Bird's Eye View

UK Librarians Speak at National Assessment Conference:

Debbie Sharp and Judy Wiza presented a session at the inaugural conference of the Association for the Assessment of Learning in Higher Education held June 5-7. It was an opportunity to talk about library assessment in a national higher education forum.

Debbie and Judy reported on their experiences with measuring student learning. Information literacy, sometimes referred to as critical thinking skills, 21st century skills, or lifelong learning, is a critical component in the development of communication skills and quantitative reasoning abilities and it is for this reason that information literacy has been included in the design of the newly revised General Education Curriculum known as UK Core. UK Librarians will be working with UK Core faculty to teach students the skills they will need to be successful in the classroom and beyond.


Art in the Hub:

KyForward has posted a story on Art in the Hub, including the Flickr show. http://www.kyforward.com/our-schools/2011/06/01/uk-show-features-high-school-art/


Essential Leader Program:

Kathryn Lybarger, Coordinator for Cataloging and Metadata, has completed UK's Essential Leader Program. ELP is for employees who want to become better leaders and learn key leadership skills. Participants are required to take 80 hours of classroom work over a two year period. The program is designed around seven leadership competencies, including communication, teamwork, creative problem solving and flexibility, interpersonal skills, professionalism, resolving conflicts and leadership.


Library Security Guidelines Revised:

New guidelines for library security have just been completed by the Library Leadership and Management Association. Pat Wilson chaired the Safety and Security of Library Buildings Committee which spent the past two years making significant revision to a Library Security Guidelines. They are available at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/llama/publications/index.cfm.


Mary Molinaro to Serve as Program Chair:

Mary Molinaro will serve as Program Chair for the Southeast Regional Educause Conference to be held June 2012. Educause is a nonprofit association whose mission is to advance higher education by promoting the intelligent use of information technology.


Doug Boyd to Deliver Keynote Address:

Doug Boyd, Director of the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History, will be the keynote speaker at this year’s annual meeting of the Oral History Association in Denver. He will address how new technologies can advance the practice of oral history and report on the best practices for collecting, curating and disseminating oral histories in the digital age.



UK Libraries Adds Chinese Journal Database to Growing Asian Studies Collections:

UK Libraries now subscribes to China Online Journals, a full-text digital collection of nearly 7,000 journals published in China. Subject areas covered include business and economics, arts and humanities, law and politics, social sciences, health and medicine, science and technology, and agriculture. This resource features interfaces in English and Chinese, as well as a list of titles arranged by subject. Simple and advanced search options are provided.

Along with the recently acquired Kikuzo II Visual, a full-text database of Japanese-language newspapers, periodicals, and other content, China Online Journals represents a significant addition to UK Libraries’ growing Asian Studies collections.


Kate Black and Reinette Jones Assist Colorado Journalist:

Mike Lawrence, a reporter with the Steamboat Springs, Colorado newspaper, wrote to express his “gratitude for, and profound appreciation of, the work of Kate Black and Reinette Jones.”

“Both women went well out of their way to voluntarily help me and our newspaper today, providing invaluable work and research that - all signs indicate - prevented local veterans here in Steamboat from placing a Confederate flag on the grave of a soldier who very likely fought for the Union.

I called Ms. Black after learning of the University of Kentucky's Civil War Sesquicentennial Exhibit through an Internet search. I was trying to verify the history of the veteran in question - who locals thought was a Confederate soldier - but was struggling to sift through the volumes of Internet sites and data.”

“I called Ms. Black after simply scrolling briefly through the library's staff listing, looking for a researcher. I thought maybe she could suggest places for me to search or point me in a right direction with a couple of tips. Instead, she listened to my situation, asked several questions to gather more information, then took it upon herself to work with Reinette Jones and - over two hours, she said - find century-old data and records that verify, as much as such uncertain history can, the likely true story of the veteran buried in our cemetery here. Ms. Black responded to me with all that information on the same day as I called her, within a few hours. I neither asked for nor expected such an overwhelmingly helpful response to a request made with no notice, from far out of state.”

You can read the resulting news story at: http://www.steamboattoday.com/news/2011/may/26/soldier-likely-fought-union-not-confederacy/


Thanks to Stacey Greenwell, Heath Martin, Deirdre Scaggs, and Mary Beth Thomson for their contributions to the Weekly Review.


Terry Birdwhistell
Dean of Libraries