Library and Archives News

The University Libraries held their annual Staff Recognition Ceremony on May 7, 2025. Eight library staff were honored for their years of service and two for the Staff Achievement and Recognition (StAR) Award. The StAR award is a peer recognition program designed to honor excellence among library staff through individual awards. The Friends of the Libraries provide support for the awards.

Library Staff Years of Service Awards

John Freeman, Library Operation Specialist 2 - 30 Years of Service

"John came to the University Libraries in 1994 and has worked as a copy cataloger in Bibliographic Control/Technical Services/Content Acquisition and Management. In this role, John reviews catalog records that are provided with books that we purchase and ensures that the information in the records is accurate and makes any corrections or supplies missing information as needed. John uses OCLC to find records for books that come without any cataloging information provided. John has also been responsible for acquisitions receiving, unpacking shipments and making sure the items in the boxes match what we have ordered. In more recent years he has been the staff member responsible for receiving order requests from selectors and placing the orders with our vendors.

John is always seeking out opportunities to learn new skills and explore new interests. He not only attends many workshops and webinars on a wide range of topics, but he is working toward a Masters Degree in instructional design and learning technologies, which he expects to complete this fall." 

Chris Nimmer, Library Operation Specialist 2 - 30 Years of Service

"Chris began his library journey as a volunteer in 1988, dedicating 20 hours per week to help re-link children's lit records that were lost. Then, as a student assistant in the early 90's, he worked in cataloging down in the basement where they now have CaTS equipment. His supervisor was Susan Bitzer, later Susan Smith. He switched to serials under Kathy O'Gorman, then to current periodicals under Debby Jennings-Ryan. Not really counting his student-assistant years, Chris' 30-year path started in 1994 working 51% in circulation under Sue Weldon. He had a Friday/Saturday/Sunday schedule. In 1998 he landed a full-time gig working with OhioLINK, and since then he has become one of if not THE leading expert across the state on OhioLINK processing. The area for packing OhioLINK has changed a number of times. Chris is one who has needed to adjust to changing spaces - mostly going from having wider spaces to much narrower spaces. Chris has served under 10-or-so university librarians--who remembers Richie Thomas, Arnold Hirshon, Vicki Montavon, or Pat Walker? As OhioLINK circulation has dropped, Chris moved to 80% FTE and it's amazing how much he can pack into one day. 

Chris has worked on so many projects over the years, it's impossible to count. He took a leading role in removing gov-doc shelving on the second floor. He helped prep the library for the new carpet installation, and perhaps not a fond memory, cleaned up glue residue on books and shelves for many months afterward. He wrangled up pallets when we needed them to store shelving pieces. He helped move items from the ERC (Educational Resource Center) over to Dunbar. He weathered the storms of switching OhioLINK couriers multiple times, including a pause between STAT and Priority when no service was running. He shifted numerous shelves and books on his own back in 2017, and he cleaned surplus shelves out of Room 370 and made that room neat and organized. For the new library carpet, he helpfully cleaned empty shelves before the installers arrived, he worked well with Maintenance & ESPM, and he even organized Lake Campus shelving. One of the most creative projects working with Chris was repairing/reinforcing book trucks for sturdiness in 2018. He reliably takes temperature readings and installs and tears down the weather wall. He works anywhere in the library, including shifting books in Special Collections and Archives. Recent projects include learning the ILL book-packing workflow, hanging up posters in the ERC, and adding expertise to Rapido workflows as we learn the new way to process OhioLINK material. We are really grateful to have Chris' expertise on staff, and to have his ear as we figure out Alma together.

Congratulations Chris on your 30 years!"

Kevin Storer, Library Operation Specialist 2 - 30 Years of Service

"Kevin joined the University Libraries staff in 1994, but his association with the Libraries goes back further, since he also work in the Libraries as a student assistant during his undergraduate years. Throughout his time on the library staff, Kevin has overseen our bindery operation, identifying recent journal issues that are ready for binding, organizing them into binding units, entering binding specifications into our vendor's management system, packing shipments, coordinating shipping arrangements with the vendor, and unpacking and distributing returned shipments. 

