Category: Units

Rutgers University Libraries at NJLA Conference, May 16 – 18

Many of our colleagues will attend or participate in the 2016 Annual NJLA Conference this month. The conference will run from May 16-18 and will take place at Harrah’s Waterfront Conference Center in Atlantic City. Perusing the program, it looks like the following sessions will feature people from Rutgers University Libraries. If I’ve missed one, please send me a note and I’ll update this post.

Tuesday, May 17:

Poster Sessions
“Embracing Challenges in Times of Change: NJ Academic Librarians Identify Opportunities Presented by the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education”
Leslin Charles
11:15 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.

Best Practices in Internal Communications
Jessica Pellien
11:30 a.m. – 12:20 p.m.

Awesome Outreach by Academic Libraries
Megan Lotts
3:10 p.m. – 4 p.m.

Music Advisory: Connecting Books, Music & Readers
Jonathan Sauceda
4:10 p.m. – 5 p.m.

Wednesday, May 18:

College & University Section Research Award Forum
Gracemary Smulewitz
2:30 p.m. – 3:20 p.m.

Training Tips & Tricks: Templates and Strategies for Training New Staff
Zara Wilkinson, Moderator
3:40 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.

Some of our colleagues from Rutgers SCI will be presenting as well:

Tuesday, May 17:

The Changing Face of Education for Information Professionals
Ross Todd, PhD, Rutgers University
Lilia Pavlovsky, PhD, Rutgers University
Joyce Valenza, PhD, Rutgers University
Chirag Shah, PhD, Rutgers University
3:10 – 5 p.m.

Wednesday, May 18:

Will Librarians be Ready When Professors and Students Move from Print Research Papers to Multimedia Presentations?
11:30 – 12:20
Dan O’Connor, Rutgers LIS
GoUn Kim, Rutgers LIS

April 28, 2016
Gary Golden’s Retirement Party Invitation

Join us as we celebrate Gary Golden’s incredible career at Rutgers University Libraries. The faculty and staff at Paul Robeson Library are planning a festive party to commemorate Gary’s retirement on June 6 at 12 p.m. Join them on the 2nd floor of the Robeson library for food and fun.

If you plan to attend, please let Monique Whittle know. RSVPs and the suggested donation of $25 is due to Monique by May 19.

We will have a couple of speakers at the event, but we want to give everyone a chance to share their special memories and moments with Gary.

If you would like to participate in a special display during the event, please fill out this Google form.

To share this form with colleagues past and present, please send this link: http://go.rutgers.edu/wtdae3t.

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April 28, 2016
Tara Maharjan’s visit to Kaiser Library in Nepal [Photos]
Special collections and university archives processing archivist, Tara Maharjan, recently traveled to Nepal, almost one year after the 7.8 magnitude earthquake. While in Nepal, she took a trip to the 120-year old Kaiser Library, the oldest library in the country. The library building, as well as one-third of the 28,000 books, were damaged. The books from the four floors have all been moved to the ground level, the only part of the building which is somewhat structurally sound, and are now in plastic bags until the building can be reopened to the public. In the mean time, the small library staff serves patrons from a tent outside the building, where people can view newspapers and a few books.

Here are just a few of Tara’s images from the Kaiser Library:
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April 28, 2016
Call for Submissions to Featured Collections

What would you feature in this spot on our homepage?

In order to better represent the magnitude and diversity of materials the Libraries hold, we are opening up the Featured Collections block on the Rutgers University Libraries homepage to submissions. We can include a photograph and a brief description of a physical or digital collection or other materials you think will be of interest to our users.

To be included, please send Mary Ann Koruth an image with a caption and a description with a link (if available) to any item that you feel deserves to be showcased on the homepage. These could include photographs, prints, videos, maps, books, collections, items relating to science and medicine, oddities from the archives–you name it.

We’d like to extend a special thanks to Caryn Radick and Tara Maharjan in Special collections in Alexander, for the wealth of material they have brought to our notice over the past years.

