Paper Contest Research Articles

Introduction: International information issues and ASIS&T

AbstractEDITOR'S SUMMARYSince 1937 ASIS&T has promoted sharing within the information science community, a goal made more critical in an expanded, globalized environment. The Association's increasingly international reach stimulates discussion of global issues and challenges, lays a foundation for future growth and has prompted the development of Special Interest Group/International Information Issues (SIG/III). SIG/III has been active in member recruitment internationally and organizes the International Paper Contest to stimulate research and sharing at a global level. Devoted to international issues, this special section features interviews with SIG cofounders and leaders in information science, a discussion of ASIS&T chapters and SIGs and their role in strengthening the Association, virtual networking activities and past and current organizational initiatives. Massively open online courses (MOOCs) that aid the globalization of education, indigenous perspectives that expand our thinking and the pervasiveness of information policy elements all reinforce the international relevance of the field and the Association.

Iconoclasm, Parody, and the Provocations of Lydia Maria Child's <em>A Romance of the Republic</em>

If I live to be ninety years old, and go on at this rate, I shall be rabidest radical that ever pelted a throne, or upset an image. Lydia Maria Child to William Lloyd Garrison, 7 July 1865 In 1865, printer L. Franklin Smith and lithographer Max Rosenthal commemorated Abraham Lincoln's declaration of emancipation by publishing an extravagantly ornate print, Proclamation of Emancipation (see fig. 1). Adhering to conventions for such patriotic displays, Smith and Rosenthal surrounded text of Emancipation Proclamation with ample decoration: cherished American icons like flag and eagle, portraits of founding fathers and well-known abolitionists, allegorical figures, and several intricate vignettes depicting, as an accompanying booklet explains, the more striking results of great Crime (slavery) on left and results of the great Justice (emancipation) on right (Smith 7). This elaborate construction, with words of proclamation spread between scenes of slavery and freedom, implies that emancipation ended the great Crime and enacted the great Justice. According to Proclamation of Emancipation, Americans had much to celebrate and only past to grieve. Yet racial injustice in form of prejudice and segregation persist in print. The images present cliched scenes of black life before and after A shorter version of this essay won first prize in Legacy's Best Paper Contest, Student Category, honoring best student paper presented at Society for Study of American Women Writers Conference in Denver in 2012. It also won first place in SSAWW'S Graduate Student Paper Award Competition for that conference. emancipation, and none of scenes depict egalitarian integration. The only white figures pictured are slaveowners and overseers (on left) and a white teacher, far more elegantly dressed than his black pupils (on right). Between scenes of slavery and freedom are white allegorical figures and formal cameo portraits of white men and women celebrated for emancipation and America's commitment to liberty. These latter white figures are placed prominently toward center at bottom and top. As Harold Holzer, who has studied art and history of emancipation, explains, in nearly all these initial, tentative efforts to commemorate emancipation in popular prints, black Americans were emphatically not created equal. Blacks are relegated to sidelines, where they appear as generic figures, nominally free but still subordinate to whites (Holzer, Emancipating Lincoln 138). In this way, Proclamation of Emancipation, like most of era's strategically patriotic prints, promotes white supremacy and Northern pride. It placates rather than provokes its white postbellum viewers. (1) This print, however, unwittingly broaches its own critique by featuring Lydia Maria Child. While it is fitting that Child should be honored for her fierce advocacy of abolition, it is also ironic that her image should appear on such propaganda. Throughout her career, as we will see, she challenged grandiose conceptions of United States demonstrated by type of iconography appearing in abundance on this print. Moreover, she was openly critical of Emancipation Proclamation's compromises and failure to address problem of racial injustice at large. On 3o October 1862, soon after President Lincoln issued Preliminary Proclamation, Child wrote to good friend Sarah Shaw, As for President's Proclamation, I was thankful for it, but it excited no enthusiasm in my mind. With my gratitude to God was mixed an under-tone of sadness that moral sense of people was so low, that thing could not be done nobly.... The ugly fact cannot be concealed from history that it was done reluctantly and stintedly, and that even degree that was accomplished was done selfishly; was merely a war-measure, to which we were forced by our own perils and necessities. …

