News from the ALASC student newsletter, The Descriptor. The Descriptor was discontinued in 2017 but we thank all contributing students for their efforts.
By Elijah Enos Abstract This paper provides an overview of the challenges faced by information designers attempting to process instances of polysemy in natural language, as well as an overview of proposed solutions. Polysemy is the linguistic phenomenon in which one word will have more than one meaning. This creates a challenge for users of search engines and…
by Amanda St John Introduction Since the 1790s, American prisons have provided books to inmates (Darby, 2004; Mfum, 2012) and many facilities staff correctional libraries. With a trend in increasing populations and 1 in 35 adults under some form of correctional supervision, the United States of America holds the largest number of inmates in the world (De la…
  Thank you for reading the Fall 2015 issue of the iSchool Descriptor! My name is Jessie Spragge, and I'm the 2015-2016 editor of the Descriptor (though I'd love to be involved beyond this year!). I was so happy to be selected to help make the newsletter possible, and I want to work with all of you to make the Descriptor the best…
by Amy Senn Those of you working in libraries may have already attended a library conference.  But for those of you who haven’t made it to one yet, I can’t recommend attending your first library conference highly enough.  I recently had the opportunity to attend the Pacific Northwest Library Association (PNLA) annual conference in Vancouver, Washington on August 6…
Welcome to the 2015-16 school year! My name is Melissa Reynolds and I am honored to serve as your newly elected ALASC President. This year we have an entirely new ALASC Board! Although this presented some challenges, I am confident that we have built a strong executive team. It has been a pleasure getting to know each of the new…