On 13 May 2005 we learned that the State Library accepted our 2005 LSTA grant application, "Enhancing the South Carolina Digital Library Initiative Structure". The State Library awarded PASCAL $45,000 to develop and maintain structures that will facilitate the creation and dissemination of digital collections in or about South Carolina -- both by individual institutions and through collaborative partnerships. Specifically, we will solidify our technical infrastructure, expand outreach and educational efforts, promote standards-based digitization pojects within the state and provide information about collections and programs to a variety of audiences through a central website. The grant will build on our previous planning grants and move the SC Digital Library initiative towards long term sustainability.

I (Rick) am also pleased to announce an extremely well-timed addition to the PASCAL staff. Courtney S. Danforth joined PASCAL on 4! May as the Program Coordinator for Digital Library Initiatives. She has previously managed digital library departments at the University of Maryland and the Smithsonian Institution Libraries. She has a background in special collections, archives, and preservation. Her training for digital libraries began at the University of Virginia, working with their E-Text Center, renowned as a digital library pioneer. Ms. Danforth has substantial experience in strategic planning, development of digital collection, digitization technologies, grant writing, and archive and museum collections. Scholastically, she specializes in the history and literature of the American South, and she is also a native South Carolinian. She has the precise mix of skills and experience we need to pursue our goals of developing the SCDL as a central repository and statewide resource for our academic and public libraries, archives and museums. Courtney will help us complete our FY 2004/5 demons! tration project on South Carolina's place in the revolutionary war and will play a pivotal role in the upcoming grant. Funding for her position is through the LSTA grants awarded by the State Library.

Rick Moul
PASCAL Executive Director
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