For the last 15 years or so Kevin has also been in charge of periodical check-in, at first supervising students and more recently performing the entire process himself. He also regularly works through a list of all of our local online journal subscriptions to ensure that our access is working appropriately.

Away from the library, Kevin (or K.L. as he is credited) has been very active in theatre and film as an actor, writer, and behind the scenes. He is a longtime member of the Board of Directors at the Dayton Theatre Guild, where he has also been a lighting and sound designer, producer and actor."

Linda Daniels, Coordinator of Administrative Services - 25 Years of Service

"Congratulations to Linda on 25 years of service to Wright State University. Linda began her career at Wright State University Libraries in August 1999 as an Administrative Specialist. She was promoted to Office Services Coordinator in 2008 and advanced to Coordinator of Administrative Services in 2009. In her current role, she provides vital administrative support to the University Librarian, five department heads, and the Libraries' business manager. Linda also serves as the coordinator for the Friends of the Libraries (FOL), overseeing grants, the Top Scholars program, and the annual luncheon. She is responsible for compiling the Libraries' Annual Report, managing accounts receivable for the University Libraries, and invoicing for Interlibrary Loan (ILL) and Special Collections and Archives (SCA). Additionally, she supervises staff, chairs the marketing committee, and consistently demonstrates a willingness to learn and adapt by attending training and staying current with new software and processes. Throughout her tenure, Linda has successfully supported seven University Librarians, adapting to various leadership styles and personalities - from Vicki Montavon to Stephen Foster, Pat Walker, Sheila Shellabarger, Sue Polanka, Karen Wilhoit, and now me, Jane Wildermuth. Her guidance and support have been invaluable to me as I transitioned into the role of University Librarian over the past year." 

Carol Fang, Business Librarian - 25 Years of Service

"Carol joined the University Libraries in June of 1999 and recently celebrated her 25th year with Wright State. At the time, Carol was a recent graduate of the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (MLIS 1997) and Virginia Tech (MBA 1993). She had worked briefly at Miami University, Oxford. Carol brought a wealth of expertise relating to business databases, financial statistics, and market analysis resources which she quickly integrated into the College of Business curriculum. Her direct, accurate teaching style has made her a fixture of the Raj Soin College of Business, creating lasting friendships among faculty. Carol has seen many changes in the provision, structure, and availability of business resources and has helped thousands of students maneuver among many different kinds of business literature. Carol has also worked with the biology department for the last eight years, bringing the same sense of careful, practical structure to science students understanding of biological literature. 

Congratulations Carol on 25 years of excellent library service."

Jane Wildermuth, University Librarian - 25 Years of Service

"Jane Wildermuth is a distinguished alumna of Miami University, where she earned her B.A. in History and Sociology in 1992, followed by a Masters degree in History in 1993. She began her career at the Ohio History Connection, where she held several key positions including reference Archivist, Assistant Head of Research Services, and Local Government Records Archivist.

In 1999, Jane brought her expertise to Wright State University Libraries as an archivist. Her commitment to leadership and innovation quickly became apparent. In a recent presentation at the Wright Leader Academy, Jane share her leadership philosophy: "Take the opportunities in front of you." A simple yet profound principle that she has exemplified throughout her career. 

Jane has continually embraced opportunities that have advanced Wright State University Libraries and the library profession as a whole. In 2006, she became the inaugural Head of the newly established Digital Initiatives and Repository Services (DIRS) department, where she launched the university's institutional repository, CORE Scholar. She also founded Ohio IR Day, fostering collaboration among institutional repository professionals across the state. 

Her contributions have earned her numerous accolades, including the Society of Ohio Archivists Merit Award and the Teddy Award for Distinguished Service from the Academic Library Association of Ohio (ALAO).

