Kentucky - Open Community

Lorene Kennard was born and raised and lives in northern Illinois, but her father was born and raised in Lewis County, Kentucky. She has an uncle and many cousins in eastern KY.   She has a masters degree in Library and Information Science from University of South Carolina. Her undergraduate degree is in Public Relations with an English minor from Illinois State University. Kennard has completed the grand slam of libraries having held leadership roles in public, academic and special libraries. She also owned a free lance research business. She is the producer and host of The Librarian Linkover, a podcast changing the paradigm on how we view librarians' skills.

Kennard's first professional job after library school was at Morningstar, Inc., in Chicago. While managing the corporate library, she was also involved in the creation, marketing and sales of the Morningstar Library Edition database designed for libraries. She left Morningstar to start Walnut Avenue Research. The information her clients hired her to find includes competitive intelligence, market research, local information and product reviews  While she was getting her business off the ground, she started working as a part-time Reference Librarian in a public library. A few years later, when the economy changed, she closed her business and pursued a public library director job. She worked as a library director for four years, but after working for incredibly difficult boards of trustees, she obtained her current role as University Archivist and Cataloging manager at a small, private university in Joliet, Illinois.

Kennard is an active volunteer, especially in SLA roles, including as President of SLA Illinois while the chapter was planning SLA 2012, as well as on the SLA nominating committee. She has won several SLA IL Awards. She served on an LTA advisory board and has mentored many library school students. Kennard feels at home in Kentucky, not just visiting family, but attending the KY Book Festival and watching her Gamecocks play in Lexington.