Category Archives: UC

William A. Altemeier Collection Archivist, Alex Temple

Posted on by

Young Dr. William A. Altemeier

Hi, I’m Alex Temple, the archivist processing the William Altemeier Archival Collection thanks to a generous gift from the Altemeier family. I’m a Cincinnati native and UC graduate. After completing my BA in History here at UC, I went on to Kent State’s School of Information, where I earned a Masters in Library and Information Science with a specialization in Archives & Special Collections.

Preserving history and making it accessible has been a passion of mine, and I have been fortunate enough to work in a variety of settings and types of work. I started at the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County in 2006, where I performed reference assistance and have contributed to numerous projects involving rare and fragile material. I have been a volunteer at the Preservation Lab at Langsam Library for four years, where I help to mend damaged books and other material.  For a look at the exciting work that happens there, you can visit their blog at http://thepreservationlab.org/. I have also participated in a massive digitization project on the Turks & Caicos Islands, where we digitized government and church records, such as marriage and baptisms.  I am also processing a collection for another UC notable, Benjamin Gettler, at the Archives & Rare Books Library here on campus.

While I’m just starting to scratch the surface of the William Altemeier Collection, I find myself really excited to learn about his life and work.  He contributed a great deal to the medical field in his time with hundreds of published articles, and the research, drafts, and manuscripts in the collection will be fascinating to look at. I really look forward not only to learning about his life, but also arranging and describing his collection, working to digitize select materials, and creating an online exhibit. I’ll be sharing notable pieces with you along way, so check back for updates! I’d love to hear your questions or stories, please email me at templea@mail.uc.edu.

Coming Together to Give Thanks Nov. 15

Posted on by

Join the University of Cincinnati Libraries for “Coming Together to Give Thanks” ~ Thursday, November 15, 3:00-4:30pm, Walter C. Langsam Library’s 4th floor.

 

giving thanks

 

In the program:

  • A brief presentation on the myths and truths associated with the first Thanksgiving
  • Thanksgiving bingo
  • Trivia contest. To participate in the trivia contest, form a group of 2-6 people. You can come with your trivia buddies or form a team on the spot. Prizes will be awarded to the top 3 teams.

And, of course, there is no Thanksgiving without food, so expect that (including pies)!

The event is free and open to all.

Mark Chalmers Joins UC Libraries as Science and Engineering Librarian

Posted on by

Mark Chalmers began work in UC Libraries on Oct. 22 as the science and engineering librarian where he will develop research and instructional programs for the UC STEM populations: science, technology, engineering and mathematics. His work will include research consultations, teaching and workshops, collection development and liaison responsibility for designated science and engineering disciplines (to be announced at a future date).  Mark will also support new and emerging initiatives such as Research and Data Services, repository outreach and connecting the libraries to UC’s innovation agenda.

Mark received his MLIS in May 2018 from Kent State University, and he holds a BA in astrophysics from Ohio Wesleyan University. While at Kent State, Mark worked as a graduate assistant in Dr. Emad Khazraee’s Data Science Research Lab and completed projects in text mining and the analysis of Twitter feed data. While studying for his BA, he was active in undergraduate research, conference presentations and tutoring in physics and astronomy.

Welcome, Mark, to UC Libraries!

Oct. 30 Life of the Mind Lecture to Address the Topic of ‘Next’

Posted on by

life of the mindLife of the Mind, interdisciplinary conversations with UC faculty, will return 3-5 p.m., Tuesday, Oct. 30, in Annie Laws (407 Teachers/Dyer) with a lecture by Sarah Stitzlein, professor of education and affiliate faculty in philosophy. Professor Stitzlein will speak on “What’s Next for America? Teaching Hope and Reviving Democracy.”

Life of the Mind is a semi-annual lecture series that features a distinguished University of Cincinnati faculty member presenting his or her work and expertise. The series includes intriguing insights from diverse perspectives and encourages faculty and students from across the university to engage in further discourse. The presentation is not simply a recitation of the faculty member’s work but promotes an informed point of view.

Sarah M. Stitzlein is professor of education and affiliate faculty in philosophy. As a philosopher of education, she explores the purposes and practices of education from the perspective of social and political philosophy. She aims to uncover problems in education and envision better alternatives. Her work touches on issues of political agency, educating for democracy and equality in schools. She is president-elect of the John Dewey Society, editor of the journal “Democracy & Education” and winner of the UC Excellence in Teaching Award.

sarah stitzleinIn this presentation, she will share insights from her newest book, Reviving Hope in Democracy: Teaching Hope and Overcoming Despair in America (Oxford University Press, 2019). This book was awarded a Toward an Open Monograph System grant for Open Access publishing from the UC Office of the Provost, Association of American Universities, Association of Research Libraries and the Association of American University Presses.

