We are excited to announce Tony Zanders, Dr. Michele A. L. Villagran, and Dr. Damayanthi M. A. Niles as the plenary speakers at Atla Annual 2022.
Tony Zanders
Tony Zanders will provide the opening plenary on Thursday, June 16. Tony Zanders is an award-winning software entrepreneur and library technology executive. He currently serves as the founder and CEO of Skilltype — a software platform for information professionals and their teams to analyze, develop, and share expertise. He also serves as the inaugural entrepreneur in residence at the Boston University Libraries. In this role, Zanders provides executive counsel to the University Librarian during the academic strategic planning process while designing and implementing new approaches to recruitment, retention, and training that produce elite performance for the University and its Libraries. Zanders is the first EIR in the Libraries’ history.
Tony is a frequent speaker and writer in library and higher education communities including the American Library Association (ALA), the International Federation of Library Associations (IFLA), and the Special Library Association (SLA). Zanders is an honors graduate from Washington and Jefferson College, where he double-majored in English and Philosophy and was awarded the institution’s Young Alumni Award in 2015. A proud native of New Orleans, Louisiana, he currently lives in Louisiana with his wife and children.
Add his session, Culture or Collections? Navigating the Next Chapter in Libraries to your Sched.
Dr. Michele A. L. Villagran
On Friday, June 17, Dr. Michele A. L. Villagran will deliver the plenary address. Dr. Michele A. L. Villagran is based in the Los Angeles area and serves as CEO of CulturalCo, LLC, consulting in areas of diversity & inclusion, cultural competency and cultural intelligence, emotional intelligence, and conflict management. Dr. Villagran is an Assistant Professor with the San José State University School of Information. Her research focuses on diversity and social justice issues in library and information science and cultural intelligence phenomena within libraries.
She is a certified advanced cultural intelligence facilitator and unconscious bias facilitator through the Cultural Intelligence Center and a Conflicts Dynamic Profile consultant. Dr. Villagran has more than 25 years of information profession experience, including work in both the public and private sectors.
Dr. Villagran earned her Doctor of Education in Organizational Leadership from Pepperdine University with her doctoral work focusing on cultural intelligence. She also received a Master of Dispute Resolution and Certificate in Dispute Resolution from Pepperdine. At the University of North Texas, Dr. Villagran received her MLS degree in Legal Informatics and MBA in Strategic Management. Dr. Villagran holds offices and serves on committees in many professional associations in the library and information science, legal, dispute resolution, and education fields.
Add her session, Relating Inside Out: Strategies for Developing a Culture of Connection to your Sched.
Dr. Damayanthi M. A. Niles
Saturday’s luncheon plenary address on June 18 will be given by Dr. Damayanthi M. A. Niles. Dr. Niles currently serves as the Interim Academic Dean and Professor of Constructive Theology (Allen and Dottie Miller Professor of Mission and Peace) at Eden Theological Seminary in St. Louis, Missouri.
Damayanthi Niles’s writing and research have been focused on constructive and contextual theology. She has taught courses on foundational theology, missiology, and post-colonial thought. She has also served as the research associate of the Christianity in Asia Project at the Centre for Advanced Religious and Theological Studies at Cambridge University, United Kingdom.
A frequent lecturer, Dr. Niles has expertise in Asian theology and missiology. Her areas of interest and teaching include constructive theology, inter-faith, comparative theology, theology and power, contextual theology with a particular interest in Asia, language of theology in a landscape of conflict and violence, and using aesthetics in the teaching of theology. In her spare time, she enjoys cooking, particularly Asian curries. She also enjoys music, reading, and theater. She is an ordained Minister of the Word and Sacrament, Presbyterian Church (USA).
Dr. Niles received her BA from Saint Olaf College, MDiv from Princeton Theological Seminary, and PhD from the University of Chicago.
Add her session, Think About Christianity that Takes Pluralism Seriously to your Sched.
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