Student Paper Contest

Student Paper Contest

Special issue on IEEE MWSCAS 2012

This special issue consists of the expanded version of three papers in the area of Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing presented at the 2012 IEEE 55th International Midwest Symposium on Circuits and Systems (MWSCAS), held at Boise, ID, from the 5th to the 8th of August, 2012. The major areas of Circuits and Systems covered by MWSCAS 2012, drew 368 submissions from 40 countries spanning the globe; 313 contributions were selected for presentations. Among the published contributions in the IEEE MWSCAS 2012 proceedings, a pre-selection of 10 papers has been completed and corresponding authors were invited for contributions to this special issue. After the assessment of at least two independent reviewers, three manuscripts have been accepted for publication. It is evident that selecting only three papers out of several hundreds of MWSCAS presentations is a difficult and critical task. We are aware that we probably missed several excellent contributions, but we do know that we did our best to put together this special issue in a timely manner. The guest editors wish to thank Professor Mohammed Ismail, Editor-in-Chief of Analog Integrated Circuits and Signal Processing Journal for giving us this opportunity, Nader Rafla, General Chair of MWSCAS 2012, and Mohamad Sawan and Jose de la Rosa, Technical Program Co-Chairs of MWSCAS 2012 for their unequivocal support. We also gratefully acknowledge all of the reviewers for their assistance and Springer personnel for the competent and efficient support provided while putting together this special issue. The three selected papers reflect continuing trends towards higher levels of integrated analog circuits and systems. The first paper, ‘‘A 2.488-11.2 Gb/s SerDes in 40 nm LowLeakage CMOS with Multi-Protocol Compatibility for FPGA Applications,’’ by Socrates Vamvakos, Claude R. Gauthier, Chethan Rao, Alvin Wang, Karthisha Ramoshan Canagasaby, Khaldoon Abugharbieh, Prashant Choudhary, Sanjay Dabral, Shaishav Desai, Mahmudul Hassan, K. C. Hsieh, Bendik Kleveland, Gurupada Mandal, Richard Rouse, Ritesh Saraf, Jason Yeung, and Ying Cao presents a multi-protocol, next generation SerDes design. This paper authored by teams from MoSys Inc., Santa Clara, CA and Xilinx Inc., San Jose, CA received theMWSCAS 2012 Myril B. Reed Best Paper Award. The second paper, ‘‘A 1 GS/s, 31 MHz BW, 76.3 dB Dynamic Range, 34 mW CT-Delta-Sigma ADC with 1.5 Cycle Quantizer Delay and Improved STF,’’ by Sakkarapani Balagopal, Kehan Zhu and Vishal Saxena of Boise State University, Boise, ID details the implementation of a high-performance continuous-time delta-sigma modulator with improved signal transfer function (STF). This paper was one among the ten papers presented at the MWSCAS 2012 Student Paper Contest. The third paper, ‘‘Fully Integrated 1.2-lA and 13-lA Quiescent Current LDOs with Improved Transient Response,’’ by Harish Valapala and Paul M. Furth of New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM details the implementation of two extremely low quiescent current, low-dropout (LDO) voltage regulators. Both LDO designs are fully integrated, stabilized with an on-chip capacitive load of 100 pF. We thank all the authors who contributed to this issue; the issue wouldn’t be possible without their research and A. Garimella (&) Intel Corporation, USA e-mail: garimella@ieee.org

PCDRecognizes Outstanding Student Research: Patel et al on Emergency Medical Services Capacity for Prehospital Stroke Care in North Carolina

