ABSTRACTS AND BIOGRAPHIES
Name: Marilyn M. Brissett and Christine A. Garrett Davis
Title of Workshop: Design It and Do It! Programming with a Purpose after Disasters and Disease
Abstract
Every region in the world experiences disasters and the Caribbean is no different. Yearly hurricanes, 19 “live” volcanoes and plate convergence make the region susceptible to devastating disasters. Similarly, every region of the world is also susceptible to disease. The Coronavirus, Covid-19, has exposed the vulnerabilities of even the wealthiest nations. Real problems require solutions that are designed with the focus on people. Planned, purposeful programs can reduce the effects of disasters and disease creatively, collaboratively, and empathetically. Writing can help heal the wounds and lessen the social impact that results following these events. The three-step design process presented in this workshop can be adapted to meet the needs of both children and adults. A Writing for Wellness Program can be implemented at school, public and academic libraries or any setting where people gather and feel comfortable. It can also be conducted virtually. Writing allows authors of any age to express their feelings, concerns, misgivings, and doubts about what the future holds and results in meaningful and effective interaction. The economic loss and social impact of disasters and disease on Caribbean communities will last for years. These challenges require vigorous, viable solutions that can be refined over time – that are iterative by design. Libraries can help alleviate potential problems by providing programs that promote resilience. Writing for Wellness programs allow participants to begin the healing process and lessen negative behaviors, such as family violence and drug abuse, which often occur in the aftermath of these events. Workshop participants will take part in activities and exercises designed to set-up and implement a post-disaster/disease writing program. Live polling, emoticons, chat, whiteboards, and virtual breakout rooms will be utilized to ensure that every participant contributes to the outcome. Virtual breakout rooms will provide small groups the opportunity to communicate and cooperate to create frameworks that can be adapted to their islands and libraries. Participants will be given hypothetical challenges to encourage the iterative process using design flexibility, brain storming and experimentation. Libraries are more than books and banks of computers. In the aftermath of disasters and disease, the value of libraries, and the support librarians can provide, cannot be underestimated. Libraries can help their communities begin the long process of recovery. Every survivor has a story and librarians can create programs to help them tell their stories and begin the healing process.
Bio Data
Marilyn M. Brissett is an academic librarian at the University of the Virgin Islands. She enjoys helping her students join other life-long learners by teaching them to think about information critically and creatively and expedite their ability to create knowledge by participating in academic and scholarly practice. She effectively leads sessions that help faculty integrate information literacy skills into their courses to increase their students’ ability to research and provide students with the core competencies to transform their information seeking behavior. Her goal is to empower students to engage critically with information throughout their lives. Her specialties include information literacy instruction and assessment, reference services, school libraries, school library research, and implementing innovative initiatives. She is interested in community health, health disparities, health literacy, rich digital collections, and data literacy. Ms. Brissett is a published researcher and holds a Bachelor’s degree in Anthropology, a Master’s degree in Education, and a Master’s degree in Library and Information Science.
Christine A. Garrett Davis is a board certified school librarian at the Joseph Sibilly Elementary School (JSES) on St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands. Since 2012, Mrs. Garrett Davis has facilitated stimulating student-centered activities, taught information literacy classes and been an active member of school leadership teams In 2018, her research on bibliotherapy was published in a special issue of the QQML peer reviewed e-Journal on School Library Research and Education Resources. To access the article, Why Bibliotherapy? A Content Analysis of its Uses, Impediments and Potential Applications for School Libraries, click here. Mrs. Garrett Davis has a Bachelor of Science in Secondary Education from Seton Hall University and a Masters in Library and Information Science from the University of Southern Mississippi. She is an educator and researcher devoted to life-long learning. In 2012, she completed three NETS Leadership courses under the auspices of the International Society for Technology in Education for a total of 96 credit hours and completion of three certificates.
Name: Laurie Taylor
Title of Workshop: Designing with StoryMapJS and TimelineJS: Easy Tools for Digital Humanities/Scholarship.
