Della Curtis

Della Curtis is currently the Coordinator of the Office of Library Information Services for the Baltimore County Public Schools, the 24th largest school district in the United States. She is also a part time instructor at Towson University in the College of Education, Department of Instructional Technology and developer of many Maryland State Department of Education inservice courses for library media specialists and teachers. She received a B.A. degree from Salem-Teikyo University in Library Science, Secondary Education, and English (1968) and a M.S. degree from Towson University in Instructional Technology (1981). She has received many awards among which are: the 1998 Towson University's College of Education Dean's Recognition Award for Outstanding Contributions to Education; named by eSchool News as one of the top 30 technology leaders in the United States (Impact 30, 1999); the CyberAngels Distinguished Librarian (1998); Wired Kids Internet Safety Award (2002); the Baltimore County Public Schools' Outstanding Contributions Award (1996 an 1998); and, the Who's Who Among Students in American Universities and Colleges (1964). Among her many accomplishments as the leader of 166 school library media programs in Baltimore County Public Schools, she has provided the vision to launch school libraries into the Information Age. As early as 1981, she envisioned "libraries without walls" by connecting all secondary school libraries to online networks where students could located full text magazine and newspaper articles and other information for class assignments and research. By 1991, all school libraries were connected to the Internet, and, she along with a colleague, conducted a 30-hour staff development training program for 175 librarians to teach the technical aspects as well as how to utilize this powerful new technology for teaching and learning. In 1996, she provided leadership in the design and development of the county's first website - onLINE: The Librarians' Information Network for the Essential Curriculum < www.bcps.org/offices/lis >. She developed another comprehensive website to support school library media specialists in their roles as teacher, instructional partner, information specialist, and program administrator is the Baltimore County School Librarians' Online Procedures Manual < www.bcps.org/offices/lis/office >. In the July 2003 issue of School Library Journal, she was recognized in the Innovator's Spotlight feature article.