Mychal Threets is a librarian, literary ambassador, and the library’s number one fan (according to himself, admittedly). He grew up in Fairfield, CA, right between Sacramento and San Francisco. He was raised in his local library as a home-school kid.
He got his first library card at the age of five and was hooked on libraries from there. 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 2023 “I Love My Librarian” award from the American Library Association, one of School Library Journal’s 2024 Movers and Shakers, and one of TIME Magazine’s 2024 Next Generation Leaders.
Closing Keynote - Mary Finley-Brook
Mary Finley-Brook, PhD is a Professor of Geography, Environment and Sustainability at the University of Richmond, where she has taught since 2006. Finley-Brook has decades of experience conducting participatory action research and she collaborates regularly with community-based organizations and frontline populations to advance climate justice in energy sector transformation. Her interests include environmental pollution, public health, climate justice, energy transition, and affordable access to renewable energy. Finley-Brook has served on review panels for the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy and the National Science Foundation. She is co-author of the textbook Climate Crisis, Energy Violence with Elsevier Press (2024). Her research has been published in International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Annals of the Association of American Geographers, Energy Research and Social Science, Geopolitics, International Forestry Review, Water Alternatives and William and Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review. Finley-Brook recommended creation of the Virginia Governor’s Advisory Council on Environmental Justice to the Northam Administration in 2017 and was a founding member of this council. She conducted participatory research with the Virginia Environmental Justice Collaborative from 2015 to 2023. Her current collaborations with community partners include green workforce training with Bridging the Gap in Virginia and energy justice initiatives in Puerto Rico with Comité Diálogo Ambiental. With the explosion of data centers in Virginia, Finley-Brook has developed expertise on cloud technologies and AI with particular attention to ethical governance and climate risks. She is co-founder of the Richmond Climate Circle and has trained with the Climate Psychology Alliance of North America to facilitate conversations in small groups about climate change, including the many emotions associated with experiencing ecological shifts.