This week, Preventing Chronic Disease (PCD) publishes the winning submission in the journal’s third annual Student Research Paper Contest, “Emergency Medical Services Capacity for Prehospital Stroke Care in North Carolina,” by Mehul D. Patel and colleagues (1). The contest is part of PCD’s effort to support and encourage the development of the next generation of public health professionals. Mr Patel is an epidemiology student in the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and Dr Wayne Rosamond is his academic and dissertation advisor. As in previous years, submissions in the 2013 contest examined a range of topics and used a variety of analytic methods. Since the first contest in 2011, the quality of the submissions has improved, making the final decision that much more difficult for the panel of judges. As Patel and colleagues note, stroke morbidity and mortality is high in the United States and in North Carolina. It is well known that early treatment of stroke can make a difference in event outcomes. During the past decade, efforts have been made to raise public awareness of stroke signs and symptoms and the importance of acting early and to increase the knowledge and capacity of emergency medical services (EMS) to improve health outcomes. Patel and colleagues examined improvements in EMS capacity to identify and treat stroke in North Carolina from 2001 through 2012. A statewide survey in 2001 found deficiencies in EMS education and the use of protocols. The authors’ survey in 2012 documented major improvements since 2001, especially in prehospital stroke screening, and highlighted other areas that remain in need of improvement, including the use of destination plans. This article nicely demonstrates the relationship among data, health, health care, and policy. The 2001 survey documented the need to improve the stroke care capacity of EMS systems in North Carolina, and surveillance data documented the burden of stroke (2,3). Together, this information supported the development and passage of state legislation in 2006 to address the availability of stroke-related resources among hospitals and EMS systems and the implementation of standardized EMS stroke care practices and policies. Results from the 2012 survey indicated that EMS had made progress in its capacity to provide services. The decline in stroke mortality in North Carolina documented by external data sources provides some ecological support to changes in health outcomes. The study had one limitation that highlights an opportunity for collaboration between clinical and public health systems: the study had no direct measures of services provided, patient outcomes, or population-level indicators. This limitation points to a challenge faced by many public health researchers: access to health outcome data in addition to process and proxy outcome measures. Direct measurement of health outcomes is ultimately needed to determine intervention effectiveness and to make a convincing argument for public health programs and policies. In North Carolina, the decline in stroke mortality documented by external data sources parallels changes in policy and service protocols. However, Patel’s study did not include data on health outcomes or services provided, both of which could offer evidence that changes in health outcomes resulted from changes in policies and service protocols. Data from other sources can sometimes be used to triangulate findings; however, this approach has limitations. This gap in data highlights an opportunity for clinical and public health systems to work together to collect data that will provide the strongest evidence to evaluate policy changes. Congratulations to Mr Patel and his colleagues on their outstanding work. We invite you to read the winning article (www.cdc.gov/pcd/issues/2013/13_0035.htm) and to listen to the accompanying podcast, an interview with the author. The study represents exceptional work, selected from a pool of several outstanding manuscripts, performed by members of the next generation of public health researchers. Although there can be only one contest winner, we were pleased to find that several manuscripts were of sufficient merit to warrant future publication in PCD. The review process for these student submissions was conducted by a panel of PCD editorial board members as well as Ellen Kersten, winner of the 2012 PCD Student Research Paper Contest. We look forward to the next round of student papers for the 2014 contest. The deadline for submission of student papers is January 31, 2014.

New year’s message

With the arrival of 2012, the journal of Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering in China has stepped into the sixth year since its birth. It is a great pleasure to express sincere thanks to all of our authors, editors, reviewers and readers who have supported us for the past five years, and wish you have a very promising and happy new year. Environmental issues draw global attention. China is also very concerned about these issues, and has strengthened communication and cooperation with other countries. The goal of our journal is to provide an international communication platform of high quality. Here I am pleased to announce two pieces of good news. First, our journal will change its name from the Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering in China to the Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering, representing a step forward as an international journal. Second, the journal will change from a quarterly to a bi-monthly journal in order to provide more opportunities for environmental researchers to communicate and to publish their excellent works. In 2011, we have selected three best papers as The Annual Best Paper in recognition for the most influential papers and with an aim to promote the basic knowledge of environmental sciences and the development of engineering technologies. In 2012, we will continue with The Annual Best Paper contest in order to draw more attention to the journal, and to encourage innovations in the environmental fields. Meanwhile, we will continue to make efforts to further improve our journal. Again, we would like to express our heartfelt thanks for your support. In 2012, we will improve the quality and scientific impact of our journal, and provide more opportunities for environmental researchers to communicate. We desire your further support to build a high-quality journal platform!

