The Agenda - Faculty and Staff Newsletter

Category: Rutgers University–Camden

Faculty and staff news from the Paul Robeson Library at Rutgers University-Camden.

  • Quick Takes on Events & News – July 2016

    Critical Thinking & Creative Decision Making

    July 15. 2016
    9 a.m. – 12 p.m.    		 This course is ideal for staff, managers, supervisors, and administrators who recognize the need to improve their ability to generate ideas, see old ideas in new light, and make decisions that are innovative yet founded on strong grounds.

    Location:  Pane Room, 1st floor, Alexander Library with teleconference to Smith Library, Dana Library and Robeson Library

    RSVP: Erica Parin on behalf of the Professional Development Committee

    Leading Staff through Change & Transition

    July 21. 2016
    9 a.m. – 12 p.m.    		 This course is ideal for managers, supervisors, and administrators who are experiencing departmental change and would like insight, guidance, models, and tools to assist them in moving their departments forward.

    Location:  Pane Room, 1st floor, Alexander Library

    RSVP: Erica Parin on behalf of the Professional Development Committee

    Digital Humanities Summer Institute

    Bart Everts attended the Digital Humanities Summer Institute at the University of Victoria in Victoria, BC June 12-16th and participated in a week-long workshop titled Critical Pedagogy and Digital Praxis in the Humanities. The workshop “built an open course as a playground, letting participants experiment with critical digital pedagogy in a class-created online course that [they] co-designed, built, deployed, promoted, and assessed.” Learn more at the website they designed: http://www.digitalpedagogylab.com/dhsi2016/.

    Dana Library Media Services Department Restructure

    The Dana Media Services department is transitioning from its location on the fourth to better concentrate on how today’s students access physical and online media. Photograph by Ed Berger.
    Photograph by Ed Berger.

    The fourth floor Dana Library Media Services Department is being restructured in recognition of how the library’s patrons access sound and video for education and entertainment. The transition will be completed by August 1 well in advance of the fall semester.

    Patrons will find a selection of some 1,700 DVDs, VHS tapes, and audio CDs currently available from Media Services publicly accessible on the lower level of the library, where the journals and bound periodicals are housed. Faculty requests to purchase new titles to support their teaching will continue to come through Dana’s department liaison librarians.

    Congratulations to Our Colleagues Who Worked on an Award-Winning Book!

    Rutgers: A 250th Anniversary Portrait received the Gold Award in the Circle of Excellence Awards given by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).Many of our Libraries’ colleagues contributed to the success of this book: University archivist Tom Frusciano served as one of the primary authors, co-authoring the opening chapter on “History and Politics,” with GSE professor Benjamin Justice, constructing the extensive historical “Timeline” that appears in the back of the book, and writing—in partnership with archival associate Erika Gorder—many, many photo captions. This was a true group effort with dozens of contributors, including Gorder on musical concerts at Rutgers, archivist Fernanda Perrone on the activities of visiting Japanese students at Rutgers in the 1870s, David Fowler, an independent researcher with close ties to Special Collections and University Archives, on the life and impact of Henry Rutgers, and former university librarian Marianne Gaunt on, of course, the libraries themselves! Lastly, former associate director of the Institute of Jazz Studies Ed Berger contributed many photographs.

    Custom Buttons Now Available from the Communications Department

    Sample buttons v2
    Custom buttons are now available from the Communications Department.

    The Communications Department recently purchased a custom button maker and we are happy to now make buttons available to all of our colleagues for events or outreach activities. These 1.5 inch buttons feature a glossy, professional-quality finish and the designs can be customized to suit your needs. We are currently piloting a small “See You @ the Library” campaign for New Student Orientations in New Brunswick and welcome ideas for other ways to take advantage of this new equipment. Please contact us with project ideas or to request a sample.

  • Guidelines for Libraries’ Use of Photography and Photos in and of Libraries’ Facilities, Events, and People

    Cabinet recently approved a new set of guidelines for the use of photography at the Libraries. These guidelines endorse and support the guidelines for the university as a whole, but also add a few tweaks specifically for the Libraries. If you are photographing events, people, or spaces of the Libraries, it is important that you familiarize yourself with thees guidelines and obtain all the necessary model releases. Three groups of subjects require special attention: children, Rutgers student athletes, and medical patients.

    Also, if you are in the position of having your photograph regularly taken at Library events and wish to avoid having to sign a new release each time, we have made available an extended model release for library faculty and staff only. If you would like to complete this one-time form, please right click and download the Extended Model Release Template RUL Faculty and Staff only (also available on the new central drive: T:\CENTRAL\Procedures and Resources\Communications\model releases for photography), complete, sign, and return to the communications department.

