2019 ITEM Fall Conference

Our keynote for Friday's lunch is Kristina Holzweiss, 2015 SLJ School Librarian of the Year and author. Her keynote will be "Empowering Students in a Digital World: From Consumers to Makers." Libraries have transformed learning for students of all ages, languages, socioeconomic backgrounds, cultures, gender identities, religions, and academic abilities. Libraries are places of possibilities! In a society of "No, but" libraries are worlds of "Yes, and!" Learn how to transform your library program into a 21st century learning environment that your students will engage and empower your students. Your library will never be the same again.

On Saturday morning, Kelly D. Holstine, the Director of Educational Equity at OutFront Minnesota (the largest LGBTQ+ civil rightsgroup in the state) and the 2018 MN State Teacher of the Year will give the keynote Every Heart Matters: Why I Stand Up and Teach. This presentation highlights the importance of owning flaws and prioritizing one’s own mental health in order to make more authentic connections with others. Holstine will reveal the roles that vulnerability and courageous connections have in creating equity for every heart. She will also reveal how working through her own personal struggles has helped her to become a better teacher and a healthier human being. Holstine will additionally share how her personal journey of being a gender non-conforming, lesbian teacher and her decision to boycott the annual Teacher of the Year White House visit (she could not implicitly show support for an administration that actively discriminates against her students and her community) has re-ignited her fire to stand up for humans who have been historically marginalized and oppressed.

Saturday afternoon's keynote will be "Diversity Activism: Mirrors, Windows, and Asian American Youth Literature" by Sarah Park Dahlen, an associate professor in the Master of Library and Information Science Program at St. Catherine University. She researches and publishes on Asian American children's literature and transracial adoption and co-founded and co-edits Research on Diversity in Youth Literature, an open access journal. In this talk, Dr. Dahlen will give a brief history of diversity activism in youth literature and librarianship and then more specifically address Asian American children's literature.