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Langsdale Link
Langsdale Library university of baltimore 1415 maryland avenue Baltimore, MD 21201
fall 2014
LangsdaleLink Vol. 13 No. 1 FALL 2014
University of Baltimore Langsdale Library
New Semester, New Space By Delores Redman
http://langsdale.ubalt.edu
e’re kicking off this semester with W some big news: Langsdale Library has moved to the third and fourth
Adam Shutz, Movin’ on Up By Jessica Reeves
In August, Langsdale bid farewell to one of our favorite staffers—administrative assistant and former Langsdale Link editor Adam Shutz. Adam started working at Langsdale in 2008 as a work study student in the circulation department. He graduated from UB in 2012 with a Bachelor of Arts in English, and a few months later, he came back to Langsdale to work full time. Needless to say, he had become something of a fixture around here. Adam has moved to San Marcos, Texas to attend Texas State University. This fall, he will begin pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing while teaching freshman composition. When asked what he wants to do after graduate school, Adam is a bit coy. “Possibly teaching,” he says, adding that, for now, he’s just excited to get away from the daily grind of a “real job” and take some time to focus on his writing. Adam’s move is also a blow to the Baltimore literary scene: He is the founder and former editor for Artichoke Haircut, an offbeat local Baltimore literary magazine that held the reading series “You’re Allowed” at various cafés in Mt. Vernon. Everyone at Langsdale wishes Adam the best of luck in his future endeavors. We will miss him, but we know he’s going to take Texas by storm.
floor of the Learning Commons at 1415 Maryland Avenue. Langsdale Library’s original building at 1420 Maryland Avenue will be completely remodeled and renovated over the next couple of years. Since moving from our original space at the end of May, we’ve had some time to make our temporary digs welcoming for students. Most staff and faculty offices (except for special collections) are located on the third floor, as are the main general book collection, the reference collection, periodicals and DVDs, the user-friendly KIC scanner, and study carrels. Close proximity to Langsdale staff on the third floor is a big perk for students needing help navigating the stacks. There are also quiet areas on this floor, including private study rooms. The circulation desk is at the front entrance, and there is a staff on duty there during the library’s regular hours. On the fourth floor, you’ll find a large, airy computer study area with printers, a game design and graphics lab, presentation practice rooms, and private and semiprivate spaces for group study. The department of special collections is also housed on this floor. The reference desk is located near the top of the stairs, where a librarian can assist students with research and any questions they may have. Jeffrey Hutson, Langsdale Library’s associate director, has some thoughts on how the Learning Commons space succeeds at serving the University of Baltimore community: “I think the best feature of the new Langsdale Library space is the diverse study options that are available. The environment we’ve created is conducive to interaction or individual study, including tables near natural light, soft-seating, collaborative study rooms, moveable tables/chairs, presentation practice rooms, individual carrels, and a large computing/printing area with more than 75 PCs. The third floor, where you can study surrounded by stacks of books, is geared more toward individual/quiet study, whereas the fourth floor is a large open area for collaboration.” Go to the link below to to see a quick visual of the Library, and then come on over and check it out in person! http://langsdale.ubalt.edu/about-us/renovation.cfm
Editorial Staff Natalie Burclaff Aiden Faust Delores Redman jessica reeves design staff laura melamed don clark Editor Adele Marley Library Director Lucy Holman
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Langsdale Link
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Langsdale Link
FALL 2014
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Lucy Holman, Library Director
Legacy of Community Arts Celebrated
W
elcome back to campus and to this latest issue of the Langsdale Link. As usual, the summer flew by here, and unbelievably, we are back to a new semester. We had a very busy spring and summer, wrapping up preparatory projects for the move of the library and special collections into renovated new spaces in the Learning Commons, making the move itself and then modifying our services here to make these spaces comfortable and accessible to students and faculty. This move, of course, is temporary; it is the first step of a two-year process to renovate the “old” Langsdale into an innovative 21st-century building filled with cutting-edge technology and collaborative learning spaces. We look forward to sharing the designs for the new building and project updates in subsequent Links as well as our blog and social media channels. We are excited about the new location, and we expect to see even more students, staff and faculty visit us in the Learning Commons and we hope more users will take advantage of our services. One new service is our mobile printing which we’re rolling out this fall. Our programming efforts also continue with a number of fall activities. Our semi-annual cupcake extravaganza will have just passed by the time the Link is out, but that’s just the first of many. We’re looking forward to again sponsoring Baltimore’s Home Movie Day in October and we’re beginning to plan an event to celebrate our newest archival collection from the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Community Center of Baltimore (GLCCB). Throughout the fall we will be hosting a series of brown bag lunchtime faculty discussions, highlighting their current scholarship. Brian Chetelat will be coordinating a number of new student displays and we look forward to showcasing the architectural renderings of the Langsdale renovation.
