The Agenda - Faculty and Staff Newsletter

Author: Matt Badessa

  • Quick Takes on Events and News – March 2019

    Did You Know?

    Did you know that Ermira Mitre, library technician at Smith Library, is an accomplished writer, poet, and translator—both in the States and in her home country of Albania? Viktor Canosinaj’s The King’s Shadow, which Ermira translated from the original Albanian, is available on Amazon, and her poem “Dust from a Green Leaf” was recently published in the Montclair Write Group’s 2018 sampler.

    That’s Honorable!

    Kudos to Robeson librarians Bart Everts and Julie still, who will both be serving as judges for New Jersey History Day during the South Jersey regional competition at Rutgers–Camden this weekend. Congrats, Bart and Julie!

    Krista Gets Cinematic

    Krista White will give a talk at the Rutgers Cinema on March 12 at 7:30 p.m. for Douglass Residential College’s screening of Captain Marvel. Her talk will be called, “Further, Higher, Faster: Women as Action Heroes in Hollywood.”

    Hopper Expert Coming to Rutgers

    The 33rd annual Bishop Lecture will be held at Alexander Library on March 13. Gail Levin, Distinguished Professor at the City University of New York and Rutgers alumna, is the acknowledged authority on the American painter Edward Hopper. Her lecture focuses on her discovery of a major theft from the Hopper estate before it reached the Whitney Museum, where she formerly served as curator of the Hopper Collection. RSVP on Eventbrite.

    New Databases

    Check out these new resources: Medieval Travel Writing and African American Communities.

    Just for Fun

    Check out this list of 12 Tales of Librarian Badassery from The Booklist Reader!

  • Quick Takes on Events and News – January 2019

    Talking Gennett Records

    Congratulations to Elizabeth Surles, who was recently interviewed for The Music Makers of Gennett Records, a documentary for WTIU, Indiana Public Television. The Institute of Jazz Studies also provided photographs and archival materials for the film. You can view it on Facebook Live now for a limited time:

    Talking Tech with Mary Beth

    Mary Beth Weber was recently featured in an interview with ALCTS News, the Association for Library Collections & Technical Services blog. In it, she discusses her role at the Libraries, her leadership position in ALCTS, some of her personal interests, and her personal and professional philosophy: “Your best investment is yourself.”

    Robeson Library Helps Camden Kids in Need

    Robeson Library continued its annual tradition of collecting toys for the Camden Rescue Mission this year. All gifts were personal contributions from faculty, staff, or retirees. “Some children in our community near Rutgers–Camden may have no toys to open during the holidays, but during this toy drive, we put a dent in those numbers,” said John Gibson, Robeson’s instructional technology specialist. “As a child, this particular toy drive meant a lot to me, and I know it means a lot to others today.” Cheers to our colleagues in Camden for their continued support of this worthy cause!

    Kudos to Kayo

    Congratulations are in order for Kayo Denda, head of the Margery Somers Foster Center and librarian for women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, who has two exciting news items to report. First, Kayo has been selected for an appointment as a Smithsonian Fellow in Museum Practice at the Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access. Kayo’s project “Discovering American Women’s Histories: An Examination of Metadata Schema and Access Issues” will explore how libraries, museums and archives develop metadata relevant to the content of women in American history. The project will emphasize finding digital resources about women of color and appropriate metadata that describes the material and captures multidimensional relationships that increase access to diverse collections in support of ongoing projects on race, ethnicity, class, and gender inclusion. Kayo’s appointment (part-time) will start in mid-May and continue through September 2019.

    Next, Kayo reports that the “Women, Education and Leadership at Rutgers” portal is now live. Here, users can access a collection of interviews created by the award-winning filmmaker June Cross for the documentary From the Boarding House to the Board Room: 250 Years of Women at Rutgers, which was produced by the Institute for Women’s Leadership Consortium in celebration of Rutgers’ 250th Anniversary in 2016. The interviews with Rutgers faculty and alumnae, former deans of Douglass College, the dean of Douglass Residential College, and the director of the New Jersey State Federation of Women’s Clubs record and chronicle first-hand accounts of the history of women at Rutgers and serve as a unique resource to advance research and learning on women, gender, and leadership at Rutgers and beyond. It also affords to the world a glimpse at the significant work of women’s and gender studies scholars at Rutgers. With guidance provided by Rhonda Marker, two NBL graduate specialists based at the Margery Somers Foster Center created the metadata schema for each interview.