Abstract
Design thinking asks us to “emphasize, define, ideate, prototype, and test” (ACURIL Call for Papers 2020). Implementing design thinking for working in the Digital Humanities and Digital Scholarship requires simple tools that help us in doing our work, and that are enabling for our processes for empathizing, defining, ideating, prototyping, and testing. Until recently, tools and processes for the Digital Humanities required more time to learn and use. The additional time required made it difficult to design with the tools in mind, and with the tools as part of the design process. Further, the tools available too often did not meet the needs for appropriate technology or minimal computing (meaning the least cost/work to create and sustain, and delivering on the goals). In this workshop, participants will learn about StoryMapJS and TimelineJS, which are two free, simple and powerful Digital Humanities tools for creating compelling visualizations for stories. Both are thus appropriate technology and minimal computing tools. Participants will also learn about how to promote finished Digital Humanities/Digital Scholarship projects in collaboration with dLOC, where dLOC creates records that link out to these new works, ensuring the works are discoverable through dLOC and amplifying their findability online overall.
This workshop relates most strongly to themes 1, 3, and 4 because it is a professional development workshop (theme 3) that focuses on how to produce stories that better support user needs and community engagement (theme 4) by using Digital Humanities tools that are appropriate technology and minimal computing solutions that best fit for the global and Caribbean context (theme 1). Participants are asked to bring their laptops and to have Google/Gmail accounts for the hands-on portion where we will use these tools to design simple works with StoryMapJS and TimelineJS.
Bio Data
Laurie Taylor, PhD, is Chair of the Digital Partnerships & Strategies Department in the University of Florida’s Libraries, where she provides leadership for partnerships with the UF Libraries across the university, regionally, nationally, and internationally. She works closely with colleagues to create and sustain supports for collaborations for building collections, community, and capacity, including for the Digital Library of the Caribbean (dLOC) and LibraryPress@UF. Her work is geared towards enabling a culture of radical collaboration that values and supports diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Name: Nicole Hartsfield
Title of Workshop: OER By Design: Affordable Learning at Your University.
Abstract
Abstract Textbook affordability has become a major issue across campuses nationwide. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the cost of textbooks has risen four times the rate of inflation or 88% between 2006 and 2016. Developing an OER Initiative is one concrete way to combat this rising cost for students. The term Open Educational Resources was coined in 2002 at the UNESCO Forum on the Impact of Open Courseware for Higher Education in Developing Countries. There, OER was defined as “The open provision of educational resources, enabled by information and communication technologies, for consultation, use and adaptation by a community of users for non-commercial purposes.” Simply put, OER are free and openly licensed educational materials. To be considered OER, materials must be licensed in a manner that allows users to engage in the 5R activities.
1. Retain—The right to make, own, and control copies of the content
2. Reuse—The right to use the content in a wide variety of ways
3. Revise—The right to adapt or modify the content
4. Remix—The right to combine or add to the original material to create something new
5. Redistribute—The right to share copies of content
In response to the rising cost of textbooks and our students’ needs, librarians at the University of the Virgin Islands developed Affordable Learning UVI, an initiative designed to generate the use and creation of open educational materials.
The initiative offered monetary compensation to faculty willing to switch from a traditional textbook to open materials. It also offered compensation for faculty willing to develop open-course materials.
To date, we have had five professors switch to open materials and one professor create an open textbook, saving our students over $45,000. In this workshop, participants will learn more about Affordable Learning UVI and strategies to implement a similar initiative.
Activities
• Define Open Education Resources
• Identify and distinguish between Creative Commons licenses
• Examine legislation and initiatives already developed
• Create a search for open materials
• Generate a list of popular repositories
• Evaluate and select appropriate OER for pre-identified courses
After careful consideration and examination of our students’ needs, the team at UVI libraries decided that an Open Education Resource Initiative provides an expeditious plan to both lower the cost of educational materials and equitable access to information for our students. It can be easily replicated in universities across the Caribbean.
Bio Data
Nicole Hatfield is a librarian at the University of the Virgin Islands where she facilitates information literacy sessions and serves as the library liaison to the College of Science and Mathematics. In just under two years with UVI, Nicole has developed an Academic Integrity tutorial used by all incoming freshmen and an Open Education Resources initiative that funds faculty work in OER. Her research interests include open education resources and open pedagogy, information literacy instruction, information services, digital librarianship, and user experience. Nicole earned her Master’s in Library and Information Science at Wayne State University and a Bachelor of Art in Education at Western Michigan University. Prior to a career in librarianship, Nicole taught composition as an adjunct instructor and both composition and literature in Michigan and Maine public schools. As an instructor, Nicole mentored both students and new educators.