Adding 2026 talks

Author: escowles

_posts/2026-03-02-a-workflow-for-automating-content-detection-in-dissertation-pdfs.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 2:10 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T14:10
+length: 10
+day: 1
+group: 2
+spot: 4
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- peter-cerda
+- aurelia-hudak
+- rachel-woodbrook
+speaker-text: "Peter Cerda, Aurelia Hudak, Rachel Woodbrook"
+title: "A workflow for automating content detection in dissertation PDFs"
+---
+The University of Michigan Library stewards scanned and digital dissertations in its institutional repository, Deep Blue Documents. Many of these dissertations have not had their copyright status determined. We receive multiple global requests each week for access to dissertations that are restricted to campus, the default for items which have not been identified as in the public domain. For items published before 1978, a copyright requirement is a statement of copyright in the dissertation. We developed a workflow to scale detection of copyright statements in dissertations. This workflow is written into a single python script that uses PyTesseract to assess and generate Optical Character Recognition (OCR) text, and search for copyright statements in batches of dissertation PDFs. The script had an accuracy rate of over 99% for detecting true copyright statements when they are present. Following this project, we can assess how common copyright statements are in U-M dissertations before 1977 and determine how many items we may be able to release. Further, we now have a basis on which to extrapolate how much time it might take to assess all of our full PDFs for OCR, which is a necessary first step for accessibility remediation of the repository.

_posts/2026-03-02-ai-in-moderation-assessing-ai-generated-alt-text-for-digital-collections.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 4:15 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T16:15
+length: 15
+day: 1
+group: 3
+spot: 2
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- linda-ballinger
+- bethann-rea
+- ruth-kitchin-tillman
+speaker-text: "Linda Ballinger, Bethann Rea, Ruth Kitchin Tillman"
+title: "AI in Moderation: Assessing AI-Generated Alt Text for Digital Collections"
+---
+In anticipation of the latest Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) standards, WCAG 2.2, the [redacted] Libraries are seeking to improve the accessibility of our digital collections for all users, including those with visual disabilities. To do so, one of our priorities over the next year is to add alternative text (alt text) for most of the images in our digital collections. However, with over 1.6 million images to address, our organization needs a way to speed up the process, so we’re conducting a study to see if artificial intelligence (AI) can be used to generate alt text without compromising the quality and inclusivity of that alt text. We also want to find ways to mitigate the environmental impact of our use of AI, to the greatest extent possible. This study will challenge small vision-language models to describe a wide range of image content, including abstract art works, to see how the AI-generated text compares with human-created alt text for the same images. Both sets of alt text will be compared to common standards for effective alt text, and to standards for inclusive and respectful descriptive metadata.

_posts/2026-03-02-artificial-intelligence-ethics-regulation-in-the-united-states.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 11:30 am
+startTime: 2026-03-02T11:30
+length: 20
+day: 1
+group: 1
+spot: 4
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- wilhelmina-randtke
+speaker-text: "Wilhelmina Randtke"
+title: "Artificial Intelligence Ethics Regulation in the United States"
+---
+This presentation summarizes recent federal activity in regulating artificial intelligence (AI) ethics. The National Artificial Intelligence Initiative Act of 2020 included a five year funded roll out for comprehensive regulation of AI across the United States including regulation of AI ethics, with the roll out funded through federal fiscal year 2025 ending in September 2025. Many AI regulation items in the news over the past five years were part of this process, including the Copyright Office reports about copyright and AI (published as an unbroken series across presidencies), the Department of Education's (now unpublished) AI Toolkit, and the broad decision with implementation of whether large technology companies will be regulated in this area versus required to self regulate. This presentation summarizes key outcomes of the process, what is likely final, and possible/probable future activities. Because the law was initially signed during the first Trump presidency, there is more consistency in this area than perhaps might be the case in other areas of governmental regulation. Similar to how privacy issues in technology were not regulated in the 1970s as computers became more and more a force that structures our lives and work, and we are still reckoning with that gap, issues around regulation of AI ethics will structure how we live and work for years to come. Regarding AI, the government acted, and choices made so far will now shape the technology ecosystem.