    New Resource for Promoting Your Next Event

    Customizable postcard templates can now be downloaded from the Communications Department website. These 4”x6” postcards are available in portrait and landscape orientations and are a great resource for promoting your next exhibit, lecture, or workshop. Download them here and contact the Communications Department with any questions or suggestions for new templates.

    Rutgers Style Guide Quick Reference Sheet

    University Communications and Marketing recently released a Quick Reference Sheet that addresses common questions about editorial style at Rutgers. This is a great cheat sheet to have bookmarked if you do any sort of writing about Rutgers or the Libraries that is public-facing. It’s also a nice complement to the Libraries Style Sheet. If you have any questions about how to use these resources, please contact the Communications Department.

  • What’s Happening around Rutgers – January 2019

    Martin Luther King Day of Service

    Each January, Rutgers University–Camden answers a national call to service to celebrate the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Volunteers, families, and community members come together to participate in a day of action, both on the campus and in the community. Activities run from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on January 21 and are open to students, alumni, faculty, and staff of the university; their families; and children and adults from across the city, the state, and the region. As an alternative to participating in a service project, attendees can also register for a marathon reading of “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” Visit Rutgers–Camden’s Civic Engagement website for more information.

    New Jersey Film Festival

    The New Jersey Film Festival’s Spring 2019 screening schedule kicks off on Friday, January 25 with showings of Geometry, a short animation inspired by the work of experimental filmmakers Oskar Fischinger and John Whitney, and Diary of Rooftop Water Towers, a poetic homage to New York City’s water towers as they evolve through the seasons. The season continues through March 1. Visit njfilmfest.com for more information.

    MLK Commemorative Lecture

    The Newark Public Library will host a lecture commemorating Martin Luther King Jr. on Tuesday, January 29 featuring antiracism educator and author Tim Wise and president and CEO of the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice Ryan Haygood. Doors open at 5:30 p.m. The event is free and open to the public, and light refreshments will be served. Visit npl.org/mlklecture for more information or to register.

  • This Month in the Agenda – January 1981

    This month we take a look at what the new year brought to the Libraries in 1981.

    Movin’ on Up

    A recent Association of Research Libraries report by Kendon Stubbs entitled “The ARL Library Index and Quantitative Relationships in the ARL” provided some indication of the relative standing of the Rutgers University Library system in this illustrious group. In 1978-79, based on volumes held, volumes added, microforms, serials, materials expenditures, Rutgers ranked nineteenth out of 98 institutions. It ranked higher than Princeton, the University of Pennsylvania, MIT, and a number of other outstanding institutions.

    The Agenda 3, no. 1 (January 5, 1981)

    That’s a Lot of Math

    The final recommendations of the committee for parking lot 34 (rear of Alexander Library) have been accepted and will be implemented in calendar year 1981. The committee consisted of four members: Don Luck of Technical Services, chairman; Jean Koyen of Alexander Library; Donald King of the Library School; and Michael Farley of the Library Administration. The recommendations of the committee are as follows:

    1. The parking lot will be redesigned to accommodate five additional parking slots….
    2. As lot spaces become available the following formula will be used to assign vacant positions. A point system will be established based on the following: Total points equal salary range plus years of service, plus five points for a subcompact/compact car plus ten points for each Alexander area employee carried in a car pooling arrangement. For example, if Jane Smith is a Range 10, has a subcompact car, carries one passenger who works for the library system at Alexander, and Jane has worked for the system for six years, she will accrue a total of 31 points.

    (Points)                (Range)                (Sub)                     (Pool)                    (years)
    (TP=                       10+                         5+                           10+                         6              = 31)

    She will be ranked along with all others who have applied for a sticker and the stickers will be assigned according to those with the highest total points.

