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Falvey Scholar program recognizes student accomplishments in research, innovation and creativity

DARREN-WITH-UPTON

Interim Library Director Darren G. Poley presents Jerisa Upton with her award.

The annual Falvey Scholars Award—established by Falvey Memorial Library in conjunction with the Center for Undergraduate Research and Fellowships and the Honors Program—recognizes and celebrates the academic excellence of some of Villanova’s finest undergraduate scholars. This year’s event, held on Friday April 25, honored six Falvey Scholars under each of the following categories: business, engineering, liberal arts, science, nursing and our new category, social science, which was added given the overwhelming response and volume of excellent candidates in the liberal arts.

Each of the Falvey Scholars presented a 30-minute summary of their winning project and were each presented with the Falvey Scholars Award by our Interim Library Director, Darren Poley.

Falvey is delighted to announce the following undergraduates as the 2014 Falvey Scholars:

Aurora Vandewark (nursing); mentor: Michelle M. Kelly, PhD, CRNP; Project: “Evidence-Based Practices to Reduce Psychosocial Distress Among Parents of Neonatal Intensive Care Unit Patients.”

Jerisa Upton (social science); mentor: Maghan Keita, PhD; Project: “Understanding Bureaucratic Politics and the Origins of the Great Leap Forward.”

Mark Bookman (liberal arts); mentors: Maghan Keita, PhD, and Edwin Goff, PhD; Project: “Re-imagining Discourse: Shingon Buddhism and Western Epistemologies.”

Clockwise, from top left: Vandewark, Upton, Bookman, McGrane, Ferguson and Shaik

Clockwise, from top left: Vandewark, Upton, Bookman, McGrane, Ferguson and Shaik

Noor F. Shaik (science); mentor: Dennis D. Wykoff, PhD; Project: “Using Fluorescent Markers in Cells and Flow Cytometry to Measure the Selective Pressures in Yeast.”

Olivia Ferguson (business); mentor: Peter Zaleski, PhD; Project: “Metropolitan Manufacturing Decline, 1980-2005, and Subsequent Effects on Residents.”

Robert McGrane (engineering); mentor: Noelle Comolli, PhD; Title: “Chitosan Thin-Films for Post-Surgical Drug Delivery.”

Falvey Scholars is just one of the many events that comprise the Undergraduate Research Exposition, or EXPO 14: a week-long series of programs that recognize the research undergraduates accomplish throughout the year. Villanova is proud to highlight the contributions of its undergraduate student community!


Article by Regina Duffy, writer for the Communication and Service Promotion team and library events and program coordinator for the Scholarly Outreach team. Photos by Alice Bampton, digital image specialist and senior writer on the Communication and Service Promotion team.

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DH in the Classroom: Aurelius Digital Humanities Launches Second Project

During the spring semester, the Aurelius Digital Humanities Initiative launched its second project, a digital edition of El Peru en sus tradiciones en su historia, en su arte. The project was commandeered by Visiting Assistant Professor of Spanish Chad Leahy, PhD, who worked with his special-topics Spanish class to digitize and transcribe the text. Guidance was also provided by Laura Bang, digital and Special Collections curatorial assistant, and David Uspal, senior web specialist for library services and scholarly applications. Dr. Leahy explains that the materiality of text as object, the smell and feel of the item itself, has a story to tell us and digital humanities as a new technology has a way of opening this aspect of the text to the world.

chad-repl

  El Peru en sus tradiciones en su historia, en su arte is a 133 page multimedia scrapbook that contains postcards, newspaper clippings, drawings—more than 160 distinct visual objects in all. In many cases, these entries are copied without original sources, raising difficult questions regarding authorship, provenance and purpose. There is no way to prove authorship, but Dr. Leahy speculates that the text may have originated through the Augustinian missions in Peru and was probably a gift. The latest internal date, 1924, suggests that the scrapbook was produced in the latter half of the 1920s. In addition to studying the Peruvian text, Dr. Leahy’s class had the opportunity to develop hands-on digitizing skills while scanning the text Los dramas de la Guerra, a serialized account of the First World War published in Barcelona during the war years.

