Woodlawn Branch Librarian Receives Award

Michelle Hamiel, branch manager of the Woodlawn Branch, is the 2012 recipient of the James Partridge Outstanding African American Information Professional Award.

Presented by the College of Information Studies at the University of Maryland and the Citizens for Maryland Libraries, the award honors the unsung members of the library profession who contribute greatly but who are often behind the scenes and do not receive public recognition for their important contributions to librarianship and the library community.

The award was given in a Nov. 9 ceremony at the Nyumburu Center at University of Maryland College Park.

Hamiel received her Masters in Library Science from the University of Maryland in 2003 and has worked for the Baltimore County Public Library for over 23 years. She has been the manager of BCPL's Woodlawn Branch for nine years, where she has led the branch through an aggressive series of outreach and partnership efforts intended to involve underserved segments of the community, launching after-school programs for teens to enhance their academic and life skills, a support project for ex-criminal offenders, bilingual/multilingual story times to promote early literacy and special sensory story times for autistic children.

Hamiel was also instrumental in the expansion of the Woodlawn Branch and the construction of Storyville West, one of BCPL's two award-winning interactive early literacy learning centers designed specifically for children ages birth through 5 and their caregivers to promote the development of important kindergarten readiness skills.