Future Assets! Staff Newcomer of the Year

Awarded to a Libraries’ faculty member and a classified staff member who has exhibited:

• Exceptional job performance;
• Strong work ethic;
• Commitment to service;
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills;
• Dedicated engagement in training for the position and a commitment to professional development;
• Successful initiation of working relationships, and
• Demonstration of solid potential for future service to the Libraries

Tim Smolko - Cataloging

Tim Smolko stood out in the crowd from Day One of our contact with him at the UGA Libraries--it's not often that we receive applications for staff positions from as far away as Pittsburgh, PA, but there it was, and he certainly seemed well-qualified on paper. He started in the Music Section of the Cataloging Department on June 4, 2007, and wasted no time at all in making a good impression. Within a month, he was producing substantial quantities of accurately-edited cataloging copy for printed music, and was champing at the bit to learn new things every time his supervisors turned around. Tim is one of the most goal-oriented staff members it has been my pleasure to encounter. He stated during his interview that he plans eventually to be a professional music cataloger, and he has been accepted into the MA program at the Hugh Hodgson School of Music here at UGA as of this writing. He asks probing questions about the cataloging code during training sessions that reveal a keenly analytical mind, something that is necessary to good cataloging in all subject areas and all formats of materials. He is a "knowledge sponge," and the UGA Libraries benefit from this habit in the returns we see in his editing of cataloging copy. Tim has quickly mastered all the basic skills required for copy-cataloging of printed music, and is now well on his way to independence in the myriad complications of sound recordings cataloging too. He will soon be adding music videorecordings to the mix.

Many of Tim's questions during training are framed in terms of a service ethic, for example, "How does taking time in the workflow to do A, rather than B, benefit our patrons? Have you ever thought about focusing on B instead, and if not, why not?" Tim reads on his breaks--not novels or newspapers, as many of us do, but biographies of composers and performers, professional literature on music libraranship, histories of music, and writings on the theory and practice of music. His natural inclination as a cataloger is to include more information (for example, detailed contents notes), rather than less, and he is willing to put in the extra effort that it takes to balance such an inclination with countervailing departmental priorities such as high production goals. Such actions are all hallmarks of professionalism, regardless of whether one is a staff member or faculty.

Tim proved to be a good fit in the Music Section right from the start, establishing cordial and effective working relationships with all his section colleagues, including the Student Assistants. He deals with other people inside and outside of the Cataloging Department in a polite and attentive manner, and is clearly a long-time practitioner of the "Golden Rule" (i.e., do unto others as you would have them do unto you), which is so important to both our departmental goals and to his own opportunities for staff development in the future.

Tim is now juggling being a new father of twins with starting a masters program in music and continuing to train as a full-time staff member of the Libraries. A lesser person might collapse under the strain, but Tim takes it all and just uses it as fuel for his goals, which, thus far, have only benefited his department and the Libraries. He is a member of the Music Library Association (US), and of SEMLA, the Southeast Chapter of the Music Library Association, and he hopes to be able to attend a SEMLA meeting as soon as his class schedule and personal finances permit.

It is a pleasure and an honor to work with Tim, and I commend him to the 2008 ASSET Awards Committee with all enthusiasm. Thank you for giving him the consideration that he has certainly earned.

Summer Ciomek - Map Library

Summer started work in the Map Library in May, 2007 and quickly established herself as a valuable staff member.  Despite having no previous cataloging experience, Summer has become a very successful map copy cataloger, particularly noteworthy due to the inherent intricacies and complexities of cartographic resource cataloging that often confound more experienced catalogers.  She successfully supervises our student staff and manages their various projects to help reduce an extensive cataloging and weeding backlog, to date having helped identify close to 40,000 duplicate maps for disposal.  Knowing she would be expected to provide reference assistance Summer made familiarizing herself with our collections her top priority from day one; patrons find her to be very knowledgeable and helpful and enjoy working with her.  In addition to her work in the Map Library, Summer occasionally assists Will Langford in retrieving, sorting and inventorying large quantities of donated materials.  Well-liked by her colleagues and employees, Summer is always quick to provide assistance when needed and always approaches her work with a great deal of energy and enthusiasm.  

Summer’s willingness to ask questions, offer suggestions and solicit feedback demonstrates her interest in and understanding of both the mission of the Map Library and the University Libraries as a whole.  She expects to start library school this fall and will no doubt approach her studies with the same level of interest, energy and enthusiasm she demonstrates towards the Map Library.  In short, Summer is a tremendous asset to the University Libraries who will continue to make a positive impact on our organization for years to come.

Ann Carey - Government Documents Processing

Ann Carey is an outstanding “newcomer,” although it would be more appropriate to call her a “returnee.”  A UGA grad, Ann worked in the UGA Libraries for 5 years in the 1980’s, left to work in libraries in Virginia and Tennessee, and finally returned home last fall.  Her wide variety of library experience includes preservation, circulation, cataloging, interlibrary loan, and bibliographic searching.  And she is now adding government documents to her repertoire.