    The Agenda 3, no. 1 (January 5, 1981)

    Get Oriented!

    The Staff Development committee is sponsoring an all day orientation for new employees on January 16, 1981. Hendrik Edelman and other library administrators and staff will welcome new employees and introduce them to various aspects of the University Libraries. The orientation will be held in the New Jersey Room beginning at 9:30 a.m. Employees hired since January 1, 1980 are invited to attend. Bring a brown bag lunch. Coffee and dessert will be provided.

    The Agenda 3, no. 2 (January 12, 1981)

    That’s a Lot of Interests
    Map of Libraries Special Interest Groups, 1981
    Map of Libraries Special Interest Groups, 1981

    The Agenda 3, no. 3 (January 19, 1981)

    Calling All Bibliomaniacs

    The auctioneer’s gavel will signal the start of “Bibliomania ’81,” the first annual fund raising event sponsored by the Friends of the Libraries. Scheduled for 1:00 p.m. on Sunday, May 3 at Records Hall on the College Avenue Campus, the auction will feature fine collectible items; antiques, coins, stamps, books, works of art, maps, and rare wines, as well as other quality items and services.

    The Agenda 3, no. 4 (January 26, 1981)

  • Quick Takes on Events and News – November 2018

    Award-Winning Oral Historian to Speak at Clement’s Place

    Patricia Willard, recipient of the 2018 Jazz Journalists Association Lifetime Achievement Award, will talk about her experiences working on the Institute of Jazz Studies Jazz Oral History Project collection and other jazz oral histories on Monday, November 5 from 6 to 8 p.m. at Clement’s Place. One of the most prolific oral historians on the Jazz Oral History Project, Willard recorded 16 interviews with luminaries such as Juan Tizol, John Simmons, and Teddy Edwards.

    Patricia Willard is an oral historian specializing in jazz, a photojournalist, lecturer, editor, archivist, broadcaster, concert producer, and research consultant, who is currently completing a historiography of Duke Ellington, 1949-74, two additional books, and a play. In June 2018, she received the Jazz Journalists Association Lifetime Achievement Award. She has conducted 38 individual oral histories and one 2005 videotaped group oral history of 19 survivors of the Duke Ellington Orchestra.

    DSMP programming is supported by a Rutgers–Newark Chancellor’s seed grant.

    OAT Program Supports Award-Winning Course

    Rutgers–Camden chancellor Phoebe Haddon recently announced that the Rutgers-Camden Nursing School received a 2018 American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) Innovations in Professional Nursing Education Award for their Spanish for the Health Professions Certificate Program, offered in conjunction with the World Languages Department. The certificate is designed to develop the Spanish skills of nursing students, increasing their capacity to provide medical care to Spanish-speaking communities in Camden and across the world.

    Dana Pilla, who was a 2017-2018 OAT recipient and who is serving on our review panel this year, is co-director of the certificate program. Her OAT course, Spanish for the Health Professions II, is a required component of the certificate. Her goal was to redesign the course to avoid costly access codes in order to better meet the demand for increased enrollment, assigning an e-book provided through the Libraries, other library resources, and free materials such as YouTube videos from the CDC and other professional health organizations.

    Congratulations to the OAT team for the role they played in supporting this innovative and award-winning program!

    NBMSA Recognized as Innovative Archives

    The New Brunswick Music Scene Archive was presented with the Innovative Archives Award on Monmouth County Archives and History Day on October 13. Jeff Moy, archivist at Morristown & Morris Township Library, pictured left, presented the award on behalf of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Archives Conference New Jersey Caucus to Christie Lutz, pictured right.

    SOAR Gets a Shout-Out 

    We’ve just received word that David Axelrod, professor in the Department of Genetics, will be thanking SOAR for its archiving services in his next publication. Congratulations!

    War Services Bureau Digital Collection Goes Live 

    The records of the Rutgers College War Service Bureau can now be accessed via their digital collection portal. This collection features letters from Rutgers students and alumni who served in the First World War, describing their experiences serving in the United States and overseas.