_posts/2026-03-02-community-digitization-as-a-strategic-response-to-political-change.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 11:20 am
+startTime: 2026-03-02T11:20
+length: 10
+day: 1
+group: 1
+spot: 3
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- nailisa-tanner
+- jessica-lange
+speaker-text: "Nailisa Tanner,  Jessica Lange"
+title: "Community Digitization as a Strategic Response to Political Change"
+---
+In recent years, Quebec’s government introduced policies around French language promotion that have created financial and cultural challenges for English universities in the province, including McGill University, founded in the 19th century and historically associated with the Quebec’s English-speaking community. These policies have sparked broader conversations about how institutions like McGill can demonstrate their value and contributions to Quebec’s largely French-speaking society. In this context, McGill Libraries have made it a strategic priority to deepen their engagement with local communities and to contribute more visibly to Quebec’s social and cultural life.
+
+This presentation will explore how these political developments informed McGill Libraries’ community engagement strategy, leading to the creation of a new community digitization partnership program. This initiative aims to partner the Libraries with Quebec non-profit organizations and charities to provide training for institutions that wish to execute their own digitization projects, or to provide in-kind digitization services from the Libraries’ digitization lab. By sharing expertise and resources that many small organizations lack, this program helps the library to position itself as a collaborative partner in the preservation and dissemination of Quebec’s cultural heritage.

_posts/2026-03-02-digital-preservation-from-scratch.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 1:50 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T13:50
+length: 20
+day: 1
+group: 2
+spot: 3
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- natasha-fisher
+speaker-text: "Natasha Fisher"
+title: "Digital Preservation From Scratch"
+---
+In 2025, The ArQuives (Canada’s 2SLGBTQIA+ Archives) hired its first-ever digital archivist to build and implement a digital preservation program entirely “from scratch”. No existing policy, infrastructure, or strategy existed. This talk will walk through the process of implementing digital preservation from scratch, including conducting maturity model assessments (DPC RAM and the NDSA Levels of Preservation), evaluating digitization equipment and workflows, starting a Digital Archives Repository (DAR), and launching digital policies and strategies. It will also discuss the realities of balancing best practices with practical constraints in a small, community-driven organization with limited resources. Attendees will gain insights into how digital preservation can be successfully, and realistically, implemented within an organization.

_posts/2026-03-02-integrating-open-repositories-and-digital-humanities-technologies-to-foster-civic-engagement.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 2:30 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T14:30
+length: 15
+day: 1
+group: 2
+spot: 6
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- david-ragnar-nelson
+- sabrina-bocanegra
+speaker-text: "David Ragnar Nelson, Sabrina Bocanegra"
+title: "Integrating Open Repositories and Digital Humanities Technologies to Foster Civic Engagement"
+---
+Since 2020, the American Philosophical Society (APS) has been developing an open repository based on the DAMS Islandora to build The Revolutionary City Portal—a multi-institutional collaboration that brings together institutionally siloed collections related to the American Revolution, with an emphasis on historically minoritized or otherwise hidden voices. The project integrates a number of open source technologies to foster user engagement, including D3.js for interactive visualizations, TimelineJS and StorymapJS for narrative content, and the open source python library kraken for handwritten text recognition (HTR). The project has been an exercise in collaboration that has brought together developers, library professionals, scholars, educators, and digital humanists. In this talk, the presenters will discuss the challenges, both technological and social, of integrating these technologies into a coherent and usable platform, including the nuts and bolts of making these technologies work together and the difficulties in onboarding nontechnical staff.

_posts/2026-03-02-librarian-as-institutional-metadata-steward-case-studies-in-research-information-management-systems-administration.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 2:20 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T14:20
+length: 10
+day: 1
+group: 2
+spot: 5
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- clarke-iakovakis
+speaker-text: "Clarke Iakovakis"
+title: "Librarian as institutional metadata steward: Case studies in Research Information Management Systems administration"
+---
+Research Information Management (RIM) systems have become core infrastructure in universities, integrating data about research, teaching, grants, service, and people into a single platform. Institutions adopt these systems for faculty activity reporting, analytics, public profiles, repository deposit, and other data-driven workflows. While many platforms offer automation features, effective administration requires technical expertise in data wrangling, harvesting, scripting, and reporting.
+
+Librarians skilled in programming, systems thinking, and project management are uniquely suited to this work. Combining these abilities with knowledge of metadata, privacy, and equitable service, librarians act as stewards of institutional metadata. Drawing on five years of experience managing a successful, library-led implementation, this talk will use case studies to illustrate the librarian as data engineer: applying code and data skills to administer, automate, and extend RIM Systems. 
+
+Examples include scripting API ingestion pipelines for data migrations (degrees, appointments, legacy systems); building crosswalks to automate local feeds; integrating with the IR for metadata harvesting and deposit; and developing workflows in R and Visual Studio to connect directly to SQL databases for reconciliation and reporting. I’ll also describe partnerships with campus offices and how a small staff sustains this enterprise-level service, highlighting RIM administration as a growing domain of technical librarianship.