By Aiden Faust photo by James Hayes
On July 16, over 100 attendees gathered in University of Baltimore’s Wright Auditorium to celebrate the history of the now-defunct Urban Service Agency’s Cultural Arts Program (CAP). Both CAP, which was the cultural education arm of city services that was available to residents through a network of neighborhood centers in the 1970s and ‘80s, and the Urban Service Agency ceased to exist after Baltimore city restructured its government during the 1990s, according to the Baltimore Sun. Langsdale Library partnered with Angela Koukoui, a community dance instructor and arts education activist, and Pete O’Neal, a TV news cameraman and documentary filmmaker, to host the event. The celebration included a reception, entertainment by youth dance troupes and musicians, performances by Cultural Arts alumni and former instructors, personal narratives from community leaders who are Cultural Arts alumni, a documentary film preview, and a presentation on the history and importance of CAP with a lively audience discussion. The program culminated in a recognition ceremony honoring Norman Ross, founder of Cultural Arts and the AFRAM festival, as well as Breck Chapman, a former Baltimore City photographer whose work documenting the Cultural Arts and AFRAM are preserved in Langsdale Special Collections (http://cdm16352.contentdm.oclc. org/cdm/ref/collection/p16352coll2/id/116). Both men were presented with certificates of recognition of their public service in the City of Baltimore, issued by City Council and signed by Council President, Bernard C. “Jack” Young.
As you’ll read, we lost a valued staff member – Adam Shutz, who left Langsdale to pursue an MFA at Texas State University. Although we are very sad to see Adam leave, we hope to use his position to hire a new Integrated Digital Services Librarian in the fall semester, and are happy to welcome Tyson Fogel as a new part-time reference librarian and Liz Mason as a new part-time metadata librarian.
This celebration of CAP was a wonderful way to bring together people whose contributions to Baltimore’s community arts may have been forgotten, but have not diminished in importance. The credit for the success of this event and the history behind it belongs to Norman Ross, Breck Chapman, Angela Koukoui, Pete O’Neal, and the many people who support them and make their work possible.
I think you will find this Link informative; I thank the editorial staff who are dedicated to providing information to our community. As always, I would love to hear from you about what you think. Contact me any time at lholman@ubalt.edu or 410.837.4333.
Langsdale is thrilled to honor local arts and artists, and to have hosted this historical community-driven initiative. We hope that with events such as these and with artifacts such as our robust photographic archives, the young people of Baltimore will get a glimpse of city’s rich cultural history, which is their legacy.
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Langsdale Link
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Langsdale Link
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Inspired Discoveries Symposium Wows UB
Save the Date: Home Movies!
By Adele Marley
By Aiden Faust
There was some stiff competition at the Inspired Discoveries symposium, on May 9, 2014 in the Learning Commons Town Hall and Lobby. On view were presentations of such far-flung topics as optimized parking at University of Baltimore, anti-Semitism in Poland as it related to the Holocaust, and an analysis of African American males and the music industry. But Megan Mercieca and her heady, research-intensive analysis of the acidity of postmortem brain tissue and its influence on schizophrenia, and Leah Jennings and Taylor Burch’s invention of a user-friendly game controller tailored to children took top honors at Inspired Discoveries.
