrum scholarships, creating the largest “cohort” or class to date.

In 2004, the Institute of Museum and Library Services awarded the Spectrum program a three-year “New Voices, New Visions” grant of $928,142. These funds enabled Spectrum to award an additional 35 and 41 scholarships in 2005 and 2006, respectively, and the ALA anticipates that 2007, the final year of the IMLS grant, will see a new record high number of Spectrum scholarships.

Also in 2006, the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Information Science announced that it will partner with the ALA on the Spectrum Doctoral Fellowship Program, to be funded through a second IMLS grant. In all, 10 participating doctoral programs will award 10 fellowship packages that include full tuition and a yearly stipend.

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