2006 Chancellor's Excellence Award
Excellence in Librarianship - Lorraine M. Melita
Melita,
who joined the Memorial Library staff in 1998, becomes the fourth
SUNY Cortland librarian to earn the Chancellor’s Award for
Excellence in Librarianship.
She earned a Master of Library Science from Syracuse University and also holds the New York State Professional Librarians certificate. In 2003, she was selected to participate in the Association of College and Research Libraries Institute for Information Literacy.
Melita began her career at SUNY Cortland as instructional support techni-cian, advancing to acting technical services librarian and, in 2001, senior assistant librarian.
As access services librarian and public services librarian, Melita supervises the Circulation Department and the Teaching Materials Center (TMC) and is the chief bibliographer for all 71 teacher education programs offered at the College. Using her previous library expertise as technical services librarian, Melita participates in the Composition Library Instruction Program (CLIP), offering technology instruction to several composition sections each year. She has taught a Computerized Information Retrieval class for many interested students.
Melita has significant knowledge in cataloging and serves as a primary resource contact for faculty, staff and student users, assisting them in navigating online records and databases. She played a key role in the unit assessment of the Memorial Library, and was an active member of the Collection Development Committee, whose charge was to discuss book selection, gift policies and presentations to the faculty.
Melita has devoted much time to updating the offerings of the TMC. In addition, she created a storytelling area in which faculty and community members read to groups of small children, including those from the SUNY Cortland Childcare Center. Other areas in the TMC offer potential teachers the opportunity to dialog with faculty.
She created the “Food for Fines” program, allowing library patrons the option to “pay” fines for overdue books not in money but by bringing in food items that are subsequently donated to a local food pantry. Melita also conducts a book drive for National Children’s Book Week. This year’s drive netted hundreds of books that were donated to Louisiana elementary schools devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
When the library at Tompkins Cortland Community College was undergoing extensive renovation in summer 2001, she arranged to provide books to students there.
A key member of critical campus committees, Melita was a member of the committee that planned the library’s new Learning Commons as a hub for student learning and support. Campus-wide, she serves on the Teacher Education Council, the governing body for all programs in the College’s nationally accredited teacher education unit. Statewide, Melita has served as secretary of the Eastern New York Association of College and Research Libraries.
She is the author of several published book reviews, including a review of Teacher Education Programs in the United States. She has co-authored articles in the Journal of American Librarianship and has a book chapter on Anne Killigrew in The Age of Milton: An Encyclopedia of Major 17th Century British and American Writers. She has lectured at numerous SUNY Library Association conferences and copresented at the New York State Association for the Education of Young Children Annual Conference and other conferences.
Melita collaborates with the Cortland Area Child Care Council, Catholic Charities Food Pantry and Head Start, both as a volunteer and through College book and food drives.