Imagining State and Federal Law in Pauline E. Hopkins's <em>Contending Forces</em>

Boston University Winner of Best Paper Contest, 2009 SSAWW Conference, General Category opening section of Pauline E. Hopkins's Contending Forces, set in 179os, Charles Montfort, a wealthy white plantation owner who has recently moved to North Carolina from Bermuda to escape imminent emancipation of his slaves, is shot dead. His wife is stripped whipped, his wife sons are transformed into slave property, his mansion is looted by a mob then burned. His estate, including his wife children as well as his property slaves, is then distributed among whites who carried out attack. The mob, organized as a committee on public safety, is led by Anson Pollock, a local aristocrat with sexual designs on Mrs. Montfort. Assisted by Bill Sampson Hank Davis, Pollock incites attack by spreading rumors that Montfort's slaves are planning an insurrection that Montfort's known plan to free his slaves at some future time constitutes illicit encouragement of rebellion. Discussing raid, Hopkins explains, In those old days, if accused of aiding slaves in a revolt, a white man stood no more chance than a Negro accused of same crime. He forfeited life property. This power of law Anson Pollock had invoked (7o). She adds that to gain sexual access to Grace Montfort, Pollock had first accused her of having black blood, then arranged that the two children their mother fell to his lot ... as his portion of spoils (71). No legal process is described__no hearing with testimony to determine Grace's race, for instance. Instead, Hopkins gives us a world in which state law, rather than intervening to prevent mob violence, actively legitimates is continuous with it. The public machinery of state law is an available instrument whites deploy to sate their private lusts, resentments, greed. Local anti-insurrection laws, combined with state tolerance of mob action, provide corrupt individuals with legal cover for murder, whipping, rape, theft, including theft of persons as property__actions carried out with impunity against whites as well as blacks. concluding section of novel, set in Boston in 189os, heirs of two Montfort sons recover a total of $250,000 in (376). Their lawsuit is brought on unspecified grounds against US government is heard privately by US Supreme Court (376-84). That is, federal government pays money to heirs of individuals who suffered (as much as a hundred years earlier) physical violence, emotional damage, loss of valuable property under color of antebellum state law. While state law had enabled injury, federal law provides a utopian pathway to healing it. Written in a time of heightened racial violence widespread lynching, Contending Forces situates federal law as key site for reparative justice for a range of injuries stemming from slavery. Hopkins's imaginative vision, federal government through its treasury its court system closes books on nation's shameful past opens door to its principled future. Although Hopkins calls her work a little romance, she also insists that both antebellum events those contemporary with her actually occurred (13, 14). Ample proof can be found, she asserts, in archives of Newberne, North Carolina, courthouse and at national seat of government, Washington, D. C. (14). No evidence has been found of a closely parallel North Carolina case or of any federal case paying reparative damages for wrongs like these; yet several critics have accepted Hopkins's claims to historical accuracy, including her excellent biographer Lois Brown, who argues at length that Montforts' story was traumatic story of Hopkins's own great-grandparents (220-52).(1) Looking closely at nineteenth-century historical legal context, I argue that, far from recounting personal or even possible legal events, Hopkins carefully reinvents American law in her novel to serve her reparative vision. …

Sarah Orne Jewett's “The Foreigner” and the Transamerican Routes of New England Regionalism

