MEDIA RELEASES

Dominican University’s Graduate School of Library and Information Science (GSLIS) will present the second annual eChicago Community Informatics Symposium on Thursday, April 3 and Friday, April 4 in the Springer Suite of the Rebecca Crown Library, 7900 W. Division Street, River Forest.

The symposium will explore how public libraries and technology centers are serving and enhancing their communities by providing public access to computers, the Internet and a variety of online tools and digital resources. Leading researchers, activists and practitioners in the field will address such topics as mapping Chicago’s ethnic communities, helping community members use information technology, and understanding newer technologies used by young people. The symposium will also address what the City of Chicago is doing to steer communities into the digital age. Attendees will have the opportunity to get hands-on experience with new technologies.

eChicago will open on April 3 at 6:30 p.m. with an evening buffet reception and keynote presentation titled “Libraries as Technology Centers: The Chicago Story” by Karen Danczak Lyons, first deputy commissioner of the Chicago Public Library. The symposium continues from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. on April 4 and will feature a keynote presentation by Shireen Mitchell, president of Community Technology Centers Network, on how public access to computing is impacting community development.

The eChicago symposium, which is being held in cooperation with the University of Illinois’s Graduate School of Library and Information Science, is free and open to the public. For more information, please call (708) 524-6845 or email eChicago@dom.edu.

Accredited by the American Library Association, Dominican University’s GSLIS has been educating future library leaders and information professionals since the 1930s. The school offers master’s degrees in library and information science and in knowledge management.

Founded in 1901, Dominican University is a comprehensive, coeducational Catholic institution offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees. In the 2008 issue of America’s Best Colleges, U.S. News & World Report again ranked Dominican University in the top tier of Midwest master’s level universities and as a “great school at a great price” for the tenth consecutive year.