2026 HLA Conference: Full Schedule

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10:00am HST

President's Welcome

Friday November 13, 2026 10:00am - 10:10am HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

Speakers

Ellen-Rae Cachola

CLEAR Librarian & Digital Archivist, Center for Labor Education and Research, University of Hawaiʻi-West Oʻahu

Ellen-Rae Cachola, Ph.D., MLISc, is the Librarian and Digital Archivist at the Center for Labor Education and Research, University of Hawaiʻi West Oʻahu.

Friday November 13, 2026 10:00am - 10:10am HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Business

10:15am HST

Zines in Libraries: Everything You Need to Know to Get Started

Friday November 13, 2026 10:15am - 11:00am HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

This program will help any librarian get familiar with zines and how to incorporate them into their library. Zines (from magazine, small independently published pamphlets or books) are a great community connector and a unique art project that you can trade and share with friends. They can be a source of knowledge, culture, and inspiration. They are very accessible and democratic, and they are a simple, easy, and inexpensive program to run in any library. I am an avid proponent of zines; I run a monthly zine club at my library, I make my own and maintain a collection of others’ work, and I recently co-organized the first Hawaii Island Zine Fest.

I will pass around examples of zines I have made and collected; present resources on how to set up a little zine library with limited space and time; and outline how I run my DIY zine workshops for patrons. This will be a fun, interactive presentation with an emphasis on empowering patrons to create their own information resources.

Speakers

Bowie Mandelbaum

Library Assistant III, Honokaa Public Library, HSPLS

Friday November 13, 2026 10:15am - 11:00am HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session

11:00am HST

Kahu I Ke Ahi: The Fires I Tend

Friday November 13, 2026 11:00am - 12:00pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

This talk is a reflection on the quiet, sometimes heavy, and often invisible work of carrying stories forward. In this keynote, Kauʻi Sai-Dudoit shares moments from her own journey—learning to listen deeply to ancestral voices, navigating the weight of kuleana, and finding purpose in the restoration of language, history, and identity. These are the fires she tends—not only for herself, but for her children and grandchildren, her community, and the generations still to come.

Speakers

Kauʻi Sai-Dudoit

Awaiaulu

Kauʻi Sai-Dudoit is a lifelong student of Hawaiʻi’s history and the Programs Director of Awaiaulu, where she has worked alongside Puakea Nogelmeier since 2011 to help guide major initiatives in Hawaiian-language resource development, historical preservation, and education. Formerly... Read More →

Friday November 13, 2026 11:00am - 12:00pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Keynote

12:00pm HST

Lunch

Friday November 13, 2026 12:00pm - 2:00pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

Friday November 13, 2026 12:00pm - 2:00pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Refresh & Recharge

2:00pm HST

Introducing Hawaiʻi Digital Collections Summit

Friday November 13, 2026 2:00pm - 2:25pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

Creating, describing, and publishing our digital collections is a task that many cultural heritage institutions face, in Hawaiʻi and everywhere else. While some have established work processes and workflows, others are still developing. Often, these digital cultural heritage resources are trapped within institutional silos, making it difficult for researchers and the public to find, search, and utilize digitized resources. In this presentation, we will introduce the first Hawaiʻi Digital Collection Summit, to be held on Oʻahu (end of 2026, beginning of 2027), bringing together professionals from diverse cultural heritage institutions such as libraries, archives, and museums. The goal of this event is to strengthen the network among these professionals to explore ways to bridge gaps between diverse types of institutions and in how their digital resources are presented online.

The Hawaiʻi Digital Collections Summit will showcase digital library/archives projects and present opportunities to create networks allowing institutions to collaborate knowledge/processes sharing and, ultimately, unify search capabilities. We will share cases of hub and aggregator functions that exist in other states and regions, and present their governance models.

The summit is organized as part of the ongoing community engagement grant funded by the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA), intended to investigate the conditions under which Hawaiʻi heritage institutions could consider contributing their metadata to this national aggregator. In collaboration with a related project investigating similar perspectives limited to aggregating finding aids, we created an overall project titled: Pūpūkahi i Holomua: Collaborating Across the Pae ʻĀina to Link Digital Collections and Finding Aids, through which we held a series of town halls across the state to bring together cultural heritage professionals and community researchers in a facilitated conversation on these topics.

The grant will support 10 professionals from neighboring islands to attend the summit, which will be held on Oʻahu.

This presentation serves as a formal invitation for HLA members to join this event to learn more about the potential to build a unified infrastructure for sharing Hawaiʻi’s digital historical and cultural resources.

Speakers

Helen Wong Smith

Archivist for University Records, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa

Archivist for University Records at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, Certified Archivist Helen Wong Smith has over 35 years experience in historical repositories in Hawaiʻi. A B.A. in Hawaiian Studies and MLIS from the University of Hawai'i at Mānoa, she has held numerous positions... Read More →

Friday November 13, 2026 2:00pm - 2:25pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session

2:30pm HST

Intertwining Research: History Day and Libraries

Friday November 13, 2026 2:30pm - 2:55pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

National History Day is a program that encourages students from grade school through high school in each state to create history based projects related to an annual theme. Students can write an essay, make a documentary, design a website, construct an exhibit, or devise a performance about their topic. Primary and secondary sources serve as the foundation for these projects and library resources and librarians greatly assist students in accessing and utilizing these materials. Hawaiʻi History Day is overseen by the Hawaiʻi Council for the Humanities and I am the Hawaiʻi Island Historian Consultant. In this presentation, I will provide examples of how students employ library resources in their History Day projects, the process of evaluating these projects, and ways librarians can assist students in their research.