In 2020, during the uncertainty of COVID-19 pandemic, Jane led the successful merger of Special Collections and Archives with DIRS and took on leadership of the newly unified department. Her strategic vision and ability to lead through change were recognized by university administration. Jane's leadership skills were further acknowledged when she was promoted in March 2024 to serve as Interim University Librarian, and again in October 2024, when she was officially appointed University Librarian. 

Over the course of her career at Wright State, Jane has also served the profession through leadership in several organizations, including as Chair of the Miami Valley Archives Roundtable, Treasurer and President of the Society of Ohio Archivists, and Chair of the OhioLINK Digital Resource Management Committee, where she helped develop statewide standards for institutional repositories.

Jane, thank you for your unwavering commitment, visionary leadership, and more than 25 years of impactful service."

Christina Duffy, Library Operation Specialist 2 - 20 Years of Service

"Christina began her Wright State journey in 2004 on an evening shift, working with our late friend, Ed Trentman. After a couple years, she switched to daytime hours and often worked as a sub. She helped out on weekends as well before becoming full-time day staff around 2009. Christina has worked on numerous library projects over the years. She is particularly proud of helping to select the library's new furniture, which happened in early 2019. In order to make these decisions, her group was able to meet with students to ask questions, and they visited downtown showrooms. She got a workout in moving items from the ERC to Dunbar in the summer of 2020. Christina is a backup for printing OhioLINK paging slips, and she answers emails from other OhioLINK schools concerning Wright State books and patrons, often running up into the stacks to look for a book that was claimed returned. Some of her unique experiences in the library include attending OLSSI conferences in the summer; being one of the first to come back on campus after COVID; leading walks through the campus woods; serving on the Social Committee, Professional Development Team, WeServeU volunteers, and Move-In Day volunteers; and addressing welcome cards to new students. One thing that impresses others is Christina's dedication to her work. She truly cares about helping students and making sure the library is a proper steward of materials. She looks for ways to remove access barriers and believes in the university mission.

Congratulations Christina on your 20 years!"

Arthur Seifert, Evening Manager, Resource Delivery Services - 20 Years of Service

"Arthur started at the Fordham Health Sciences Library in 2004 and worked there until it closed in 2009. He worked a nights-and-weekends schedule there, and his primary role was stack maintenance. When he came over to Dunbar, Arthur took on the role of PCIRC coordinator, making sure Wright State maintained its excellence in all things OhioLINK. This began as a nights-and-weekends position as well, but there was a period of about two years when the schedule was actually in the daytime. When a spot opened up for the nighttime manager Arthur leapt at the chance and embraced this larger role. Arthur has been incredibly helpful working on stacks projects over the years. He has done numerous shifting projects, dismantling shelves for discards, rearranging Room 315 with Ed Trentman, and is one of the backups for packing OhioLINK bags. Some of Arthur's unique projects that I've been around for include taking evening gate counts and people counts for an assessment study; helping to implement extended summer hours in August, mainly for the medical students; learning the room booking software and training other staff; working during various building repairs, including when the electricity was off; piloting extra weekend hours; and creating accessible PDFs for the Digitization Team. Arthur is one of, if not the most, reliable coworkers you could meet. He can handle any situation and is able to remain calm in the face of adversity, which is exactly what you need in a manager.

Congratulations Arthur on your 20 years!"

2025 StAR Award Recipients

Lisa Rickey, Archivist

Lisa received four nominations:

"I would like to nominate Lisa Rickey for a StAR Award for a variety of reasons, but mostly for her incredible ability to wrangle data and make it useful and accessible. Lisa has an amazing ability to distill a complex problem down into manageable steps and create a concise document to represent the process. She follows up with a detailed spreadsheet that presents the project data in an understandable and useful format. Her charts and graphs are a thing of beauty! Lisa is an asset to the University Libraries and gives wonderful examples of how to measure and present our worth. Lisa is a StAR!"

