Washington, DC - The U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science (NCLIS) announces that President Clinton has designated Martha B. Gould as the Chair of the Commission. Mrs. Gould was appointed to the Commission in 1993 and reappointed to a five-year term in 1998. She has served as Vice Chair under Chairperson Jeanne Hurley Simon who recently lost her gallant struggle with cancer. Upon her appointment to replace Mrs. Simon, Mrs. Gould said, "Jeanne was a dear friend and a wonderful colleague. I will work very hard to continue the work she began. Her dedication to the promotion of literacy and to libraries will continue to serve as a model for all of us. During my tenure, I will work for all libraries and especially school libraries, public Internet accessibility literacy and information literacy."
Mrs. Gould's first official act as Chair was to designate Joan R. Challinor, Ph.D., of Washington, DC Vice Chair. Dr. Challinor was nominated to her second term on the Commission in 1999.
Mrs. Gould is the retired director of the Washoe County Library. Her career includes work at the New York Public Library, the Nevada State Library and the Los Angeles Public Library. She has served as President of the Nevada Library Association, as a member of the Legislative Committee of the American Library Association (ALA), as a member of the ALA Council, and member of the ALA Intellectual Freedom Committee.
Named Nevada Librarian of the "Years" in 1993 for continued service throughout her career, her many accomplishments have resulted in other honors as well. In 1992 she received the International Reading Association Leadership in Literacy Award from the Sierra Nevada Chapter and was honored as the Woman of Distinction in Human Rights by the Soroptimist International of Reno South. She was named "A Woman of the Nineties" by Nevada Women Publications, ACLU Libertarian of the Year in 1988, in 1989 was AAUW's For Freedom Sake Awardee, and was the recipient of the Nevada Women's Fund Hall of Fame Award for Leadership also in 1989. In 1999 a plaque was installed in the Washoe County Library's new northwest branch recognizing Mrs. Gould as an individual who has changed many lives by her activities on behalf of the library and the community.
Mrs. Gould is a graduate of the University of Michigan and received her M.S. degree from Simmons College Graduate School of Library and Information Sciences. She has published articles and bibliographies on a variety of topics that include censorship and obscenity, drug abuse and venereal disease, and government limits to access to information. She has lectured about censorship at the University of Nevada and more recently, she teaches a Distance Education class in Library Administration. She has served as a consultant to the Nevada State Library and Archives and as Vice Chair of the Washoe County School District taskforce revising the social studies curriculum. Other community-based activities include service on the City Election Task Force and Vice President of the Nevada Diabetes Association for Children and Adults. Currently, she is the Chair of the Citizen Advisory Board to KUNR Public Radio Reno. Mrs. Gould lives in Reno with her husband, Arthur, an emeritus professor at the University of Nevada and an award winning documentary filmmaker.
The U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science is a permanent, independent agency of the Federal government charged by Public Law 91-345 to appraise the adequacies and deficiencies of current library and information resources and services and to advise the President and Congress on national and international policies and plans.