This award, sponsored by Baker & Taylor, recognizes dedicated and outstanding performance by a library support staff member. An award of $1,000 and a commemorative plaque was awarded during the BCALA membership meeting at the 2019 ALA Annual Conference in Washington, D.C.
The following individuals were awarded the Baker & Taylor/BCALA Support Staff Award during its inaugural year:
- 2019 – Gail Littleton (Virginia Commonwealth University)
- 2019 – Renee Robertson Tecco (Public Library of Cincinnati/Hamilton County)
Gail Littleton is the Coordinator of Acquisitions Accounting at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA and is a 40 year professional of VCU Libraries. Her nomination was submitted by Amanda Echterling, Head of Licensing and Acquisitions at the University. Her nomination describd her as follows: “she is an excellent manager of her staff, supervising, training and advocating for them. She is the departmental expert in the fiscal procedures of the university. She is the go-to resource for errors in eVA requisitions. She also worked with vendors and university procurement to get the VCU voluntarily into compliance. Ms. Littleton continues to prove she is an essential, detailed, strategic and forward-thinking leader of VCU Libraries.”
Renée Robertson Tecco serves as Sr. Library Services Assistant in the Youth Services Department at the Main Branch of the Public library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County. She has worked at the library system for twenty-five years and was a founding staff member of our TeenSpot in 2008. Her nominator described her as “dedicated to the lives and emotional well being of teen and tween library patrons in Cincinnati.” In the early days of TeenSpot, she led efforts to contact high school teachers to create summer reading lists. More recent accomplishments include her leadership in helping the teens and tweens create a podcast called Brain Pizza and her advocacy for the library system’s creation of a Mock Coretta Scott King Awards event to accompany their Mock Caldecottt, Newbery and Printz events. Ms. Tecco consistently creates engaging independent programming and is currently working to revive a Cincinnati-Area chapter of BCALA.