LIBRA RY NEWS
FLORIDA GULF COAST UNIVERSITY
Photography
Greco
Anna Karras
Abigail Muth
Lucia Navarrete
Heather Snapp
Melissa Minds
Dawn Workman
A MESSAGE FROM THE DEAN
While we had grand plans for the fall semester, some of which have been archived within this issue of Library News, we were inspired by how the students and faculty have maximized our efforts. We had a record attendance at our monthly Scholar Series event. We also had local media coverage of student use of our Makerspace equipment. The collection of faculty and student scholarship in our research portal, ScholarsCommons@FGCU, has reached over 7,000 assets, representing a 20% increase. Finally, we were incredibly proud to host over 80 librarians and staff from libraries throughout Southwest Florida for Makerpalooza, which we co-hosted in our new and exciting spaces in Library West with the Southwest Florida Library Network.
We will not be outdone this spring. Read about our annual Authors & Artists Awards ceremony that was held Feb. 8, where we celebrated the accomplishments of our faculty who have published books and created significant works of art. The FGCU Scholar Series event will continue this spring. The exhibit They Were Children: Rescue as Resistance, which chronicles the story of the Oeuvre de Secours Aux Enfants’ (OSE) harrowing rescue of Jewish children during World War II, will be open until March 31, and represents two years of research by library faculty, staff and students.
Tracy Elliott, Ph.D.
Dean, University Library
This is also a bittersweet spring semester for the Wilson G. Bradshaw Library as we extend a fond farewell to two of our faculty and staff members, Melissa VandeBurgt, Director of Academic and Community Engagement and Head of the University Archives and Special Collections, and Bailey Rodgers, Archives Coordinator, as they move on to prestigious positions at Temple University and Connecticut College, respectively. Their work, which can be sampled in the current archives exhibit, is only a taste of the incredible legacy they have created for FGCU. We have no doubt they will continue to build upon the contributions they have not only made to the university and Southwest Florida, but also to the global library and information profession.
Welcoming the New Employees
Janice Kwiatkowski, Administrative Assistant
Our new Administrative Assistant, Janice Kwiatkowski, loves getting to work with students and has been a part of the University Library team since June 2023. Previously, she worked on campus in Procurement Services but wanted to work closer with students and experience the academic side of the university. Outside of work, Janice enjoys reading, gardening and vacationing with her grandsons.
Amy Craig, Research and Instruction Librarian
Amy Craig started her position as Research and Instruction
Librarian in August 2023. After working in various other libraries for over 10 years, Amy now enjoys the opportunity her position grants her to work closely with students and connect with them in their classrooms. “The best part of this position is working with faculty across campus to collaborate for library instruction,” she said. Outside of work, Amy enjoys spending quality time with her family.
Elise Carnes, Budget Specialist II
Elise Carnes joined the library as a Budget Specialist in October 2023. Her favorite part about the library and her new job is that it brings students, professors, employees and the community together. Outside of work, she enjoys going on walks and bike rides, and she recently got a new puppy! “Everyone at the library has been so welcoming, and that makes for an easy transition,” she said.
Karen Contreras, Library Collections Management Specialist
Joining us as Library Collections Management Specialist, Karen Contreras said her favorite part of the new job is “feeling the collective effort of the entire library team working to ensure the library is accessible to all patrons.” Karen started in January 2024 and previously worked in small music libraries in Los Angeles. Outside of work, she is a multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger and gamer.
Scholar Series Authors & Artists Awards
Our monthly Scholar Series event has once again been a hit. In the fall semester, the University Library hosted three scholarly presentations led by faculty experts in their field. These faculty members are doing great research within and outside of the FGCU community.
In January, Terry Leary, Ph.D., and Senthil Girimurugan, Ph.D., presented “One’s Propensity to Serially Kill: A Behavioral and Statistical Perspective,” and in February, Anna Koufakou Ph.D., presented “Decoding Emotions in Human-written Language: AI and Machine Learning Explorations.”
We look forward to hosting two more upcoming events this spring!
11:30 a.m. - 1 p.m. Library West, first floor
Rob Sillevis, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Physical Therapy and Human Performance, speaks in September 2023.
Faculty and staff were honored Feb. 8. with our annual Authors and Artists Awards ceremony. Running the gamut between different colleges and departments, our honorees were recognized for publishing works from philosophy to nursing and wetland ecology to hospitality.
After a wine and hors d’oeuvres reception, Provost Mark Rieger presented certificates to the honorees and closing out the ceremony, two recipients gave brief keynote talks about their works. Loureen Downes, Ph.D., from the School of Nursing talked about her book, Health Promotion and Disease Prevention for Advanced Practice, and Myra Mendible, Ph.D., from the Department of Language and Literature spoke about her research for the book American Fury: Essays on Moral Outrage in Culture and Politics.
March 27
Amir B. Ferreira Neto, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Economics and Director of the Regional Economic Research Institute for the Lutgert College of Business, “Firm Mobility and Hurricanes: Evidence from Florida Gulf Coast University”
April 24
Roy Arnab, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Later World Literature, “The Postcolonial Bildungsroman: Rethinking Narratives of Youth and Coming of Age from the Global South”
For more information contact Heather Snapp at 239-745-4224, hsnapp@fgcu.edu
Loureen Downes, Ph.D., was one of the 15 authors recognized Feb. 8 for her outstanding work at the Authors and Artists Awards ceremony.