    The guidelines also cover how to handle videotaping and photographing events. If you are taking photos that might be useful to your colleagues or for publication on our website or in our print materials, please be sure to upload the photos and scanned copies of the signed model releases to the Photos and Media network location, too.

    There is a lot of confusion about when model releases are necessary. Some situations are clear–as when you are taking a photo of a single person or a group of people–but other scenarios aren’t as obvious.  A guiding mantra is that if you want to identify someone in the written caption for the photography, you will need a model release. Hopefully the examples below will help clarify how to deal with different types of situations.

    Model Release Examples (arrows require model release, circles are optional depending on circumstance)

    1 No photo release would be necessary for this type of group photo as everyone is facing away.

    Before photographing this group, the photographer should announce that s/he is taking a photograph and provide time for people to move out of the frame if necessary.
    2 You would not need a photo release for a photo like this of a subject looking away and not identifiable.
    3 Even though you might be able to pick out and identify individuals because you know them, this scene would not require any photo releases as there is no “subject” per se.

    However, there should be a notice in the program and a sign at the entrance indicating photography will take place and to notify the event staff if they don’t want to be included.
    4 You would get a model release from the gentleman in the foreground of the photo, but not from the others in the room. You would also need a model release if you want to mention the teacher by name.
    5 In a photo like this, you would need releases from the library staff behind the table, but not from the standing person. However, this is a case, where you would likely want the name of the person for the caption, in which case you would need a release.
    6 The primary subject of the three is the man facing the camera. Even though the man in the back is blurred and facing sideways—a model release is required. The woman is facing away so a release is not required. If you planned to mention their names in the caption, then you would need model releases.
    7 This is a scenario where you would want to identify all subjects in the caption. So, even though only two people are identifiable and require a model release, you would want to get model releases from all five.
    8 A straightforward photograph that requires model releases even if these individuals work at the library or have given permission to use photographs on another occasion.

     

  • Announcing New Shared Drive – Central

    USA-NYC-Grand_Central_Terminal_Clock
    Image credit: Ingfbruno – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=27955753

    The Libraries now have a Central drive (T:\CENTRAL) where shared items of interest to all areas of the Libraries can be stored. The plan is to eventually store shared resources, information, procedures, and manuals in this location. Currently, it contains folders for Assessments, Collection Development and Management, Communications and Marketing, Photos and Media, Procedures and Resources, and Visual Identity, but more folders will be added as needed. Some of the folders are read-only, while others like Photos and Media are available to all for adding materials.

    Please take some time to peruse the folders:

    • Jeanne Boyle recently sent an invitation to view the LibQUAL+ survey results now stored in the Assessments folder.
    • Under Visual Identity, you will find resources that are useful if you are making flyers, advertisements, or website graphics, such as the colors, fonts, logos, and letterheads that are approved by University Communications and Marketing.
    • Photos and Media is a one-stop place to find images of our spaces, our events, and faculty & staff.
    • The communications department has also moved their folders from the ALEX drive to Central location Communications and Marketing.
    • Procedures and Resources currently holds the recent communications policies for photography and fielding requests to photograph in the Libraries, but will be populated with other materials, procedures, and FAQs in the future.

    These changes are partly philosophical–these are resources we all share and shouldn’t be housed on one of the unit server locations–but they are also intended to surface important materials and provide a single authoritative place to look for procedural information and guidance. If you have feedback, suggestions for how to further improve this shared drive, or materials you would like added to this drive, please speak with your unit director or supervisor.

  • Gary Golden Retires after 30 Years with the Libraries

    • Gary Golden retired on June 30 after 30 years with Rutgers University Libraries.

    On June 30, Gary Golden retired from his long-time position as director of Paul Robeson Library. His colleagues at Rutgers University-Camden held a retirement party earlier in June and assembled these photos to document some highlights from his time with Rutgers. I hope you enjoy the photo slide show.

    Here is the text Krisellen circulated earlier this year because it is a story that bears repeating.

    Gary started working at Rutgers in June of 1986, shepherding the Camden Library through many transitions—new technology; new building; a new name as the Paul Robeson Library; and, most recently, a $3 million dollar, four-year renovation that completed in 2015. Throughout these changes, Gary has maintained a steadfast eye on the student user experience, made smart financial and technological decisions, and created links to the Camden community.

