Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Jesuit Tradition Of Astronomy At Holy Cross, Sarah Campbell M.A., M.S.I.S.

Staff publications

This paper summarizes the study of astronomy and related fields as part of the curriculum at the College of the Holy Cross. It briefly profiles four Jesuit priests who were associated with Holy Cross and made significant contributions to the study of astronomy, solar physics and other scientific disciplines. The history of a campus observatory is briefly described as well.

This paper was presented an event sponsored by the Holy Cross Libraries to commemmorate the solar exclipse which occurred April 8. 2024.

Celebrating Native Chemists And Encouraging More Native Talent In Stem, Lisa Villa

Staff publications

This editorial was written to accompany cover art submitted to the American Chemical Society's 2023 ACS Diversity & Inclusion Cover Art Series, and selected as the July cover for Environmental Science & Technology Letters. The artwork design features several prominent chemists who are also strong advocates for increasing the number of Native American/First Nation scientists. They recognize how cultural beliefs may often be in conflict with scientific conversations, but have been working to attract and encourage Native American talent in the STEM fields.

The published cover art is included as a supplemental file.

Careful Consideration: Designing Workflows For Content Selection, Copyright, Privacy Concerns And Cultural Competency, Abby Stambach, Corinne Tabolt, Lisa Villa

Staff publications

Archives & Distinctive Collections at the College of the Holy Cross is digitizing key components of the Deaf Catholic Archives. This presentation introduces this hidden collection and describes workflows to address such complex issues as content selection, privacy, and permissions while incorporating the nuances of Deaf culture in all processes.

What Do I Do With That?, Abby Stambach

Staff publications

“What Do I Do with That” describes a museum once housed in an academic library which became part of the institution's archives, and discusses how this legacy collection impacted the work of today's Archives & Distinctive Collections Department.

The academic archive staff identifies preservation needs such as storage and documentation, as well as how they work with the dedicated campus gallery to provide access to its art collections.

Campus Poetry Walk: (Re)Creating And Reconnecting A Community (Presentation), Lisa Villa

Staff publications

In January 2020, the Outreach and Engagement Team at the College of the Holy Cross began preparing a poetry walk, which was reconfigured to a social media “poetry event” due to COVID-19. With the anticipated return of students to campus for the Spring 2021 semester and a need for the community (especially students) to have recreational opportunities that were safe, socially distanced and preferably outside, the Team attempted for a second time to plan a poetry walk. CrossWorks, the institutional repository for the College, was a part of this plan from the beginning. Foremost, CrossWorks would support the scholarly and …

Thinking Outside The Box: A Case Study Of Preserving The Guiney Family Papers On A Budget, Corinne Tabolt, Abby Stambach

Staff publications

The Archives & Distinctive Collections of the College of the Holy Cross has a large collection of three-dimensional objects, which can be challenging to store and preserve. This presentation will examine the low-cost and creative solutions used to develop a custom storage plan for the objects within the Guiney Family Papers.

Virtually (Im)Possible: Transitioning To A Virtual Marketing And Outreach Program, Laura Wilson, Corinne Gabriele, Alex Mcconnon, Susan Skoog, Nicole Tantum, Lisa Villa

Staff publications

This article outlines the challenges and successes of a library outreach team at a small New England college campus during the COVID-19 pandemic. In March of 2020, the highly residential College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, sent almost all students home to continue their classes online—yet no online classes had ever been taught at the college before. For the first time ever, the college’s libraries were in the position to rebuild all promotional communications and activities from scratch—pivoting from a largely in-person setting to an entirely virtual setting. The team quickly created and launched social media campaigns and …

The Undergraduate That Could: Crafting A Collaborative Student Training Program, Jennifer L.A. Whelan, Jared Andrew Rex

Staff publications

Since the mid-19th century, student worker programs have been an integral component of academic libraries, and the evolution of the profession has put more students, even undergraduates, into positions with greater responsibility, raising questions about the level of expertise of which undergraduate students are capable. The authors address these questions through the lens of the collaborative redevelopment of two distinct library student worker programs at a small liberal arts college. Included is a discussion of successes and challenges, as well as a consideration of the benefits of a “cross-library” support system in developing such a program.