Please take some time to peruse through collections in your specialty and send in a submission that grabs your eye and piques your interest!

April 28, 2016
Dana Library Proposed Renovation Project
Rutgers University–Newark chancellor Nancy Cantor recently approved an $11 million renovation project for the John Cotton Dana Library.

Building upon the Rutgers 2030 Physical Master Plan and the Rutgers University–Newark strategic plan, this project is one of two student-focused renovation and expansion projects to be included as part of the university’s capital improvement fund (CIF) grant.^{^[1]} The renovation project will take place in two phases, the first of which will be contingent upon the receipt of the CIF grant.

The completion of this multiphase renovation will result in a more visually appealing building that will better facilitate learning interactions between faculty, staff, and students; serve as a collaborative space where town and gown meet; and provide a comfortable, contemplative space conducive for individual and group study.

The first phase of the renovation will be the creation of the new P3 Collaboratory on the third floor of the library. This space has remained unfinished since the addition of the third and fourth floors during the library’s 1994 renovation. The fourth floor houses the world renowned Institute of Jazz Studies.

The P3 Collaboratory is a university unit that will provide comprehensive support to instructional faculty and graduate students focused on teaching, leadership, collaborative publicly engaged scholarship, and career development. To accommodate the expected increase in traffic, the plan also includes the installation of a new high capacity elevator and a grand stairway.

The second phase of the project will be a complete reimagining of the first floor. A highlight of the plan is a public interior passageway on the ground floor called RU-N Walk that will position the Libraries at the heart of the campus by providing connectivity between the Campus Center and University Avenue. This phase will also include the addition of student-centric spaces and service areas such as a QuadCommons café, a research commons area, exhibit space, and soft seating.

While there will be a lengthy construction period, when the project is complete, the library’s spaces will be more appealing and useful to our core users. As soon as we know when the renovations will begin, we will let you know so we can prepare for any disruptions to our services.

Scroll through this presentation for more information on this project (click on images to make them bigger and more legible):
[1] “Facts About Proposed Facilities Projects Across Rutgers University”. http://news.rutgers.edu/fact-sheet/facts-about-proposed-facilities-projects-across-rutgers-university/20160114#.VplDMWMsalH. Accessed 4/21/16
April 28, 2016
University Librarian Report: Update on Budget for 2016-2017
Krisellen Maloney, Vice President for Information Services and University Librarian

Hello all –

Few things impact the function of the Libraries more than the outcome of the lengthy budget process we undertake each year. This year, our budget requests were made in the context of the RCM budget model in which the Libraries must demonstrate the value of their requests to the Chancellors at each university and ask for funding of both central and local components of our expenses.

I am happy to report that many of our requests have been approved, including:
1. $256,198 – Specialized clinical resources – Central
2. $200,000 – Nature/Springer STM e books – Central
3. $21,000 – Pharmacy resources, previously paid directly by Pharmacy – Central
4. $87,000 – Computer refresh – NB
5. $24,000 – Computer refresh – RBHS
6. $10,000 – Extended hours – Newark
7. $TBD – extended hours – Alex NB (Chancellor funding directly as trial)
8. $20,000 – Evening staff – RBHS (no longer to be paid directly by NJMS & GSBS)
9. $TBD – Extended hours – Kilmer NB (Chancellor funding directly cost as trial)
10. $36,000 – Permanent late hours guard – RBHS
11. $42,000 – Salary adjustments – RBHS
12. $14,749 – partial elimination of salary vacancy factor
You can view the original budget request here. [.docx]

These allocations directly support the priorities we discussed the State of the Libraries presentation in November 2015 to enhance undergraduate support, identify resources for advanced research support, and optimize collection development and management.

