Applications Open for Inaugural Core LIFT Award for Professional Development

Core is pleased to announce our new Career LIFT Award to support skill development and networking opportunities for information professionals. Sponsored by OCLC, it consists of up to $1,500 the recipient may use on professional development including, but not limited to, ALA and/or Core membership dues, attending the ALA Annual Conference, ALA LibLearnX Conference, the Core Forum, or continuing education.

Grounded in Core’s mission of cultivating and amplifying the collective expertise of library workers in core functions and its tagline, Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures, the Career LIFT award is designed to support information professionals whose passion, actions, and everyday work warrants recognition and celebration. The Award celebrates the often unseen but critical labor that goes into organizing, managing, and maintaining library collections and services.

Core members may apply or nominate another Core member for the LIFT Award. The deadline to apply for the 2023 Career LIFT Award is Sunday, July 16.

The application process requires a brief essay about how the candidate is engaged in community building, advocacy, or learning; how they contribute to keeping things running day-to-day; and how funding would help them achieve their professional development goals. The recipient will be honored at the 2023 Core Forum in New Orleans in October.

This first LIFT Award was initiated by Past Core President Lindsay Cronk to proactively meet the needs of Core members who desire professional development but lack the financial means to attend professional conferences or take continuing education courses.

Applications for the 2024 Career LIFT Award will open in January, and the recipient will be announced in April. Core is seeking funding to add more LIFT Awards to invest in our members' futures and help them realize their vision and passion to improve their communities.

We are grateful to the Core Awards & Scholarships Coordination Committee for shepherding this Award to its launch and thank OCLC for sponsoring it.
 

About Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures
Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures is the national association that advances the profession of librarians and information providers in central roles of leadership and management, collections and technical services, and technology. Our mission is to cultivate and amplify the collective expertise of library workers in core functions through community building, advocacy, and learning. Follow us on our Blog, Instagram, or on Twitter.

About OCLC
OCLC is a nonprofit global library cooperative providing shared technology services, original research and community programs so that libraries can better fuel learning, research and innovation. Through OCLC, member libraries cooperatively produce and maintain WorldCat, the most comprehensive global network of data about library collections and services. Libraries gain efficiencies through OCLC's WorldShare, a complete set of library management applications and services built on an open, cloud-based platform. It is through collaboration and sharing of the world's collected knowledge that libraries can help people find answers they need to solve problems. Together as OCLC, member libraries, staff and partners make breakthroughs possible.