Anne M. Isbell
Director, Lake Blackshear Regional Library System

Anne M. Isbell is the director of the Lake Blackshear Regional Library System in Americus, GA. She began her professional career with that library system in 1994, after receiving her MLS from the University of Alabama. Originally hired as the Head of Adult Services, she became the assistant director in 2000 and was named director in 2006. Before entering library school she served on the board of trustees of the Gadsden-Etowah County Public Library from 1990 to 1993.

Anne served as president of the South Georgia Associated Libraries from 2002 to 2004. She has been the treasurer of the Georgia Council of Public Libraries since 2006. She is a member of the Regents Public Library Advisory Committee. She has served as the coordinator of the Georgia Public Library Accounting Alliance since 2007. She is a member of the Georgia Library Association.

Diana Very
Director, LSTA, Statistics and Research, Georgia Public Library Service

Diana Very worked in private industry and public agencies, including economic development, workforce development and law enforcement as an accountant and grants administrator, but public administration/public policy and analysis is the area to which she wants to devote her energies.

Diana completed the program of certified grants manager from Management Concepts and was certified as a project manager in the state of Missouri. She holds a B.S.B.A. in Accounting from University of Missouri at St. Louis and a Master's of Public Administration from University of Missouri at Columbia. After moving to Georgia, she continued her library education with the Master's of Library and Information Science program at Valdosta State University. Diana is now focusing on a Doctorate in Public Administration at Valdosta State University. The focus of her research is library culture and organizational environments of libraries as public agencies.

Diana has worked in state agencies for fifteen years, with the past six in state libraries. Her positions of administering Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA) grants and working with public library statistics have given her the opportunity to be deeply involved in all aspects of library services. With her background in accounting and public administration, she brings a systematic methodology of business to the environment of library science.

Sarah Steiner
Social Work and Virtual Services Librarian, Georgia State University

Sarah Steiner serves as the Social Work and Virtual Services Librarian at Georgia State University in Atlanta, where she has worked since 2005. She earned an MLS from the University of South Florida in 2004 and an MA in English Literature from Georgia State University in 2011.

Sarah has held several leadership posts with the Georgia Library Association, and would value the opportunity to continue reaching out to new and existing members through the Membership committee. She has served on membership and new membership committees on the national level and in three states, including Georgia. She also co-founded and co-maintains the Carterette Webinar series, which was created in response to GLA member requests for educational programming throughout the year.

Tessa Minchew
Systems & Electronic Content Librarian, Georgia Perimeter College

Tessa Minchew began working in Georgia libraries in 2004 as Catalog Librarian at Georgia Perimeter College. In 2006, she became Systems/Catalog Librarian at GPC and by 2010 she had morphed into Systems and Electronic Content Librarian.

Tessa has held several offices in the Georgia Library Association, including chairing the Technical Services Interest Group and the Interest Group Council, and she feels very privileged to have been given the 2010 McJenkin-Rheay Award. She is currently serving as Secretary of the Academic Library Division and GLA Webmaster, in addition to being a planning team member for the Carterette Webinar Series. Tessa likes long walks in the stacks, amusing LCSH typos (e.g, Angelo-Saxon poetry), and taking copious and thorough notes.

Karen Viars
Volunteer, National Archives & Atlanta History Center's Kenan Archives

Karen Viars, an Atlanta native, received her B.A. degree in English Literature from the University of Georgia. She is a recent graduate of the University of Tennessee's Information Sciences program, and also holds an M.S. in Instructional Technology from Georgia State University. She has completed internships with Dekalb County Public Library, Georgia Perimeter College Clarkston campus library, and the Georgia Institute of Technology Library and Information Center. Currently, she volunteers at the National Archives in Morrow, Georgia and at the Atlanta History Center's Kenan Archives.

Karen is a member of the American Library Association and the Georgia Library Association. She has served as the secretary/treasurer of the GLA New Member's Round Table, presented a program at the 2008 COMO conference, and won the 2009 GLA Academic Award for a paper on instructional design in library school curricula. She has also served as the social media coordinator for the Atlanta Emerging Librarians planning committee, and as a COMO scholarship raffle volunteer. She is currently the vice-chair/chair-elect of the Professional and Continuing Education interest group and a member of the Carterette Webinar Series planning team.

Lorene Flanders
Professor and Dean of Libraries, University of West Georgia

E. Lorene Flanders serves as Professor and Dean of Libraries at the University of West Georgia, where she was appointed in 2005. She served as Instruction Librarian, Associate Director for Instruction and Reference Services, and Associate University Librarian at Georgia College and State University from 1989 to 2005. She began her career in 1980 with Cobb County Public Library System where she served as Children's Librarian, and she served as Young Adult Librarian with the Oconee Regional Library System from 1986 to 1988. She holds the A.B. from Wesleyan College, where she majored in American Studies, the M.Ln. from the University of South Carolina, and the M.A. in History from Georgia College.

She is past chair of the Academic Library Division of Georgia Library Association, and has previously chaired the GLA Awards Committee and served on the GLA Scholarship Committee. She is a member of the University System of Georgia's Regents' Academic Committee on Libraries, and the Library Council of the Atlanta Regional Council for Higher Education. She chairs the Southern Books Competition committee of the Southeastern Library Association, and serves on SELA's Membership and Mentoring committee. She is a member of the Association of College & Research Libraries and the American Library Association, and served on ALA's Emerging Leaders Selection Committee in 2006 and 2007. A member of the Library Leadership & Management Association, she served as the mentor for the 2006-2007 ALA/LLAMA Emerging Leader project "Millenials in the Workplace." She is a member of the Friends of Neva Lomason Library, a unit of the West Georgia Regional Library System, and the Carrollton City Schools' System Media and Technology Committee. She co-founded the Bibliographic Instruction Group of Georgia: Eastern Region (BIGGER) in 1994, and has served as Bibliographer for the Georgia Historical Society since 1999, co authoring the bibliography of Georgia history published annually in the Georgia Historical Quarterly.

Gene Ruffin
Director, Georgia Gwinnett College Library

Gene Ruffin is Director of the library at Georgia Gwinnett College. He has been at Gwinnett since 2000 where he started as library director of the Gwinnett University Center, which became GGC in 2005. Prior to coming to Gwinnett, Gene was at Piedmont College where he was college librarian and taught in the Department of Philosophy and Religion.

Gene has been active in various library organizations for the past nineteen years including service on the Regents' Academic Committee on Libraries (RACL), the GALILEO Steering Committee, as Chair of the North Georgia Associated Libraries, as Chair of Georgia's Private Academic Libraries, and as Trustee on the Boards of the Athens-Clarke Library and the Athens Regional Library System. Over the years he has served on numerous GLA committees and at posts such as GLA Academic Division Chair, GLA Parliamentarian and on the GLA Academic Division Selected Papers Review Board. He has been active in ALA, ACRL and LLAMA, serving on numerous committees.

Gene received his M.L.S. from the University of South Carolina and pursued his undergraduate studies at the University of Georgia and his graduate studies at Boston University. He is an avid college football fan and enjoys traveling to cities and hiking in deserts and mountains, Zen meditation, independent music, and reading philosophy, religion and travel books. He is married to Laura, a high school French teacher, and has a very active and intelligent eleven year old lab/golden puppy. He lives in Athens.