The Library this week was granted some amazing news re: the ACRL award that took up much of my attention this November..writing intros & transitions, collecting information from various departments, piecing it all together into something coherent with a few other folks and sending it off. I kept the thinking the whole time we HAD to win w/ no other option (I was, in a way, probably having an annoying Rory Gilmore moment of over confidence, but it did pan out in our favor). I figured we would win, or there was actually never any hope of us winning ever. On one hand, we've done a lot of awesome things over the past few years in terms of content,--programming, faculty collaborations, both through our own little corner of AofR and other departments & endeavors in the library in general. I may have never realized exactly how impressive until I saw it all in one place in writing. We focused a lot on how we excel as a a library smack in the middle of an art school--how the things we do (our spaces, our collections, our classroom involvement, our programs & events) reflect that and set us apart from different kinds of academic libraries It did not hurt (and I expect actually won it for us) that we had some amazing illustrations from one of our student artists, that made our application look very different from our competition. And so we won, and the prize is a big shindig and awards presentation. So that is on the horizon and in the bag.
I am also in the midst of hanging our winter AofR show, MY BLOODY VALENTINE, of which I have some pieces in (see above). I am hanging a little bit each day and will hopefully be finished by Monday and the beginning of the term. I am currently awash in reserves and other pre-semester prep, so hopefully I can find my way out of this pile of books on my desk by Monday to finish up and avoid feeling like I am behind the game before it even starts.
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