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John & Patricia Beatty Committee Report
Submitted by Jill Patterson, 2006 Beatty Committee Chair
The 2006 Beatty Committee members exemplify the dedication inspired by the only book award that CLA solely bestows. Along with considering sixty titles and selecting the final winner of the 2006 award, the committee updated and clarified all the documents used to guide member activities and promote the award. John Kallenberg took the lead in the initial update phase and the bulk of the 2005 November meeting was dedicated to finalizing the changes. None of the updates required approval from the Executive Committee as there were no changes to procedures or selection criteria. Primarily, wording was added to clarify that only books published in a given year could be considered by the committee and books unable to be considered could not be "passed on" to the subsequent year's committee. Additionally, we updated the award history and itemized specific responsibilities of the chair. Updated documents have been emailed to Susan Negreen, the 2007 and 2008 chairs and inserted into the Beatty Notebook.
The committee selected eleven books to add to the Eureka database of works that highlight California and demonstrate a high level of literary merit. Lisa Bartle then downloaded the entire Eureka database, examined the entries, and created a template. All entries were standardized in format, a number of former winners of the Betty award that were missing from the Eureka file were added, and after review by the Beatty Chair, the corrected file was uploaded. During this review, it was discovered that the Eureka entries for 2002 publications had never been added. We are in the process of contacting the members of the 2003 Committee headed by Julie Passalacqua. Julie was able to send a list of the Eureka titles and one member had annotations for five of the sixteen books. We hope to complete the database by adding these missing titles.
I can not praise the committee enough. Shana Johnson and Lisa Bartle are particularly thoughtful reviewers and have excellent design skills as they created the program and bookmarks. I can highly recommend both as potential chairs of this committee. John Kallenberg, who knew Patricia Beatty and helped create the award, was invaluable in updating the documents. Cynthia Corderman is the creative mind behind the centerpieces. All had strong opinions on the titles we considered and our final meeting to determine the winner was emotionally charged. It has been an honor and a privilege to serve as the chair of the 2006 John and Patricia Beatty Committee. I extend my sincere gratitude to Danis Kreimeier for appointing me to this position.
Posted on November 17, 2006 7:15 AM | Permalink