RAILS Announces New Catalog Manager for PrairieCat

The Reaching Across Illinois Library System (RAILS) announces that Carolyn Coulter will be the new PrairieCat Manager, effective January 4, 2016. PrairieCat is one of four RAILS shared online catalogs. Coulter has a strong technology background and experience working at different types of libraries.

Currently, she is the Information Technology and Virtual Services Officer at the Pikes Peak Library District in Colorado Springs, CO, where she is involved with long-range planning, decision making, and major project oversight and implementation for all aspects of IT and Collection Management. Previously, she was the Chief Technology Officer for the Boston Public Library (BPL) in Boston, MA. This included managing the IT end of the Metro-Boston Library Network (MBLN), a cooperative resource sharing network serving multitype libraries in Boston, including BPL, the Boston Public Schools, and other surrounding libraries. Prior to that, she worked for Gaylord Information Systems (became Polaris Library Systems) as a customer service representative and database migration specialist.

Coulter was awarded Library Journal’s Movers and Shakers award as a technology leader in 2012.

PrairieCat has 124 member libraries in Illinois. Through membership in RAILS shared catalogs, Illinois library users share more than 18 million items annually, broadening the number of catalog items available to an individual library user. Coulter will be based at the RAILS Coal Valley service center.

RAILS is one of two multitype library systems in Illinois. RAILS provides continuing education and consulting services, a variety of online forums and resources for libraries, e-book services, delivery service, shared online catalogs, talking book services, and more. RAILS serves more than 1,300 academic, public, school, and special library members in northern and western Illinois. Visit the RAILS website at http://www.railslibraries.info.