USF Student Creative Activity and Research Day

USF’s Creative Activity and Research Day (CARD) is this Friday, April 19th in Fromm Hall. This annual one-day conference celebrates the research, artistic, and creative work of USF undergraduate and graduate students. It is a great way for students to present the results of their hard work and showcase their knowledge outside of the classroom. Student talks start this Friday at 10:00a and can be heard  continuously until 3:00p. The poster sessions begin at 11:00a. The full schedule can be found on the College of Arts and Sciences CARD website.

CARD 2012 Student Research Presentation

One way the Gleeson Library | Geschke Learning Resource Center supports CARD – we archive digital records of many of the student presentations and posters. Anyone can browse the 2012 and 2013 CARD presentations stored in the Gleeson Library Scholarship Repository.

This year will be another great event!  We hope to see you there on Friday and if you’re presenting give us a shout out in the comments section below.

Happy Holidays!

Good luck on finals and have a great winter break. If you’re graduating – congratulations!!

The iPads Are Here!

Its official! Starting October 1, 2010 USF students, faculty and staff can check out an Apple iPad from the Gleeson Library circulation desk.

The iPads will circulate for 5 days and you can read all the fine print here. If all three of the iPads are all checked out, you can make a reservation (booking) for a future date.

There are a few apps, books (including the Library Book Club selections) and other resources on the devices now. Based on your feedback (see survey below) we’ll be adding more resources soon.

We’ve built a very brief online survey – please let us know what you think of the iPad and our efforts to bring new technology (like the Kindle) to the library.

Who’s the next mayor of Gleeson Library?

If you aren’t familiar with Foursquare, the social media location-based game, a brief explanation comes from their website: “We’re all about helping you find new ways to explore the city. We’ll help you meet up with your friends and let you earn points and unlock badges for discovering new places, doing new things and meeting new people.” Foursquare is not only a great way to explore San Francisco, it is also a fun and easy way to explore USF and connect with other Dons.

Just getting started with Foursqaure? Once you’re on Foursquare via your smartphone (iPhone, Android, Blackberry), be sure to connect with your friends (via email, Twitter, Facebook) and meet new Dons along the way. When you check into a location, you’ll see who else is there at the same time and the mayor if there is one. 

One of the fun features of Foursquare (along with badges) is becoming the mayor of a location (called venues you 4SQ) you’ve checked-into. Some mayorships are easier to come by than others. For now, its much easier to become the mayor of Gleeson than it is to become the mayor of the Golden Gate Bridge. If you become the mayor of Gleeson, we’ve got a little library schwag for you – an official, limited edition Gleeson mug.

There are dozens of other locations on the USF campus in addition to Gleeson you can check-into with Foursquare. If you’re somewhere on campus that does not have a location, add it right from your smartphone!

So, let the battles for mayorships commence. For those lucky few how become the Mayor of Gleeson, we salute you. Stop by the circulation desk to pickup your schwag.

PS – Julie H. Since you’re the mayor of Gleeson right now, feel free to stop by the Circulation Desk at the library to pick up your super-awesome library mug. Yea, the mugs are that cool.

Gleeson Library Welcome Weekends Event

Xbox + Playstation + Wii + Board Games = Sweet!

We know you.
You’re ambitious.
You never give up.
You continually strive for higher and higher levels.
You stay awake at all hours until your eyes burn, and a vicious thirst rouses you from your single-minded drive.
You ignore every distraction, until, at last, you reach the finale to all your aspirations, the culmination of what you’ve worked so hard to achieve:

…To pop that zombie punk with your last grenade launcher, and call it done.

Yeah.
We know you.
And we know you’ll love this event, at Gleeson Library:

Gaming Night @Gleeson Library

A “Welcome Weekends” Event
Saturday, September 11th
4pm – 8pm
In the Gleeson Library Atrium

Be there, play games, and welcome to Fall 2010, USF!

Watch our Gleeson Library Facebook Fan page for up to date info on this great event.

Event contact: Shawn Calhoun, calhouns@usfca.edu, or @GleesonLibrary on Twitter, with the assistance of the Gleeson Library Innovation Workgroup.

