Conceived by Dracine HodgesCompiled by Chad WalzPreface by Karla StriebIn August 2011, an ad hoc meeting of the department heads of the Collections, Technical Services and Scholarly Communication division engaged in a lively discussion of how to communicate to a broader group of library leaders (Admin Plus) some sense of the diversity and interest of work in the recently reorganized division. Dracine Hodges suggested compiling a “day in the life” snapshot of work faculty and staff in the division engaged in on a single day. Logistical constraints quickly led to the selection of Tuesday, August 16, 2011 as the day in which all staff would be invited to share information on one item for or in the Libraries’ collections on which they had worked.
In total, more than 60 people in the division sent in examples of items they had “touched” (if only virtually) that day. Individuals each chose a single item they had contact with that day so the collection is not statistically representative of the work in the division. Yet perusal of these exemplars rewards the reader with a rich sense of the range of collections and the work that absorb the attention of the members of the division.
The basic descriptive information of title, format, year of production, and what the staff person or faculty member did with the content is provided. Not surprisingly, what you see is that we are still doing some traditional work on prototypical “print library book” but you will also encounter a generous proportion of other formats including many digital works, a mix of fresh-minted and produced-long-ago content, content in many languages, images, text, and even some code - to touch on a just a few categories that can be applied. The range and depth of the work required is similarly wide-reaching. Along with activities that are mundane and tradition (and no less valuable because of that), other individuals had the opportunity to share work they did that was unusual, innovative, challenging, or simply didn’t exist a few years ago.
I hope you find exploring this collection as interesting and inspiring as I did. --
Karla Strieb,
Associate Director, Collections, Technical Services, and Scholarly Communicatio
