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December 12th, 2017
Several Purdue University students showed the many reasons why they love Purdue Libraries in the Purdue University Libraries’ fifth “Why I Love Purdue Libraries” video contest. This fall, we added a twist to the contest theme and asked students to produce video entries that show why they love the newly opened Purdue Libraries’ Wilmeth Active Learning Center (WALC), home of the Library of Engineering and Science.
The contest–which was announced in Fall 2017 and is supported by the Purdue Federal Credit Union–was open to Purdue students and received 24 entries for the Fall 2017 competition. All entries were judged by members of the Undergraduate Student Libraries Advisory Council.
Four videos – first, second, and two videos for a third-place tie – were selected as winners of the first $1,000 prize, second $750 prize, and third $500 prize. Five students produced the videos. They include:
View the winning videos on the “Why I Love Purdue Libraries’ WALC” Fall 2017 Video Contest YouTube Playlist at www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfiLH31ZZsO136sTrEir-exeiBi1X30wI
First Place: Cole Griffin and Anna Magner
Second Place: Jake Heidecker
Third Place (Tie): Matt Schnelker
Third Place (Tie): Jason Kelly
December 4th, 2017
In addition to Christmas and snow, Purdue students know that December means finals. Students are filling study spaces across campus as they prepare for exams and term papers, just as they have throughout Purdue’s history. Can you identify this location filled with studying students, what it was called, and where it was located? Share your theories in the comments and check back on Friday for the full reveal!
UPDATE:
The Bookstall on the second floor of the Humanities, Social Science, and Education Library in Stewart Center was a student destination. The large open space, the result of a 1961 renovation, housed newspapers and periodicals and included ample room for dozens of students to complete assignments or study for exams. It remained a popular study spot until a new Bookstall opened with the Hicks Undergraduate Library in 1982.
In addition to study space, the HSSE Bookstall was sometimes an event destination. It hosted a series of “coffee concerts” as musicians performed and crowds assembled in the space.
December 1st, 2017
A retirement reception held in honor of Dean of Purdue University Libraries and Esther Ellis Norton Professor James L. Mullins is set from 3-5 p.m. Friday, Dec. 15, in the Mullins Reading Room, Library of Engineering and Science, Wilmeth Active Learning Center. Formal remarks at the event will begin at 3:45 p.m.
Mullins has been the dean of Purdue Libraries since 2004. He came to Purdue from MIT Libraries, where he was associate director for administration. Prior to MIT, he held senior administrative positions at Indiana University and Villanova University.
During his tenure at Purdue, Mullins’ leadership propelled Purdue Libraries to the forefront of academic and research library innovation, and he strengthened Purdue Libraries in all areas; championed the active-learning concept on campus; and established the W. Wayne Booker Endowed Chair in Information Literacy, a first of its kind in higher education, in Purdue Libraries. Additionally, Mullins was integral in establishing the Purdue University Research Repository (PURR), the Libraries Scholarly Publishing Services Division to advance scholarly communication, and the Distributed Data Curation Center in the Libraries’ Research Data unit.
In late September, Purdue University President Mitch Daniels announced that the Reading Room in the new Thomas S. and Harvey D. Wilmeth Active Learning Center (WALC) is named after Mullins, who played an integral role in envisioning and designing the new building.
“Jim Mullins has dedicated his life to serving students and transforming and improving the way we educate them. It is truly fitting for his name to forever be a part of something as innovative as the Wilmeth Active Learning Center,” Daniels noted.
The Mullins Reading Room is among the many now well-used study spaces in the innovative new building, which opened in August 2017. The WALC—home of the Library of Engineering and Science and 27 active-learning classrooms—marries library and classroom space in a first-of-its-kind structure and is situated in the heart of the Purdue West Lafayette campus.
“Due to Jim’s vision and pioneering work, Purdue Libraries is internationally recognized as a creative and visionary leader in the academic and research library profession,” said D. Scott Brandt, interim associate dean for research, Purdue Libraries.
