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    This is an exciting time at the School of Information and Library
    Studies (SILS) at the University of Michigan. With the assistance of
    the W. K. Kellogg Foundation, SILS has embarked on the Kellogg
    Coalition on Reinventing Information Science, Technology, and
    Library Education (CRISTAL-ED), a five-year project to reinvent such
    education to meet the changing needs of information professionals.
    Determined to radically change its instructional program, SILS plans
    to facilitate development of a international, multidisciplinary
    consortium of schools to define new areas of professional
    specializations to serve society's needs for information access and
    use.

    To garner a wide range of opinions, exchange ideas, and learn from
    others involved in comparable activities, SILS will begin a
    moderated listserv named CRISTAL-ED on Friday, January 20, 1995.
    Initially, the listserv discussion will focus on the vision of the
    new information and library studies (ILS) education, and then target
    planning, prototyping, and implementing new core curricula for such
    education.

    This is the right time for Kellogg CRISTAL-ED. It is a time of both
    unprecedented need and opportunity to provide individuals and
    organizations with access to information. We recognize the growing
    need for information professionals who can:

    *   Grasp a holistic view of information systems; that is,
        professionals who understand users of information, are committed
        to information organization and preservation, and can use and
        shape current and emerging digital systems technologies.

    *   Commit themselves to the organization and preservation of
        information; that is, professionals who can lead in hybrid
        environments that feature both print and digital technologies.

    *   Transform organizations with the aid of information technology.
        Graduates of the new educational program will introduce
        technology into information-intensive organizations for the
        purpose of fundamentally transforming the organization's
        processes, products, and services.

    We aspire to educate a professional with broad competency and a
    holistic view of information systems. To accomplish this, the
    Kellogg CRISTAL-ED Project has the following objectives:

    1.  Reinvent the core curriculum for information and library
        studies.

    2.  Define new ILS specializations.

    3.  Create a distributed community of faculty and practitioners
        (collaboratory) to deliver the new professional education.

    4.  Build "living" laboratories in information-intensive
        organizations to serve citizens, faculty, and students. These
        pilot projects will provide realistic learning experiences for
        students, faculty, and practitioners, and will provide the basis
        for larger-scale digital libraries and collaboration systems.

    We invite you to join the Kellogg CRISTAL-ED listserv discussion and
    work together to discover the knowledge and skills for a new
    academic program that is committed to producing leaders who will
    create, organize, manage, and apply new forms of libraries and
    information environments to meet human needs. Not only will we
    feature discussions that parallel project activities, but we will
    devote time to promising ideas that arise during focused
    discussions. Feel free to subscribe and unsubscribe from the
    listserv as time permits or to follow topics in your areas of
    expertise or interest. SILS faculty will post course outlines and
    lists of questions to stimulate the discussion of new topics.

    A calendar of listserv discussions follows:

    Jan. 20 to 30: Envisioning information-intensive environments in the
    year 2015.

    Jan. 31 to Feb. 13: Identifying the knowledge and skills that
    graduates of ILS schools must have to effect change and
    transformation in future information-intensive environments.

    Feb. 14 to 28: Identifying components of a core curriculum for ILS
    programs.

    March 1 to 13: Organization of Information Resources in the core
    curriculum.

    March 14 to 28: Information Technology in the core curriculum.

    After March 28: To be announced.

    To support the discussion of the first area--Envisioning
    information-intensive environments in the year 2015--we will extract
    pertinent passages from the proposal to the Kellogg Foundation and
    post a list of questions. To familiarize yourself with Kellogg
    CRISTAL-ED generally, we invite you to visit the CRISTAL-ED Home
    Page. The URL is

    http://sils.umich.edu/Publications/CRISTALED/KelloggHomePage.html

    For participants who have no access to World Wide Web documents, we
    will feature Home Page information in listserv postings and make
    lengthy documents available through listserv transactions and FTP.
    New topics that emerge in the course of the listserv discussion that
    do not directly pertain to the scheduled topic for discussion will
    be introduced to the discussion when activity on the scheduled topic
    wanes. They may also be added to the calendar to a later date. SILS
    will evaluate the listserv in early summer 1995 to determine the
    future of its direction and content.

    To subscribe to the CRISTAL-ED listserv, on the first line of an
    electronic mail message to: majordomo [at] sils__umich__edu:

        subscribe cristal-ed

    We hope you will become a participating member in the Kellogg
    Coalition on Reinventing Information Science, Technology, and
    Library Education--an international, multidisciplinary collaborative
    consortium to define new professional specializations to serve
    society's needs for information access in the rapidly merging age of
    digital data, information and knowledge. We look forward to your
    participation.

    Daniel E. Atkins
    Dean, SILS
    Professor, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
    University of Michigan
    Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1092
    +1 313 747 3576
    Fax: +1 313 764 2475
    atkins [at] umich__edu
    URL: http://sils.umich.edu/People/atkins.html

Karen M. Drabenstott
Associate Professor, SILS
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1092
+1 313 763 3581
Fax: +1 313 764 2475

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 8:59
                 Distributed: Sunday, January 29, 1995
                        Message Id: cdl-8-59-014
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