The MU Library Science program has received a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to prepare tomorrow’s academic library leaders. This funding supports a total of 20 students through the master’s program. In the first year (beginning in Fall 2008) eight students were admitted as Academic Library Fellows. Two students are provided with support to work at MU, the University of Missouri-St. Louis, the University of Missouri-Kansas City and Missouri State University. Anthony Strand and Ashley Nelson are the current fellows working at MU Libraries . For more information about this program, visit http://education.missouri.edu/SISLT/LIS/LIS_Fellows_Program.php.
Anthony is originally from Hatton, North Dakota. He received his undergraduate degree in History and English Secondary Education at Mayville (ND) State University. He developed an interest in LIS while working as a student assistant at the university library in college. He has not decided what type of library work to go into, although he’s leaning towards reference or special collections and is fairly certain he wants to work in an academic library. In his free time, he enjoys watching movies and television and reading comic books, as well as over-analyzing all of those things.
Ashley Nelson has lived in Columbia for three years but is originally from Washington State. She graduated from Westminster College in Fulton with a major in English and a minor in Mathematics. For her English thesis project, she wrote a novel for 9-12 year olds and is trying to get it published. She knows American Sign Language fairly well, and this summer, she biked the Katy trail both ways (aprx. 500 miles).