News & Reviews Committee

Charge

Compiles, produces, and distributes the Rainbow Round Table news blog. Creates book and media reviews for publication in the round table's reviews blog. Recruits volunteers to write articles about the round table, ALA, and other news of interest to round table members.

Roster

Kathleen T. Baril
(Chair, July 1, 2023, to July 31, 2024)
Jim Collins
(Member, July 1, 2022, to July 31, 2024)
Luke Sutherland
(Member, July 1, 2023, to July 31, 2024)
Ms. Amanda Michelle Toth
(Member, July 1, 2023, to July 31, 2024)
Anjali Jain
(Primary Staff Liaison, July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2030)
Hillary Pearson
(Staff Liaison, July 1, 2023, to July 31, 2024)
Previous Year / Next Year

Displaying active committee roster as of 07/29/2024. Last retrieved on 07/29/2024. Refresh now.

Resources

Composition

The committee will consist of 10 to 15 members, a board liaison, and will be led by a chair.

Origin

The Rainbow Round Table (formerly GLBTRT) Reviews Committee was charged at the November 2013 GLBTRT Board meeting. Book reviews were published in the organization's newsletter since the late 1990s. These reviews were written by an ad hoc group of members and edited by the newsletter editor and later a reviews editor.

Milestones:

  • 2007 - Reviews were posted on the new GLBTRT Blog, the group became an ad hoc sub group of the round table Newsletter Committee.
  • Fall 2008 - The Newsletter began reviewing films.
  • Winter 2009 - Title for Book Review Editor changed to Reviews Editor.
  • Spring 2009 - New guidelines for reviewers updated and formalized.
  • Summer 2009 - Newsletter now averaged 18–21 reviews per quarterly issue.
  • 2010 - Word limit for reviews raised from 250 to 500.
  • Summer 2010 - The GLBT Reviews blog launched in the ALA domain, on ALA's installation of WordPress at http://www.glbtrt.ala.org/reviews/.
  • Summer 2010 - Google Analytics was used to gather traffic data for Web Committee reports.
  • Summer 2010 - Notifications of all new posts to GLBT Reviews blog were automatically shared on the GLBTRT Feed (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace).
  • November 2013 - The GLBT Round Table Reviews Committee was charged at the November 2013 GLBTRT Board meeting as a standing committee of the round table.
  • July 2014 - The GLBT Round Table Reviews Committee began work as a standing committee.

At the 2018 ALA Annual meeting and the 2019 ALA Midwinter meeting, the Rainbow RT Executive Board voted to merge the News and Reviews standing committees into a single committee.

Procedures

Current review group procedures are documented in an informal round table procedure manual. The committee will craft their procedures and publish them here in the future.

Get Involved

Serving on a Rainbow Round Table committee requires membership in ALA and RRT. Learn more by visiting our membership page. To volunteer for a committee, visit our volunteer form page.