Phone

Participants loved the way the website reformatted for easy reading on hand held devices.

David Uspal wrapped up the event by explaining the development behind the website. Uspal said, “in addition to the transcription work by the undergraduate students, technical support for the project was provided by Falvey [Memorial] Library’s Technology Development Team, with a large contribution by technology graduate assistant Pragya Singhvi.  Pragya’s work on importing transcription documents and automatically producing TEI and HTML versions of these documents will both help reduce the work necessary on future translation projects (and thus, more likely to get more and varies projects approved) and allow these projects to adopt open standards which will allow for greater use in the academic community.”


Laura Hutelmyer is the photography coordinator for the Communication and Publications Team and special acquisitions coordinator in Resource Management

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Want to Get Published? Attend a Workshop with Journal Editors

JOURNALS

Publishing articles is an essential part of every scholar’s practice. It can be confusing, though, to know just how to navigate the process of preparing, submitting, and revising articles, and getting them accepted. How do you select the best journal for your paper? What can you do to improve your chances of being accepted? What does it mean if your article is not accepted, or if you get “revise and resubmit” decision?

Next Tuesday, the editors of four journals in the social sciences and interdisciplinary studies will hold a workshop on academic publishing. Scholars in other disciplines are welcome to attend as well. The editors will discuss a range of topics regarding manuscript preparation, submission, and revision, and answer all your burning questions about the whole process. Just in time to get started with your summer research!

On hand to offer their advice will be:

Maria Toyoda, editor of Japanese Political Economy

Christopher Kilby, book review editor for Review of International Organizations

Connie Titone, editor of Journal for Peace and Justice Studies

Heidi Rose, past editor of Text and Performance Quarterly

Chip Folk, past editor of Visual Cognition

HYPATIAThe workshop is sponsored by Hypatia: A Journal of Feminist Philosophy, and will take place on Tuesday, May 13, from 1-3pm, in the Hypatia Editorial Offices on the first floor of Falvey Memorial Library.

 

 

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Wherefore were the “ShakesDucks?” These folks kneweth.

DUCKVAR

As some of our readers may have noticed, the Internet has been exploding with Shakespeare related content over the last few weeks in celebration of the bard’s 450th birthday. Falvey Memorial Library played its part in the celebrations by collaborating with the Department of English on a birthday party held in the Falvey Hall Reading Room. We also held a library-wide scavenger hunt; hunters could win a ShakesDuck by following research-oriented clues leading them to specific hiding places in the Library where they would find a glitter encrusted egg, which they could then present for their ShakesDuck.

We had a great range of interest with participants majoring in everything from English to chemistry and economics. So far, five of our clever hunters (four of them are pictured here) have shown up to claim their ShakesDucks. If you found an egg and haven’t yet had time to pick up your ShakesDuck, don’t forget to stop by English and Theatre Librarian Sarah Wingo’s office in Falvey (room 232) to claim your prize!

Several winners, pictured top to bottom: Jonathan Grecco, Katharine McLellan, Chris Tamaninie, Lisa Dixon.

 

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Ramp Up Your Research: How to Tag Items in the Library’s Catalog

Do you ever think an item should have a search term or category associated with it, but it doesn’t? This video shows how to make items easy to find by adding a tag. (Enable Closed Captioning for silent viewing.)

For additional “How to” videos, click the “Help” button on Falvey’s homepage.


Gerald info deskVideo tutorial produced by Gerald Dierkes, information services specialist for the Information and Research Assistance team, senior copy-editor for the Communication and Service Promotion team and a liaison to the Department of Theater.

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Caitlin Ritchie: Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant

Caitlin Ritchie poem photoTo honor the University’s Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards, the Library is publishing contestants’ poems or prose excerpts on Falvey’s blog. The Library also has created posters for the contestants’ poems or prose excerpts, which will be displayed throughout the library’s first floor.