    Rutgers–Camden Embraces The Big Read

    Paul Robeson Library, in conjunction with the Rutgers–Camden Center for the Arts, is hosting The Big Read/In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez now through January 3, 2019.

    Alvarez’s 1994 novel is a work of historical fiction based on the lives of the four Mirabal sisters, who participated in underground efforts to topple dictator Rafael Leonidas Trujillo’s three-decade-long regime in the Dominican Republic. Three of the sisters—Patria, Minerva, and María Teresa—were executed on Trujillo’s orders on November 25, 1960. Their story haunted Alvarez, whose own family had fled the Dominican Republic just three months earlier in fear that her father’s participation in the resistance would make him a target of Trujillo.

    Complimentary copies of Alvarez’s novel are available on a first-come, first-served basis and viewers will have the opportunity to contribute to the Butterflies in Memoriam installation piece by creating their own butterfly in remembrance or honor of someone close to them.

    Exploring New Jersey’s Diverse Foodways

    Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University Libraries’ new exhibition From Cooking Pot to Melting Pot: New Jersey’s Diverse Foodways will open November 12, 2018 at Alexander Library. The opening will feature a presentation by Carla Cevasco of the Rutgers Department of American Studies, historian of food in colonial America and author of the forthcoming Violent Appetites: Hunger, Natives and Settlers in the Northern Borderlands. From Cooking Pot to Melting Pot is one of the first events in Transcultural NJ Revisited 2018-2020, a two-year, statewide celebration of local and global cultures in the Garden State under the auspices of Rutgers’ Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and the Jane Voorhees Zimmerli Art Museum. Register to attend.

  • What’s Happening around Rutgers? November 2018

    A "VOTE" pin or button on a flag of the United StatesThe Morning After

    Wednesday, November 7 | 9:30 a.m.
    Live-streaming on Facebook

    Hosted by the Eagleton Institute of Politics, The Morning After panel discussion will feature analysis of the results and implications of the 2018 elections.

    Panelists include:

    • Mike DuHaime, Partner, Mercury Public Affairs; Republican Strategist
    • Michael Hill, Correspondent, NJTV
    • Herb Jackson, The Record/USA Today Network New Jersey
    • Julie Roginsky, President, Optimus Communications; Democratic Strategist
    • Debbie Walsh, Director, Center for American Women and Politics, Eagleton Institute of Politics

    Moderator: John Weingart, Associate Director, Eagleton Institute of Politics

    mineralMineral Late Night

    Wednesday, November 7 | 4 to 8 p.m.
    Rutgers Geology Museum | Rutgers–New Brunswick

    Visit the Rutgers Geology Museum for their Mineral Late Night on November 7. Re-use your Halloween costume and come dressed as your favorite super hero while learning about some powerful minerals!

    Demonstrations, arts and crafts, and educational activities will be set up around the museum and people are welcome to come and go as they please. The event is free and open to visitors of all ages. Visit the museum website for more information.

    A Conversation with Gov. James Florio

    Thursday, November 8 | 6 to 8 p.m.
    Campus Center | Rutgers–Camden

    James J. Florio, a former New Jersey governor and an alumnus of the Camden location of Rutgers Law School, will discuss topics from his new book, Standing on Principle: Lessons Learned in Public Life. This free event will feature a conversation between Governor Florio and retired Philadelphia Inquirer reporter George Anastasia. Copies of the book will be available for purchase at the event. Register to attend.

    Behind the Magic of Disney: Is It Really Happily Ever After?

    Wednesday, November 28 | 2:30 to 3:50 p.m.
    Paul Robeson Campus Center | Rutgers–Newark

    This event is an open discussion on how gender roles, violence, and oppression have been masked in magic. Join the Rutgers Office for Violence Prevention and Victim Assistance to explore the hidden messages in classic Disney films. Visit the Rutgers–Newark website for more information.

  • This Month in the Agenda – November 1998

    Agenda november 1998It may be hard to believe, but November 1998 was two whole decades ago! What was happening around the Libraries?

