Intellectual Freedom Round Table supports Spectrum Presidential Initiative

CHICAGO - The Intellectual Freedom Round Table (IFRT) of the American Library Association (ALA) has announced its support of the Spectrum Scholarship Program through a gift of $500 to the Spectrum Presidential Initiative.

ALA President Molly Raphael, Immediate Past President Roberta Stevens, ALA President-elect Maureen Sullivan and ALA Past President Dr. Betty J. Turock, chair of the initiative, continue the Spectrum Presidential Initiative as a special campaign to raise $1 million for the Spectrum Scholarship Program. Through this initiative, ALA aims to meet the critical needs of supporting master’s-level scholarships, providing two $25,000 doctoral scholarships, increasing the Spectrum Endowment to ensure the program’s future and developing special programs for recruitment and career development.

Carrie Gardner, 2011-2012 Intellectual Freedom Round Table Chair, said of the gift, “I speak for everyone on the IFRT Executive Board when I say that continuing to ensure the diversity of our profession ensures that the principles of intellectual freedom will be carried forward to new generations of librarians and patrons.”

The Intellectual Freedom Round Table (IFRT) provides a forum for the discussion of activities, programs and problems in intellectual freedom of libraries and librarians; serves as a channel of communications on intellectual freedom matters; promotes a greater opportunity for involvement among the members of the ALA in defense of intellectual freedom; and promotes a greater feeling of responsibility in the implementation of ALA policies on intellectual freedom. For more information, visit www.ala.org/ifrt.

Established in 1997, the Spectrum Scholarship Program is ALA’s national diversity and recruitment effort designed to address the specific issue of under-representation of critically needed ethnic librarians within the profession. Spectrum Scholars improve service at the local level through the development of a representative workforce that reflects the communities served by all libraries. Spectrum has provided more than 730 scholarships to qualified applicants enrolled in an ALA-accredited graduate program in library and information studies or an NCATE-AASL reviewed and approved school library education program. To learn more about the Spectrum Scholarship Program, visit www.ala.org/spectrum.

For more information about the Spectrum Presidential Initiative or to make an online donation, visit http://spectrum.ala.org. To learn more, get involved, or to make a pledge to the Spectrum Presidential Initiative, contact Miguel A. Figueroa, director, Office for Diversity & Spectrum at mfigueroa@ala.org, or Kim Olsen-Clark, director, Development Office at kolsen-clark@ala.org.