Speakers

Michael Skinner

Instructor of History, Hawaiʻi Community College

Friday November 13, 2026 2:30pm - 2:55pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session

3:00pm HST

Hoʻopaʻa Hou Nā Hīpuʻu: Advancing Reparative Description and Building Access

Friday November 13, 2026 3:00pm - 3:45pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

ʻAʻohe mea nāna e māwehe aʻe ka hīpuʻu i paʻa
No one can undo a securely fastened knot

From national and international updates to current local projects, this presentation shares the efforts of reparative description in the GLAM field, challenging us as information professionals to think deeply about how we are describing our materials and take inspiration from the networks of knowledge that have developed across the world to address these topics.

The first part of the presentation will focus on recent efforts to improve, adapt and add to controlled vocabularies within cataloging, metadata, and descriptive work in cultural institutions. Margaret will lead this part of the presentation, drawing on her experiences, including being chair of the ALA Subject Analysis Committee and co-teaching an indigenous knowledge organization class, as well as working on the Ka Wai Hāpai and Kahoʻiwai grants, which have advanced the development of the Hawaiian Knowledge Organization System (HKOS). .

The second part of the presentation will look deeper into a few of the Kahoʻiwai grant projects and share about the current efforts to add and improve metadata for records through the implementation of ʻōlelo Hawaiʻi and ʻike Hawaiʻi. Ani will lead this section of the presentation, sharing about the work that she has been doing with the Table of Contents Project, the Nūpepa Index, and being a member of the Kahoʻiwai Hawaiian Knowledge Organization System (HKOS) working group.

After these presentations, the presenters will lead a discussion on topics related to reparative description in Hawaiʻi institutions. We will encourage attendees to talk about their own efforts to better and more inclusively describe their materials, as well as talk through the steps to implement such projects in their collections. We believe that making space for such conversations at HLA is important for us to build our networks of knowledge.

Speakers

Margaret Joyce

Hawaiian Materials Cataloging/Metadata Librarian, Hamilton Library

Margaret Joyce is originally from Chicago, and has served as the original cataloger for the Hawaiian collection at Hamilton Library, University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, since 2017. She received her Master’s Degree in Library and Information Science from the University of Illinois... Read More →

Ani Kawada

Hawaiʻi Cataloger/Metadata Librarian, Hamilton Library

Friday November 13, 2026 3:00pm - 3:45pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session

3:45pm HST

Beyond Mainstream Manga

Friday November 13, 2026 3:45pm - 4:30pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

North America has been a rapidly growing market for manga ever since the 2020 pandemic, the height of which led to publishing delays and out of print titles due to demand. Luckily, manga fans can still find and discover new series at their local libraries!

While the majority of über-popular manga and anime fandoms are shōnen titles full of battles and action scenes, there is a vast number of underrated titles that should not be missed! A variety of series will be covered with tween, teen, and adult appeal. Whether you are an experienced graphic novel selector or new to manga, this session is for you! Expand your network of manga knowledge: By looking beyond the most recognizable titles, librarians can cultivate rich reading experiences, strengthen readers' advisory services, and allow patrons to discover stories that explore the expressive media of manga and sequential art. Q&A to follow as time permits.

Speakers

Jennifer Vinzons

Youth Services Librarian III, Kapolei Public Library

Jennifer Vinzons uses the term "Artist Librarian" to describe her educational background of a BA in studio art and her MLISc. Besides representing her two passions, it also reflects her goal to instill a lifelong love of reading, creativity, and learning in all patrons regardless... Read More →

Friday November 13, 2026 3:45pm - 4:30pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session

4:30pm HST

Research Support Onboarding Program: A first‑year exploration of student research assistant training

Friday November 13, 2026 4:30pm - 4:55pm HST

Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo

Our library is exploring a pilot Research Support Onboarding Program to introduce undergraduate student research assistants to foundational practices that may help them support faculty research. During this first year, we hope to experiment with training in literature searching, basic data organization, citation skills, and early exposure to responsible AI use in research workflows. The pilot’s purpose is to learn what approaches resonate with students and faculty, identify gaps, and understand where deeper training might be valuable. The library will coordinate the trial and gather feedback to consider how a more developed program could evolve in future phases.

Speakers

Becky DeMartini

Outreach and User Experience Librarian, BYUH

Becky received her MLIS from University of Hawaii in 2005 and for the last 17 years has been working at Brigham Young University-Hawaii in the Joseph F. Smith Library mainly focusing on learning and teaching and outreach. Over the years she has been involved with HLC, HLA, ALA, ACRL... Read More →

Zoia Falevai

Instruction and Reference Librarian, Brigham Young University—Hawaii

Zoia Falevai is an information literacy, instruction and reference librarian at the Brigham Young University – Hawaii, Smith Library. She obtained her Bachelors in Pacific Island Studies from the Brigham Young University – Hawaii and received her MLISc from the University of Hawai'i... Read More →

Friday November 13, 2026 4:30pm - 4:55pm HST
Grand Naniloa Hotel Hilo 93 Banyan Dr, Hilo, HI 96720

Focus Session