For Immediate Release
June 19, 2003
  

Three students pursuing their master’s degrees in library science won this year’s AALL and West George A. Strait Minority Scholarships worth $10,000.

Filiberto Govea received a Strait Scholarship for $3,500 to help finance his education at San Jose State University, where he is working toward his M.L.S. Since 1988, Govea has worked as a library technician at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. He received his B.A. in consumer and family science in 1998 from San Francisco State University.

Debora Taylor was awarded a Strait Scholarship for $3,500 so she can continue to pursue her M.L.I.S. from Dominican University in River Forest, Ill. Taylor has been an assistant cataloger at Loyola University School of Law Library in Chicago since August 2002. She was previously an assistant public defender at the Cook County Public Defender’s Office in Chicago from May 1989-July 1991. Taylor was also an assistant attorney at the Chicago Board of Education Law Department from December 1987-May 1989. She received her B.A. in sociology in 1977 and a J.D. from Loyola University Chicago in 1980.

Florante Ibanez will use his $3,000 Strait Scholarship when he attends the University of California at Los Angeles Department of Information Studies graduate program in the fall. Ibanez has worked at the William M. Rains Law Library at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles as its computer resource assistant since July 1992. He received his B.A. in comparative cultures in 1977 from the University of California at Irvine.

Established by AALL and West, the Strait Scholarship is awarded annually to help aspiring minority law librarians obtain the educational credentials necessary to enter the profession. To qualify for the scholarship, candidates must be members of a minority group as defined by current U.S. government guidelines. They must also be degree candidates in accredited library or law schools. Preference is given to individuals with previous service to or interest in law librarianship. Applicants must show evidence of financial need.

The scholarship was named in honor of George A. Strait (1914-1989), a longtime AALL member and law librarian. He worked at the Harvard University Law School Library for 20 years. He left Harvard twice in that time to spearhead building the library collections at Northeastern University School of Law in Boston and the Antioch School of Law in Washington, D.C. After leaving Harvard, he became the director of the law library and professor of law at the University of Iowa College of Law. He was awarded the AALL (now Marian Gould Gallagher) Distinguished Service Award in 1989.

For more information about the scholarship, please go to http://www.aallnet.org/services/sch_strait.asp.