Winner of the Best Paper Contest, 2009 SSAWW Conference, Graduate Student Category In January 1896, just as the first installments of Country of the Pointed Firs were appearing in the Atlantic Monthly, Sarah Orne Jewett traveled by cruise ship throughout the Caribbean. Writing home to Louisa Dresel, Jewett expressed her fascination with the islands of Haiti and Jamaica, articulating her touristic view of the local population in racialized terms that echo the nostalgic plantation literature of the 185os: Then we went to Hayti, which was oh, so funny with its pomp of darkeys. Port au Prince was quite an awful scene of thriftlessness and silly pretense__but one or two little Haytian harbours and the high green coast were most lovely. And then Jamaica, with all its new trees and flowers, and its coolies, Loulie! with their bangles and turbans and strange eyes. You would like Jamaica immensely (Letters 163). Jewett eventually returned to the exoticized and eroticized Jamaica that she thought her friend would love in a ghost story that told the history of Dunnet Landing, Maine, prior to that community's presentation in her most critically acclaimed work, Country of the Pointed Firs. The Foreigner, written in the fall of 1899 and published in the Atlantic in August 190o, would, in fact, bring Jamaica__and the complex maritime interconnections of the Atlantic slave trade__home to Maine. The Foreigner reveals the secrets behind Mrs. Todd's herbalist powers and empathic connections to the women of Dunnet Landing. When read alongside a series of letters Jewett wrote during her many travels to Europe and the Caribbean between 1898 and 1900 that contain her most consistent and developed thoughts on American imperialism, the story depicts these secrets as emerging from a history of racial exclusion and sexual threats to the homogeneity of that small maritime community. Jewett's deliberate ambiguity in describing the racial and national background of Mrs. Tolland, the title character of The Foreigner, marks that figure as unstable, unable to be synthesized fully into the regionalist reshaping of local and national communities. That which is marked as foreign in this story is precisely what haunts the imagined space of the pure and homogeneous communal history suggested in Country of the Pointed Firs. In trying to situate Dunnet Landing in the context of the global, Jewett instead highlights both the regional barriers to the promises of assimilation and the nostalgic dream of a benevolent American empire at the turn of the century. Unable to assimilate the racialized figure of Mrs. Tolland into the Dunnet Landing community, Jewett attempts to subordinate race to gender and, in the process, to elicit sympathy from white readers for a victimized woman whose racialized body must be erased by the story's conclusion. Further, the secret history of Dunnet Landing that Jewett reveals in The Foreigner essentially rewrites the earlier Country of the Pointed Firs, problematizing critical interpretations that disavow the importance of race, slavery, and empire in the novel in favor of gender- and class-centered readings. In fact, Jewett's simultaneous evocation and erasure of race in The Foreigner demonstrate how the story's shared bonds of female empathy, familial belonging, and nostalgia are constructed through the intersection of imperial nostalgia and amnesia. JEWETT'S TRAVELS AND HER WRITINGS ON NATION Jewett's frequent travels between her introduction to the Boston Brahmin class in 1879 and her final extended trip in 190o included trips to Europe for reasons of cultural enlightenment, many trips to health spas in New England and the American South for reasons of convalescence, and a two-month cruise to the Caribbean on a private yacht for reasons of both health (primarily to escape the bitter New England winters) and elite cultural tourism to places imagined to be exotic. …

10th international French speaking conference on knowledge discovery and management (EGC2010)

This conference report gives an overview of the 10th International French-speaking conference on Knowledge Discovery and Management (KDM) held in Hammamet, Tunisia, January 26-29, 2010. Since 2001, this annual conference has been supported by EGC. EGC is a non-profit French association which aims at promoting KDM both in academia and industries. The conference is the main annual event of the association EGC. Even if the official language is French, the selection process of the conference follows high-quality international standard, e.g. at least 3 reviews per paper, blind reviews, author feedbacks. At a glance, EGC 2010)2 may be summarized in some key figures: 139 submitted papers, 32 accepted long papers (25% selection ratio), 30 short papers, 31 posters and 12 software demonstrations; 7 joined workshops and 2 tutorials; 4 keynote talks; a best paper contest rewarded by 2 prizes. More than 275 participants from 23 countries attended this edition celebrating the 10th birthday of the conference. The next EGC conference will be held in Brest, France, in January 25-28, 2011.