Although we are still in the process of understanding how best to align our collection-related allocations with University priorities, we knew that our STM collection spending had not kept pace with the changes in the University. Items 1, 2, and 3 will allow us to immediately improve our STM collections and avoid reallocating funding from other areas until a complete study can be conducted. Items 4, 6, and 7 will greatly enhance undergraduate education with extended hours and computer refresh. Graduate students are the primary student base for the RBHS libraries, so parallel group of requests for the Health Sciences will expand service hours and provide a computer refresh (items 5, 8, and 10). Items 11 and 12 will allow RBHS libraries to tie up loose ends related to the integration. In addition, but not on the list, Camden funded a new NTT librarian to provide library support during all hours the library is open.

The New Brunswick request for expansion of hours (item 7 and 9) to 24/5 in Alex and Kilmer was for over $500K, but the actual funds remain TBD. While we have agreed to move forward with a trial, the Chancellor has asked us to provide some lower cost options for discussion.

All told, the definite funding totals $711K and if the overnight is funded at even half the level of request, our overall increase will be just below $1M. This is fantastic news!

The only bad news that we received is that the University will only fund 1% of the 2% salary increases in 2017. For us, that means that we will have to fund approximately $210K of increases with existing salary funds.

When everything is accounted for, we expect that we will have an additional $750K in permanent funding. We still have to make it over one additional hurdle. In June, the legislature will meet to decide the overall University budget. If University experiences a budget cut, the cut may be passed on to us. Let’s keep our fingers crossed and hope for the best.

Having this additional budget will help us do so much over the next fiscal year, but it is also a significant reminder of the value of the Libraries and our services to the Chancellors and the institutions we serve. Please join me in celebrating this outcome and also in thanking our many colleagues who helped assemble the budget request and participated in budget meetings.

Thank you,
Kris

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April 28, 2016
Celebrating the Life of Ellen Calhoun

Heaven’s the place where all the dogs you’ve ever loved come to greet you. —Unknown

Ellen Calhoun (August 17, 1949 – December 17, 2015) was the beloved wife of Bob DeMartino, with whom she celebrated forty four years of happy marriage. She graduated from Douglass College and had strong ties to Rutgers University.

Ellen joined Rutgers University Libraries on November 2nd, 1981 as a Circulation Librarian. She achieved tenure in July 1988. During her thirty-four-year career at Rutgers, her titles included Head of the Reference Department, Serials Librarian, and Head of the Government Documents Department. As a government documents librarian at the Library of Science and Medicine, she helped countless library users track down hard-to-find materials including government documents, soil surveys, and topographic maps. She was also a patents expert and an early adopter of technologies in the library. In 1988, she was recognized by the United States Internal Revenue Service for her outstanding public service contribution in government documents. As the author of several publications, she received an Outstanding Research Award, presented by the New Jersey Library Association for her paper, “Patents: A Valuable Resource in the Information Age”, with Connie Wu.

In addition to her skills as a librarian, Ellen was a friend who will be missed for her wit, her gentleness, and her love for all living things, especially dogs. We wish her peace among all of her beloved animal friends.

Donations in Ellen’s memory may be made to:
Big Fluffy Dog Rescue
or
the charity of your choice

Big Fluffy Dog Rescue is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization

March 31, 2016
“The Book: Digital, Edible, and as Art”
Edible books return as part of the Byrne Seminar taught by Megan Lotts: “The Book: Digital, Edible, and as Art.” Click on this image to see more.
These books were created by students in the Spring 2016 Byrne Seminar “The Book: Digital, Edible, and as Art.” All photos were taken by Megan Lotts.
March 31, 2016
30 Years of the Bishop Lecture

If you have a photo that might complement one of the lectures that don’t currently have a photo, please send it along to kuehl@rci.rutgers.edu.

March 31, 2016

Quick takes on events & news

National Library Week

April 10 – 16, 2016

The theme of this year’s National Library Week is “Libraries Transform.” You can read up on National Library Week here: http://www.ala.org/news/mediapresscenter/factsheets/nationallibraryweek.

Student Employment Week

April 10 – 16, 2016

The Student Coordinator Group is putting the finishing touches on their plans to celebrate and thank our student workers. Each unit will have different activities throughout the week and we will host a spotlight series showcasing a different student worker across the system each day as a news story. Look for more information on this soon.