"Lisa Rickey should be commended for her outstanding work as the Collections Manager in Special Collections and Archives. As the primary contact for donors interested in contributing materials, she skillfully guides them through the donation process, answers questions, and conducts onsite visits to appraise and collect materials. Over time, she has built strong relationships throughout the Miami Valley community, including with private donors, community organizations, and local businesses. Since 2020, when the Archives reported a critical lack of space, Lisa has worked tirelessly to reduce the footprint of the holdings. Thanks to her efforts, we now have enough space to accommodate over 20 years of growth. She implemented innovative storage solutions, reappraised collections for deaccession, and skillfully navigated difficult conversations with long-time donors to decline new additions when necessary. Lisa's dedication and impact make her truly deserving of the StAR Award."

"Lisa Rickey is a true shining star for the University Libraries. In her role as Special Collections and Archives' Collection Manager, Lisa accomplishes a huge amount of work and provides tools to help the rest of the staff work more efficiently in their positions as well; and all with a pleasant and fun demeanor! Lisa interacts with the archives' collection donors, expertly answering their questions. These donors express confidence and gratitude for Lisa's transparency and straight forward discussion. As most of us have witnessed with her quick wit, and quick keyboard strokes, Lisa is a lover of data and a guru at setting up spreadsheets and databases to capture data in a relevant and visual way. Not only does the data help the department provided the information we need for a variety of reporting, but it informs our department's project priorities, decisions, and actions. The bar charts tracking our progress on collection projects, that Lisa periodically posts on her office door, are great motivators for the staff! No less impressive are Lisa's star abilities in producing eye-catching exhibits, and her creativity in making Photoshop templates that help all of the staff design exhibits in a more time and budget-friendly way. Lisa also has an impressive knowledge of the archives' collections and the area's local history; and is wonderful at engaging students and visitors in conversation relevant to their interests. Lisa's star qualities are immense, and we value her illuminating ideals and expertise." 

"Lisa is the most audaciously organized archivist I've ever met. Her prodigious skills at categorization create useful patterns from previously inchoate "stuff." Lisa's skill is aptly applied in her work to process collections, articulate departmental statistics, and evaluate search committee applicants. Lisa's sense of curiosity and discovery is applied well when working with collection donors, asking the right questions to provide and accurate scope of interest, and when working on the other side of the equation with collection queries, especially DDN views. Her enthusiasm to make the past more present is evidenced most often by her Out-of-the-Box blog posts. Lisa brings a positive reflection of the libraries to the Dayton Community. She's the one who is most often thanked for the yet-another Discover Classical request for a Dayton Philharmonic program guide. Lisa provides a working guide to using individual skills and interests to provide exceptional archives service."

Aaliyah Williams, Library Operation Specialist 2

Aaliyah received two nominations:

"Aaliyah has jumped into course reserves in Alma with both feet! She has made a tremendous effort - first with clearing out books that were old and outdated from reserves - second with creating workflows for processing reserves in the new software. Aaliyah has also spent time and effort in organizing and reorganizing various spaces behind the circulation desk to remove items we no longer use and consolidate the remaining items. She is a major presence on our social media channels and helps with marketing events like Bingo Night and Game Night. She goes the extra mile to make sure our daytime student workers have direction and guidance. Aaliyah is a wonderful part of our staff and very deserving of a StAR award."

"Aaliyah represents what is great about library service. She is super reliable and acts as the backup opener for the building. She is available to help patrons during busy times, slow times, good days, bad days, cold days, and hot days. She promotes library events and services via social media. She also volunteers for events such as Library Game Night and Library Bingo. Aaliyah has taken on extra duties in processing and managing course reserves. It is encouraging to have such a helpful team player contributing in multiple ways toward the Libraries' mission. Last, but not least, Aaliyah has a great rapport with the student workers in the library. She keeps them on task and inspires them to excel. We are super lucky to have Aaliyah on the Dunbar staff!"

Congratulations and thank you to our dedicated staff for their many years of service to the library and Wright State as a whole, and to our 2025 StAR Award recipients!