Tips for New Graduate Students [The GOLD Report

Before starting the article, I would like to congratulate the students who received the best paper awards, all the students whose papers were selected in the Student Paper Contest, and the students whose papers received special mention. I take this opportunity to thank all the students and advisors and IEEE GOLD (Graduates of the Last Decade) members who attended the Student Reception held Sunday, July 11, 2010, at the IEEE International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation and USNCIURSI National Radio Science Meeting in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. While meeting other PhD students and staff members at the meeting and with my personal experience as graduate student, I would like to dedicate this article to all the new students who will be starting their graduate student life in the near future, and also for those who have started their graduate life in the fall semester, 2010

Guest Editorial: Special Issue on SoC for Multimedia Networking (SiPS 2007)

This special issue focuses on “SoC for Multimedia Networking,” the theme of the 2007 IEEE Workshop on Signal Processing Systems (SiPS 2007) held in Shanghai, China in October 2007. This issue consists of highest quality papers selected from SiPS 2007 presentations with three major emphases centered on multimedia, networking, and architecture/SoC. For SiPS 2007, we were very pleased to receive a record number of 299 paper submissions from 36 countries. After a rigorous review and selection process, the final technical program consisted of 130 papers (43.48% acceptance rate) representing 25 different countries. These papers were arranged into nine lecture and 10 poster sessions (one special session), and the threeday technical program also included a student paper contest. The highlights of the workshop were the three keynote presentations by Magdy Bayoumi, Liang-Gee Chen, and Lajos Hanzo, each of them addressing state-ofthe-art and future direction in these emerging areas. To select high quality papers for publication in this special issue, authors of the papers that received high review scores were invited to submit expanded version of their papers to include more in-depth research work. Each of the papers was again carefully reviewed by at least three reviewers and the final decision for each was reached after careful discussion among the four guest editors. Finally, only seven papers passed through this rigorous process and were eventually accepted. They address some contemporary design and implementation issues in “SoC for Multimedia Networking” applications. In multimedia communication, it is always challenging to achieve high received video quality under coding and communication constraints. Guo et al. presents a fast multihypothesis motion compensated filter for video denoising. The authors utilize a number of hypotheses (temporal predictions) to estimate the current pixel which is corrupted with noise. Song et al. proposes an adaptive pixel interpolation technique for spatial error concealment in block-based coding system, where a missing pixel in a corrupted block can be derived from four neighborhoods of the block through interpolation using a multiple prediction strategy. The design works effectively in consecutive block loss situation which is common in real-time video. Pantoja et al. addresses the use of super-resolution algorithm based on irregular sampling for video transcoding with resolution conversion. This is because in transcoding, quantization and other techniques could result in lower video output quality. The proposed method was applied to VC-1 to H.264 transcoding to show video quality improvement. The paper also includes a hardware feasibility study. In system-on-chip designs, recent research have migrated from fairly simple single processor and memory designs to relatively complicated systems with multiple processors, onchip memories, standard peripherals, and other functional blocks. Communication between these blocks becomes the dominant critical system path and performance bottleneck of system-on-chip designs. Network-on-chip architectures emerged as solutions for future system-on-chip communication architecture designs. Wang et al. presents a novel network-onchip architecture, pipelining multi-channel central caching, to address the cost and communication latency/throughput of existing architectures. By embedding a central cache into every switch of the network, blocked head packets can be removed from the input buffers and stored in the caches temporally, thus alleviating the effect of head-of-line and X. Yang :W. Zhang Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China

2009 Student Paper Contest Winners

2009 Student Paper Contest Winners

Experiencing and writing Indigeneity, rurality and gender: Australian reflections

This paper has two interrelated aims. The first is to contribute to knowledge about rurality, gender and Indigeneity. This is undertaken by the first author, Bebe Ramzan, an Indigenous woman living in the Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara (APY) Lands. Bebe shows similarities across rural and remote areas in Australia and details her knowledge and experience of home, rurality, rural communities, land and gender. The second aim of the paper is to examine issues surrounding the involvement of academic white women in Indigenous research. Writing from the position of feminist white women Barbara Pini and Lia Bryant reflect on theories of whiteness as cultural practice and in this paper contest representations of rurality in rural studies as white.

