Megan Hodge and Rebecca K. Miller

At the 2012 Annual Conference, President Connie Gilman presented Rebecca K. Miller of Virginia Tech and Megan Hodge of Chesterfield County Public Library with the VLA Presidential Citation. The text of the Citation read:

“In May of 2011, the Virginia Library Association Executive Committee received a petition, signed by 36 library staff from Virginia. The petition sought to re-establish a forum to engage and recruit new members to VLA. The effort was spearheaded, enthusiastically, by  two librarians, one of whom was a recipient of the VLA Scholarship Award in 2009, and the other who had recently moved to Virginia. A specific objective of the petition was to ‘provide a wide variety of programs to assist, encourage, and educate those new to the Virginia Library Association and the profession.’ Through dynamic recruitment and creative social hours and gatherings in VLA regions, the New Members Round Table Forum has done just that. In 2012, VLA gained 190 new members. As we begin to collect memberships for 2013, we already have 82 new members, due largely to the efforts of the NMRT. To quote the petition once more, a goal of the New Members Round Table Forum was ‘to bring new vitality, energy and ideas’ to the Virginia Library Association, and they have exceeded that expectation. Please join me in presenting this Presidential Citation to Rebecca K. Miller and Megan Hodge.