Illumination Summer 2016

ILLUMINATION KNOWLEDGE for the 2Ist CENTURY at the UNIVERSITY of MARYLAND LIBRARIES

IN THIS ISSUE

Honoring Gymkana’s Seventy Years

By Amanda Hawk

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Students Fund Textbook Program

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IN THE FALL OF 1946, David A. Field established a co-ed exhibition gymnastics troupe at UMD, building upon his experience as a collegiate gymnast. The thirty young men and women who participated in Gymkana’s first annual “Home Show” performance sparked a lasting tradition of mentorship and public service, brought to light in an exhibit currently on view in McKeldin Library. continues on page 4

Margaret Leng Tan: Sorceress of the New Piano

McKeldin’s New Reading Room

Jeff Krulik’s Iconic Film Turns 30

A MIXED DOUBLES balancing team performs at one of Gymkana’s annual Home Shows circa 2000.

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Summer 2016

Student contributions push crowdfunding campaign over its goal Textbook-loan program expands as a result MIKE MORGAN

Gary White, Associate Dean for Public Services

Dear Friends, This issue of Illumination marks the beginning of summer and the end of my first year as Dean of the Libraries.

You’ll read in the following pages how donors like you help provide services, collections, and environments that benefit UMD students and faculty. Donors provided critical support, for example, that allowed us to expand a popular textbook-loan program. Margaret Leng Tan, a donor and longtime friend of the University, shared her talent through workshops and seminars.

Some of what we do is far less visible. As outlined in our new strategic plan, we are taking bold steps to manage the data, information and knowledge assets of the University and community. We will achieve this vision by proactively seeking partnerships within and outside the University.

Home to information managers, programmers, systems analysts, and digitization experts, we are uniquely positioned to offer technology-based solutions to university departments and others. We are defining a model that better serves the academic community and advances the university’s priorities of innovation and entrepreneurship.

Sincerely,

Babak Hamidzadeh Dean of the Libraries 2

COLLEGE AFFORDABILITY is a top issue for students, parents, legis­lators, and the general public.

Students, especially, are leading the effort to address the rising costs of attending college. At the University of Maryland, organizations such as the Student Government Association, MarylandPIRG, and the University Libraries Student Advisory Group are working hard to raise awareness and to find long-term solutions.

To address the issue of rising textbook costs, students and librarians are pushing for the adoption of open access textbooks, materials via library reserves, and the use of non-textbook materials in courses. The University Libraries are staunch supporters of open access initiatives, and have also started a new service that is straightforward and effective—making copies of the textbooks for some courses available for checkout at McKeldin Library.

Encouraged by student leaders, librarians at the University Libraries started a program in 2015 to begin offering textbooks to students. Librarians used gift funds to acquire the textbooks of the top 50 enrolled courses at UMD (www.lib.umd.edu/ access/top-fifty-textbooks). Students can check out these books for four hours at a time—long enough to read a chapter or two, take notes or review for a test, and then free up the

book for a classmate to do the same.

The textbooks cover a broad range of subjects and majors. Students love this popular program and the textbooks are heavily used.

Because this pilot project was established using one-time gifts, a more sustainable solution is needed. In April 2016, the Libraries Student Advisory Group started a crowdsourced fundraising campaign via the University’s Launch UMD platform to raise additional funds to expand and extend this program. The Launch campaign aimed to raise $15,000 for this effort.

The Friends of the Libraries matched donations up to a total of $10,000.

This campaign is garnering much attention from our student body, receiving endorsement and financial support from the Undergraduate Student Government Association, who voted in early May to donate over $13,000. With the individual donations, the student government contribution, and the Friends of the Libraries match, the campaign has raised over $25,000—well above the target of $15,000. With these funds, the Libraries will acquire additional textbooks and expand the program for the 2016-2017 academic year.

Members of the dean’s student advisory group put a positive spin on a burdensome issue.

S T U D E N T

S P O T L I G H T From left: Faith Rusk, Edie Sandler (standing), Nancy Lovas and Cecelia Parks.

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Teaching is one of those skills that cannot really be learned in a class— you have to learn by doing, by trying different things.

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Libraries Research & Teaching Fellows Rachel Gammons CECELIA PARKS, Faith Rusk, Edie Sandler, and Nancy Lovas were the first hires in the UMD Libraries Research and Teaching Fellowship, a new three-semester training program aimed at improving teacher training for future librarians and strengthening relationships with first-year students. This May, Cecelia, Faith, and Edie graduated with their Masters in Library Science and will go on to pursue positions as academic librarians.