    Starting in 1986, Gary strived to create a safe, comfortable, and functional space for students to study and research. Between an addition in 1995 and, more recently, the 2015 renovation, he has successfully met the demands of the students at Rutgers University—Camden. Gary tells me nearly every square foot of public and 80% of work space has been renovated during his tenure, and I believe it. You can see the results for yourself if you visit: the libraries look great, the furniture is comfortable, the computer labs are top notch. Because of Gary’s efforts, the Paul Robeson Library is truly a 21st-century institution that Rutgers University can be proud to call its own.

    Under Gary’s guidance, the Paul Robeson Library has invested wisely in exciting partnerships like the ongoing one with Camden County Library and Rowan University that not only expand the service of the library, but have also yielded good financial results—money that that has been invested back into the Library to continue to improve and expand services. His efforts have kept the Library on the cutting edge of technology—from introducing the first computer labs of the late 1980s and phasing out the paper card catalog in 1992 to bringing wireless access to all areas of the library in 2000 and, just last year, creating a 10,000 square foot OIT computer lab.

    Additionally, Gary has forged important connections with Rutgers University–Camden and the greater Camden community. He and his colleagues have collected toys and donations for the Camden Rescue Mission, organized conferences and events that span town and gown, and created Camdenbase, an online database of citations to newspapers and periodicals about Rutgers Camden and Camden City.

    As if these accomplishments were not enough, Gary is also a wonderful colleague—smart, thoughtful, kind, and creative.We wish him all the best in this next chapter.

  • Kicking off Annual Planning and Budget Process with LibQUAL+ Results

    Kicking off Annual Planning and Budget Process with LibQUAL+ Results

    Welcome to July!

    For me, summer has always been a time to catch up, tidy loose ends, reflect, and prepare for the upcoming academic year. As with so many other things, I am learning that at Rutgers things are different.

    As a cost-center, the summer is a time of planning. Our budgets and plans for the following fiscal year have to be ready by October. That means that our plans for 2018 have to be in place this summer. This month, there will be two Cabinet retreats to begin to establish priorities, look at potential projects, and consider budget requests. There will be many conversations in the coming months.

    As we move into planning, one of the most important issues that we will address is the LibQUAL+ results. I talked about these a bit at the Spring Town Hall, but since these will be at the heart of our planning efforts, it is worth spending more time studying these.

    Overall, our results were good. However, there was a consistent finding, across libraries and universities, that the Information Control dimension did not meet faculty expectations. This graph from the LibQUAL+ results shows the combined results for all 1,200 faculty respondents:

    lib qual survey graph
    This graph is from section 6.2 – Core Questions Summary for Faculty (page 73 of 13501-2 Rutgers University Libraries.pdf available on T:\CENTRAL\Assessments\LibQUAL 2016 Reports).

    Here is a table form of the same information:

    lib qual chart
    The first column represents the minimum mean, the second is the desired mean, the third is the perceived mean, and the fourth is the adequacy mean.

    But what does this mean? LibQUAL+ does a good job of showing us where we are doing well and where we might improve. However, LibQUAL+ doesn’t tell us why and understanding why is the first step in solving the problems.

    When we look at IC-1 and IC-8 together, it is not clear if the problem is lack of collections or difficulty finding the collections. How do the website (IC-2) and access tools (IC-6) contribute to the perception that our collections are below expectations? These are not problems that are simply solved by purchasing more collections or by making improvements to the search functions of our website. They require a multi-pronged approach that balance collections needs and ease of discovery.

    This year, using both one-time funding and new funding from the chancellors, we have made some substantial additions to our collections. These additions include:

    • SWANK Digital Campus subscription: 250 feature films selected by instructors
    • UpToDate: an evidence-based clinical resource
    • Sage Journals: Approximately 180 additional Social Sciences, Health Sciences and Science Journals
    • Wiley Journals: Approximately 880 Science, Technology, Medicine, Social Sciences and Humanities Journal
    • EBSCO e-books: 850 e-book titles selected by faculty and students
    • Springer e-books: Approximately 2300 Biomedical/Life Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
    • American Institute of Physics (AIP) Digital Archive: Digital backfiles of 12 journals and conference proceedings
    • Oxford Journal Archive: Backfiles of about 150 Science and Medicine Journals
    • Wiley Journal: Digital backfiles of about 800 Science, Technology, Medicine, Social Sciences and Humanities Journals

    In addition, we eliminated the fees charged for requesting articles through ILL.

    In the coming year, we need to continue to make smart decisions about new collections and resources and I am confident that the Collection Analysis Group and the Selectors are moving in the right direction. But we must also look more deeply into our access infrastructure, making it easier for faculty to find the information they need. Moving in this direction will take a large amount of coordination, an effort kicked off by the new discovery working group charge.

