Paul Whitsitt
As director of the Chicago Public Schools Department of Libraries and Information Services, Paul Whitsitt is charged with supporting, improving and advocating on behalf of library programs in a school district with 650 schools and 410,000 students. He oversees professional development for approximately 500 librarians, administers a variety of federal, state and local grants, and coordinates school library services with federal and state educational initiatives such as No Child Left Behind.
Whitsitt’s department develops reading motivation programs and is currently implementing a library automation project that will connect the resources of more than 500 school libraries.
Whitsitt serves on regional and national library boards, including the Metropolitan Library System for the Chicago area and the American Association of School Librarians, has been an adjunct faculty member for the Dominican University Graduate School of Library and Information Science, and is a frequent presenter at library and educational conferences.
Previously, he was a labor and employment lawyer in the telecommunications industry. He has a master’s degree in library science from Dominican University, a law degree from the University of Michigan School of Law, and a bachelor’s degree from Baylor University.