    Dana Puts High Schoolers Online

    16 Newark Central High School students… participated in an innovative computer-usage-training program conducted last year by Dana Library and Rutgers-Newark’s Institute for Outreach and Research in Urban Education. This program was conceived by Dana Library Director Lynn S. Mullins and Professor Jean Anyon of the Institute.

    [T]hey learned about navigating the internet, searching government and university websites, finding websites on research topics, and using the networked indexes available at the Rutgers University Libraries…

    After the semester long course was completed, the Rutgers-Newark Teaching Excellence Center was asked to evaluate the program’s effectiveness. The center’s director, Ken Kressel conducted focus group sessions with the 16 students and four Central H.S. faculty members and reported afterwards that “This program received the most collective and heartfelt endorsements of any instructional activity I have studied in nearly four years of doing focus groups at Rutgers.”

    The Agenda 20, no. 22 (November 1, 1998)

    Let’s See Some ID

    The RUconnection Card Office is ready to start issuing the new photo ID card for regular library faculty and library graduate assistants on the New Brunswick campuses starting November 23 through December 11. If you have any questions, please contact Sandy Troy.

    The Agenda 20, no. 23 (November 15, 1998)

    Live to Serve… and to Instruct

    Learning and instruction take a myriad of forms in the Rutgers University Libraries of the 1990’s, from traditional to technological, from distance learning to digital.

    The Instructional Services Committee (ISC), composed of instruction coordinators and/or librarians skilled in instruction or instructional technology, was formed last month to keep track of the range of instructional offerings at RUL, and help develop new opportunities.

    Members of the committee are: Jeris Cassel, Helen Hoffman, Kevin Mulcahy, Ann Scholz-Crane, Julie Still, Thelma Tate, Bobbi [sic] Tipton, and Irwin Weintraub.

    The Agenda 20, no. 24 (November 29, 1998)

  • Designing Storage Architectures for Digital Collections

    Digital storage meeting at the Library of CongressStoring and preserving digital content continues to be a significant expectation of libraries and cultural centers around the country. To better understand these needs, as well to see what digital archivists around the country are doing to meet this challenge, the Library of Congress holds an annual meeting called “Designing Storage Architectures for Digital Collections.” The DSA meeting brings together technical and industry experts, IT and subject matter experts, government specialists with an interest in preservation, decision-makers from a wide range of organizations with digital preservation requirements, and recognized authorities and practitioners of digital preservation. The meeting is by invitation only, and for the past two years Rutgers has been invited to take part in the conversation. The most recent meeting was held on September 17 and 18.

    The first thing glaringly clear from our discussions was the increasing need for digital storage across all of our peers. From the few terabytes of data that Rutgers Libraries store in our repository, to the dozen or so petabytes stored by the Library of Congress, our digital collections continue to grow, and the demands for storage increase. This is driven by an increasing appetite for digital data from our patrons, but is also the effect of researchers and artists having greater access to digital authoring tools. We are now in the age where smartphones and tablets already in the hands of our user base can capture images, documents, and video in stunning quality—but with a cost in terms of larger file sizes.

    To meet this challenge, storage makers continue in the short term to refine the technologies we are already familiar with. Reasonably-priced tablets and laptops are now shipping with solid state drives reaching a terabyte in capacity. Fourteen-TB traditional hard drives are now hitting the market. And for long-term backups, tape continues to rule, with 30TB tape cartridges costing about $200 each. At the institutional level, libraries are beginning to cooperate and pool resources to distribute their storage needs across multiple datacenters, for redundancy and additional capacity.

    The not-too-distant future holds some different approaches, as well. In particular, research is ongoing to move beyond hard drives and tapes, and to begin storing data at the molecular level, using polymer chains. Even DNA sequencing is showing significant promise as a long-term method for archiving and preserving data.

  • Quick Takes on News & Events – September 2018

    Conceiving New Tools for Public Health Researchers

    In April 2018, JSTOR and Rutgers University convened a workshop of scholars, librarians, and students to brainstorm new ways to support public health researchers. Using a series of design thinking activities, they conceived a number of new tools and services, which were subsequently user-tested with both students and faculty. This video describes that work, shares the ideas that emerged, and presents the findings from the users tests.

