The School of Information at The University of Texas at Austin has received $60,000 from the Tocker Foundation to create the Tocker Fellows program for visiting scholars in library and information science.
The goal of the program is to attract nationally recognized experts who will foster new thinking on teaching, research and service in librarianship and information professions.
The funds will be dedicated to four strategic areas that are emerging in the field of information science:
- Law librarianship and legal information studies
- Information literacy and policy
- The future of libraries in the digital age
- Medical librarianship, health informatics and medical records
The grant will help to promote the school’s curriculum, which addresses all aspects of information, from access and usability to management and preservation of records.
The school’s research focuses on information in its social context, from a single user searching for a document, to a government entity determining access to public records. The research extends to schools and corporations, design companies and libraries, museums and archives, and wherever people search for, read and store documented knowledge.
The Tocker Foundation, family and board members, have a long history of supporting The University of Texas at Austin, including gifts to the Harry Ransom Center, Texas Performing Arts and University of Texas Press. The foundation is dedicated to the wide distribution and free access of information through public libraries and has been a longstanding partner and beneficiary of the School of Information’s faculty and students.