“The Elusiveness of Progress: Voting Rights in America” exhibit at Kilmer Library

Ends August 31, 2016

The Elusiveness of Progress: Voting Rights in America is on display at Kilmer Library, Rutgers University–New Brunswick, now through the end of August. The exhibit is free and open to the public.

Like Jazz Women’s History Month Film Festival in Newark

March 29 – April 7, 2016

Dana Library and the Institute of Jazz Studies are partnering with Women In Media – Newark n their 2016 Women’s History Month Film Festival.

April 5 at 5 p.m.: Dana Library will host the screenings of Airgirl and The Unforgettable Hampton Family (with Dawn Hampton making a special appearance at the screening).

April 6 at 5 p.m.: Dana Library will show An Educated Woman and Mary Lou Williams: The Lady Who Swings the Band.

For a complete schedule of films please visit their website: http://wim-n.com/film-festival-2016/

TFAP@TEN exhibit at Douglass Library

Ends April 8, 2016

Detail from Apiphobia (2011) by Anonda Bell. Mixed media installation. Dimensions variable.

TFAP@TEN, a group exhibition honoring the 10th anniversary of The Feminist Art Project (TFAP), is on display through April 8 in the Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries at Douglass Library.

Women and Creativity House Student Exhibitions

April 20 – May 2, 2016

Sarah Ferreira, After Jill Magid, Muse Portrait, 2014, digital photograph, 14 x 11". From 2014-15 WCH Exhibition. — Sarah Ferreira, After Jill Magid, Muse Portrait, 2014, digital photograph, 14 x 11″.
From 2014-15 WCH Exhibition.

Women and Creativity House Student Exhibitions will feature the work of Sarah Ferreira, CWAH intern and Stacy Scibelli, learning community coordinator.

The annual Women and Creativity House Student Exhibition is sponsored by Douglass Residential College and the Center for Women in the Arts and Humanities, a unit of the Office of the Senior VP for Academic Affairs. The exhibition is part of the Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series, a program of the Center for Women in the Arts and Humanities in partnership with Rutgers University Libraries, and is the oldest continuous running exhibition space in the United States dedicated to making visible the work of emerging and established contemporary women artists.

Twenty years later, Jim Niessen will revisit Historians and the Internet

Twenty years ago, near the beginning of his career as a librarian, world history librarian Jim Niessen was invited to contribute to a discussion about the Internet on the pages of the Debrecen journal of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and his essay on “Historians and the Internet” appeared here (in Hungarian): http://w3.atomki.hu/debrecen/debszem/96_2/niessen.html . The contributors will now be providing updates to their remarks, and Jim has promised us a recap of his new essay for our next issue.

Preservation Week

April 24 – April 30, 2016

Rutgers University librarians are participating in events to celebrate Preservation Week, which is an initiative of ALA ALCTS-PARS:

“From Cassette to Cloud: Reformatting Audiotapes,” by Krista White on April 26 from 2 – 3 p.m.

Learn how to evaluate audio formats and the technical details of digitizing them in this one hour webinar.

“Preserving Your Digital Life,” by Krista White and Isaiah Beard on April 28 from 2 – 3 p.m.

Learn how to develop and implement a plan for preserving your digital life so that friends and family can enjoy your memories far into the future.

Both of these webinars are designed by ALCTS to be suitable for a lay audience. The official description of the webinars and more information is at the ALA/ ALCTS-PARS Preservation Week site here: http://www.ala.org/alcts/confevents/preswk/alctsevents

“Cherry Blossoms in Spring” exhibit at Dana Library

April 14 – June 30, 2016

cherry blossoms in spring exhibit image 300

Dana Library is hosting “Cherry Blossoms in Spring,” an installation by artist Karen Guancione, in the Gallery from April 14 through June 30. An opening reception will take place on Thursday, April 14, from 5 to 7 p.m. in the Library’s Dana Room and an accompanying program on the history of cherry trees in the Garden State featuring horticulturist Anthony S. Aiello will take place on Thursday, April 21, at 3 p.m. in the Dana Room. Read up on these events here.