Report on the 2008 AP-S Symposium student paper contest

Report on the 2008 AP-S Symposium student paper contest

8 th French-speaking conference on knowledge discovery and management (EGC2008)

In this paper, we provide a report about the 8th French-speaking conference on Knowledge Discovery and Management (EGC'2008) [1] held in Sophia Antipolis, France, from January 29 th to February 1 st , 2008. Since 2001, this annual conference has been supported by the French-speaking association (EGC Association) which aims at promoting Data Mining and Knowledge Management for both research issues and applications in companies. EGC2008 may be summarized in some key figures: 130 submitted papers, 40 accepted long papers (33% selection ratio) published in a special issue of a review and completed with 30 short papers, 15 posters, and 8 software demonstrations; 9 joined workshops and 2 tutorials; 4 keynote talks; a best paper contest rewarded by 2 prizes of 1500 euros each; and 250 participants from 14 countries. The 9th EGC conference will be held in Strasbourg, France, in January 27-30, 2009 [2].

2007 Student Paper Contest Winners

2007 Student Paper Contest Winners

What SPE Has Meant to Me

SPE's current and incoming presidents and staff executive director reflect on how the society has influenced their careers. William M. Cobb, 2008 SPE President It has been my privilege to be connected with SPE for more than 43 years, as a student, as a junior member, and then as a full member. Since 1969, I have attended every SPE Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition (ATCE, in years gone by, was also known first as the Fall Meeting, then the Annual Meeting) but 1977. I have had opportunities to serve our society at the local, regional, and international levels. This 43-year relationship has been exciting, technically inspiring, and professionally rewarding for me. As I reflect over these years of service, I unearth many fond memories. One of my first memories was my participation in the Gulf Coast Region student paper contest in 1967 while I was a graduate student at Mississippi State University. I did not win, place, or show, but the experience of conducting a research project and then learning to make an oral presentation about it to my peers was one of the most enlightening adventures of my career. To this day, I am grateful for the guidance and constructive criticism from William D. McCain and T. Don Stacy and from my classmates. This early mentoring and networking set my feet firmly on the SPE path that I have found so gratifying throughout my career. (In 1968, I won the graduate-level competition at the first West Coast Region student paper contest while working on my PhD degree at Stanford University.) Another key moment came in 1972, when Professor W. John Lee asked me to serve on the Well Test Analysis Committee to help solicit abstracts and select papers for the 1973 ATCE in Las Vegas. This was my first opportunity to participate at the societywide level of SPE. The returns to my volunteer efforts were immeasurable—working with some of the most brilliant minds in our industry from around the world, exposure to the latest technology, and the chance to help shape one of our industry's most important events. (My wife, Carolyn, and I were married in May 1973, and the 1973 ATCE trip was our honeymoon. Unfortunately, I was bedridden with the flu during the entire meeting, but Carolyn kept me apprised of all of the activities.) Another special moment occurred in January 2000, when I received a call advising me that the SPE Nominating Committee had nominated me to serve a 3-year term on the SPE Board of Directors as Vice President of Finance. I was deeply honored, but very surprised at this invitation! After phone calls to several past presidents and a few days of mulling the invitation, I accepted the nomination. This 3-year assignment involved a significant commitment of work and travel, but also fun and friendships. I also gained a deeper understanding of how our society functions and supports our industry. Once again, the "return on investment" in SPE was personally and professionally high.

