Dow Jones Leadership Award
Presented annually to an SLA member or members in good standing who exemplify leadership as a special librarian through examples of personal and professional competencies. The recipient of the Dow Jones Leadership Award receives a cash award in the amount of US$ 2000. 

2007 Recipient of the Dow Jones Leadership Award

Jane Kinney Meyers, President
Lubuto Library Project, Inc.
Washington, D.C.

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Jane Meyers, an SLA member since 1982, is a professional librarian with over 20 years' experience working with and living in Africa. She lived in Malawi for nearly four years, developing a network of research libraries for the country's Ministry of Agriculture, under a World Bank project, and pioneering CD-ROM applications for Africa in the mid-1980's. Ten years later she returned to neighboring Zambia, accompanying her husband for a three-year posting. There, as Myers worked on projects for the American Library and for Johns Hopkins University, she became increasingly involved with services to street children offered by the Fountain of Hope, a drop-in shelter in Lusaka. She established a reading program, served on the Board, raised funds, and created a library for the children, among her many contributions to the center. On her return to the U.S. in 2001, she developed the concept, approach and organization of the Lubuto Library Project, based on the success and impact of the library in Lusaka.

It was becoming a mother, volunteering in her children's schools and with an organization to support child survivors of the Rwanda genocide, and working at the Cheshire Cat bookstore that prepared Jane to go in a different direction professionally when she moved to Zambia. She had taken perhaps 1,000 good children's books with her, knowing (from the Malawi experience) how precious and inaccessible books are in Africa. So it was natural that, when she first visited Fountain of Hope, she asked if she could read to the children. Recognizing the great unmet need in helping those children, her career is now focused on making books and libraries available to the most vulnerable children in Africa.

Meyers has a master's in library science from the University of Maryland College of Library and Information Services, bachelor's from the University of Arizona.

About Lubuto
The Lubuto Library Project grew from a seed planted at the end of the 1990s. From 1999 to 2001, Meyers was instrumental in establishing a "street kids library" at the Fountain of Hope drop-in shelter in central Lusaka, Zambia.

More of a reading room than full-fledged library, it grew out of a weekly reading program that Meyers began, which attracted a whole cadre of volunteers. As word of the reading program spread, individuals, publishers and schools in both the United States and the United Kingdom donated thousands of new and used children's books.

A used 20 foot shipping container was adapted for use as a library by adding a door, windows, shelving and carpeting. Local embassies, businesses, charitable organizations and members of the Zambia Library Association facilitated the opening of the library. Two Fountain of Hope staff members were appointed to run the library.

The street children loved the library, and treated the books with respect. Some children used the library to study for the secondary school entrance exam, and were able to pass, earning a right to attend public high school, which in Zambia are boarding institutions, and a better future. The need to build on this experience was clear, and the Lubuto Library Project was born.

The library that opened in spring 2006 Lusaka is the first of 100 the project plans to build libraries in Zambia and neighboring countries. The plan is to open two more libraries in Zambia this year. The project selects sites where there are at least 500 children ages five to 18 within walking distance.

How can you help? Visit http://sla.dsoc.googlepages.com/lubutolibraryproject.

Past Recipients of the Dow Jones Leadership Award
Eugenie E. Prime (1998)
Lucy B. Lettis (1999)
Janice Chindlund (2000)
Carol L. Ginsburg (2001)
Tom Fearon (2002)
Robert Bellanti (2003)
The Special Committee on Competencies (2004):

Dee Magnoni
Eileen Abels
Joanne Gard Marshall
John R. Latham
Rebecca Jones 

Susan Fifer Canby (2005)
Ilene Strongin-Garry (2006)