The iSchool Inclusion Institute (i3) is proud to announce that University of Pittsburgh alum, Alexia Hudson-Ward, will deliver a keynote address on June 13, titled, “The Imperative of Informed Leadership: Making Information and Knowledge Matter (again),” to officially kickoff the seventh summer i3 residency. The reception will be held at the newly formed School of Computing and Information at the University of Pittsburgh and will celebrate the arrival of the 2017 cohort of i3 Scholars. The 2017 cohort includes 23 students from 15 colleges and universities across 11 states.
Tuesday, June 13
5:30PM
3rd Floor Theatre, Information Sciences Building
135 North Bellefield Avenue
About Alexia Hudson-Ward
Alexia Hudson-Ward is the Azariah Smith Root Director of Libraries for Oberlin College and Conservatory – one of the nation’s leading liberal arts academic library systems. Prior to assuming this role in July 2016, she was a tenured associate librarian at Penn State University Libraries based at the Abington College in Abington, PA. During her term at Penn State, Alexia was selected by senior administration as one of five university-wide Big 10 Academic Alliance Faculty Leadership Fellows in 2014-2015.
Her librarianship philosophy rests upon the principles of accessibility, diversity, equity, and inclusion. Her professional points of pride include providing leadership in leveraging library resources to enhance and foster new pedagogies, strategic planning and organizational design, and educational technology deployment.
Alexia holds an M.L.I.S. from the University of Pittsburgh, a B.A. degree in English Literature and African American Studies from Temple University, and is currently a Ph.D. student in the Managerial Leadership in the Information Professions program at Simmons College. She is the recipient of several awards and recognitions including Library Journal’s Mover and Shaker honor (2008), ALA Emerging Leader (2007), the Pennsylvania Library Association’s New Librarian of the Year (2007), and the University of Pittsburgh’s School of Information Sciences Young Alumni Award in 2013.
Alexia was also honored to receive an invitation to participate in a live White House Twitter Town Hall Tweet Up with former President Barack Obama and Twitter founder Jack Dorsey in 2011.
Alexia has served on the Executive Board of the American Library Association and has held several leadership roles in non-profit organizations. Her hobbies include researching pre and early post-Civil war African American history, arguing with Twitter trolls, and increasing her ever-growing shoe collection. She is also enjoying her most recently acquired past time since moving to Northeast Ohio, which is teasing Cleveland Browns fans.