New digital exhibition: “Invisible Restraints: Life and Labor at Seabrook Farms”

April 20, 2016

The online exhibition, “Invisible Restraints: Life and Labor at Seabrook Farms,” which will be hosted by the New Jersey Digital Highway, will officially launch this month. The opening event will be held Wednesday, April 20, 2016 at 4 p.m. in the Teleconference Lecture Hall at Alexander Library. For more on this unique collaboration, read our news story.

Digital Humanities Initiative workshop

April 6, 2016

L0022787 L. Ercker, The laws of art and nature... Credit: Wellcome Library, London. Wellcome Images images@wellcome.ac.uk http://wellcomeimages.org Sculpture II. Engraving The laws of art and nature... Lazarus Ercker Published: 1683 Copyrighted work available under Creative Commons Attribution only licence CC BY 4.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ — Engraving from “The laws of art and nature…” (1683) by Lazarus Ercker. Image credit: Wellcome Library, London.

Rutgers’ Digital Humanities Initiative and the Libraries will host a Digital Lab Series of five workshops throughout the spring semester at the Alexander Library, Rutgers University–New Brunswick. This lab will introduce the basic building blocks of the web: HTML and CSS.

Introduction to Web Development with HTML and CSS
with Francesca Giannetti
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
11 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.

SAPAC brown bag presentation, “A Citation Analysis of English Dissertations at Rutgers University”

April 6, 2016

Brown Lunch bag paper with red apple on white background

The Scholarly and Professional Activities Committee invites you to a brown bag presentation on Wednesday, April 6, at noon, in the Pane Room, Alexander Library, with video-conferencing to the Dana (Dana Administrative Conference Room) and Robeson (290).

A Citation Analysis of English Dissertations at Rutgers University
Kevin Mulcahy
Abstract:
Academic libraries, especially at state funded institutions, face converging pressures—budgets that are often flat or declining; increased requests for a wide variety of resources (journals, print and e-books, full-text databases, data sets, films and other media), and demands for assessment and accountability from university administrations and state legislatures. Literature librarians confront, directly, or at least implicitly, the additional challenge: is spending institutional funds on books worthwhile. While there is perhaps a tendency for literature specialists to throw up their hands in dismay or to regard the questioners as philistines who simply do not understand the nature of literary research, a more sound strategy is to assess the actual use of their collections. What evidence proves that books are still an integral part of the resources used by literature scholars? To help answer this question, I examined the bibliographies of 30 recent (2008-2014) dissertations from the English Department at Rutgers University, and coded 5870 citations by format and date. Books account for 67.7% of all citations, journal articles for 16.8%, and literary works (novels, drama, poetry, etc.) for 9.7%.

TeachMeet, “See One, Do One, Teach One”

April 6, 2016

The Instructional Community of Practice (ICOP) and the Instruction and Information Literacy Team (NB) invite you to a TeachMeet being presented by our RBHS colleagues, Roberta FitzPatrick and Peggy Dreker.

See One, Do One, Teach One
Date: Wednesday, April 6, 2016
Location: Pane room, Alexander Library (Dana, Robeson, Smith teleconference)
Time: 2 p.m. – 3:30 p.m.

Students at the New Jersey Medical School (NJMS) and the Rutgers School of Dental Medicine (RSDM) attend an instructional session which covers some basic searching and evidence-based medicine/dentistry concepts, as well as information about writing a CAT (Critically Appraised Topic). They learn how to write a searchable question and how to break that question into concepts, called the PICO format, which helps them to generate search terminology. Students use the information taught in the session to write their own CAT, then teach from that CAT in their subsequent small group sessions. The scholarship and research skills demonstrated by their finished CAT are graded by the preceptor. Hear how this approach to assessment can be adopted in your own discipline/instruction sessions.

March 31, 2016