_posts/2026-03-02-making-the-library-web-design-process-more-collaborative-a-case-study-using-figma-to-develop-strategy-focused-web-solutions.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 4:45 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T16:45
+length: 15
+day: 1
+group: 3
+spot: 4
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- tyrone-fontaine
+speaker-text: "Tyrone Fontaine"
+title: "Making the library web design process more collaborative // A case study using Figma to develop strategy-focused web solutions"
+---
+At a time when libraries are doing amazing digital work, it’s deeply rewarding to help shape the tools that share those stories. This talk walks through how one public library built a lightweight design library in Figma, complete with reusable page patterns, motion guidelines, and component documentation, and began connecting it to live data like LibCal through a simple API. Along the way, you’ll see how small steps toward consistency and creativity can make design more collaborative, less intimidating, and a lot more fun. This reframing of the library web design process allows team members without expertise in web coding and graphic design to participate equally, including sharing critical input using their expertise and intended strategy to better inform a more user-friendly and innovative website. The session includes a short demo showing how a Figma “sandbox” can pull real library events or books into mockups, turning static design into something alive. It’s part how-to, part love letter to the power of library design work, and a reminder that what we’re building really does make a difference.

_posts/2026-03-02-new-and-old-fangled-html-elements-what-is-accessible-really.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 4:00 pm
+startTime: 2026-03-02T16:00
+length: 15
+day: 1
+group: 3
+spot: 1
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- kate-deibel
+speaker-text: "Kate Deibel"
+title: "New (and Old-Fangled) HTML Elements: What is Accessible Really?"
+---
+Over the years, the HTML standard has dropped and added many elements for developers to play with. Some, such as <blink> and <marquee>, are long and thankfully gone. Accessibility oten emphasizes using native elements over rolling your own. However, when it comes to accessibility conformance, not every element is equal out of the box. Different elements can interact with each other elements in confounding ways. Assistive technologies may or may not announce elements effectively. This talk will go over various elements and discuss the art of using them accessibly. Elements discussed will include relatively newer ones such as <dialog> and <output> but also longstanding elements such as the definition list posse (<dl>, <dd>, and <dt>).

_posts/2026-03-02-on-searching-for-library-standards-that-align-with-library-values.md

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+---
+layout: presentation
+type: talk
+categories: talks
+time: 10:45 am
+startTime: 2026-03-02T10:45
+length: 20
+day: 1
+group: 1
+spot: 1
+location: frist
+speakers:
+- eric-phetteplace
+speaker-text: "Eric Phetteplace"
+title: "On Searching for Library Standards that Align with Library Values"
+---
+On March 14, 2025, the Library of Congress changed the subject headings for the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America and Mount Denali to Mount McKinley. Despite outrage amongst catalogers about the flagrant violation of their own standards, LC cited a change from the U.S. Board on Geographic Names (itself responding to Executive Order 14172) as an overriding concern. While LC, OCLC, and other major organizations promulgate standards that are used near-universally, librarians sometimes overlook the ideological commitments underlying these bodies. They serve more severe tyrants than the Statement of International Cataloguing Principles.
+
+This session examines a small library's crisis of conscience in building a repository subject vocabulary off of Library of Congress vocabularies. It surveys the most promising alternatives, ones with values that more closely align to those of librarianship. Specifically, we will review Getty's Art and Architecture Thesaurus, Homosaurus, and Wikidata. The nuances and difficulties of using these vocabularies for subject, genre, and name authorities will be discussed.