Good evening!

It’s my great honor and pleasure to introduce to you this evening, TAMIKA BARNES, the honoree for our North Carolina Chapter’s 2002 Horizon Award. Tamika is the Engineering Services Librarian in Burlington Textiles Library at NC State University.

This award is presented to a relatively new Chapter member who, through work and professional activities, shows promise of becoming an outstanding member of the profession. You will all soon discover that Tamika has indeed earned this distinction.

There have been nine Horizon Award recipients since 1990. At least three of these distinguished Chapter members are here this evening: our current Chapter president, Marlys Ray (1995); our past president, Ellen Leadem (1991), and Nancy Kozlowski, library director North Carolina Biotechnology Center.

I confess to a particular fondness for this Horizon Award. Quite simply, it identifies and encourages the newest and brightest among us. I consider it to be the essence of mentoring the next generation of information professionals. Tonight this Award has special significance. Celebrating with us this evening are three SLA Vormelker Mentoring Award winners. Please recognize this evening’s guest speaker, Lynn Berard, and our Chapter’s own Larry Wright! Students, I urge you to introduce yourselves to these champion mentors. They will enthusiastically welcome you! Think of them as “coaches” or “scouts” of the big leagues in info-pro ball. This is your chance to connect. 

We all have our eyes on newcomers and up-and-comers in our Chapter this evening. Who knows, we just may be looking at future NC/SLA Horizon Award winners from among the talented group of students joining us from the Schools at North Carolina Central, UNC-Greensboro, and UNC-Chapel Hill. And it’s a good bet that some among them may be our future Chapter leaders!

And that’s why I’ve been keeping my eye on Tamika for the past several years. Apparently several others have as well, for she has made extraordinary accomplishments in her short career and has been appropriate recognized.

From Tamika’s faculty advisor at the School of Library and Information Sciences at North Carolina Central University comes this: “It was at a winter NCSLA meeting in which I was a panelist that I noticed her presence in the audience and began to observe her interest in special libraries.  From then on, I watched her closely.  She later became the president of the NCCU SLA Student Group and attended SLA annual meetings”. . . .I believe that few could have done more in such a short time.  Above all, I consider her to be an outstanding young person.” 

From Tamika’s supervisor: “Throughout this time I have been impressed by Tamika’s strong service ethic and willingness to go the extra mile for patrons.  She is very active professionally, both inside and outside the NCSU Libraries.  She serves on both the NCSU Libraries Staff Learning and Development Committee and the Diversity Committee, of which she is the current chair; both of which are areas that Tamika shows a passionate interest in.”

I met Tamika when she was a student at NC Central, enrolled in Prof. Bob Ballard’s special libraries class. I recall her being, at first glance, a quiet one; until she started asking questions, politely, yet pointedly. She got the message, but was clearly going for the specifics. Frankly, I thought that she had the makings of a fine journalist, but I’m glad she chose our profession instead. We need rising stars like Tamika. Here is a sampling of her impressive record of leadership, internship, and scholarships:

ALA Spectrum Scholarship

SLA Affirmative Action Scholarship

Theo Pilkington Internship (Duke)

SLA Diversity Leadership Development Committee

And now she can add our NC/SLA Horizon Award. Well done, Tamika.

I owe a great deal to the mentors throughout my career, for their friendship, inspiration and leadership. Such warmth, concern and good humor goes beyond the professional and enters the human domain. A web is formed that encourages and supports. The true web, as far as I can tell, is not just the virtual variety; it is the real, genuine network of personal and professional associations that sustain not only me, but all of us. This is a web that is strong yet flexible, expansive but stable, enduring yet constantly renewing and reinventing itself.

SLA, therefore, becomes the hallmark of all that is excellent in our profession and serves as a model for the future. I’m willing to bet that Tamika Barnes is fully aware of that and plans to be around to chart its course, document its progress and celebrate its achievements. I know she can count on our North Carolina Chapter’s continuing support.

Tamika, please come forward and claim your Horizon Award.

Tamika, left, receiving her Horizon Award.

Tamika, center, with Lynn Berard, left, SLA
Board member, and Barbara Semonche