Building Community Through Festival: Library Orientation On The Quad, Jennifer L.A. Whelan, Laura L. Wilson

Staff publications

Each fall, the Libraries at the College of the Holy Cross host a library orientation festival, “LibFest,” to introduce first-year students to our services. To enhance the festival atmosphere, LibFest is hosted outside with a variety of giveaways and entertainment, including a local food truck. The event provides opportunities for students to informally meet and chat with library staff, while simultaneously learning about our services. Over time, LibFest has grown into a substantial event located in the heart of the campus, encompassing all library departments and branches as well as offices with which we frequently partner. Through yearly evaluations, we …

Drawing On Walls And Other Alliances, Barbara Merolli

Staff publications

How can the divide between science and the humanities be bridged? This article describes a series of collaborative art projects initiated by the science librarian at the College of the Holy Cross, who worked with faculty from Visual Arts and Creative Writing. Participating faculty were eager to help design opportunities that would highlight student work as well as form alliances with the libraries. These collaborations were innovative in that they brought together two academic worlds which don’t always have opportunities to mix with each other, generated other projects that drew non-traditional users into the science library, and, most significantly, enabled …

Personal Research Sets The Stage For Change, Jennifer L.A. Whelan, Alicia S. Hansen

Staff publications

Starting in 2011, implementation of Personal Research Sessions, or PRS, not only showed librarians at College of the Holy Cross the success of one-on-one research appointments, but also led the reference program on a path of service-centered changes. This path includes fewer hours on the physical desk, a system of on-call reference shifts, an increase in reference student worker training, a semester-to-semester increase in PRS, and new goals for assessment. We discuss the state of student research at Holy Cross and our approach to reference service

Habits Of Mind In The Classroom: Threshold Concepts, Instructional Philosophy, And Sotl, Alicia S. Hansen, Brad Petitfils Ph.D.

Staff publications

Students performing research in higher education, especially at the undergraduate level, is a progressively dazzling task in the universe of digital and print resources. Using sound pedagogy to create student confidence in approaching research, hand in hand with creating scholarship, is a challenge tackled well by librarians and teaching faculty together.

We will discuss three theories and their place in research methods, using ACRL’sFramework for Information Literacy as context. First, Mezirow’s Transformative Learning Theory. Second, Perry’s Epistemology of Learning: moving a student’s absolute belief in all things defined by authority toward a belief in his own values and …

Making Reference Personal: Student And Faculty Outreach Through Personal Research Sessions, Jennifer L.A. Whelan

Staff publications

While academic reference desks are seeing fewer visitors, the information environment is becoming increasingly complex. We know that students (and faculty) continue to have higher-level research needs that they are not bringing to traditional service points. At the same time, academic librarians often find themselves struggling to provide sustainable and meaningful research support. How can we reach a critical mass of students, while also respecting not only our own workloads but also those of faculty increasingly pressed for instructional time? The libraries at College of the Holy Cross are working to meet this challenge with a consultation-based Personal Research Session …

Personal Research Sessions: A Consultation-Based Program For Research Support, Jennifer L.A. Whelan

Staff publications

A gradual decline in reference questions at the Holy Cross Libraries prompted research librarians to offer Personal Research Sessions. The PRS program allows students to meet one-on-one with a research librarian by appointment. Established in 2011, the PRS program has become increasingly popular and successful.

Reference Resilience: Balancing Sustainability With Customized And Effective Research Support, Jennifer Adams, Laura Hibbler

Staff publications

As we see fewer "walk-up" questions at the reference desk, our librarians faced difficult questions about how best to focus research support for Holy Cross students. While so-called 'ready-reference' information is now available online, the expanse of information on the Internet combined with the increasing complexity of tools like research databases, pointed to a need for a different kind of research assistance which is more in-depth and focuses on effective search strategies. For many libraries, including ours, this calls for shifting our priorities and hours from traditional time at the reference desk to other, more-personalized activities such as meeting with …

Building Buzz Without Big Bucks, Laura Hibbler, Robert Scheier, Michael Zeller

Staff publications

Guerrilla marketing is a means of advertising that relies more on unconventional methods and less on big budgets. The goal is typically to do something that gets the targeted market or demographic talking so that word of mouth does most of the advertising legwork. Guerilla marketing was the technique employed to promote the 2010 Information Faire and Festival, or IF², a new event sponsored by the Libraries of the College of the Holy Cross which invited students to learn in fun and engaging ways about the many library services and resources available. The Information Faire and Festival was …

Case Study: Student Art As Construction Beautification, Barbara Merolli

Staff publications

The article presents a case study of using student art as decoration at the College of the Holy Cross. The College's library was undergoing some construction and as a result the Atrium, one of the most aesthetically pleasing features of the library, was boarded up. Cristi Rinklin, a visual arts assistant professor, coordinated a final project for her students of a course on the principles of color theory to create artwork through scientific inspiration which was then turned to wallpaper.