AALL Registration Grant

Submitted by Joyce Manna Janto

Every year AALL gives a full registration grant to several chapters.  This year, VALL is one of these chapters.  The only stipulation on the grant is that it is to go to a newer member of AALL.  They definition of “newer member” is someone who has been an AALL member 5 years or less. 

If you are interested please down load application form here: Application Form

Indicate on the application that you are applying for the registration grant. The applications should be emailed to me no later than 5:00 p.m. on Friday, April 5th.  We must notify AALL by April 15th who the grant recipient is so we cannot extend this deadline.

VALL Spring Meeting, May 3, 2019

The meeting will be held at Hunton Andrews Kurth, downtown Richmond, VA. The deadline for registering is April, 26, 2019. The registration form is available under VALL Meetings on this blog. Don't miss this opportunity to network with colleagues and witness the installation of new board members.

Bethany J. Ochal Award Recipent

Congratulations to VALL's own recently retired Terry Long for being a recipient of the Bethany J. Ochal Award for Distinguished Service to the Profession!

This award is given to a Government Law Libraries Special Interest Section member who has made a significant contribution to law librarianship and who is nearing the end of his or her library career or who has recently retired. For more information about the award and past recipients click here: Ochal

Terry will receive the award at the 2019 business meeting of the Government Law Libraries SIS at AALL in Washington, DC, July 13 - 17, 2019.

In and Around VALL: Kelsey Cox

submitted by Gail Warren

On February 25, 2019, Kelsey I. Cox joined the Virginia State Law Library as our new librarian.

Kelsey is from Chicago, Illinois, and currently lives downtown in Richmond.  In her free time, she enjoys practicing yoga, painting, playing the piano, and hiking.

Kelsey attended Lake Forest College, graduating in 2015 with a BA in Political Science and minors in Islamic World Studies and Legal Studies.  She earned the distinction of Phi Beta Kappa and was her school’s first participant in its 3+3 BA/JD accelerated law program.  Kelsey graduated from Chicago-Kent College of Law in May of 2017 and is licensed to practice law in Illinois.  Kelsey also holds a MLIS degree from the University of Wisconsin—Milwaukee.

In her role as librarian, Kelsey will be sharing responsibility for staffing the Reference Desk and providing professional legal reference and research assistance to judicial branch staff, attorneys and the broader legal community, as well as members of the public who call or send us email messages.

She arrived on her first day of work with her own copy of A Guide to Legal Research in Virginia (2017) in hand, so she is familiar with the “ins” and “outs” of Virginia primary and secondary sources of legal information.  

Kelsey’s experience working on metadata projects with the Law Library of Congress to make US Treaties and other International Agreements available to the public has already proven to be invaluable as she assumed responsibility for our law library’s participation in the Legal Information Archive.  Kelsey will be identifying, harvesting and ingesting judicial branch publications and other items for the Legal Information Archive, which migrated from OCLC’s digital archive platform to Preservica in 2018.  Later this year, Kelsey also will begin working on content for the Virginia Judicial System Court Self-Help website, which is hosted by our law library on behalf of the Virginia Access to Justice Commission.

Please join us in extending a warm welcome to Kelsey and look for her at the VALL meeting in May at Hunton Andrews Kurth!

2019-2020 VALL Executive Board Candidates

Vice President/President-Elect: Jane Harrison, Hunton Andrews Kurth

Jane is a member of the research & information services team in the Richmond office of Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP, and has spent 21 years with the firm.

She feels honored and privileged to be able to work among many talented and dedicated professionals, at the firm, and, in the community-at-large.

She received her M.S.L.S. and B.A. from The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.

Jane has served as VALL Membership chair and was a member of the VALL 30^th Anniversary Committee.  Most recently, she has served as a member of the VALL Programming Committee.

Treasurer: Alexis Sharp, Hunton Andrews Kurth

Alexis Sharp is a reference librarian at the Richmond office of Hunton Andrews Kurth LLP. 

Alexis has been active in VALL since moving to Virginia in 2013 to work as a reference & research services librarian at the University of Richmond. She is serving as chair of the Public Relations Committee and is also a director on the executive board.

Alexis earned her Bachelor’s degree (2008), Juris Doctorate (2011), and Master’s in Library & Information Science (2013) from Louisiana State University. During her time as a graduate student at LSU, she served as library fellow at the Paul M. Hebert Law Library.

Alexis lives in Richmond with her husband and five-month-old son Jack.

Director: Anna Price, Alexandria Law Library

Originally from the Pacific Northwest, Anna earned a Bachelor of Science in Communications from Ithaca College in Ithaca, NY.  After graduating, she returned to Washington state, where she attended the University of Washington School of Law. 

