Greetings OELMA members and friends. 

February 1, 2023 is the OELMA awards season opener and the OELMA Awards Committee is pleased to announce the following awards and scholarships:

OELMA Emerging Leader Award

Tech Innovation Award

Intellectual Freedom Award

Leadership-in-Action Award

Literacy Leader Award

OELMA/Follett School Solutions Outstanding School Librarian Award

OELMA/JLG Floyd Dickman Programming Grant

OELMA Service Award for School Administrators

Outstanding Contributor Award

J. Allen Oakum Scholarship

OELMA Founders Scholarship

OELMA READ On! Ohio Award for Children & Teens

If you scan the list and don’t see the OELMA Collaborative School Library Award, it’s because the award has been renamed - Ross J. Todd Collaborative School Library Award.  The award honors the life and work of Dr. Todd, a professor of library and information science at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, who was recognized, up until his death in 2022, as an award-winning expert on the transformative role of school libraries.  Todd and his co-author, Professor Carol Kulthau, conducted a leading-edge study, “Student Learning through Ohio School Libraries,” in the early 2000s and received a Certificate of Appreciation for Notable Service and Significant Service to Ohio’s School Libraries from OELMA.  The award recognizes and encourages collaboration and partnerships between school library media specialists and the school community through joint planning of a program, project, or event in support of the curriculum, using school library resources, and incorporating Ohio’s Library Guidelines for Librarians (2021).

The Awards Committee now reports to Amanda Brasfield, Director of Communications. We are pleased to announce this year’s Awards Committee members: Casaundra Bronner, Gayle Brusk, Heidi Fletcher, Lisa Gallagher, Cheryl Lorson, and Susan Yutzey.

Awards season is open until March 22, 2023.  Please check out the awards pages and nominate yourself or a colleague. As Angela Wojtecki, 2022 OELMA Outstanding Contributor Award recipient, remarked recently “An OELMA Award is truly special because it is a testament that the work you do on a daily basis is being seen by others in the field. It is empowering and a very special honor to receive an OELMA award as a school librarian and educator." 

Stay tuned for awards and scholarship updates throughout February and March!