    Exploring the Rutgers Female Institute

    A new post on the Rutgers Classics Department’s blog by professor T. Corey Brennan explores the classical roots of the Rutgers Female Institute, and also gives a nice shout out to our colleagues Kayo Denda and Fernanda Perrone for their work on The Douglass Century. Read the blog here.

    Chantel
    Chantel Harris (third from left) was recently named an honorary member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, the sorority her great-great-grandmother founded. Photo: Houston Style Magazine.
    Congratulations to AKA’s Newest Honorary Member

    Chantel Harris was named an honorary member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority this summer. Chantel is the great-great granddaughter of the sorority’s founder, Ethel Hedgeman Lyle. “Mrs. Harris’ commitment to helping others started at a young age. Through her church she served the homeless and worked with the Circle of L.O.V.E (Let’s Overcome Violence Everywhere) program that was started by her grandmother and member of Alpha Kappa Alpha, Muriel “Puff” Lyle- Smith. Mrs. Harris continues to advocate for women and children in her community. She is currently working to eliminate hostile work environments and workplace bullying,” wrote Houston Style Magazine in its report in July. Congratulations, Chantel!

    Tweeting in Defense of Libraries Everywhere

    Katrina Zwaaf’s tweets were featured in articles from Gizmodo and Inside Higher Ed following the Forbes article (subsequently removed) that stated Amazon stores should replace libraries to save taxpayers money. Thank you, Katrina, for taking this stand on behalf of libraries and the people we serve.



    NJDNP Awarded Second NEH Grant

    The New Jersey Digital Newspaper Project recently received a second grant, totaling $216,609, from the National Endowment for the Humanities. The additional funding will allow for the digitization of additional historical newspapers for the Library of Congress’s Chronicling America website. Read more in this report from NJ101.5. Congratulations to project director Caryn Radick and the entire NJDNP team!

    Krista White Making Waves

    Kudos are in order for Krista White, who has had two pieces of good news come across her desk recently. First, she has received another Rutgers–Newark Chancellor’s Seed Grant to expand her Digital Scholarship as 21st Century Scholarship project. The second grant—totaling $33,130, more than three times the initial award—will support Digital Scholarship as Modular Pedagogy, allowing Krista to develop curricular materials to share with faculty members and train them so that they can add digital scholarship and ACRL Framework elements into courses.

    Next, Krista reports that the special issue of College & Undergraduate Libraries titled “The Digital Humanities: Implications for Librarians, Libraries, and Librarianship”—which includes an article she contributed—has been so well-received that Taylor & Francis has decided to publish it as a monograph through Routledge. Keep an eye out for it in January 2019. Congratulations, Krista, on all this fantastic recognition!

    bike routeMapping Philadelphia’s Historical Bike Routes

    Julie Still’s article in Hidden City Philadelphia details her project to digitize the Philadelphia Inquirer’s column “Trips Awheel: Where to Go and How to Get There,” which appeared in 1897 and 1898. In addition to hand-drawn maps of each route, the column, written by Alphonse Estoclet, featured a unique blend of commentary and narrative. “The routes themselves read much as modern travel blogs do, with reference to historical, cultural, culinary, and financial aspects of the area,” Julie writes. View the research guide she created to document the project here.

    Inspiring Librarians across the Country–with Buttons!

    Megan Lotts and Tara Maharjan got a nice shout out on the Library Think Tank Facebook group last week for their recent article on button making: “Due to some major semester reorganization, our library lost a freshmen orientation event that we loved. We brainstormed an alternative Welcome event. We read the article about button making at Rutgers in College and Research Libraries News. My husband just happens to be the proud owner of a 40 year old button maker. We bought supplies and printed some images from our Archives. Our FTE is about 1200 and we made over 90 buttons yesterday (not everyone wanted a button). Students, faculty and staff all requested buttons. It was a blast,” wrote Mary Jackson, research and instruction librarian at Milligan College in Tennessee. Congratulations, Megan and Tara!