This year the contest includes both poetry and prose (in previous years it was “the Senior-Class-Poet Contest”). The Department of English will announce the Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards winners later this month.

“The Third Floor Water Fountain”
by
Caitlin Ritchie

I approach you
Place my hand on yours
Lean in hoping for the refreshment I’ve been waiting so long for

You give me water, but not without pressure
And even then you deprive me
Giving me just a taste of what I need for survival

You barely quench my thirst
And the hunger, like my assignments, persists
I hope with each new meeting that you will have changed

You cannot see the effect you have on me
Your water dribbles out like empty and unfulfilling words
But still I overdose on eager dreams of your sustenance

I pretend not to forgive your uncertainty as I hide in the stacks
But nothing, no advice, can stop me from returning to your iron lips
I have to come to terms with my insatiable thirst for you,
You and the third floor water fountain

Caitlin Ritchie, a Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant, says “This poem was actually partially inspired by Falvey’s third floor water fountain that has never worked quite right. I loved playing around with the imagery in the poem and had the opportunity to share and edit the poem with my poetry workshop class, taught by visiting Irish professor Eamonn Wall.”

Caitlin is a senior marketing major and international business minor from Plymouth, Minnesota. Her poetry has also been published in multiple editions of Villanova’s literary arts magazines, POLIS and Arthology.

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Mary Grace Mangano: Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant

Mangano poem photoTo honor the University’s Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards, the Library is publishing contestants’ poems or prose excerpts on Falvey’s blog. The Library also has created posters for the contestants’ poems or prose excerpts, which will be displayed throughout the library’s first floor.

This year the contest includes both poetry and prose (in previous years it was “the Senior-Class-Poet Contest”). The Department of English will announce the Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards winners later this month.

Excerpt from “Independence Day”
by
Mary Grace Mangano

“Every day leading up to the party was a knockout. Clear skies, sun so bright you basically had to look down at your feet, and zero humidity. You had played in the sprinkler for hours (you didn’t have a pool like the rest of your neighbors) until Mom curled her finger at you to come inside and explain that “Eileen, we’re in a drought, OK? That means no extra water and we’re not supposed to use the sprinkler on the grass so let’s not dance around and draw attention to it, sweetie.”

But the day of the Fourth of July party was not a knockout, no siree. You couldn’t sleep the night before because you were so excited and also the thunderclaps felt like they were in your chest, or right next to the bed like a mean bully kid from school clapping his hands in your ear. Well, that thunder didn’t let up the whole morning and all through the day. You were disappointed because there were supposed to be games outside but when you saw your Pop’s face so sad and long, you forgot about the games and climbed onto his lap. He let you stay there for breakfast as he ate his Cheerios mixed with Cap’n Crunch, sipping his coffee which always made you queasy and looking out the window at the rain.”

Mary Grace Mangano, a Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant, says “I’ve heard that the most imaginative space is the moment when a person wakes, somewhat startled to find herself in a new day. Maybe this is because all of the scattered thoughts a person has while sleeping and dreaming remain on the surface and introduce themselves. Writing–especially poems–seems to happen like this for me. It will start with a thought, feeling, or idea that presents itself to me and the more I sit with it, the more I want to say something about it. The writing itself is a way to explore that flash of an idea, to find a way to say what I’m feeling or thinking. In a way, the poetry is being able to find a moment to explore these ideas and share it with words, on the page, to other people.”

Mary Grace Mangano is an English major seeking an honors degree with a concentration in writing and rhetoric and an Italian minor. She is from Clinton, New Jersey, has enjoyed creative writing since she was a young girl, and also loves to run, dance, cook, read and travel.

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‘Twas the Week Before Finals: Chicago-Style

chicago manual of style

Are you working on a final project or paper that requires Chicago Style formatting? Attend this helpful session to brush up before your deadline.

The workshop will be held in Falvey 204 in the second-floor Learning Commons on Tuesday, April 29:  4:00 p.m. – 5:00 p.m.

For more information, contact history liaison librarian Jutta Seibert.