The lecture takes up recent polls revealing alarming trends in America: citizens have become increasingly cynical, less certain that they can have an impact in democracy and more supportive of authoritarianism. Professor Stitzlein will detail shifts in the hope of citizens, including increased reliance on messianic political leaders to fulfill hopes, exhaustion amongst populations plagued by inequality and reduction of citizenship to personal responsibility and entrepreneurialism. The speaker will provide her perspectives on the dangers these changes pose in relation to democracy, the investigation necessary to understand these forces better and the reasons why what we hope for and how we hope together are crucial considerations as we strive to overcome despair and revive democracy.

A panel of three will respond to and discuss the lecture from diverse perspectives. The Oct. 30 Life of the Mind panel will consist of:

  • Wendy Calaway, assistant professor of criminal justice, UC Blue Ash College
  • Whitney Gaskins, assistant dean and assistant professor – Center for Inclusive Excellence & Community Engagement, College of Engineering and Applied Science
  • J. Antonio Islas-Munoz, assistant professor of practice, head of transportation design, College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning

Sponsored by the Office of the Senior Vice President and Provost, and organized by the University of Cincinnati Libraries and Faculty Senate, the mission of Life of the Mind is to celebrate UC faculty research, scholarship and creative output and to foster the free and open exchange of ideas and discourse. Life of the Mind is free and open to the public and attracts a broad audience including UC students, faculty, staff and alumni, as well as people from the community.

More information about Life of the Mind is available online at www.libraries.uc.edu/lifeofthemind/.

Sidney Gao Joins UC Libraries as the Digital Imaging Coordinator

Posted on by

On Monday, Oct. 15, Sidney Gao joined UC Libraries as the new digital imaging coordinator in the Preservation Lab. Sidney comes to UC from UC San Diego (UCSD) where she has over four years of experience working in a digitization, imaging and preservation studio for Geisel Library. During this period, she perfected the ability to lead a production team in digitizing and archiving thousands of historical artifacts, documents, books and art pieces. As such, she has extensive experience in the application of various types of scanners and scanning techniques, as well as in image post-processing and various capturing software. Working in collaboration with UCSD Special Collections ensured her ability to handle rare and fragile objects, while simultaneously maintaining high digitization standards.

Welcome to UC Libraries, Sidney!

Videos from Research Reproducibility workshops now available

Posted on by

Many thanks to all who attended the UC Libraries and IT@UC  Research Reproducibility Workshops offered on Oct 3rd and 4th.  We are especially thankful to April Clyburne-Sherin, Director of Scientific Outreach for Code Ocean who came and shared her knowledge part of the Provost sponsored Data and Computational Science Series.  The videos from the workshop are available through the STRC youtube channel and at these links:

Oct 3rd – Video – Integrating reproducible best practices into biomedical & clinical research : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_VBmFNXWg0 

Slides – http://bit.ly/2DToKHt

Oct 4th – Preparing your data and code for reproductive publication: https://youtu.be/TkQbtEYXuUA 

Slides – shorturl.at/iwDVY

Also many thanks to Jay Sinnard and Jace Cheeseman for capturing and creating the videos.  We are grateful for the talent and knowledge in the STRC!

If you want to discuss research reproducibility or other data related issues, please contact the UC Libraries Research and Data Services Team at ASKDATA@UC.EDU.  

Join UC Libraries at Books by the Banks Oct. 20

Posted on by

On Saturday, Oct. 20, the 12th annual Books by the Banks: Cincinnati USA Book Festival will take place downtown at Duke Energy Convention Center from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Once again, UC Libraries is an organizing partner of the literary event that allows readers to meet and greet favorite authors.

The day-long festival will feature over 150 regional and national authors, book signings, author panels and activities for the entire family to enjoy. All events are free and open to the public.

At the festival, attendees will have the opportunity to meet authors and to purchase signed copies of their books. Books by the Banks features writers in various categories, including fiction, non-fiction, cooking, children’s literature, local travel, sports and more. Nationally known authors such as Nick Bruel, Wil Haygood, Alice McDermott, Sara Paretsky and Jason Reynolds will join local favorites Sharon Draper, Will Hillenbrand and Thane Maynard to celebrate the joy and reading of books. Continue reading →

Some Blowpipe Equipment : Notes from the Oesper Collections, No. 52, September/October 2018

Posted on by
A portable Berzelius oil lamp for blowpipe analysis. The additional ring and alcohol lamp could be used to evaporate mineral water samples for analysis.

