Fall 2019 Semester Newsletter

See highlights from the University Libraries' busy semester, including:

• Welcome Back Events
• Campus Conversations
• Banned Books Week
• Open Access Week
• Stress Less Month
• and more

The future of scholarship? It’s digital. And librarians from the University at Albany and Binghamton University want to start a conversation about it.

On Friday, October 11, the two libraries hosted Digital Scholarship: Opportunities and Challenges, a one-day conference held in UAlbany’s Science Library. Over 90 scholars and students from a variety of institutions attended the event. 

"I never thought I would have the opportunity to visit South Africa, but an unexpected invitation from Dr. Jako Olivier, UNESCO Chair on Multimodal Learning and OER and Professor in Multimodal Learning at North-West University (NWU) in South Africa, changed that."

The New York State Archives’ Documentary Heritage Program (DHP) has awarded the M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives a $10,333 grant to arrange, describe, and create finding aids for two archival collections documenting the history of New York State social activism and reform. 

It was a move two years in the making. 

On the morning of Tuesday, July 2nd, the University Libraries flipped the switch, activating a new website and search system. Plans for the One Search platform had been in the works since May 2017, while progress on the switchover began in April 2018. This replaced the previous system which had been in place since 2004. 

Question: Are the University Libraries working to find new ways to assist students?

Answer: Of course they are!  

Ahead of the Fall 2019 semester, alongside a new website and search tool, the University Libraries launched a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) module

On a recent morning, Karina Ricker was found in the basement of the University Library, sorting through a sampling of poster boards. They display actual government documents, ranging from a timeline of the Underground Railroad to images of national parks, and will soon adorn the library walls. 

“It’s important to make the collection usable, helpful, and findable,” says Ricker. “That’s why I’m finding government documents to mount on the wall; it’s too easy to walk by it and ignore it.” 

The Science Library celebrated its 20th anniversary with a resource fair on Wednesday, September 12, 2019.  

In addition to the science subject librarians, representatives at the event included the Alice Hastings Murphy Preservation Department, M.E. Grenander Department of Special Collections and Archives, Career Services, the New York State Writers Institute, Advising Plus, and the Center for International Education and Global Strategy. Along with learning about resources in the building, students also enjoyed a birthday cake celebrating the library’s opening. 

Here's what our faculty and staff published and presented during the Fall 2019 semester.

Join us in welcoming the newest members of the University Libraries' faculty and staff.