CHAPEL HILL - Amy VanScoy, doctoral student at the School of Information and Library Science (SILS) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and M. Cristina Pattuelli, SILS alumna, have been awarded 2011 Jesse H. Shera Awards. VanScoy has been selected for the 2011 Jesse H. Shera Award for Support of Dissertation Research for "Exploring the Meaning of Reference Work for Librarians in Academic Research Libraries." Pattuelli has been selected for the 2011 Jesse H. Shera Award for Excellence in Published Research for her paper, "Modeling Domain Ontology for Cultural Heritage," published in the Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology 62(2): 314-342, February 2011.

The  Jesse H. Shera Award for Distinguished Published Research was established by the ALA Library Research Round Table. Almost every year since 1975 the organization has given out awards for exceptional research.

Pattuelli's paper is based on a study that examines the design requirements and potential usefulness of a domain ontology to facilitate access to digital primary sources. The original contribution of this work is the introduction of a user-centered approach to the method of ontology development.

"The article was derived from my dissertation work completed at UNC at Chapel Hill with the help and guidance of Drs. Stephanie Haas, Gary Marchionini, Paul Solomon (now of University of South Carolina) and Barbara Wildemuth of SILS, and Eileen Jacob of Indiana University SLIS, with whom I share this honor," said Pattuelli.

VanScoy is the first SILS recipient of the Jesse H. Shera Award for Support of Dissertation Research.

"Reference and information services is such a vital component of LIS," said VanScoy. "It's wonderful that LRRT values continued research in this area."

Her study uses interpretive phemonological analysis to explore the thoughts, values and beliefs held by reference librarians about their work. The study is expected to inform professional and continuing education for reference and information services professionals and contribute the library and information science perspective to the larger discourse on practitioner beliefs.

VanScoy's dissertation committee includes Drs. Barbara Moran (advisor), Deb Barreau, Claudia Gollop from SILS and Drs. Paul Solomon (USC) and John V. Richardson (University of California, Los Angeles).

Pattuelli joins previous SILS winners of the Jesse H. Shera Award for Excellence in Published Research, including  Dr. Jane Greenberg, who received the 2010 Jesse H. Shera Award for Excellence in Published Research for her paper, "Theoretical considerations of lifecycle modeling: An analysis of the Dryad repository demonstrating automatic metadata propagation, inheritance and value system adoption;" and Dr. Paul Solomon, Dr. Gary Marchionini, and then Ph.D. students Cheryl Davis and Terrell Russell who received the award in 2007 for their paper titled, "Information and Library Science MPACT: A Preliminary Analysis."


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