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COMO XXI, held in October in Columbus, Georgia, featured two Fulton county employees, Deborah Simmons and Donna Flannery. Simmons and Flannery are graduate students at University of North Texas. Simmons (third from right), a School Media Specialist at Liberty Point Elementary, and Flannery (second from right), an Art Teacher at McClarin High School presented along with 6 other class members of a 35 cohort a skit performed at the 1998 ALA Annual Conference.

The skit, Red Light Libraries: Intellectual Freedom and Individual Rights, focused on the daunting realities that librarians must face in regard to the rights of individual patrons. Following the skit, the moderator and audience debated the rights to free speech, censorship, and examined ALA’s stance on these issues. Flannery portrayed the supervisory librarian role and Simmons portrayed the Library Director.

Media specialists, students, technology specialists and others participated in various workshops to increase their librarianship and instructional technology skills.

During COMO XXI, Simmons Meets Carmen Deedy (Signed copy in the Media Center)

14 Cows for America, by Carmen Agra Deedy in collaboration with Wilson Kimeli Naiyomah and illustrated by Thomas Gonzalez.

A remarkably beautifully illustrated story–it details the true story about a gift from a small Kenyan village to America following September 11.

Excerpt from the referenced site: As a child in the small Kenyan village of the Maasai, Kimeli Naiyomah’s biggest dream was to one day own a cow, a symbol of life to his people. As an adult, Kimeli held great sadness in his heart following the tragic events of 9/11. He decided to offer his beloved cow to the grieving Americans as an expression of his sympathy. In similar gestures, his tribe offered more cows – fourteen in all. Find out what cows mean to the Maasai. Follow what became of the fourteen gift cows and learn about the unique brand they bear. Read about the scholarship developed in tribute to this compassionate gesture.