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award winners Leah Jennings (left) and Taylor Burch photographs by Adele Marley
The symposium itself is a collaboration of Langsdale Library, the Helen P. Denit Honors Program, and the Office of Sponsored Research and the Office of the Provost. The conference--as Langsdale Director Lucy Holman describes it—is a way “to recognize and celebrate undergraduate achievement in scholarship and creative works.” Inspired Discoveries 2014 showcased a full spectrum of ideas and innovations; there were 31 entries which included not only presentations but also poster sessions. Some exhibits highlight creative fields of study, like simulation and digital entertainment and communications design, but Holman says that many entries are more “hard data” focused: large numbers of research projects are from the fields of psychology, criminal justice, biology, economics, finance and history. And while some students share their findings with Inspired Discoveries independent of their prescribed course of study, many enter at the suggestion of professors, or as a result of their classwork. Leah Jennings-- who along with her colleague Taylor Burch earned the Robert L. Bogomolny Award for Undergraduate Creative Achievement-- points out that in addition to the win, one of the perks of participating in Inspired Discoveries is its supportive vibe. “I enjoyed sharing our invention with the UB community and also getting invaluable feedback,” says Jennings. Megan Mercieca, who was able to use her experiences at work and in the classroom to inform her project, which earned the Robert L. Bogomolny Award for Undergraduate Research, describes her Inspired Discoveries experience as a boost to her education, her curriculum vita, and her wallet. Says Mercieca, “Inspired Discoveries helped me to utilize my education and…apply it to the research I was conducting through my work at Johns Hopkins. I was given the opportunity to present my research to my fellow students, professors, and faculty, which has provided great practice for presenting my work at conferences in the future.” She adds that she used her winnings to “fund my GRE preparation classes.” Ultimately, the program highlights the fact that advanced and transformative research in academia is not the sole purview of post-graduates. In short, Holman says, “It’s a showcase of the brightest and best at UB.”
Please join Langsdale Library as it hosts Baltimore Home Movie Day 2014. Baltimore Home Movie Day is an initiative of the Center for Home Movies (www.centerforhomemovies.org), which describes Home Movie Day as “a celebration of amateur films and filmmaking…providing the opportunity for individuals and families to see and share their own home movies with an audience of their community, and to see their neighbors’ in turn.” In addition, the organization characterizes the event as “a chance to discover why to care about these films and to learn how best to care for them.” This year, Baltimore Home Movie Day participants who plan to bring motion picture film home movies are asked to deliver their films by October 16th to Langsdale’s audiovisual (AV) archivist Siobhan Hagan at in Room LC 418a. Each film will be inspected and repaired before the event. There will CC image courtesy of ATiwolf on Flickr. be an onsite film inspection and repair bench for those who cannot bring their films in the day before, but these films will screen later in the program. Acceptable formats include 16mm, Super 8mm, and 8mm film with all soundtracks. There will also be a VHS VCR and mini-DV player with a television onsite for more recent home movies. For more information about this event, please contact Siobhan Hagan, AV archivist, at shagan@ubalt.edu or 410.837.4268.
What:
Baltimore Home Movie Day
When:
Saturday, October 18, 2014
Where:
Learning Commons Town Hall, 1415 Maryland Avenue
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Langsdale Link
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Langsdale Link
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Langsdale by the Numbers By Natalie Burclaff
We count a lot of things at Langsdale: the number of books checked out, the number of library visitors, the cost of purchasing new items, and the number of searches in our databases. We collect these statistics to make sure we’re providing services and resources that are getting used. We’ve also initiated some larger assessment projects that compare results to other campus data to find out how we’re doing and how we could improve. The circulation department recently developed a survey to solicit feedback from student workers anonymously. The survey will be used to inform training procedures, provide student workers with more support, and learn about work environment preferences. Betty Landesman, head of technical services and content management, is tracking the number of items University of Baltimore students, staff, and faculty have requested from other libraries. She will use this information to decide if Langsdale Library should purchase its own copy of a particular item, especially if it has been requested frequently. Reference Librarians Catherine Johnson, Mike Kiel, and Natalie Burclaff recently completed year one of a multi-year study on how well students understand information literacy concepts. The study was part of a larger effort among academic libraries to develop research plans through the National Assessment in Action project. Their research plan consisted of pre -and post-tests and used rubrics to assess final projects in both INFO110: Introduction to Information Literacy and WRIT300: Expository Writing
In-
John Chapin, Natalie Burclaff, Catherine Johnson, Mike Kiel, and Laura Pope at the American Library Association 2014 Conference classes. “We often rely on our assumptions about what students do with a research assignment or research question, and this project tells us definitively,” said Catherine Johnson. “We can use that information to modify what and how we teach in order to help students learn what we hope they’re learning.” The three librarians, along with a campus team of Nancy O’Neil, director of the Center for Excellence in Learning, Teaching, and Technology, John Chapin, writing coordinator, John Brenner, writing instructor, and Laura Pope, writing instructor, were awarded a Fund for Excellence Grant to present their research findings at the American Library Association Conference this past June. “I learned that in some ways [assessment] is really challenging,” said Mike Kiel, “But in other ways assessment is not as bad as it sounds – and anyone can do it as long as they stick to a plan.” The group plans to continue the assessment project this fall, and present their methodology and findings to the campus community.