    The LibQUAL+ results provide us with a tremendous amount of information and highlight opportunities for improvement. I expect that looking deeper at these issues will be a priority in the upcoming year and look forward to seeing what we can accomplish together.

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  • Rutgers University Libraries at the American Library Association Meeting

    ALA logo

    The American Library Association Meeting will take place later this month in Orlando, Florida. Here are highlights from the program that feature our colleagues:

    Research, Writing, and Publishing Fair

    June 25. 2016
    10:30 a.m. – 11:30 a.m.    		 Are you interested in publishing? Would you like to learn about a variety of opportunities to publish, resources to help you get started with writing an article or a book, and tools that will make research and writing for publication better and easier? Please join us for the Research, Writing, and Publishing Fair, where you’ll have the opportunity to meet with ALCTS editors, the Library Research Round Table, learn about publishing mentoring opportunities in ALA, and more. Sponsored by ALCTS Leadership Development Committee. Co-Sponsored by ALA Library Research Round Table (LRRT), ALCTS New Members Interest Group (ANMIG), and ALA New Members Round Table (NMRT).

    Speaker: Mary Beth Weber (Rutgers University Libraries)

    ACRL Arts Publications and Research Committee Annual Discussion Forum

    June 25. 2016
    3:30 p.m. – 4:30 p.m.    		 Join ACRL Arts Publications and Research Committee for their Annual Discussion Forum! This year’s forum will feature the following presentations:

    • “Artists as Scholars: The Research Behavior of Dance Faculty” by Shannon Marie Robinson (Drexel University)
    • “Building Bridges, Creating Partnerships and Elevating the Arts: the Rutgers University Art Library Exhibition Spaces” by Megan Lotts (Rutgers University Libraries)
    • “You Say Tomato, I Say Tomato: Collection Format Preference of Music Faculty” by A. Carey Huddlestun (Kennesaw State University)

     

    If there are additional Rutgers University Libraries highlights I should include here, leave a comment below or let me know.

  • Annual Celebrations for Staff and Faculty of Rutgers University Libraries (2016)

    Recently, the University convened two events to recognize faculty and staff who are celebrating a decade increment of employment at Rutgers. We are delighted to announce that more than 25 of our colleagues were included in the festivities and hope you join us in congratulating them on these accomplishments:

     

    10 Fay Austin (TAS)

    Ashwin Bijur (TAS)

    Kevin Conover (RIS)

    Eric Fizur (Robeson Library)

    Qun Luo (RIS)

    Holly Muller (RIS)

    Alfreda Richardson (RIS)

    Christopher Singh (Dana Library)

    Li Sun (TAS)

    William Torres (RIS)

     
    20 Stephanie Bartz (RIS)

    Barbara Grau (RIS)

    Charlene Houser (Central administration)

    Yoshiko Ishii (Dana Library)

    Mei Ling Lo (RIS)

    Andres Martinez (RIS)

    Fernanda Perrone (SC/UA)

    Julie Still (Robeson Library)

     
    30 Ka-Neng Au (Dana Library)

    Gary Golden (Robeson Library)

    David Hoover (TAS)

    Martin Kesselman (RIS)

    Kenneth Kuehl (Central administration)

    Linda Langschied (TAS)

    Julianna Ritter (TAS)

    James Robinson (RIS)

     
    40 Natalie Borisovets (Dana Library)

     

     

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  • From Townhall to Rutgers Day, We Have a Lot to Celebrate

    From Townhall to Rutgers Day, We Have a Lot to Celebrate

    Hello all –

    I hope you all enjoyed the Townhall meeting last week. It was great to see so many of our colleagues virtually and in-person and to review all the ways we’ve moved forward on the priorities we identified at the State of the Libraries in the fall. The presentation by the architects provided us with a glimpse of how the spaces in our libraries are currently configured providing a baseline for planning for the changes that will meet the needs of the students and faculty. The LibQUAL+ survey results give us insight into what our users really think of the services we provide – which are necessary or optional, where we meet their expectations and where we don’t.  Together, these provide us with a strong foundation for planning.

    We are coming up with ways to share all the graphs and comments from LibQUAL+ with the Libraries’ faculty and staff, so look for this soon. I expect this will generate a lot of discussion and activity for us all, but in the meantime, with Memorial Day behind us and the summer yawning ahead, I wanted to take a breather and look back at one of the most popular and fun events the Libraries take part in…Rutgers Day!

