Campus Poetry Walk: (Re)creating and Reconnecting a Community

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 creative work of the community as a preservation and access tool for the project. Just as importantly however, the IR could serve as the means for members of the community who were still dispersed, not yet back to campus, or coming to campus infrequently to enjoy the walk virtually. The Outreach and Engagement Team collaborated with both academic and non-academic departments to assemble a mile-long loop through campus featuring original student poetry and poetry from the library’s Distinctive Collections. The project was very successful, with 600 downloads. It was also a great way to promote CrossWorks and solicit more scholarly work as the academic year came to a close. Most rewarding has been the feedback from students and faculty, who appreciated the poetry walk as a way to feel connected to campus and community despite the many ways people were disconnected. Link to Campus Poetry Walk: http://crossworks.holycross.edu/poetry2021. Link to article about Campus Poetry Walk: https://hcspire.com/2021/05/07/behind-the-story-of-the-poetry-walk/ Lisa Villa\u27s presentation notes are available for download as an additional file

Celebrating Native Chemists and Encouraging More Native Talent in STEM

This editorial was written to accompany cover art submitted to the American Chemical Society\u27s 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

50 Years of Title IX and Women\u27s Athletics at Holy Cross

Two major events in 1972 brought major changes to the College of the Holy Cross: the passing of Title IX and the admission of women as students. This exhibit commmemorates the 50th anniversary of Title IX and continues the celebration of the 50th anniversary of coeducation at Holy Cross by highlighting the founding and growth of women’s athletics at the College

Grant project: Digitizing Hidden Collections

The Archives and Distinctive Collections at the College of the Holy Cross is almost half-way through a two-year CLIR Digitizing Hidden Collections grant project to digitize key components of the Deaf Catholic Archives (DCA). This collection of newsletters, scrapbooks, periodicals, conference material, publications, photographs, ephemera, books, and audiovisual recordings was donated to the College of the Holy Cross in 1990. Many diocesan and religious order archives did not keep records pertaining to their work with Deaf people, and so this unique collection provides insight into Deaf culture, and demonstrates how a subgroup, unable to fully participate and therefore marginalized, was able to create a vibrant faith community within the greater Catholic Church that is both spiritually and socially fulfilling. It continues to grow and is curated by Rev. Joseph Bruce, SJ. We will discuss the initial steps of working with the materials in the DCA to prepare for digitization in order to make this unique information discoverable, accessible, and usable to the Deaf community as well as students, researchers and anyone interested in the material. This includes addressing initial decision-making and workflow issues, as well as finding solutions to various challenges we encountered. The newsletters are the largest series in the DCA collection, representing over 10 countries and hundreds of Catholic dioceses, and as such have provided a blueprint for the procedures for requesting copyright permissions, privacy considerations, and creating the workflows for digitally processing all materials in the collection

Be Opened: The Deaf Catholic Archives

This exhibit briefly describes the origin and curation of the Deaf Catholic Archives and includes images of selected items. This unique collection was founded by Rev. Joseph Bruce, S.J. in the 1970s and is housed in the Archives & Distinctive Collections Department at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts

Virtually (im)Possible: Transitioning to a Virtual Marketing and Outreach Program

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 virtual programming and activities to engage a newly far-flung and isolated campus community. Some highlights of successful activities included poetry paired with new photography of campus, recorded faculty book talks, library staff introductions to first-year students at its virtual LibFest, and video storytelling of legends from the college archives. The Holy Cross Library Outreach team hopes that sharing its methods may help other libraries reach more patrons and playfully experiment outside of their old library marketing comfort zones

Correlation between <em>Phragmites australis</em> growth and seasonal lake level variations in Lake Maggiore (Italy/Switzerland): common reed management guidelines

The present study investigates the impact of water level regulation on the growth of common reed (Phragmites australis), a globally widespread helophytic plant. The investigation has been carried out in the Bolle di Magadino (municipalities of Locarno, Gambarogno, Gordola and Tenero; Ticino, Switzerland), a lacustrine-riparian nature reserve in the context of the Lake Maggiore (that stretches between Italy and Switzerland). This is an oligotrophic, artificially regulated lake. Our initial hypothesis was that variation in water table regulation is the most influential factor for explaining observed local reed dieback. To test this, culm height of P. australis was measured at each significant change in lake water level (water table height increase greater than 20 cm), or monthly in the case of a relatively constant lake level. The study took place between 2020 and 2022, monitoring 14 plots of 400 m2, placed at three different relative elevation classes with respect to the level of the lake (5 plots at low elevation, 193.701 m). The results showed that P. australis growth is significantly influenced by the lake water level and thus the relative elevation of the stands, with lower lake levels leading to better growth, especially during the early phases of the growing season. On the other hand, prolonged flooding of shoots significantly impaired common reed growth. The study identifies two relevant relative elevation thresholds for winter mowing, a management practice that enhances reedbeds health. Mowing below 193.20 m elevation is considered risky, as no healthy reedbeds have been observed below this threshold. Mowing below an elevation of 193.50 m was defined as possibly risky, due to observed dieback in some areas as well as healthy reedbeds in other locations at the same or lower elevations. The research also discussed the potential impact of future changes in water level regulation, including the planned change in the spring regulation threshold (+1.50 m above the hydrometric zero in Sesto Calende). This is expected to result in a further rearrangement in lacustrine vegetation, with the growth optimum for P. australis becoming higher and an increase in clumping habit. In conclusion, this study provides valuable insights into the impact of water level regulation on the growth of P. australis in the Bolle di Magadino nature reserve. The research highlights the need for careful management of water level regulation to preserve the reedbed ecosystem and identifies relevant elevation thresholds for winter mowing to mitigate the risks of reed dieback. The findings can inform future management strategies for the Bolle di Magadino reserve and other similar ecosystems facing the challenges of artificial regulation of water levels