Conference Keynotes

Opening Keynote: Amanda Jones

Champion for Intellectual Freedom

We're thrilled to welcome Amanda Jones as our Opening Keynote Speaker on Wednesday, February 18, 8:30am. Recently named to the 2025 TIME100 Next list, spotlighting changemakers from around the globe who are shaping the next generation of leadership and redefining what progress, influence, and impact mean in today's world. 

A Louisiana school librarian and past School Library Journal School Librarian of the Year, Amanda made national headlines in 2022 after speaking out against book bans at her local library board meeting—and refusing to be silenced when extremists targeted her. Her courage has made her a national voice for intellectual freedom and democracy, earning honors from both the American Library Association and the American Association of School Librarians.

 Amanda’s 2024 memoir, That Librarian: Fighting Book Banners in Today’s America, and her feature in the upcoming documentary The Librarians share her inspiring journey and the vital role libraries play in our communities.

Closing Keynote: Mychal Threets

Mychal Threets is a librarian, mental health advocate, and the library’s number one fan (according to himself, admittedly). He was raised in his local library as a home-school kid, and got his first library card

 at the age of five.

He got his first library job as a library shelver at the library he grew up in and worked his way up to become Supervising Librarian of that very same library. He is very open about his mental health. He talks about it in hopes that it’ll help others in their mental health journey. He is adamant about encouraging people to believe him when he says he’s happy they are here.

He considers it an honor to the library people who raised him that he is a recipient of the 2024 “I Love My Librarian” award from the American Library Association, one of School Library Journal’s 2024 Movers and Shakers, one of TIME Magazine’s 2024 Next Generation Leaders, a 2024 winner of The Webby Awards for social impact, and one of the 2025 TIME Magazine’s inaugural list of 100 creators.

He is the author of I’m So Happy You’re Here: A Celebration of Library Joy, published by Random House Children’s Books and illustrated by Lorraine Nam. He is proud to be Resident Librarian for PBS and PBS Kids. He will never believe that he serves as the host of the revival of Reading Rainbow.