Nancy, a first-year graduate student, will continue in the program through the spring of 2017.

In their time with the libraries, the Fellows have taught over 100 library instruction sessions for students, contributed to the libraries research assistance program, organized and led a journal club for library staff, and partnered with subject librarians to explore new approaches to teaching library research skills to UMD students.

New Classrooms

TWO FULLY REMODELED classrooms debuted in the summer of 2015, spearheaded by librarians at the forefront of teaching and learning.

Lindsay Taylor Inge

When asked about the impact of the program, Faith shared, “The [fellowship] has been important to me personally in terms of exploring what aspects of librarianship I enjoy (turns out teaching is a huge aspect I really like) and also professionally, in terms of giving me the specific experience that I can speak to in my job search.”

Cecelia echoed her sentiments: “Teaching is one of those skills that cannot really be learned in a class— you have to learn by doing, by trying different things (and sometimes failing), and by figuring out your own style and approach. The Fellowship gave me an opportunity to do all of these things in an environment where it was okay to fail, and where we were able to reflect on our experiences, get feedback from others, and connect our experiences in the classroom with the scholarly literature on instruction and pedagogy.”

The renovations included replacing desktop computer workstations with laptop carts and flexible furniture arrangements; TV carts for projection with a cable to connect to personal laptops; large whiteboards for instruction, smaller whiteboards for group work and, as of this semester, two large whiteboard walls. A third instruction lab retains its desktop workstations, but received its own renovation in the form of full software updates in winter of 2016.

The remodeled classrooms and updated technology have proven to be popular with instructors and students alike. The labs offer students additional study space when they are not needed for instruction. Library instructors have noted that they love teaching in these flexible spaces, and have especially expressed enthusiasm about the addition of the whiteboard walls.

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Sorceress of the New Piano Donald Manildi PIANIST MARGARET LENG TAN

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Margaret Leng Tan has earned acclaim not only for her forward-looking contributions to contemporary piano literature, but also for her virtuosity as a performer on the toy piano.

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visited the University of Maryland in April, attracting students, faculty, and area music lovers for a rare chance to hear the leading exponent of music for prepared piano and for toy piano.

Tan has expanded the boundaries of piano music through her collaborations with such composers as John Cage and George Crumb (among many others), and offered an enlightening session describing the styles, methods, and creative innovations that have generated a large body of avant-garde keyboard works, many written expressly for her.

Tan’s career to date is documented in the International Piano Archives at Maryland (IPAM), part of the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library.

Her April lecture-demonstration in the Kogod Theater at The Clarice illustrated how a normal piano’s timbre is altered through the use of external objects placed between the strings— a classic example being the Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano (1948) by John Cage. Tan also performed several works of Henry Cowell that involve unorthodox “inside the piano” techniques. At this moment, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer George Crumb is at work on a new composition which Tan will premiere next year at the National Gallery.

Crumb’s piano writing involves a surprising array of new sonorities, vocal interpolations, and unique notational ideas. Tan provided her audience with a preview of several sections of the work-in-progress.

A native of Singapore, Tan became the first woman to earn a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from The Juilliard School in New York. She has earned acclaim not only for her forward-looking contributions to contemporary piano literature, but also for her virtuosity as a performer on the toy piano—“essentially a repackaged glockenspiel pretending to be a piano,” she says. Constantly encouraging composers to accept “the new and exciting challenge” of writing music for the toy piano, Tan is now preparing a program called “A Cabinet of Curiosities” which she will bring to UMD in December. Watch for an announcement on The Clarice website (www.theclarice.umd.edu).

Above left: Program cover, 4th Annual Home Show, 1950.

Above right: In 1952, the troupe performed for servicemen in Idaho and Montana as “Ambassadors of Goodwill,” traveling on a military transport plane. Through the years they have performed for troops in Iceland, Bermuda, the Azores Islands, and other locations.

Below: Living statuary tableau, “Prayer.” Participants hold each pose for 30 seconds, gradually acting out each scene.

Among Gymkana’s seemingly impossible balancing acts were the “Jerry and Jack” acts of the 1950s, which combined chair balancing with a clown routine. The bottom chair was perched on Coca Cola bottles.