A portable Berzelius oil lamp for blowpipe analysis. The additional ring and alcohol lamp could be used to evaporate mineral water samples for analysis.

Issue 52 highlights items in the Oesper Collections related to the practice and teaching of blowpipe analysis.

Click here for all other issues from the Oesper Collections and to explore the Jensen-Thomas Apparatus Collection.

 

 

 

 

 

 

SAE Standards and Papers (Trial Access)

Posted on by

Through November 10, UC has trial access to SAE Mobilus, a vast repository of engineering and technical content for the automotive, aerospace, and commercial vehicle industries.  The trial includes access to SAE standards and technical papers.

Standards cover these areas: Ground Vehicle Standards (J-Reports), Aerospace Standards, and Aerospace Material Specifications (AMS). Technical papers include thousands of reports on the latest advances and research in all areas of mobility engineering, including ground vehicle, aerospace, off-highway transport, and manufacturing technology.

Your feedback on the SAE Mobilus trial is important to our evaluation.  Please send comments to: Ted.Baldwin@uc.edu (Ted Baldwin, Director of the Science and Engineering Libraries).  Following the trial, we will use your feedback to determine if we pursue a campus subscription.

How UC Researchers use the Open Science Framework – Karlynn BrintzenhofeSzoc, CAHS-School of Social Work, Associate Professor

Posted on by

In our third installment of the series “How UC Researchers use the Open Science Framework”, we hear from

Karlynn BrintzenhofeSzoc, CAHS-School of Social Work, Associate Professor

Karlynn Brintzenhofeszoc, CAHS-School of Social Work, Associate Professor

 

Research Project Description or statement about your research interest:

I am working with a group of trans-disciplinary researchers who focus on the current state of care for older adults with cancer.  It is well known that enrollment of older adults into cancer clinical trials is not proportional to the number of older adults who are diagnosed with and treated for cancer.  Further there is little known about how older patients who participated in clinical trials respond to treatments.  And we do not have a clear understanding of the many factors that affect their quality of life during treatment such as drug tolerance levels or best practices in coordinating their care.

Additionally, The American Society for Clinical Oncology (https://www.asco.org/) published a call to increase the recruitment of older adults into trials.  One of the main recommendations they made is that journals develop policies that would involve a better reporting system that would encourage data to be analyzed and reported by age groups on efficacy and adverse effects.  This change could improve clinical practice and likely improve the quality of life of older adults.

Our research project will take a snapshot of the literature and focus on Phase III therapeutic cancer clinical trials.  We are conducting a systematic review of the literature for the time frame of July 1 2016 to June 30 2017.  One of the data points we are gathering is inclusion and exclusion criteria which have an upper age cutoff.  Already we see in the literature that there is an inconsistency in age reporting.  Also, it is difficult to find reports where the results are stratified for older adults.  And in order to set best practices, we believe researchers need to pay more attention to older adults when reporting outcomes.

This group of researchers and clinicians are a part of the Cancer and Aging Research Group (mycarg.org) which is a national advocacy group that funds and supports research to provide better coordinated care for older adults with cancer.

Why did you chose to use the OSF to organize your research/projects?

We started off using another workflow to assign readings to reviewers and it was a disaster in record keeping.   We couldn’t figure out what articles had been assigned to reviewers, and if and when they had completed their assigned readings.

Then I discovered the Open Science Framework (through an email from the library) and switched to using the OSF.  It was very easy to transition our workflow to this system.  We could set up projects in the OSF, connect with the reviewers by inviting them to be collaborators, and share their tasks through the OSF.  We created files (or components in the OSF) for each person.  We loaded their reading assignments into the project and were able to track when they opened the files.  So we knew what was getting done and what still needed to be addressed.  It was very easy to use, especially for collaborators with virtually no training needed.  There was no angst or pain with the system.  It is also very easy to add and remove collaborators.

What about the OSF makes this tool a good choice for your project management (i.e. specific function of the OSF)?

I LOVE the notification features.  We can track that the work is being done by the reviewers assigned.  And it is easy to extract the data from a collection document in the OSF into our REDCap data management system.

Additional comment for the post that you are willing to share:

A second group of clinicians and researchers who are members of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer (MASCC; mascc.org) are starting another project using the OSF.  A CARG clinicians, who is leading this second project that is looking at shared decision making with older adults with cancer, has also decided to use OSF for the project.

The OSF has a lot of potential.  I personally could use it more, but would want additional training to understand all the functionality of the OSF.  And I love that the platform is accessible anywhere.

Currently our project is only accessible to collaborators, but it will be easy to open components of the project if we choose or need to share some of our findings.