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Announcing the Gordon M. Conable Conference Scholarship

The Freedom to Read Foundation is proud to announce the Gordon M. Conable Conference Scholarship. The Conable Scholarship enables a library school student or new professional to attend ALA’s Annual Conference, with a specific focus on intellectual freedom meetings and programs.

The 2008 ALA Annual Conference will be held June 26–July 2 in Anaheim, CA.

The Conable Scholarship will provide for registration, transportation, housing for six nights, and a per diem. In return, the recipient will be expected to attend various FTRF and other intellectual freedom meetings and programs at conference, consult with a mentor/board member, and present a report about their experiences.

The deadline for submitting an application for the 2008 Conable Scholarship is Monday, May 5; the award will be announced on Wednesday, May 14. (Note: If the recipient is already registered for ALA’s Annual Conference, he or she will have their conference fee refunded.)

Gordon Conable was a California librarian and intellectual freedom champion who served several terms as president of the Freedom to Read Foundation. Following his unexpected death in 2005, his wife and FTRF created the Conable Fund, which provides funding for the Conable Scholarship. (The Conable Fund is still accepting donations – visit the Conable Fund homepage for details.)

For more information and to apply online, please visit the Conable Scholarship webpage. If you have questions, please contact Jonathan Kelley at (800) 545-2433 x4221 or jokelley@ala.org.

Loriene Roy Applauds Swift Action to Restore Full Access to POPLINE

Controversy arose this week when librarians discovered that they could no longer use the word ‘abortion’ on POPLINE, a reproductive health database maintained by the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg School of Public Health and funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID).

When informed about the restriction, Dr. Michael J. Klag, the Dean of the Bloomberg School, reversed the decision and restored full access to the POPLINE database.

Loriene Roy, President of the American Library Association, issued the following statement on the controversy:

“We applaud Dr. Klag’s swift action to restore full access to the POPLINE database. We are dismayed, however, at the circumstances that caused the administrators running the POPLINE database to begin blocking any and all searches on the word “abortion.” Any federal policy or rule that requires or encourages information providers to block access to scientific information because of partisan or religious bias is censorship. Such policies promote ideology over science and only serve to deny researchers, students, and individuals on both sides of the issue access to accurate scientific information.”