By
the Numbers:
HOW WE STACK UP
29,960 Total Equipment Loans Chargers Loaned 9,710 Help Questions Answered
Makerpalooza Farewell to FGCU and Southwest Florida
In December, the University Library hosted the Southwest Florida Library Network’s Makerpalooza. Local librarians from around Southwest Florida were able to spend the day playing with technology, learning new skills and ideas or checking out the library’s Makerspace. VR sets, 3D models, games and other hands-on activities were available for use. Additionally, librarians were treated to a host of lectures and demonstrations on various topics ranging from “AI in Library Programming” to “Creating Maker Curriculum.”
Matthew Losey, the library’s Creative Commons Lab Coordinator, was present during the event to show off our recently renovated Makerspace. SWFLN Executive Director Brian Chase said, “Makerpalooza was a great opportunity for attendees to learn new content, connect with colleagues from different types of libraries throughout our region and grow their awareness regarding how emerging technologies can be used in libraries.”
Dear Southwest Florida community,
It is with a grateful heart that I bid farewell to Southwest Florida and FGCU. In 2012, I was greeted by a small but mighty handful of collections that would become the basis for the University Archives and Special Collections. Nearly 12 years later, the Archive consists of 47 collections valued at $2 million and a digital repository that currently makes 16,000 collection items globally accessible. Our reading room and gallery have greeted thousands upon thousands of students, scholars and community members. Many visit to view our museum-quality exhibitions, which garner national and international press.
I am immensely proud of the small team of faculty and staff that have upheld and continue to champion our commitment to:
• Develop archival collections that are equitably representative of all communities residing within Southwest Florida in hopes of spurring crucial conversations and scholarship while contributing to the historical record.
• Collect critical resources pertaining to the environmental ecology of Southwest Florida.
• Foster partnerships through fundraising and donor engagement in an effort to expand access to unique and rare primary resources.
• Deliver diverse and inclusive educational programming to FGCU and the Southwest Florida community.
Of all the department’s accomplishments, I am most humbled and honored by the dozens of student interns, archival assistants and wonderful humans who have shared part of their academic career with us. The University Archives and Special Collections has impacted our students’ lives, and they have indeed impacted mine.
Take good care, Southwest Florida! Sláinte!
Melissa Minds VandeBurgt
Archives & Black History Society
The success of our 2022 exhibition, The Black Experience in Lee County, points to the community’s interest and cultural relevance of the historically Black neighborhood of Dunbar. The University Archives and Special Collections continues to partner with the Lee County Black History Society to make their collections globally accessible through our digital repository, DigitalFGCU.
Thanks to the generosity of Madelon and Samuel Stewart and FGCU’s WiSER Eagle Research Assistant Program, the Archive was able to hire two students last year, each for a 16-week period to digitize and make the materials accessible. If you would like to contribute and financially support the project, please contact Rochelle Jackson at rjackson@fgcu.edu.
GIFTS TO THE FGCU UNIVERSITY LIBRARY OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
The University Library has purchased Leganto, an online course materials platform, that brings library-owned and licensed materials together with open educational resources, videos, websites and professor-owned materials into one list that can be easily integrated into Canvas courses. Canvas is the course management system that all FGCU professors and students use as an online learning platform.
Giving to the University Library Fund is one of the most important ways to support the FGCU Library. These dedicated funds can be used to provide new equipment and support other services that the faculty and staff in the library provide.
Creative Commons — an interdisciplinary learning space. Students utilize these resources to create tangible versions of their ideas with a variety of technology and equipment including 3D printers, scanners, electronics kits, laser cutters and industry-standard audiovisual production software and hardware.
Research Commons — a collaborative space for research and instruction librarians to engage faculty and students when promoting the production of exciting research, scholarship and innovation. Services include: research support, funding search tools, publication assistance and next steps to establishing a scholarly identity.
One of the library’s goals for the reading list platform is to save students money on textbooks. We are working on reaching this goal by identifying course texts that the library can provide in print or electronic formats and creating reading lists with links to these texts for instructors to use in their courses. It has been estimated that students have already saved nearly $25,000 in textbook costs this academic year (2023-24) by accessing materials on their reading lists rather than buying a textbook.
University Archives and Special Collections — the preservation and promotion of collections especially relevant to Southwest Florida. Unique opportunities exist for exhibitions, collection acquisitions, gallery/ reading room lighting and vault expansion.
The library will be offering workshops and online training for faculty in the upcoming months.
“With a library reading list, students don’t have to go search for e-books or articles they have been assigned to read; everything is there in one place.”
~ Anna Carlin, Instructional Technology Librarian
Please consider making your gift today to support our efforts. Visit library.fgcu.edu/giving or contact either Rochelle Jackson at rjackson@fgcu.edu, 239.590.1099, or Dr. Tracy Elliott at telliott@fgcu.edu, 239.590.7602.
Anna Carlin demonstrates to faculty how to build reading lists using Leganto.