New Member Spotlight

This is the first of what we hope will be a series of continuing articles on new members of ALL-SIS.

Dragomir Cosanici is the Head of Reference at the Ruth Lilly Law Library, Indiana University School of Law in Indianapolis. He holds degrees from Michigan State University (B.A. with honors), the University of Michigan (M.I.L.S.) and the University of Kansas (J.D.). His work experience includes practicing law in the employment and labor areas, as well as working as a library law specialist for the State Library of Michigan. Dragomir has also worked as a reference law librarian for Hofstra University School of Law and the Michigan State University College of Law.

Dragomir handles most of the foreign and international reference questions that come to the library via the reference desk or through its faculty liaison program. He’s fluent in English, Serbo-Croatian, Romanian and has a good working knowledge of the Russian language. Dragomir also teaches U.S. legal research to LLM students enrolled at IU-Indianapolis, as well as first year law students in the JD program.

His research interests are multiple. He and a colleague just published a new article which will come out in print on June 23, 2005. The “Recent Citation Practices of the Indiana Supreme Court and the Indiana Court of Appeals” is found in volume 24, issue 1/2 of the Legal Reference Services Quarterly, and it represents the first published bibliometrics study of Indiana’s appellate courts. This study was funded in part by the AALL Online Bibliographic Services/Technical Services Joint Research Grant received in 2004.

Dragomir enjoys the challenges of attracting new members to ALL-SIS through its membership committee. Many of his JD students have heard and experienced his enthusiasm for law librarianship. He hopes to attract a new flock of future law librarians from the vast numbers of new lawyers.

Mary Elizabeth Williams is a Graduate Research Assistant at University of Washington, Marian Gould Gallagher Law Library. Born and raised in Pensacola, Florida, Beth earned a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Humanities from University of West Florida; a Master of Arts Degree in Philosophy from Marquette University and a Juris Doctor Degree from Syracuse University College of Law. She attends the Masters in Library and Information Science program at University of Washington as a full scholar and expects to graduate this August.

Prior to joining the Gallagher Law Library as an intern working in the Reference, Technical Services and Circulation Departments, Beth practiced law for two years in Maine where she worked for Penquis Law Project, a non-profit organization, representing low-income victims of domestic violence in family law matters. In addition, she coordinated and conducted legal clinics for public groups in rural outreach areas. She spent a year at Marquette University in Milwaukee Wisconsin working in an Educational Opportunity Program for first generation minority college students where she taught Introduction to Philosophy and Logic.

While in Law School, Beth received various awards and scholarships such as the National Association of Women Lawyers Award (2002), Book Award (2002), Dean’s Scholarship (1999-2002), George and Leona Gray Memorial Scholarship (2000-2002), and Grant Opportunity Program Scholarship (2001). Her research interests include philosophy, law, ethics and legal research.

Beth has the makings of a future law librarian scholar. Her life long commitment to learning and academic scholarship coupled with a continuing desire to serve the educational and informational needs of the students and library patrons who are less fortunate, is what led her to pursue a career in academic law librarianship. When asked who is her source of inspiration or her mentor, she states:

I am very fortunate to have worked for and learned from some extraordinarily gifted women, Joan Sommer from Marquette University’s Raynor Memorial Library; Leslie Bender, Professor of Law & Women’s Studies at Syracuse University College of Law, Tamar Matthieu from the Penquis Law Project; and now Penny Hazelton, Professor of Law & Associate Dean for Library and Computing Services at University of Washington, Marian Gould Gallagher Law Library.

She hopes to continue her path of learning through her work beginning this fall as a reference librarian at Columbia Law School, Arthur W. Diamond Law Library in New York and someday be a source of inspiration or mentor to future academic law librarians.