Mullins has served in leadership roles within the American Library Association, Association of Research Libraries, and the International Federation of Library Associations. In 2016, Mullins received the prestigious Hugh A. Atkinson Award from the American Library Association in recognition of his outstanding leadership and his many contributions to research libraries. In 2017, he was honored with the Distinguished Alumni Award in Information and Library Science by the School of Informatics and Computing, Indiana University.
During his tenure, Purdue University Libraries received the 2015 University Library Excellence Award by the Association of College and Research Libraries.
Mullins earned B.A. degrees in religion, history, and political science and his M.A.L.S. degree from the University of Iowa and his Ph.D. from Indiana University’s School of Informatics and Computing (formerly the School of Library and Information Science).
Filed under: faculty_staff, general, UncategorizedNovember 30th, 2017
Take a break from final exam stress with the Fall 2017 Hicks Study Break Events! Pet some therapy dogs or channel your inner baker and decorate cookies! Other Study Break Events include a popcorn bar, craft-making activities, as well as art-relaxation stations, bubble wrap, and
Lego-building resources available around Hicks.
All events, Tuesday and Thursday, Dec. 5 and 7, and Monday-Wednesday, Dec. 11-13, are free and open to all Purdue students and will be held in the Hicks Undergraduate Library’s main common area.
November 27th, 2017
Purdue University Libraries Associate Professor Michael Witt has been awarded a visiting research fellowship at the Pufendorf Institute for Advanced Studies (IAS) at Lund University in Sweden, where he will spend a month as a part of a sabbatical during the Spring 2018 semester.
According to the Pufendorf IAS website, it hosts international experts on different themes that revolve around one or more current research issues. Witt will participate in the “DATA” theme, which incorporates five distinct threads that relate to archiving vanishing languages, data visualization, text mining, creating astronomical catalogs, and interdisciplinary collaboration. Witt’s research focuses on the application of library science principles to the management and curation of research data.
“The DATA theme is taking an integrated, interdisciplinary approach that includes the university library as a partner and incorporates library science as a fiber that could potentially be woven into all of its five threads,” Witt said.
The aim of his sabbatical is to gain a better understanding of data repositories and to promote the practice of using data repositories, in particular, in underrepresented disciplines and geographic regions of the world, Witt noted.
“One way of increasing the impact of research is to share the underlying datasets that support the findings in an appropriate repository and make them available to other researchers to reproduce the results and to repurpose the data for new research,” he added.
Witt, who is also the head of the Distributed Data Curation Center (D2C2) in the Research Data unit of Purdue Libraries, will begin his six-month sabbatical in February.
The Pufendorf IAS is named after Samuel von Pufendorf (1632-1694), a philosopher and a faculty member at the 350-year-old Lund University.
Witt is featured on the Pufendorf IAS website at www.pi.lu.se/en/activities/theme-data/michael-c-witt and in a video profile at www.pi.lu.se/article/videoportratt-av-tema-datas-gastforskare.
Filed under: faculty_staff, general, UncategorizedNovember 17th, 2017
Assistant Professor and Business Information Specialist Heather Howard’s path to becoming a librarian faculty member at Purdue University Libraries was not as straightforward as some of her fellow colleagues’ routes may have been. The Purdue University alumna (she earned her B.S. in organizational leadership and supervision, with a minor in computer programming technology in 2004) had a varied career before she started at Purdue Libraries in the summer of 2016.
“After graduating, my career was anything but direct. I worked as a restaurant manager, steelworker, advertising account manager, and office manager for a property-management company. In these positions, I was able to hone the skills I had learned in my undergrad program in such areas as talent management, human resources, training and development, and change management,” she explained. “While working towards my MLS [Master of Library Science degree], I started working for Butler University as access services supervisor; then, after graduating in 2014, I took a position as information services librarian at Trine University.”