    All that Jazz

    Finally, Clement’s Place has announced a full schedule of events for the fall, including NJPAC Jam Sessions, the IJS Concert Series, and a new monthly series on Wednesdays called “Jazz973,” which focuses on local and emerging musicians. Clement’s is a really fantastic space and with all these events on tap, there’s never been a better time to check it out!

  • What’s Happening around Rutgers? September 2018

    New Exhibits at the Zimmerli

    On September 1, the exhibition Self-Confessed! The Inappropriately Intimate Comics of Alison Bechdel, which encompasses the decades-long career of the illustrious cartoonist and graphic memoirist, opens at the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers. It explores Bechdel’s work as a writer, an artist, and an archivist of the self, someone who constantly mines and shares her own experiences as a way to communicate something vitally human: the quest for love, acceptance, community, and social justice. Bechdel will speak at Rutgers on October 10.

    In conjunction with U. S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s first memoir for young people, the Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers is pleased to announce the opening of The Art of Turning Pages: Illustrations by Lulu Delacre for Sonia Sotomayor’s Life Story on September 15. Justice Sotomayor shares her inspiring story about growing up and her deep love of reading inTurning Pages: My Life Story, which will be published by Philomel Books on September 4, along with a Spanish version, Pasando páginas: La historia de mi vida. The exhibition features nearly 30 objects on loan from award-winning children’s author and illustrator Lulu Delacre, including her oil and collage art, preparatory drawings, and research material, on public view for the first time. Bilingual labels, in English and Spanish, accompany the works. Ms. Delacre will speak at Art After Hours: First Tuesdays on October 2.

    Halsey Fest
    Thursday, Septebmer 6, 4 p.m.
    Halsey Street, Downtown Newark

    We’re shutting down Halsey from Central to New Streets with tons of activities, arts, games, food, drinks, mascots and more! Come one, come all, bring a friend, and enjoy a night and get a taste of why everyone is buzzing about Newark! This is going to be epic! Rain date: September 13. For more information, click here.

    Panel Discussion: Child Separations at the Border
    Thursday, September 13, 12:45 to 1:45 p.m.
    401 Penn Classroom, Rutgers–Camden

    This free, public panel discussion will address the topic of children being separated from their parents at the United States-Mexico border. Panelists are: Ann Adalist-Estrin, director of the National Resource Center on Children and Families of the Incarcerated at Rutgers–Camden; Joanne Gottesman, clinical professor and director of the Immigrant Justice Clinic at Rutgers Law School; Lorrin Thomas, professor of history and chair of the Department of History; and John Wall, professor of religion and childhood studies and chair of the Department of Philosophy and Religion. For more information, click here.

    Fall Fest
    Saturday, September 22, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.
    Woodward Lawn, Rutgers–Newark

    Come out and enjoy food, games, and activities on the Woodward Lawn with the rest of your fellow Rutgers University-Newark students. For more information, click here.

    Finding and Facing Facts in Campaigns and Government w/ Eugene Kiely
    Monday, September 24, 7 to 8:30 p.m.
    Eagleton Institute, Rutgers–New Brunswick

    Eagleton Institute of Politics presents its 2018 Arthur J. Holland Program on Ethics in Government lecture, “Finding and Facing Facts in Campaigns and Government” with Eugene Kiely, director of FactCheck.org and Rutgers alumnus. Monday, September 24 at 7:00 PM. Free, but registration is required. Click here to RSVP. For more information, click here.

    An Evening with Colson Whitehead
    Wednesday, September 26, 7 p.m.
    Walter K. Gordon Theater, Rutgers–Camden

    Colson Whitehead, author of the New York Times bestselling novel The Underground Railroad, will give a free, public lecture. His novel is the 2018 selection for the Rutgers Reads program, which introduces incoming first-year students to academic life at Rutgers–Camden by reading and discussing one designated book. Register for this free event to reserve your seat. Email Rutgers Reads to be placed on a mailing list for more information, or click here.