NCSU Libraries Focus Online

Volume 23 number 1 - Fall 2002

Laura K. Blessing, Director of Personnel Management

Laura K. Blessing joined the NCSU Libraries as director of Personnel Management on February 1, 2002. She is responsible for planning, developing, and delivering responsive and innovative services for library personnel and overseeing the staff in Personnel Services. She also directs leadership for the library's strategic initiatives to reward, recruit, and develop a diverse and highly skilled staff committed to providing quality library service.

Blessing comes to the library from the University of Texas at Arlington (UT-Arlington) Libraries, where she served as human resources and budget manager. In 1996 she became the personnel librarian at UT-Arlington with responsibility for recruitment, employee relations, and staff development and training. In 1999 she assumed additional responsibility for management of the library's budget. Employee recruitment was also an important focus for her. She helped to facilitate the work of a team charged with planning and implementing a library-wide reorganization and had significant involvement with diversity initiatives on the national and local levels. Before joining the UT-Arlington Libraries, Blessing was a circulation/reserves librarian at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay.

Blessing holds the M.L.I.S. from the University of Texas at Austin, a B.A. in psychology from New Mexico State University, and has begun graduate coursework toward an M.S. in human resource management. She is active in professional organizations.

Joanna C. Duy, Serials Librarian

Joanna C. Duy joined the NCSU Libraries as its serials librarian on March 25, 2002. She manages the serials acquisitions program and works with other library departments on the licensing and tracking of digital resources to ensure access to serials resources.

Previously, Duy was an NCSU Libraries Fellow with a dual assignment in the Distance Learning Services (DLS) Department and the Veterinary Medical Library (VML). In DLS she developed a database of usage statistics and contact information for electronic products and vendors, served as a liaison with database and electronic-journal vendors regarding usage statistics and other services, and contributed to the development of the E-Journal Finder project at the Libraries. At VML Duy performed collection management duties, served as a member of the Agriculture and Life Sciences Subject Team, and redesigned the VML Web site.

Before working at NC State, Duy was the librarian for the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Greenhouse and Processing Crops Research Centre in Harrow, Ontario.

Duy received an M.L.I.S. from the University of Western Ontario, an M.S. in biology from Acadia University, and a B.S. in biology from McGill University. She received the Sam D. Neill Scholarship for academic achievement for graduate work in library and information science and the Dawson Scholarship in biology for her graduate work at Acadia University.

Joseph Hester, Academic Personnel Librarian

Joseph Hester became the NCSU Libraries' academic personnel librarian on April 8, 2002. He plans and manages academic personnel services for the library's professional staff, designs and implements innovative recruitment and retention strategies, and oversees all search and nomination processes to ensure compliance with federal and university regulations.

Hester has a broad range of experience in personnel recruitment, educational training, public relations, and communication, with more than ten years of experience in personnel management and recruitment. Most recently, he served as business administrator for Raleigh's Hudson Memorial Presbyterian Church.

Previously, Hester worked as a research assistant in the North Carolina Collection at UNC-Chapel Hill, where he provided reference service and bibliographic instruction and worked extensively with the Thomas Wolfe Collection. He also was employed at the Environmental Protection Agency Library in the Research Triangle Park as a reference and branch librarian.

Hester completed degree work in 2002 for the M.S.I.S. as well as requirements for library science from UNC-Chapel Hill. He is a recipient of the School of Information and Library Science's Margaret Ellen Kalp Scholarship. He holds an M.Div. as well as a B.A. in history and Germanic languages and literature from Duke University, where he received the Robert E. Cushman Exchange Fellowship to study at the University of Bonn.

Steven P. Morris, Head of Digital Library Initiatives Department

Steven P. Morris became head of the Digital Library Initiatives Department on May 20, 2002. He leads the development of the Libraries' digital products and services, including Web-based services, multimedia cataloging, search and delivery systems, and emerging teaching and learning initiatives. Morris works with other library and campus units and with faculty and students to foster new digital library solutions that best serve the needs of the academic community.

From February 2000 to the time of his appointment, Morris headed Data Services at the Libraries. He maintained a high level of expertise in spatial and numeric data resources and applications, geographic information systems (GIS), metadata standards and trends, and user-oriented digital library environments. In addition, he coordinated the design and delivery of instructional sessions and of Web-based tutorials, data documentation, and research resources for the campus.

Morris joined the Libraries in 1997 as librarian for spatial and numeric data services. In that position, he developed and managed GIS and other library spatial and numeric data resources and services. Previously, he worked as a technical services librarian at the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California at Berkeley.

Morris received an M.L.S. from the University of California at Berkeley and a B.A. and M.A. in geography from California State University at Chico. In addition, he completed coursework in East European studies at the University of Uppsala, Sweden, and in industrial cooperation at the Central School of Planning and Statistics in Poland.

Jan H. Kemp, Associate Director for Collection Management, Organization, and Preservation

Jan H. Kemp became the associate director for Collection Management, Organization, and Preservation at the NCSU Libraries on June 3, 2002. She provides leadership for the Collection Management, Special Collections, Acquisitions, Cataloging, and Preservation departments and ensures that programs and services meet the scholarly needs of NC State. Kemp serves as primary liaison for collections issues regionally and nationally, and she represents the Libraries on cooperative collection development initiatives in the Triangle Libraries Research Network (TRLN).

Most recently, Kemp served as interim associate dean at Texas Tech University Library, where she administered the collections, technical services, and public services programs. She gained leadership experience on regional and national library committees, including several with the Association of College and Research Libraries.

Before her appointment as interim associate dean, Kemp served as head of the Acquisitions Department at Texas Tech University Library. She participated in budget allocation processes and worked with collection management staff to oversee the materials budget, ordering and receiving procedures, and accreditation reports. Previously, she was cataloger and reference librarian at the University of Texas at Austin (UT-Austin), interlibrary loan/reference librarian and serials librarian at Texas A & M University at Commerce, and senior reference librarian at the Austin Public Library.

Kemp received an M.L.S. from UT-Austin, an M.S. in business administration from Texas Tech University, and a B.A. in general and comparative studies from UT-Austin. She is currently enrolled in the Ph.D. program in management at Texas Tech University. Kemp has received many scholarships and awards, including a Dean's Scholarship from the Rawls College of Business Administration at Texas Tech University.

Gregory K. Raschke, Assistant Head of Collection Management

Gregory K. Raschke became assistant head of the NCSU Libraries' Collection Management Department on July 12, 2002. He helps to manage collection development, budget allocation, policy formulation, user needs assessment, and liaison activities. He also supervises the science and engineering collection managers.

Raschke formerly served as head of the Spahr Engineering Library at the University of Kansas, where he administered all operations, supervised staff, managed collection development for the School of Engineering, evaluated electronic resources, and served as interim bibliographer for mathematics and chemistry.

Before his appointment at the University of Kansas, Raschke worked at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He served as information consultant to the School of Industrial and Systems Engineering and the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, and he managed the work of librarians and staff of the Technical Resources Department.

Raschke received an M.S.L.I.S. and a B.A. in history and political science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Raschke received the 2001 Reference Press Service Award from the American Library Association.