Mary L. Boone, a senior adviser to the Office of Information Programs and Services, which oversees the U.S. Department of State's main library, will serve as the winter commencement speaker for the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The ceremony will be held at 10 a.m. Sunday, Dec. 21, at the Wilson Library’s Pleasants Family Assembly Room.

Boone, who received a master's degree from the School of Information and Library Science in 1973, has had held overseas assignments with the State Department in Northern Europe and the Baltics, Germany and the Benelux, Southeast Asia and the Pacific, and the Middle East Gulf States. Prior to joining Foreign Service, Boone was director of the Chapel Hill Public Library from 1978 to 1985.

Her current position is at the oldest federal library established in 1789 by the first Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson. The library was named in honor of Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, diplomat, scholar and distinguished statesman who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1950. Boone’s assignment is to create a new and expanded information organization for the Department of State, to be called the Jefferson Information Center. The Bunche Library will form the foundation of the Center, and it will also include a new program to be called the Diplomatic Research Service.

The Jefferson Information Center will expand access to electronic information resources to department employees, stationed not only in Washington but also at 250 U.S. Missions around the world. From a single point of contact, department employees, members of the foreign affairs community, and scholars interested in the field of foreign policy will have access to the holdings of the library, about 500,000 volumes, as well as new electronic resources, and the archives and records of the department. Eventually, once the new organization is established, Boone’s position will be as director of the Jefferson Information Center, U.S. Department of State. In the meanwhile, she has the exciting challenge of establishing new programs and services while also overseeing an $11 million renovation of 45,000 square feet in the heart of the main State Department building.

For more information about the commencement ceremony, contact the school at 919-962-8366, e-mail info@ils.unc.edu or visit http://www.ils.unc.edu/ils/graduation/winter03/