Tiffany Alston, LIS Industry Speaker Series

Tiffany Alston is currently the Chief of Public Services for the DC Public Library. She began her career at libraries in 1995 at the New York Public Library where she was hired as a book page. Over her extensive career, she worked in almost all capacities in a public library setting. Tiffany has a passion for working with young adults. She LOVES teenagers and their attitudes but not always their approach. She will often share with them that her road to where she is, was not an easy one nor was it the worst but it was a lot of work!

Since leaving the New York Public Library in 2018 to join the DC Public Library, Tiffany has participated in the Equity Lab’s Seeding Disruption 3rd Cohort, Leadership of Greater Washington’s Anti-Racist Leadership series 101 & 201 in addition to internal Talent management work. She has also participated in an Action Learning Certification program which focuses on learners gathering knowledge by working with other peers in a group setting to find a solution to a problem or scenario. In doing so, learners will be able to not only develop their own skill sets and knowledge base, but also those of the group or of the organization. She is a committed supporter of Racial Equity work and has participated in diversity and Inclusion work in addition to de-escalating difficult situations. Tiffany has used her operational ranks in diverse communities to build and create policies and procedures to strengthen the work of the agency, create pandemic preparedness documents and processes and connect people and resources.

Tiffany has a passion for public service and building unified communities. She is proud of strengthening the DC Public Library by supporting the right sizing of programs and services for neighborhoods in the Washington, D.C. area. She also has had the opportunity to work with and develop several Library directors, managers and staff members during her career. Under her leadership, staff has been able to learn, evolve and flourish professionally. As a result, libraries are working more closely with each other and their local CBO’s. Tiffany is also a member of the American Libraries Association, Public Library Association, Urban Librarians Council, District of Columbia Library Association and the Maryland Library Association.She also previously served as Vice President of the New York Black Caucus Association for 2 years. In that support role, she worked closely with the President on initiatives that she wanted to see accomplished.

Tiffany holds a master’s degree in library science from Pratt Institute (NYC).