Description: “Approaches to Intellectual Freedom Instruction at Canadian Library Schools” is a follow-up to the Intellectual Freedom plenary presentation at the 2025 BC Library Conference. We are fortunate to have three professors from across the country who will share their approach for teaching, discussing, and encouraging student-led engagement in their IF courses.
Join Dr. Toni Samek (University of Alberta), Dr. Cameron Pierson (University of British Columbia), and Dr. Mahdi Ganjavi (University of Toronto) for an informative Q&A and a review of their programs’ intellectual freedom courses, moderated by BCLA’s Executive Director, Rina Hadziev.
The presenters will also provide tips, ideas, and best practises for teaching IF, applicable to conversations within a library setting with new hires, colleagues, and staff who are processing this challenging topic.
When: Tuesday, November 18th at 10am – 11:30am PDT via Zoom
Who should attend: Library workers with an interest in Intellectual Freedom, library professors, library leaders, and those training staff and / or hiring future library students
Presenters:
Dr. Toni Samek
Dr. Toni Samek is Professor and former Chair at the School of Library and Information Studies, University of Alberta and Scholar-in-Residence at the Centre for Free Expression (CFE), Toronto Metropolitan University. Toni co-founded and served as first convenor for the Association for Library and Information Science Education’s Information Ethics Special Interest Group, twice convened the Canadian Library Association’s Advisory Committee on Intellectual Freedom, served two terms on the Canadian Association of University Teachers’ Academic Freedom and Tenure Committee, and served on the Canadian Federation of Library Associations’ Intellectual Freedom Committee and its Indigenous Matters Committee.
She is on advisory boards for CFE and the International Center for Information Ethics and serves on both CFE’s Working Group on Intellectual Freedom and Working Group on Schools and Intellectual Freedom. Toni developed, and continues as primary instructor, for a graduate course on intellectual freedom and social responsibility in librarianship at the University of Alberta, where she served on the Advisory Group on Free Expression. Toni is the recipient of the debut Library Journal Teaching Award in 2007, a Faculty of Education Graduate Teaching Award in 2008, and a 3M National Teaching Fellowship from the Society for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education in 2012.
Toni is honoured with the 2013 University of Wisconsin-Madison’s School of Library and Information Studies Distinguished Alumna Award, the 2017 Library Association of Alberta’s President’s Award. In 2022, Toni was awarded a Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee Medal for service to the Alberta library community, including sustained efforts on the intellectual freedom front. In 2024, Toni received an Outstanding Reviewer Award from the International Journal of Information, Diversity, & Inclusion.
Dr. Mahdi Ganjavi
Mahdi Ganjavi, PhD (University of Toronto), is a lecturer, scholar, publisher, and distinguished historian specializing in the history of education, print, and literature in the Middle East. A former postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern University’s School of Education and Social Policy, he currently teaches at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information.
Ganjavi is also a publisher (Asemana Books) and cultural entrepreneur (Alef Persian Book), directing a platform devoted to progressive literature and scholarship on the Middle East, while curating diasporic literary events across North America. As the Editor-in-Chief of Asemana Magazine, he brings forward progressive, underrepresented, and diasporic voices that engage with resistance, memory, decolonial thought, and literary experimentation. His publishing and cultural projects aim to democratize cultural memory, bridge academic and civic knowledge, and support community-led archiving.
His research spans intellectual freedom, the transnational history of literature, books, education, print, and translation, as well as the politics of archives and counter-archiving practices in the contemporary Middle East.
Ganjavi’s book, Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East: The Franklin Book Programs in Iran (2023), was awarded the Middle East Librarians Association (MELA) 2023 Book Award. His second monograph, co-authored and titled Revolutionary Engineers: Learning, Politics, and Activism at Aryamehr University of Technology, is published by MIT Press in 2025. His scholarly writings, essays, and reviews have been featured in The American Archivist, International Journal of Lifelong Education, Encyclopaedia Iranica, Iranian Studies, and the Review of Middle East Studies.
Dr. Cameron Pierson
Dr. Cameron Pierson: UBC iSchool Lecturer
My teaching and research are informed by my background as an American Library Association accredited librarian. With experience in national, university, legal, school libraries, and ProQuest, I have worked in Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Germany, and now Canada. These experiences have created a unique, global expertise, supporting my research and teaching capabilities. I aim to facilitate students’ learning journeys to become information professionals who critically engage with interdisciplinary, global information issues, and to foster equity, inclusion, and cultural conscientiousness.
Cost: We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Province of British Columbia through the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, which enables us to offer these events free of charge.