While studying law, Anna valued volunteer experiences outside the classroom. To that end, she volunteered with Seattle’s Immigrant Families Advocacy Project, the Consumer Protection Division of the Washington State Attorney General’s Office and various judicial election campaigns. Anna also served as a Judicial Extern with the Washington State Court of Appeals.

During her second summer of law school, Anna began interning for Connelly Law Offices, a complex civil litigation firm in Tacoma, Washington. Anna continued working at the firm through her third year of law school and accepted an offer to return to the firm as an attorney after graduation. 

During her legal career, Anna tried multiple cases to verdict and argued before Washington’s Court of Appeals and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. She was also recognized annually as a Rising Star by Super Lawyers, 2011-2015.

After five years of practice, Anna decided to take a sabbatical from trial work. She realized that what she enjoyed most about practicing law was helping clients, doing research and problem-solving. As she thought about what she loved doing, the possibility of librarianship kept coming to mind, and she decided to explore the field further.

Anna has been the law library operations supervisor with the Alexandria Law Library since 2017. Her other library experience has included working in interlibrary lending/borrowing for the Fairfax County Public Library and volunteering with the Library of Congress as a researcher guidance volunteer. She is happy to have the opportunity to blend both her legal knowledge and passion for public service and access to justice in her current role. 

In further pursuit of her career in librarianship, Anna is currently enrolled as an MLIS student at the University of Washington’s iSchool.

Happy Retirement Terry Long!

by Evelyn Campbell

Terry Long with library staff

On February 1, 2019, after almost forty years at the Virginia State Law Library, Terry Long shelved the last law book and answered the last reference question, said “adieu” to law librarianship, and “yes” to retirement.

Terry joined the Virginia State Law Library in July, 1980 … moving from the State Library & Archives. She didn’t have to move far – the two libraries shared the same building on Broad Street. 

The following year the State Law Library moved to its current location on 9^th and Franklin Streets.

That job with the State Law Library gave Terry the “push” to go to library school. “Having an MLS was not a requirement of the job, but one of the best things I ever did was to get that library science degree. It opened up the boarder side of librarianship and it gave me a confidence that I would not have had otherwise.”

It was an exciting time for Terry. She was there in the beginning when informal gatherings of downtown law librarians grew into the Richmond Area Law Libraries Association (RALLA) in 1981. RALLA eventually morphed into the Virginia Association of Law Libraries and became a chapter of the American Association of Law Libraries in 1988.

Terry's advice to VALL members, is “Volunteer ... volunteer … volunteer. Stretch your wings and stretch your mind.”

Terry has served VALL tirelessly for decades in its many committees, programs, and as president from 1995 – 1996, and lately as VALL liaison to the Virginia Library Association. Many VALL members who are fortunate to count Terry as a mentor, colleague and friend, will miss her but are happy that she will be moving on to new adventures.

No one who knows Terry will doubt that she will embrace her new life. “I’m going to see the world – at least try to see as much of it as possible!” Terry said as she plans her many travels. In June she will be heading to Italy – to Vinci in Tuscany, home of Leonardo da Vinci. And when she gets home to Richmond she will barely have time to unpack her bags before she will be off to Hilton Head.

When she is not traveling Terry volunteers with the Junior League and also at her church where she wears many hats.

Happy retirement Terry! 

Terry chatting with court staff

Terry's mother, Mildred Long, at the open house

Photos courtesy of Gail Warren.

In and Around VALL: Ashley Vavra

submitted by Gail Warren

On January 25, 2019, Ashley N. Vavra joined the Virginia State Law Library as our new librarian-archivist.

Ashley is from Gloucester, Virginia and now lives in Henrico with her husband, Dylan, who she met as an undergraduate at the University of Richmond. She enjoys indoor rock climbing, hiking, spending time near the James River, seeing new places, baking for friends, and reading novels while snuggling with her two cats.

Ashley attended the University of Richmond, graduating in 2014 with a BA in History and earning the distinction of Phi Beta Kappa.  Later that year, she began working at the University of Richmond Law School Library and, while working in various positions, pursued her Master’s Degree in Information Science from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.  Most recently, Ashley worked as the digital collections and archives associate at the law school library under Molly Lentz-Meyer.

In her role as librarian-archivist, Ashley will continue the good work begun by Catherine OBrion in identifying, documenting and directly the safekeeping of judicial branch archival records and other historically significant items in the Supreme Court of Virginia Archives.  She will coordinate our Oral History Program and other projects, including the creation of court’s “Judicial Learning Center” exhibit, to be opened on the first floor of the Supreme Court Building later this year, and conducting tours of the courtroom and our portrait collection for students, private individuals, and civic and charitable organizations.  Ashley is already busy reviewing our archival records and processes, and preparing her tour script.

Please join us in extending a warm welcome to Ashley and look for her at the VALL meeting in May at Hunton Andrews Kurth!

Ashley hiking Old Rag in the Shenandoah National Park