Now that the multi-talented Howard has landed at the Parrish Library of Management & Economics, it’s no surprise that she has been recognized for her eclectic skill sets and areas of knowledge. Recently, Howard was honored with ATG Media’s “Up and Comers” Award, which is “intended for librarians, library staff, vendors, publishers, MLIS students, instructors, consultants, and researchers who are new to their field or are in the early years of the profession.” This is the first year ATG Media—the umbrella group that includes the Charleston Conference and the Against the Grain news source for librarians—recognized a few individuals with the award.
“Up and Comers are passionate about the future of libraries. They innovate, inspire, collaborate, and take risks. They are future library leaders and change makers,” noted the press release announcing the award winners.
Howard shared more about her work and her love of “connecting people with information” in the brief Q&A below.
Q. How did your recognition in ATG Media’s first-ever “Up and Comers Award” program come about?
Howard: I was nominated by my colleague and fellow business librarian Ilana Stonebraker.
Q. Tell me a bit more about your background and why you decided to pursue a career as a faculty member in an academic library.
Howard: In 2011, I made the decision to attend graduate school. I considered going for my MBA and continuing my work in the business world, but was sidetracked by a friend who was working toward her MLS degree. This was a path I had never considered, but after several long talks with her, I determined it would be a great fit for me, as I have always loved connecting people with information. In the summer of 2016, I started here at Purdue as an assistant professor/business information specialist, which perfectly marries my previous experience with academic librarianship. I’m glad to be back on the Purdue campus after so many years!
Q. What are you working on these days?
Howard: So many things! This semester my time has been taken up with the course I’m teaching in the Krannert School of Management & Economics (MGMT 190), guiding student teams in the Soybean Innovation Competition with their market research, helping students in the Entrepreneurship Bootcamp for Veterans with Disabilities (EBV) program with market research for companies they are starting, helping organize and judge several case competitions, and helping organize the Purdue University Human Library. I am also doing research in the areas of change management in academic libraries, gender parity in academic library administration, social media use by Purdue students, teaching first-year management students about evidence-based decision making, and how the libraries can best serve first-year international students.
Q. As an academic librarian, what do you think are the most important information trends impacting the academic/research library environment?
Howard: I think the open access movement and data management are both areas already changing the nature of academic libraries and will only do so more in the coming years. Additionally, efforts to critically examine our practices (critical librarianship) are working to make our practices, spaces, and resources more inclusive to all our patrons.
Q. Anything else important to include about the award, or anything else you would like to impart?
Howard: I’m honored to win this award and need to give credit to my amazingly collaborative and generous colleagues. I feel very fortunate to be surrounded by such inspirational people and to do work that I love.
Filed under: faculty_staff, general, UncategorizedNovember 16th, 2017
Welcome to Database of the Month, a feature from the Parrish Library. Each of these monthly snapshots will give you a very brief introduction to the basic features of one of our specialized subscription databases. This month’s database is eMarketer brought to you by Axel Springer SE.
Focus: eMarketer provides e-business and online marketing statistics, aggregated and analyzed from over 2,800 sources on topics such as market research and trend analysis on Internet, e-business, online marketing, media and emerging technologies.
Link: http://guides.lib.purdue.edu/businessdatabases is the alphabetical list of the databases specially selected for those in a business program of study. Access the databases off-campus with your Purdue login and password.
Search: Click here to see the basics of searching eMarketer.
Start with this hint: From the eMarketer homepage, try searching for keywords in the search box, then refine your results by type, geography, publication date, topic, industry, or demographic.
Why you should know this database: eMarketer provides coverage by geographic location on subjects such as mobile, social, digital advertising, demographics, media usage and ecommerce for industries such as advertising, automotive, healthcare and pharmaceuticals, retail, small business, technology, and travel.
Interested in Market Research?
Some other databases you might want to check out, are:
Database of the Month comes to you from the Roland G. Parrish Library of Management & Economics. If you would like more information about this database, or if you would like a demonstration of it for a class, contact parrlib@purdue.edu. Also let us know if you know of a colleague who would benefit from this monthly feature.
