News & Blog

Lily Dubach started as a Student Assistant in the Acquisitions Department in 2014, then held part-time roles in other departments, including as Adjunct Librarian for the Office of Scholarly Communication before joining us full time as the Connect Librarian supporting the Valencia West Campus.  She has a Bachelor of Science from UCF and a Master of Science in Information from Florida State University.

Lily officially becomes the new Textbook Affordability Librarian on May 8, 2021. In this role, she collaborates with teaching faculty, librarians, instructional designers, and pertinent campus units to promote and transition traditional course content to affordable textbook alternatives. These textbook alternatives include open educational resources (OER) and library-sourced materials. To date, UCF faculty have taught over 950 classes using open or library-sourced materials, in turn reaching over 65,000 students and potentially saving them just over $6.7M as of Spring 2021.

For more information about how Lily can help you reduce textbook costs, visit our Textbook Affordability page.

Did you know that many books include chapters authored by experts? Our very own library faculty and staff have written book chapters included in published books.

This is the second post in our Library Author Spotlight Series. If you missed the first one, check out our post on books.

Congratulations to our librarians who earned promotions this year!

Associate Librarian
Sandy Avila, Research & Information Services – Sciences
Sara Duff, Acquisitions & Collection Services

University Librarian
Ven Basco, Research & Information Services – Computer Science & Engineering

The promotion process takes nearly an entire academic year as faculty are evaluated on three main areas: research, teaching and service. Thank you for all your hard work and dedication to helping make UCF and the Libraries a major research destination. You are what makes UCF excellent!

To see the full list of UCF faculty receiving promotions or tenure in 2021: UCFToday: 138 Faculty Promoted Across the University

UCF Libraries welcomes our new Electronic Resources Librarian, Faye Mazzia!

Faye joins us from Touro University Nevada where she served as the small university’s Electronic & Technical Services Librarian and managed a collection that was 95% electronic. She has a Master’s in Library and Information Sciences from University of Arizona, with a focus in academic and digital librarianship.

If you look at Libraries’ faculty and staff bios, you will find a series of questions and answers to get to know us better (and find the important things like favorite book). We posed those same questions to Faye.

What are your main job responsibilities?

My main job responsibilities include assigning subject headings and call numbers to electronic resources. Basically doing what I can to make sure eresources (ebooks and ejournals) are accessible and discoverable to the UCF community! 

What does working at a library mean to you?

My favorite part about working in the library is the collection! I’m fascinated by just how much information is out there, be it print or electronic. 

What is your favorite book?

I think I can narrow my favorite books down to just 2!

Lord of the Flies by William Golding: I often think about how I would fare on a deserted island – probably not well.

Finders Keepers: A Tale of Archaeological Plunder and Obsession by Craig Childs: This exposes the murky ethics of the archaeology field. 

After 26 fantastic years with UCF Libraries, Meredith Semones is retiring on April 29, 2021.

Meredith started as a subject librarian with Research & Information Services before the Ask Us chat service began in 2002. For the past 19 years, she has coordinated the team of 15 staff and librarians who provide IM, chat, telephone, email and text reference services which were especially important during the pandemic. She also coordinates the Research & Information Desk (currently called TeleReference@RAID) which provides in-person reference assistance at the John C. Hitt Library 7 days a week.

In her own words:

As you know Ask Us chat holds a special place in my heart, it all started in 2002 and now 19 years later we are averaging between 500 & 600 chats per month. Thanks for thinking of me, I will miss all my co-workers. However I feel confident that Ask Us will continue to be a valuable virtual reference service serving the UCF community.

And as we wish pleasant journeys and a well-deserved break for Meredith, we leave you with a fond farewell from her LTAI, Dawn Tripp:

In spring 2013 I was given the opportunity to interview for the Senior LTA position with UCF Libraries/Ask A Librarian by Meredith and Barbara Tierney.

I was very nervous and felt intimidated since I had worked in public libraries for 15+ years and had never worked in academic libraries.  Many of my fears were allayed straight away with their warmth, kindness and encouraging words.

When Meredith offered me the position and I started that July, I was very nervous starting my first position with an academic library.  I felt that I may not fit in, but Meredith always made me feel like I belonged and was open to my questions and concerns and made me feel very comfortable.  She is one of the warmest, kindest, and most genuine people I have ever had the pleasure to work with. 

Meredith’s almost 50 years of librarianship, over 25 years of which have been with UCF Libraries, made her the best mentor I could have ever asked for!  I have learned so much these nearly 8 years.

I am honored and proud to have been her “right hand woman” these past years. 

Congratulations on your retirement Meredith!  I will so miss you.