38 · Survey Results: Survey Questions And Responses
the Divinity Library. The audience is primarily graduate students because the Divinity School is a graduate institution but
undergraduates do also use the library.
Provides hands-on experience using special collections for students and faculty. Provides work and education experience
for students involved in the curation of the exhibit. Production of papers about the exhibit for use in discussion and
research.
Selection of exhibitions involve a number of factors. Signature dates, donors, solicited and unsolicited proposals,
collaborative opportunities.
Some faculty have used exhibits as teaching tools. CTASC staff are developing assignments with some instructors that
involve students researching and developing online exhibit text to accompany digitized materials.
Special Collections hosts the Bonnie Cashin Lecture Series, which is always planned to coincide with a physical exhibit of
collections or materials that have inspired scholarship. In some cases, exhibits are co-curated by graduate students who
have processed the collections as fellows of the Center for Primary Research and Training.
Student workers are instrumental in design of exhibit.
The Library’s Sousa Archives and Center for American Music and its Rare Book and Manuscript Library use their exhibits
to engage students who visit these units as classroom activities in thoughtful discussions on specific historical topics
related to the contents of these exhibitions.
The major thrust of our engagement activities now is to involve students and faculty with the team that develops
content for exhibits. We have a Museums and Society minor and many of these courses culminate in a student
exhibition. Special Collections curators are currently teaching several book history classes that have an exhibition
component.
There are smaller cases in the reading room that house short-term exhibits, typically tied to an event or program
happening in the archives.
This is probably not a reasonable way to state purpose/policy. We put limited resources into display of a limited amount
of material in a context that (a) is of current staff interest (b) is convenient because we’re working with those materials
of another reason or (c) because it “ties” to a conference or other campus event. Anecdotal evidence suggests this
“engages” at least some people most of the time, but it isn’t entirely fair to suggest we are “using” it to the end of
“engagement” as you seem to be thinking about it.
This past semester students in History of Science 350 (Science on the Eve of Darwin’s Origin of Species) were guest
curators for a Department of Special Collections exhibit titled “Science Circa 1859: On the Eve of Darwin’s On the Origin
of Species.” The current exhibit in the Historical Collections (Ebling Health Sciences Library), “It’s good for You: 100
Years of the Art and Science of Eating,” installed in conjunction with UW’s Go Big Read program has drawn historians,
nutritionists, dietitians, cookbook people, herbalists, etc.
Used as resource for selected instructional activities.
We also view exhibits as a development opportunity for the Libraries as a whole. Exhibits are aligned with objectives
and plans for development. Topics are in areas that have been previously identified as academic priorities, or on a topic
for which we can develop ad hoc plans to attract new donors or interest current donors. The exhibit and accompanying
activities are integrated with very specific strategies focused on results that facilitate fundraising in the Libraries in
general.
We always use exhibits to highlight our own resources or the scholarly process, or both, planting ideas for research or
teaching.
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