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Book launch for Building Our Own: Critiques, Narratives, and Practices by Community College Library Workers of Color, edited by Amanda M. Leftwich and Eva M.L. Rios-Alvarado
Presenter Info
Amanda M. Leftwich
Amanda M. Leftwich is the Student Success Librarian and Instructor at Montgomery County Community College (MCCC). She received her M.S.L.S. from Clarion University of Pennsylvania and M.A. in Human Development from Fielding Graduate University. She is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Human Development at Fielding Graduate University. Her research focus includes fandom, mindfulness, reflective practice, communities of practice, and effective peer review within librarianship. Her teaching focus includes accessibility, embedded librarianship, and collaboration with faculty through liaison programs. In 2018, she became the first Faculty Diversity Fellow at the Libraries at MCCC. She has presented her research at national and international conferences on wellness in librarianship, focusing on Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) librarians and library workers.
Eva M.L. Rios-Alvarado
Eva M.L. Rios-Alvarado has worked as a community college librarian since 2014. The “Libertad” (freedom) in her name expresses who she is as a scholar, educator, and community member. She is engaged in research and practices which come from long traditions of liberation and resistance. As a practitioner of Capoeira Angola, the Afro-Brazilian spiritual, healing art, since the early 2000s, Eva continues to learn how to weave community and legacies of resistance as integral places and spaces into her education work and beyond. She has a B.A. in Geography, M.S.(LIS) in Library Information Science, and is working on her M.A. in Latin American Studies.
Gerie Ventura
Gerie Ventura is a second-generation Pinay born and raised in Tacoma, Washington. She has been the Director of the Highline College Library in Washington State since 2018. Gerie is a writer and avid community volunteer with the Filipino-American National Historical Society and the Friends of the Tukwila Library.
Evangela Oates
Evangela Q. Oates is a scholar-practitioner and the Associate University Librarian for Student Success at the University of Minnesota Libraries. For the past 15 years, she has worked in various positions in academic libraries spanning all institutional types. Following a critical constructivist paradigm, her research primarily used necessary frameworks and methodological approaches centered on lived experience. Her main research areas are Black faculty and administrators, academic librarianship, and community colleges.
Fran L. Lassiter
Fran L. Lassiter is an Associate Professor of English at Montgomery County Community College (MCCC). She received her Ph.D. in English from Temple University, specializing in African-American literature and early slave narratives. Her research and teaching focus broadly on questions of gendered and racialized identities in literature and Africanisms as a theoretical approach for the reclamation of understudied slave narratives. In 2008, she became the first Faculty Diversity Fellow at MCCC. She has presented papers at various national conferences on Black women writers and the rhetoric of nineteenth-century African American activists, and her paper entitled “Journey to Equality: From Maria W. Stewart to Barack Obama” received the Northeast Modern Language Association’s CAITY Caucus Prize in 2010. In addition, her paper “From Toasts to Raps: New Approaches for Teaching the Harlem Renaissance,” published in Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture, offers a cross-disciplinary approach to teaching literature of the period. She is completing a book on a free-Black family in Colonial-era Virginia. She is married and lives with her hus band in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.
Adriene Hobdy
Adriene Hobdy is the Director of Talent Management & Leadership Development at Montgomery County Community College. Dr. Hobdy received her Doctorate of Education in Leadership and Innovation from Wilmington University, a Master of Business in Human Resources Management, and a Master’s in Budget and Finance from the Lincoln University of Pennsylvania. She holds a Certificate of Leadership, Next Generation Leadership Academy, from Civitas Learning. Before that role, she was the AVP of Talent Management at Lambert Worldwide, Inc. In addition, Dr. Hobdy previously served as the Director and Associate Faculty of the Business Programs in the Schools of Graduate and Professional Studies at Rosemont College. Dr. Hobdy is very active in the community. She mentors high school and college students in Philadelphia, providing guidance and encouragement during their educational journey. She is the Vice-President of the National Association of University Women-Suburban Philadelphia Branch (NAUW) and a board member of the Abington School District Human Relations Council.