    As you all know, Rutgers Day was expanded to Newark and Camden this year, in addition to sites in New Brunswick at Busch and College Ave. Each site celebrated the day a little differently, but across the board, I heard nothing but praise for our displays and activities. Thank you for taking the time to make the Libraries’ contributions to Rutgers Day exceptional in every way.

    From Newark bringing a bona fide Star Wars actor to campus and showcasing the activities of the archivists and IJS, to Camden collaborating with the public library branch to bring touches of superhero whimsy to campus, to New Brunswick inviting some impressive student athletes to read in our children’s reading corner—major effort went into making sure the Libraries’ booths and stands stood out from the crowd. Thank you to all of the volunteers who took time out of a sunny weekend day to participate in Rutgers Day and a special thanks to the members of the Rutgers Day committee who put it all together!

    Most of us only get to see one part of Rutgers Day, so I hope you enjoy the photographs below.

    Thank you,

    Kris

     

    • Hands-on Rutgers Day activities on the Busch campus.

     

    Thank you to our Rutgers Day volunteers:

    Busch:

    Students:

    Jenali Patel

    Jacek Zmuda

     

    Faculty & Staff:

    Mei Ling Lo (Chair)

     

    Camden:

    Students:

    Amanda Deptula

    Alex Carrigan

     

    Faculty & Staff:

    Zara Wilkinson (Chair)

    Julie Still

    Vibiana Cvetkovic

    Monique Whittle

    John Gibson

    Melinda Aviles

    Theresa Macklin

     

    New Brunswick:

    Joe Abraham

    Matt Badessa

    Marty Barnett

    Isaiah Beard

    Jeanne Boyle

    Stacey Carton

    Henry Charles

    Judith Cohn

    Peggy Dreker

    Melissa Gasparatto

    Marianne Gaunt

    Mina Ghajar

    Erika Gorder

    Bela Gupta

    Pam Hargwood (co-chair)

    Zachary Johnson

    Melissa Just

    Kim Kaiser

    Rob Krack

    Linda Langschied

    Tara Maharjan

    Jackie Mardikian

    Jim Niessen

    Erica Parin (co-chair)

    Jessica Pellien

    Tonie Perkins

    Roselyn Riley

    Kati Ritter

    Sheridan Sayles

    Connie Wu

    Tao Yang

    Katrina Zwaaf

     

     

    Newark:

    Consuella Askew

    Dorothy Grauer

    Maggie Harris-Clark

    Tad Hershorn (chair)

    James McElroy (Graduate student, assistant to IJS Associate Director Adriana Cuervo)

    Mark Papianni

    Vincent Pelote

    Marlene Reilly

    Chris Singh

    Wen-Hua Ren

    Elizabeth Surles

    Ann Watkins

    Krista White

     

     

    If your name does not appear on this list and you volunteered at Rutgers Day, please email Jessica Pellien to have it corrected.

     

     

     

     

  • Quick takes on events & news

    Quick takes on events & news

    National Library Week

    April 10 – 16, 2016 160217-pao-national-library-week-2016-psa.inddThe 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 Thank-you-word-cloudThe 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 Voting rights ondisplay obama 300 pxThe 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 LikeJazz 300Dana 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.
    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 preservationRutgers 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 300Dana 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 Seabrook Farm exhibit imageThe 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.
  • A Celebration of Books reception is scheduled for April 12

    A Celebration of Books reception is scheduled for April 12

    micah
    Micah Kleit, incoming director, Rutgers University Press

    We are holding the reception for A Celebration of Books (previously called the Faculty Author Celebration) on April 12 at 5 p.m. in Alexander Library. In addition to a display of books and poster giveaways, we are delighted to announce that our featured speaker for the evening will be Micah Kleit, the incoming director at Rutgers University Press.

    He will address the convergence of publishing, libraries, and universities and what it is that causes us to want to produce—and reproduce—knowledge. Exploring the landscape of publishing (generally) and university press publishing (more specifically), he will discuss how libraries, scholars, and universities with and without presses need each other now more than ever. The talk will take into account questions of risk, especially as the landscape of scholarly publishing and depositories is changing, and how the risks embedded in contemporary publishing offer new opportunities for scholars, students, and the general public.

    Micah Kleit is the incoming director of Rutgers University Press. He has been at Temple University Press for the last seventeen years, first as executive editor, then as interim editorial director, and most recently as editor-in-chief. Before Temple, he was an editor at Beacon Press and the University of Minnesota Press.

    Please RSVP using this form: http://go.rutgers.edu/14dnx3nb or email events@rulmail.rutgers.edu.