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Gianni Carr: Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant

Gianni Carr poem photo formalTo honor the University’s Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards, the Library is publishing contestants’ poems or prose excerpts on Falvey’s blog. The Library also has created posters for the contestants’ poems or prose excerpts, which will be displayed throughout the library’s first floor.

This year the contest includes both poetry and prose (in previous years it was “the Senior-Class-Poet Contest”). The Department of English will announce the Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards winners later this month.

My Loyal Light
by
Gianni Carr

Again I find myself sitting in the dark with a lit candle
At this point
My thoughts are fragile and can break me
That’s if too many thoughts are to keep occurring
On things unchangeable in my life
So I choose to watch the flame flicker
And I even try to count the steps of the dancing flame
It is a beautiful distraction
Gianni Carr poem photo artsyOne that is loyal and punctually at my command
Once I’ve had enough
I blow it out
And I receive a gratifying whiff of sweet vanilla smoke
Then once I need this dancing flame back
I strike a match to awaken it and it’s punctual
At my command
But all the while a loyal friend
For me to watch melt away it’s problems and
To teach me how to melt away mine
It is strange
My flame doesn’t seem to grieve about burning to the last of its flesh
It is like it knows something
Like that last dance it takes
Its partner the wind
Somehow frees him and takes him away
to infinite kept promises.

Gianni Carr, a Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant, says “My Loyal Light was not written in a time of brightness. In fact, the setting was quite dark, matching my state of mind during that time. The personification of the light and its loyalty gives insight to the speaker’s vulnerability. The candle gives the speaker hope and control over ‘things unchangeable.’ If only we could ignite change and positivity as simply as striking a match – that would be a beautiful dream come true! But there would be less darkness and less desire to change the unchangeable. Therefore, like a candle, we keep on burning and lingering in the darkness until it is our time to present ourselves to the light.”

Gianni Carr is a liberal arts and communication major from Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. Her specialization is in media productions, and she feels as if her light as an artist shines the most in this area of her studies at Villanova University. She not only loves writing but also tries to integrate and visualize it in her films and paintings.

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James Giblin: Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant

James Giblin poem photoTo honor the University’s Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards, the Library is publishing contestants’ poems or prose excerpts on Falvey’s blog. The Library also has created posters for the contestants’ poems or prose excerpts, which will be displayed throughout the library’s first floor.

This year the contest includes both poetry and prose (in previous years it was “the Senior-Class-Poet Contest”). The Department of English will announce the Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards winners later this month.

The Walk Home
by
James Giblin

I
A pair of twenty-somethings, shuffling past train stations,
their wheels still running smoothly with the oil of conversation;
fears of the future fresh in their minds.

II
Corcaigh; cork-eared from the deafening pub music just gone by…
halfway across the world where we’ve only just arrived. Walking home to hostel,
past minstrels present on street corners, playing tunes familiar to foreigners.

III
Aran. Shipwrecked from one island to the next, taking pride in
only the moonlight and poorly paved road as our guide.
A car-load of locals speeds past us, shouting profanities
we haven’t heard the last of.

IV
Cousin and cousin, a single generation spread across nations.
Nettles keep me in place: a one-lane street hidden amid
a choir of cows, crickets, and unidentifiable insects.
Walk off the sting those sprigs and bigots bring.

V
Once again walking roads close to my home away from home.
Navigating snowdrifts that force hopscotch along sidewalks.
Words slip from lips like feet on ice, clumsily cleaning up
revelations given away at too low a price.

James Giblin, a Class of 2014 Creative Writing Awards contestant, says “‘The Walk Home’ presents the stark contrast of the loud, bustling atmosphere of a pub’s interior with the resulting, ear-ringing quietness of walking home. This deafening quiet and the free time of a walk lends me a certain mental clarity with which I can evaluate past, present, and future circumstances in my life. That’s the kind of pensiveness out of which my best writing comes.”

James Giblin is an English major from Plymouth, Massachusetts. In addition to creative writing, he enjoys foreign languages, singing and studying philosophy.

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