Sally Najera Romero
Sally Najera Romero is a Research and Instruction Librarian at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly Pomona). She holds her BA in Communications from California State University, Fullerton, and her MLIS from San Jose State University. She is a first-generation Latina who aims to focus her teaching and scholarship on equity, diversity, and inclusion and uplifting the voices of the Latinx community.
Andrew Kuo
Andrew Kuo is an immigrant from Taiwan who spent half his childhood in Delaware County, Pennsylvania. He has served as the Library Coordinator of Contra Costa College (CCC), an HSI community college, in California since 2018. He is a writer and poet. He is a member of the CCC Asian Pacific Islander Faculty & Staff Association and CCC Friends of the Library.
Edeama Onwuchekwa Jonah
Edeama Onwuchekwa Jonah is the Equity and Engagement Librarian and Professor at the San Diego Mesa College. She has worked as an Academic Librarian and gained several years of experience actively working in the library, working and engaging with faculty and students towards promoting student success outcomes. She has a unique passion for serving the needs of students, significantly underrepresented, underserved students of color, and students from different socio-economic groups. Onwuchekwa Jonah has published in academic journals, presented in conferences, and has created and developed content for diverse professional groups. She currently serves on the Executive Board of the California Academic and Research Libraries Association. She is also on the Advisory Board of the Lifelong Information Literacy (LILi) Group. Before these roles, she served as Chair-Elect and Chair for the Diversity in Academic Libraries interest group in the California Association of Research Libraries. She is a member of the American Library Association (ALA) and the Black Caucus of the American Library Association. Besides her leadership role in the library, Dr. Onwuchekwa Jonah is the current President of the San Diego Chapter (Region X) of the American Association for Women in Community Colleges. Dr. Onwuchekwa Jonah is a voracious reader and an adept believer of the Maxim “Information Provision for All”. She enjoys reading, writing, traveling, and spending time with her family.
Shamika Jamalia Morris Simpson
Shamika Jamalia Morris Simpson is the Collection Development and Outreach Librarian and professor at Long Beach City College in Long Beach, California. Shamika is the current California Academic & Research Libraries (CARL), Vice President/President-elect, and a Booklist board member. Before this role, she served as an executive board member of the Black Caucus of the American Library Association (BCALA), Secretary/Treasurer of the Southern California Technical Processes Group (SCTPG), and has volunteered with a host of other professional library associations and groups. Simpson is passionate about engaging technologies in instruction, student wellness, social justice in librarianship, and continuous learning. She holds Social Media and Marketing certificates from CSU Dominguez Hills, Diversity and Inclusion Skills from Library Juice Academy, and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Workplace from the University of South Florida Muma College of Business. She completed the 2021 CLA Developing Library Leaders Challenge and Dare to Lead certificate.
Dele Chinwe Ladejobi
Dele Chinwe Ladejobi is the Technical Services Librarian and professor at the Long Beach City College (LBCC), California. She currently serves as the Library Department Head. Dele has mentored several minority students and faculty from all over the world. She values the importance of literacy and access to information. Having experienced the frustrations of an environment where there are many barriers between students and the availability of critical resources, she has generously contributed thousands of essential educational materials to institutions in Nigeria, establishing her as an international educator who cares for the welfare and sound education for all societies. Several publications and instructional resources have cited her writings about the Nigerian-Biafran Civil War, African culture and traditions, especially the Igbo language, Igbo names, social life, and customs. Dele has served as a member on several campus-wide committees and task forces, including the Curriculum Committee; President’s Task Force on Race, Equity & Inclusion; Faculty and Staff Diversity, Faculty Co-Chair, Student Equity Committee; LBCC Faculty Association (LBCCFA); Chair of the LBCCFA Faculty Equity; Co-Chair, Faculty and Staff Diversity; and more. She is also a member of the American Library Association (ALA) and the Black Caucus of the American Library Association (BCALA). She has served as the Vice President and President of the Southern California Technical Processes Group (SCTPG). She enjoys gardening, writing, traveling, and spending time with her family.
Terezita Reyes Overduin
Terezita Reyes Overduin is a first-generation college student and academic. She has been an academic librarian for seven years at both public and private institutions of various sizes. She works to better the research experiences of students, staff, and faculty through her teaching, reference, and research activities.