Lightening Talks
The Library and Animal Assisted Activities: Let’s Paws for a Moment
Offering events that include pets to relieve stress has been a trend at academic libraries up until COVID restrictions. With these restrictions slowly being lifted, these activities may start to emerge again, and could prove to be very important in reducing the stress of both students and staff members. This talk will give information on past animal assisted activities and the planning that took place to host them.
Developing a For-Credit Information Literacy Course
The Clarkson University instruction librarians developed a framework for a 3-credit semester-long elective information literacy course. Since the successful implementation of the course, we’ve been able to offer two separately focused sections on the topics of “Fake News” and “True Crime,” with plans to offer additional sections. The librarians will discuss the course design process, the structure of the course content, reflect on their individual observations and share what they have learned, and finally discuss plans for the future of the information literacy program at Clarkson.
Growing through the Cracks: Adapting and Advancing Sustainability Initiatives in Academic Libraries during the COVID-19 Pandemic
In this lightning talk, we will give a brief overview of how the COVID-19 pandemic shifted our perspective, leading us to develop new time and project management strategies in regards to our sustainability initiatives. We’ll touch on the hindrances caused by COVID, the adjustments we made to adapt, and the ways we made sure to take advantage of opportunities presented by everyone’s ‘new normal’. We will cover this in the first five minutes. For the second five minutes, we’ll finish by giving a quick overview of some of the highlights of our newly formed, and quickly growing, Sustainability Hub.
‘Leaf’ your Worries at the Door: Library Tree Grows Gratitude and Hope on Campus
In the middle of tough times, it can help to reflect on the past or dream about the future. The SUNY Cortland Memorial Library Tree gave our campus community an outlet to reflect on what they are most grateful for and dream about what they hope for the future during the wake of the pandemic. We found giving people the opportunity to reflect, dream, and display their personal thoughts anonymously as a leaf on our community created tree was empowering. Learn how to create a project using library resources to promote a positive mental health experience within your community.