Reflections

What a surprise and a delight to receive the James Cretsos Leadership Award and to share it with my wonderful colleague, Caryn Anderson! This award is really a tribute to the wonderful teamwork spirit of the Special Interest Group/International Issues in Information (SIG/III), which I had the pleasure to chair this year (and with which Caryn has also been actively involved). Such a strong and dedicated team makes leadership easy and natural. I became a member of ASIS&T when I was a doctoral student. At that time, I was looking for a forum that could be my scholarly home, and my mentors and role models such as Christine Borgman and Marcia Bates all happened to be ASIS&T members. I joined ASIS&T because I wanted to be a part of the broader information science community, and it seemed to be the obvious (and only) venue to do so. No other association really brings together information scholars (in all their diversity) the way ASIS&T does. Many years later, as a supervisor for six doctoral students in Toronto, Canada, I encourage my own students to also think about ASIS&T as their primary home and to join this great network. In 2004, the students created a University of Toronto Chapter of ASIS&T, for which I have been serving as the faculty advisor. Although I hold a membership in various SIGs, the one that has a special status for me is SIG/III. Since the beginning I have been struck by the warmth and inclusiveness of the SIG/III officers. Michel Menou, who introduced me to SIG/III, remains a wonderful mentor and friend. Other long-time contributors to the SIG who have also shared their passion and dedication include Sue Johnson, Yin Zhang, Toni Carbo, Bahaa El Hadidy and many others. I held various positions within the SIG (communications officer, marketing chair, jury member for the International Paper Contest, and chair-elect) before becoming the chair in 2005–2006. Through SIG/III have come to realize how privileged we (in the West) are in terms of access to information, resources and technologies, and how much we take these aspects for granted. At SIG/III, we strive to promote (through discussions and practical initiatives) equity issues as well as diversity of viewpoints by providing a forum for information sharing and exchange with our colleagues from all over the world, particularly developing nations. It has been tremendously rewarding to watch various colleagues from India, China, Brazil and Nigeria get involved in various SIG/III (and ASIS&T) activities and become mentors and resource people for new members. Through initiatives such as the International Paper Contest (now in its seventh year), the InfoShare program (which awards one-year ASIS&T memberships to information professionals in developing countries), the International Calendar of Information Science Conferences, as well as the Global Information Village Plaza (which Michel Menou and I co-organized for three years, and is now in the able hands of Aaron Bowen and Amanda Wilson), and the new Mentorship Program, we are able to broaden the scope and reach of ASIS&T to address global issues that concern us all. This year, we further signaled our commitment to diversity and inclusiveness by adding two new positions to an already international roster of SIG/III officers. We established SIG/III co-chair and co-chair elect positions, both of which are to be filled by individuals residing outside North America. For 2005–2006, I was fortunate to have Miriam Vieira da Cunha, from Brazil, as a co-chair, and our co-chair elect was a previous winner of the International Paper Contest, Ifeanyichukwu (Ify) Njoku, from Nigeria. The future looks bright for SIG/III and ASIS&T with such leaders as next year's SIG/III chair, Duncan Omole, from Kenya (who is also a previous winner of the International Paper Contest and is now at the World Bank). He will be leading an internationally competent and dedicated team that will continue to collaborate with other SIGs and benefit ASIS&T as a whole. Mine has been a humbling experience, where I learnt as much as I contributed. As long as ASIS&T will keep recruiting and retaining able and dedicated individuals from all parts of the intellectual and geographical spectrum, it is headed in the right direction. I encourage everyone to check out the great work of SIG/III (at www.asis.org/SIG/SIGIII/) and more importantly to join a SIG (or two or three) and become involved. The payoff is tremendous.

ASIST SIG III’s International Paper Contest Raffle

The American Society for Information Science and Technology’s SIG for International Information Issues’ fundraising raffle for this year’s international paper contest is in full swing. The grand-prize winner will go home with a sophisticated Dell Inspiron Digital Notebook. The fundraiser kicked off on April 1, 2007, and will conclude with a draw during the 2007 International Reception at the ASIST Annual Meeting in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in October 2007. Only 250 tickets will be sold, thus each entrant has an excellent chance of winning the grand prize. Tickets are sold on a first come, first served basis. Monies raised will promote international research by benefiting the winners of the 2007 international paper contest.
 
 Tickets are available at: http://www.asist.org/SIG/SIGIII/fundraising/fundraising2007/
 
 The purposes of SIG III are:
 
 to promote better awareness among ASIST members and information professionals of the importance of international cooperation
 to facilitate and enhance better communication and interaction among ASIST members and their foreign colleagues on information issues
 to develop an international network of digital scholars and experts on digital libraries and information technology in developing countries
 to provide a forum for exploring and discussing international information issues and problems
 
 SIG III membership includes most non-U.S. ASIST members, and a true cross-section of U.S. ASIST members.
 
 More information about the paper contest can be found on the award winning SIG III website under Paper Contest:
 http://www.asis.org/SIG/SIGIII/index.htm

President's page

President's page