Gymkana, continued from page 1

“Timeless Traditions: Celebrating 70 Years of Gymkana” focuses on the troupe’s diverse outreach programs, which earned members the title “Ambassadors of Goodwill” in recognition of their travels to visit military troops at home and abroad aa well as their work promoting healthy and drugfree living. Additional photographs display the troupe’s aweinspiring acts including ladders, vaulting, chair balancing, and fan-favorite routines like the Man of Bronze and the Ring of Fire.

The University Archives’ partnership with Gymkana also led to a successful Launch UMD fundraising campaign during the spring semester, which raised over $26,000 to begin digitizing and making widely accessible the troupe’s photographic and audio-visual materials.

“Timeless Traditions” will be displayed in McKeldin’s first floor lobby and in the second floor Portico Lounge until August 2016. For more information about the exhibit, contact Amanda Hawk at 301-314-3287 or ahawk@umd.edu.

To help preserve Gymkana’s archives, see www.gymkana.umd.edu/support.

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McKeldin Library Opens New Reading Room AS A QUIET COUNTERPOINT to the noisy Terrapin Learning Commons, McKeldin Library now boasts a light-filled, classic-style reading room for students and researchers.

The room features: l Large wooden tables with room to spread out l Chairs to accommodate nearly 100 users l Individual task lamps and new overhead lighting l Dozens of electrical outlets and USB ports l Soft seating for casual reading or quiet conversation l New carpeting Originally constructed in 1958, with an addition built in 1993 to accommodate the university’s growing collections, McKeldin Library logs more than 1.2 million visits a year. The reading room is part of an ongoing effort to upgrade the library to meet the changing needs and expectations of today’s students and faculty.

As one student tweeted, “The new reading room on the 4th floor of McKeldin is so Hogwarts it is fantastic.”

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Heavy Metal Parking Lot: The 30-Year Journey of a Cult Film Sensation Laura Schnitker WHEN ASPIRING FILMMAKERS

Jeff Krulik (UMD ’83) and John Heyn descended upon the Capital Centre parking lot on May 31, 1986, they had little more in mind than to document a fan scene at full peak. What they ended up creating was a cult film now considered among the greatest rock documentaries of all time. Just under 17 minutes long, Heavy Metal Parking Lot features local heavy metal fans expressing their enthusiasm for Judas Priest before the band performed in concert that night.

The exhibit “Heavy Metal Park-

ing Lot: The 30-Year Journey of a Cult Film Sensation”, currently on display in the Gallery at the Michelle Smith Performing Arts Library, illustrates the film’s unexpected path from bootlegs to international fame in celebration of its 30th anniversary.

A lively grand opening to celebrate the 30th anniversaryof Krulik’s most iconic film and exhibit on campus took place on May 27th and featured short presentations by film scholars, a screening of the film with Q&A session with Jeff Krulik and John Heyn, and music by Daraja Ensemble,

Above: Jim Healey (left) interviews fimmakers Jeff Krulik (center) and John Heyn (right) after a showing of their cult classic. Below: Enthusiastic fans peruse the exhibition, re-enacting teenage antics in the parking-lot-themed gallery.

the School of Music’s Graduate Fellowship Woodwind Quintet.

The Jeff Krulik Collection, acquired by the University Libraries in November 2015, includes research files and source tapes for more than a dozen documentaries, as well as photos, catalogs, magazines, guides, posters, ephemera and audiovisual materials that represent a lifetime fascination with the offbeat and unusual.

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N ON PR OFIT OR G .

U.S. POSTAG E

PA ID

PE RMIT N O. 1 0 COL L E G E PARK , MD

www.lib.umd.edu Dean of Libraries 7649 Library Lane 6131 McKeldin Library College Park, Maryland 20742-7011

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— P R E S E R V I N G

M A R Y L A N D

H I S T O R Y —

FREDERICK DOUGLASS & WYE HOUSE

September 2016 – July 2017 Hornbake Library Gallery PROFESSOR MARK LEONE of the University’s Anthropology Department curates an exhibit exploring Frederick Douglass’ birthplace on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. Drawing on his archaeological investigations at the Wye House plantation, Professor Leone examines how evidence of cultural exchange between enslaved people and their owners broadens our understanding of the impact of slavery. The exhibit weaves materials discovered during excavations with the testimony of descendants of former slaves at Wye House in developing insights into one of the greatest leaders and spokesman for human equality, Frederick Douglass.

— Doug McElrath

PHOTO COURTESY OF RICHARD AND BEVERLY TILGHMAN

Archaeology and African American Culture in Maryland