Since usage statistics are an important barometer when databases are up for renewal, tell us your favorite database, and we will gladly promote it. Send an email to parrlib@purdue.edu.
Filed under: database, general, MGMT
November 15th, 2017
On Tuesday (Nov. 14), Purdue University Libraries recognized the research contributions of Libraries faculty members during its annual “Celebrating Research” event. During the celebration, one of the presenters, Associate Professor and Information Literacy Specialist Clarence Maybee, talked about his new book, “IMPACT Learning: Librarians at the Forefront of Change in Higher Education,” which will be available in March 2018.
The book covers how librarians in academic libraries can help enable the success of college students “by creating or partnering with teaching and learning initiatives that support meaningful learning through engagement with information,” states the book’s description on the publisher’s website.
“Since the 1970s, the academic library community has been advocating and developing programming for information literacy. This book discusses existing models, extracting lessons from Purdue University Libraries’ partnership with other units to create a campus-wide course development program, Instruction Matters: Purdue Academic Course Transformation (IMPACT), which provides academic libraries with tools and strategies for working with faculty and departments to integrate information literacy into disciplinary courses,” the description continues.
At Purdue, Dr. Maybee is among the group of faculty members in the libraries and in other academic areas demonstrating the importance of information literacy not only for college students, but also for new graduates and mid-career and long-time professionals–indeed, for everyone.
To create awareness about this importance Maybee, Libraries Information Literacy Instructional Designer Rachel Fundator, with the help of Julia Smith, graduate assistant, and Teresa Koltzenburg, strategic communication director, implemented “Inform Purdue,” a social media campaign to “celebrate information literacy at Purdue. The campaign features interviews with Purdue students, alumni, and faculty in a series of videos and social media posts.
“Purdue Libraries’ approach to information literacy is to teach students to use information in the context of learning about something—much as they will do on the job, or to make personal decisions after graduation,” Maybee explained. “In the ‘Inform Purdue’ campaign, Purdue students, faculty, former faculty, and staff share their own ‘stories’ of teaching and learning about information literacy, and how it helps them to accomplish their educational and professional goals.”
The campaign concludes today with a final video featuring Dr. Maybee (see above).
You can catch more of the videos online at www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfiLH31ZZsO3vwygf_oblFiyZfqZzWV1k or via the Libraries’ news and announcements website at https://blogs.lib.purdue.edu/news/category/inform-purdue/.
Filed under: general, RSRCHNovember 9th, 2017
This blog post is written by Larry Hanover, co-author of Rebuilt from Broken Glass: A German Jewish Life Remade in America (Purdue University Press, July 2017).
Seven years ago, when I proposed to Fred Behrend that we work together to tell the story of a life that changed forever on Kristallnacht – the Night of Broken Glass – I never envisioned it would have much relevance today. I thought his memories and the history etched in the pages of his father’s diary and that of his own were just that … fascinating but somewhat dusty history.
How wrong I was.
Thank God, as we tonight mark the onset of Kristallnacht’s 79th anniversary, we have no reason to think we will see its likes here in America. Yet Charlottesville proved beyond doubt that Rebuilt from Broken Glass: A German Jewish Life Remade in America, is relevant . . . beyond imagination.
Neo-Nazis, Ku Klux Klan and other white supremacists rallied at the University of Virginia in August, holding torches in the night, intentionally evoking images of Kristallnacht-like terror as they chanted “blood and soil” (an English rendering of a Nazi slogan) and “Jews will not replace us.”
On the night of Nov. 9-10, 1938 then 12-year-old schoolboy Fred Behrend walked to school in Cologne, Germany, to see his own terror and to see his childhood stolen from him. One magnificent synagogue was in flames, and then a second, and then what appeared to be the Jewish school itself seemed on fire as well (it was actually the attached synagogue). He didn’t understand why it was happening . . .
