Awarding Quality Service

Mikaila Corday, Library Assistant I, Acquisitions and Accounting, mikaila.corday@uc.edu

Dean Victoria A. Montavon (left) presents the QSI Award to Alphonso Early (second to left) as the QSI Award Committee (Dorris Jackson, Mikaila Corday, and Becky Topmiller) looks on. Photo by Melissa Cox Norris

"Wow! I never thought I'd win! This makes my day--no, my year!"

Alphonso “Al” Early spoke these words of surprise and elation as the Quality Service Initiative (QSI) prize team awarded him with the Fall Quarter University Libraries’ QSI Award. Al is a Library Assistant I in the Curriculum Resources Center (CRC), and has been with University Libraries for 18 years, honing his quality service skills in a variety of departments. Al started in the Conservation and Binding Department. He then spent several years in Periodical Services before moving to the CRC in 2001.

Al’s users and colleagues know him for his detail-oriented work and for his practice of never letting a problem go uncorrected. Recognizing that the success of the library largely depends on student assistants, Al has made student training his forte. In addition to his exemplary hands-on student training, Al has created training and reference manuals that are organized, up-to-date, and always within reach as a secondary resource for his student staff. CRC’s student assistants admire Al, noting that his easy-going personality and methodical approach to teaching them the ropes of the library make their work at CRC especially enjoyable. “He makes us want to do a good job,” one of his students said during the ceremony.

Anyone who’s been in the CRC may be daunted by the many types of materials with multiple classification systems housed in the stacks, everything from children’s books, games, toys, and teachers’ manuals to name just a few. Al insists on continual stacks maintenance to ensure that this varied collection of materials is readily accessible.

Al also contributes to quality service by serving on many University Libraries’ committees, including the Staff Advisory Committee, the Quality Service Initiative Committee, and the Quality Service Award Committee.

Al’s hard work and attention to detail result in satisfied users and a happy, motivated staff of coworkers and student assistants. Congratulations Al!

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