The Student Assistant Appreciation Party, Spring 2010

We had a lot of pizza at the student party.

The complex, daily work of an academic library could not be easily completed without the support of our industrious team of student workers.  This afternoon, Gleeson Library staff, librarians, and the Dean’s Office, honored our wonderful, hard-working, student assistants with an end-of-the-year appreciation party.  This spring semester in particular, our party felt a little more poignant, since we reluctantly bid farewell to a number of terrific students who are graduating from USF, and moving on to greater things.

Pizza, beverages, snacks, and a raffle filled our time during the celebration, but really — being “dead day,” the day before final examinations — I think it’s safe to say that our students just enjoyed the opportunity for a good meal, the company of friends, and hopefully the chance to know that the staff, librarians, and the Dean’s Office of Gleeson Library appreciate all the work they do for us… and for you.

Two of Gleeson's wonderful student assistants.

Congratulations on another great year, Student Assistants!  Have a terrific summer!

Dean Cannon awards some raffle prizes.

To view more photos of the event, feel free to visit this link at Flickr.

The Crisis in Higher Education: A Reading List

I am confident that we are of a size and nimbleness that allow us to capitalize on the positive underpinnings beneath an iceberg that most folks can only see the tip of. This is a time for vision, imagination, energy and action tempered by a prudence that capitalizes on latent opportunities without jeopardizing the enterprise or compromising our mission of educating leaders to fashion a more humane and just world.

Rev. Stephen A. Privett, S.J., USF Town Hall Meeting April 2009

With the goal of providing additional context to the ongoing crisis in higher education, Gleeson Library has collected a set of articles and other resources that discuss the current state of budgeting, enrollment management, endowments and other topics from institutions with budgeting challenges similar to the ones we face at USF. This list is just a start. If you have other articles you’d like to see on this page, please let us know in the comments below.

Congratulations Graduates!

On behalf of the Gleeson Library | Geschke Learning Resource Center it is my pleasure to extend an enthusiastic congratulation to the University of San Francisco’s 2009 graduating class. We applaud your achievements, and wish you great opportunities and success in your future endeavors.

2008 USF Graduation :: Photo by Sarainsanfran via Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarainsanfran/2498837354/)

Tyrone H. Cannon Ed. D.,
Dean, University Libraries

Did you know you can still use the Gleeson Library as an alumnus? Sign up for an Alumni Special Access ($20) or Borrowing Card ($50) – stop by the Gleeson Library Circulation Desk to request an Alumni Card. Annually renewed Alumni special borrower cards provide you with continued access to the Gleeson Library. To learn more about Library services and resources available to alumni, check out the libraries Alumni information page.

AJCU Library Directors/Chief Information Officers/Educational Technology Conference hosted at USF

The University of San Francisco recently hosted the bi-annual Joint Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities Library Directors/Chief Information Officers/Educational Technology conference.  Close to 100 individuals attended and their reviews of the meeting were excellent.  While many timely issues facing academic libraries, IT, and the use of technology in the classroom were discussed, we also reserved time for some great socialization including a dinner cruise on the San Francisco Bay, a trip to the wine country, and a tour of the new 95 million learning commons at Santa Clara University. Mary Lee Sweat and her colleagues created a flickr photo gallery.  The meeting represented 10 years of library directors’ meeting outside of the American Library Association’s annual conference. Thanks to Carmen Fernandez-Baybay, Shawn P. Calhoun, Vicki Rosen, Tracy Schroeder, Carol Cook, Richard Soo, John Bansavich, and a host of other Library and IT staff for making this one of the best conferences ever!

Announcement

Read the Blog!

The Blog is Happening!

I am very pleased with the interest that Gleeson Gleanings has generated. Way to go Bloggers!

Library Atrium 24/7 Access Suspended Temporarily

Due to facilities issues related to safety, the Library Atrium will not be available for 24/7 student study at the beginning of the Spring 2008 semester.

USF’s Facilities Management department is working on the issue and has tentatively forecast 4-5 weeks before we have a resolution. During this interim period, the Atrium will be open the same hours as the main library and there will be no outside entrance. Access to the Atrium will only be available from inside the library.