Guiding patrons to become adept researchers and effective communicators by providing teaching and learning that engages with students, researchers, faculty, and staff.
Library Research Instruction
Tableau dashboards:
FY23 short courses by library department: Link to interactive dashboard
FY23 short courses by attendee/participant: Link to interactive dashboard
In 2022-2023 the Reference and Collection Development Department led 54 instruction sessions on library research for 694 attendees. These sessions included group teaching for the GPS Pathways Scholars, first-year graduate students from diverse backgrounds; 32 sections of First-year Writing-Intensive Seminars (FWIS); several capstone and practicum groups; visiting high school students; and a library skills session for consultants at the Center for Academic and Professional Communication (CAPC). Students and instructors continue to find value in librarians' expert guidance to resources in their fields of study.
In spring 2023, Information Literacy Librarian Joe Goetz worked with Digital Media Commons (DMC) Director Jane Zhao and student employees Ida Du and Oriana Tang to develop a new, concise instruction video for OneSearch. This OneSearch video formed the basis of the new Fondren 101, a library orientation Canvas course covering library spaces, services and essential research skills. Responding to feedback from the User Experience Office's undergraduate Library Ambassadors on the previous Fondren 101 iteration, the new version consists primarily of short videos, able to be pushed out to incoming first-years the summer before their arrival on campus. Incoming undergraduates had the opportunity to complete Fondren 101 beginning in the early summer through Student Success Initiatives' Matriculating Class of 2023 course on Canvas, and graduate students through the Office of Graduate Studies' New Student Checklist.
Increased Support for Streaming Videos
In collaboration with OIT’s Learning Environments department, Fondren library staff greatly increased support for streaming videos during the 2022/2023 year. New database collections were acquired, including Swank Digital Campus, Academic Video Online, and multiple resources that support the Visual and Dramatic Arts department. The library also increased its purchase of individual videos used in class instruction and rolled out an improved platform to host these titles. More information about Fondren’s streaming video resources can be found via the Streaming Video Resources guide. Instructors who are interested in learning more about classroom use of streaming videos can visit the Learning Environments Streaming Video page.
Expansion of Alma Digital
Alma Digital is a toolset which allows librarians to host digital content (i.e. document, audio, and image files) alongside other items within the catalog. It’s rather uncommon that these need to be within the catalog, but sometimes it’s critically important. For example, some musical scores have accompanying audio which needs to be played in time with a musician. For example, a waterfall sound effect alongside a crescendoing violin solo. Staff in technical services have fine tuned the settings and are adding items as appropriate. The growing collection can be found at the library’s collection discovery page.
Classes and Outreach Held at Woodson Research Center
The Woodson Research Center provides in-person research instruction for courses, both for the Rice community and for outside patrons. In FY23 staff members in the Woodson offered instruction for the following Rice classes: ARCH 550 Houston talks; ENGL 114 Literary Editions and publications; ENGL 210 British literature to 1800; ENGL 555 The Labor of reading; ENGL 600 Topics in literary studies ; FOTO 210 Beginning digital photography; FOTO 205 Introduction to photography; FWIS 150 The world of medieval medicine; HART 313 Art of death in the Middle Ages; HART 320 and HART 520 Medieval art, science and magic; HIST 260 Early history of science; MUSI 223 Monsters and bards; RELI 300 Religions in America; SWGS 201 Introduction to LGBTQ studies; SWGS 247 Sex, race, and the city; and SWGS 238 Tran-visual cultures seminar. Multiple classes were offered to a regional audience of archivists on the management and use of the Texas Archival Resources Online platform.
Outreach to national and international audiences included presentations to the Archives of the Impossible Conference; a panel presentation at the 2022 ALA Annual Conference on Preserving the Past providing access and anticipating future needs; to Global Crossings: an International Workshop on incorporating the Indian Ocean and Asia into SlaveVoyages.org; and to the Print Council of America. Multiple presentations/open studio events were made on the use of the Star Wheel Printing Press and the works of William Blake. Additional presentations were made to the Society of Southwest Archivists on: FAAQ (Frequently Asked Archivematica Questions), Persevering the Times, and How to Run a LAC (Local Arrangements Committee); and on the use of ePADD for the Texas Conference on Digital Libraries
The Woodson Research Center hosted events highlighting collections including the Comic Art Teaching and Study Workshop (CATS) collection; a panel on Townes Van Zandt for the Houston Folk Music Archive; an event for Houston Hillel highlighting the Joan and Stanford Alexander South Texas Jewish Archives; a film and reception on American Women Rebuilding France after WW I; a lecture on the Novi Thesauri Musici; an author event celebrating Allison Bashford’s book focused on the Julian Huxley biology archives for the Friends of Fondren Library; and the Texas Map Society/Texas General Land Office meeting. The Woodson also welcomed groups and individuals for tours and discussion of collections, including members of the Filipino American Society, the Friends of Fondren Library, the Rice Women’s Club, and Rice Pride.
Classes and Outreach at Digital Media Commons
The DMC taught 57 digital media courses throughout the year, including 6 in-class sessions and 51 regular sessions. The in-class ones were mainly Zotero workshops for FWIS and ANTH classes. There were a total of 314 participants.
The DMC Workshops Playlist on YouTube continues to grow. Ten more were added this year and the playlist now totals 23. This allows patrons who have conflicts and can’t attend in-person workshops to still engage in learning key skills. The recording of Reading, Annotating, Note-taking, and Drafting/Outlining with Zotero 6 has 2.3K views after six months. One comment says, “This is the best Zotero video I’ve seen.” The recording of Animate Blood Cells in Blender 3D has 460 views after seven months. One comment says, “Thank you for the very detailed, understandable and helpful tutorial. Great work!”
Various credit course projects heavily use DMC’s studio spaces, such as photo assignments from Foto 205/210 and podcasting assignments from FWIS 103, FWIS 182, ENGL 308, and BIOS 201.
GIS Supports Learning
GIS/Data Center in the spring of 2023 successfully conducted over 12 specialized GIS training courses attended by dozens of students, staff and faculty. The center also collaborated with the Rice Department of Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures in the School of Humanities to deliver a specialized ArcGIS StoryMap class to their students.
Dr. Ibrahim Gumel, Senior GIS Support Specialist, discusses the GIS/Data Center with Fondren’s Library Ambassadors.
Photo by Debra Kolah
Research Data Services Hosts International Love Data Week
Catherine Barber, Data Data Services Specialist from June 2022-August 2023, worked with Fondren’s UX Office to understand the needs of students for data classes during February 13th-February 17th, 2023. Dr. Barber currently is the Associate Director and Assistant Teaching Professor at Rice’s Center for Teaching Excellence.
Dr. Barber does a data needs analysis with students visiting Fondren Library.
UX student researcher, Nimah Shukkoor ‘26 works with Dr. Barber at a User Experience table.
Reagan Reynolds ‘25 displays OneSearch, the Fondren Library search interface and Fondren books on data.