The maturity, dedication, and breadth of experience Ann brings to her position are outstanding.  She came with exceptional skills in using an integrated library system and OCLC, as well as with many years of experience getting along with people in a variety of workplace settings. Her ability to make connections between her past experience and various aspects of her new position made her an ideal trainee.  And the fact that she came to us with the ability to distinguish a serial from a monograph brought immeasurable joy to all concerned!

The work ethic Ann exhibits would be an outstanding model for any employee.  She is focused and hard-working, managing her time effectively and completing an incredible amount of project work (doing retrospective updating of GIL records and barcoding pieces) in addition to her regular duties.  Her organizational skills, dedication, and desire to do things as effectively as possible have led her to fashion new ways of accomplishing tasks, including new methods for managing claims and tracking GPO shipping lists.  These new methods have given us a much better handle on problems than we previously had.

Ann clearly demonstrates solid potential for future service to the Libraries.  She is dedicated, hard-working, easy to get along with, and obviously committed to working in libraries.

Donnie Summerlin - DLG

With an educational background in history, Donnie hit the ground running with newspaper digitization. His research skills proved essential in disambiguating newspaper titles, and his contagious enthusiasm for historical resources motivates both co-workers and the student assistants he supervises. Donnie is a pleasure to work with and always upbeat. A patient listener, he excels in training and supervising student assistants and trouble-shooting. Quick to learn even the most technical of tasks, Donnie is naturally adept in the digital realm. He helps operations run smoothly by treating everyone with respect and lightens the workload with his sense of humor. Eager to expand his skill and knowledge through library seminars, Donnie is considering library school. His competence reflects highly on both DLG and the Libraries.

Donnie Summerlin - DLG

Since his arrival in the DLG, Donny has been helping test and develop the DLG's approach to digitizing newspapers. In the digital library arena, digitizing newspapers is particularly tricky, and the field is definitely on the bleeding edge. At the same time, the DLG's users are clamoring for access to fully searchable digitized newspaper content. During his short tenure, he (with the aid of our student assistants) has digitized the Macon Telegraph from 1826 to 1908. Over 50,000 pages of microfilmed newspapers have been scanned, cropped, and OCRed. Historic newspapers are often difficult to read and OCR because of broken type and other printing issues, so it is extremely important the best scans possible be made available. Donny has tested various methods of scanning to improve legibility and to enhance OCR extraction which will improve our users' experience with the database. He performs all these duties with a high-level of attention to detail and with a commitment to the development of a high quality product. Moreover, Donny actively engages with other team members and contributes to project discussions. He also responds to changes in workflow with a high degree of flexibility and actively contributes to improvement of processes.

Donny quickly absorbs new tasks and is a good critical thinker. He effectively analyzes problems and improves methodologies to create a high quality product. He is patient and willing to apply new techniques to improve past work and to new projects. As our newspaper methodologies are evolving, his flexibility is essential. He is always eager to learn new tasks and broaden his knowledge of digital libraries and is considering pursuing an MLS to complement his MA in history.

Donny has been an excellent hire and we look forward to great things from him.

Donnie Summerlin - DLG

I have no doubt that both the DLG and UGA Libraries' missions are enhanced by Donnie's presence. He has a gentle and sunny disposition that makes him easy to work with, paired with a public historian's passion for archival materials and a quickness-to-learn that make him such a good fit in the DLG. I am still impressed with what a quick study Donnie was when we trained him to use pretty complex microfilm scanning equipment and software during his first week in the DLG. Not only did he pick things up quickly, but his experience looking through many newspapers as a grad student in history was such a tremendous asset.  Because Donnie really understood the logic and quirks of historic newspapers, typesetting and layout, only several weeks after his initial training, he was able to apply even more complex aspects of image capture and preparing historic newspaper microfilm copy for optimal optical character recognition (OCR) scanning. Aside from his being such a  great guy, and such a pleasure to have in the work area, I think the UGA Libraries are extremely well-served by having such a good citizen among its workforce. I know that Donnie has expressed interest in the MLIS coffee meetings, and hope that he does indeed decide to become a librarian, because I think he'd be great at it. And with that interest in trivia...who knows? He might become the Greatest Trivia Player. Ever.

Kelsie Crawford - Serials

As her co-worker, I have been happily humbled and mightily impressed by Kelsie's ability to learn and master the duties of her position in record time. She works hard and fast and yet maintains a high standard of accuracy and attention to detail. She sticks her neck out and dares to propose new ways of accomplishing things and has already been an agent of several positive procedural changes. Simply put, the woman is smart as all-get-out and a true asset to the department.