As described in this Chapter 2 (“Kristallnacht and Sachsenhausen”) excerpt:
Before November 7, 1938, no one knew the name of a 17-year-old Polish Jew named Herschel Grynszpan. However, his actions that day marked the beginning of a series of events that changed not only my life but that of every Jew in Germany. Grynszpan, a teenager just five years older than I, was living in Paris when the Nazis decided to arrest and deport all German Jews of Polish origin. Because Poland wanted no part of them, either, they were left stranded in a small town along the German-Polish border. Grynszpan was enraged when he received a postcard from his father informing him that his family members were among the 12,000 Polish Jews trapped in this nightmare.
Grynszpan reacted in a way his father never could have foreseen. He walked into the German Embassy in Paris, said he was a German resident, and requested to see an embassy official. The clerk on duty asked an embassy diplomat, Ernst vom Rath, to speak to him. Grynszpan walked into vom Rath’s office, pulled out a revolver, and shot him five times. Vom Rath died two days later.
This was an act that any respectable, civilized human being would condemn, regardless of the outrages being committed by the German government against the Jews. But the Nazis, not satisfied simply to remove Jews from the nation’s economic machinery, used the assassination as an excuse to proceed with the next step toward resolving the Jewish “problem.” They orchestrated a pogrom on the night of November 9–10, setting out to arrest all Jewish males from the ages of 14 to 83, with the goal of accelerating the widespread Jewish emigration already underway.
This would become known as Kristallnacht, the “Night of Broken Glass.” Besides conducting arrests, members of Hitler’s SA (Sturmabteilung) and SS (Schutzstaffel) beat Jewish men and women into a bloody mess, plundering their businesses, breaking their windows, and destroying everything in sight. They did not stop there. The Nazis burned or destroyed 267 synagogues and 7,500 Jewish businesses, and killed at least 91 Jews, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. The insanity stood in contrast to the old German saying, “Am Deutschen Wesen, Soll Die Welt Genesen” (The world will benefit from the German character and conduct).
Little did I realize that the insanity had already arrived at our front door in Lüdenscheid. I would only learn the details years later through conversations with my parents and reading my father’s diary.
The greatest terror of all was his father, back at the family home in Lüdenscheid, being arrested and taken to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. He was released on the condition the Behrends leave Germany forever. They escaped to the only place that would take them – Cuba – until their quota number was called to enter the United States.
So, yes, the book is a remembrance of a history that grows ever more distant, a Holocaust that costs 6 million lives that we must “never forget.”
But there are real-life Nazis out there still, trying to instill terror even though they are small in numbers. There are real-life white supremacists who think they are the master race.
Oh yes, Rebuilt from Broken Glass is a story that, sadly, we need today.
Rebuilt from Broken Glass: A German Jewish Life Remade in America
Purdue University Press, July 2017
Hardcover with jacket, 184pp, ISBN 9781557537843
“[This] powerful book is the story of a boy whose sheltered childhood gave way to hell; of a hard-working family finding refuge, first in Cuba and then in the United States; and of growing up to become a businessman and author with a voice as empathetic on the page as in person. Rebuilt from Broken Glass is, after all, not simply a memoir about family and faith, but a work of history, written by an eyewitness.”
–Philadelphia Inquirer
November 5th, 2017
Many buildings have been part of Purdue’s campus landscape over the years. Some became institutional landmarks while others were here only briefly, built to serve a specific purpose for a limited period of time. Can you identify the structures in this photograph, their purpose, and where they were located? Share your theories in the comments and check back on Friday for the whole story!
UPDATE:
Purdue was a military training location during World War I and men from across the country traveled to West Lafayette before shipping out to other parts of the world. To accommodate the influx of so many new people on campus, many of whom stayed for just a few weeks before being replaced by the next group of recruits, the university constructed temporary military barracks on the north side of campus in what had been farmland. This photograph looks south toward the barracks that sat on the site of the current Mechanical Engineering Building with the tower of Heavilon Hall visible in the background. They were demolished shortly after World War I ended in 1918.
Interior scene of Company 5 Barracks photographed in Fall 1918.
Please join us again for our final From the Archives photo of the year on Monday, December 4.
Filed under: general, SPEC