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Spotlight on Carmen Orth-Alfie

By Brett Poe

In the first week of September 2008, Carmen Orth-Alfie replaced Jeff Bullington as Government Information Services Coordinator.  Jeff left KU to become the new College Liaison Librarian at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO.  Orth-Alfie already possessed a breadth of experience related to the field.  She had previously worked with government documents at KU for more than ten years and, while working in cataloging, worked alongside Jeff when selecting government documents to go to the annex.

The main responsibility of Carmen’s new position is to coordinate the integration of government information into other activities in the library.  As for goals for her new position Carmen says, “I would like to continue to work at what Jeff was doing to help educate others in the library about government information and to continue to provide instruction for it.”   Carmen has already found her favorite part of her new job.  “It’s really exciting to work with someone that needs information and I can help them find it. That’s really fun.”

Carmen is also responsible for the Federal Depository Library Program activities at Kansas’ regional depository library here at KU, and has just returned from the semi-annual depository council meeting in Arlington, Virginia.  The discussion from KU’s perspective is cataloging issues; whether KU Libraries is getting the information it needs from the Government Printing Office, and whether that information is in formats it can use.  Carmen must also find out what KU as a regional repository is required to have on hand.  She works with depository libraries to find out who is legally obligated to hold on to which government documents.  This is due to the fact that no single library could hold all the government documents.  Therefore they are spread among several different libraries.

Orth-Alfie had been headed on a different path when she was offered the position.  “I was very interested in working on something associated with copyright,” says Orth-Alfie. This interest is reflected in Orth-Alfie’s studies with the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where she is working toward an MLS degree through distance education.  She is currently taking a course that covers copyright called Legal Issues for Librarians and Information Managers. Carmen added, “I am very interested in digital initiatives and things dealing with images … but on the other hand that all ties in with government information.”  This is because 97 percent of the information distributed through the Government Printing Office is now done so digitally.

Orth-Alfie’s schedule is a bit hectic for the time being.  Carmen is beginning her thesis work, regarding copyright, next semester. “It is a balancing act to do well at work and school while having a healthy family life,” says Orth-Alfie.  Many of KU’s staff, faculty and students can probably relate to this statement.

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