Now an assistant professor of African history at Rice University, Daniel held the same position at Mizzou from 2012 to 2017, teaching courses on the history of early and modern Africa. His research focuses on the African slave trade, especially from West Central Africa, and he has participated in several digital humanities projects such as Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database and Visualizing Abolition: A Digital History of the Suppression of the African Slave Trade. Visualizing Abolition was developed here at Mizzou.
Rachel Brekhus
Daniel credits Rachel and other Mizzou librarians with playing key roles in his research and teaching. “They not only helped me secure important primary and secondary sources for my research,” he says, “but they also created study guides for my students, workshops on how to conduct research, and trained students in operating related equipment and computer softwares. They also reviewed applications and nominated students and myself to internal and external research and teaching awards.”
Humanities librarian Anne Barker provided students with valuable insights into copyright issues and the use of images. Digital services librarian Felicity Dykas trained students on scanning techniques and image specifications. In the spring of 2017, Ellis Library hosted an exhibit about the making of the Visualizing Abolition project, providing students an opportunity to showcase their work.
Anne Barker
Prior to the CRL Award for Teaching, Daniel had won teaching awards within the University of Missouri campus community and considers those awards “an important way of rewarding faculty for their teaching achievements” and letting faculty know they are on the right track. However, he says “the CRL award was something different. As a global consortium of research libraries, it meant that I was not only a good teacher among my peers at Mizzou, but that my teaching skills were also appreciated among a much larger community of scholars.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Although the Cycle of Success typically focuses on the relationships among the Libraries, faculty, and students, the Libraries also contribute to the success of all the communities Mizzou serves. The Libraries are an integral part of Mizzou’s mission “to provide all Missourians the benefits of a world-class research university, no matter their age. The fifth graders from Grant Elementary School recently visited the Special Collections Department to get an in-depth look what the department has to offer.
Matt Kuensting and John Nies, fifth grade teachers at Grant Elementary, recognize the importance of community connections, and five years ago, revised their practice to focus on community connections. Since their revision, they have taken their students into the community to observe and cultivate their interests, and one of those stops is to Special Collections. Kelli Hansen, Tim Perry and the Special Collections staff, took the students through three stations based in the evolution of technology, map making, and historical botany books.
“Ellis Library is one of our first places we visit, and many kids favorite place. These experiences are very impactful for us because our students are currently studying observing organisms like plants, they are making maps of their own imaginative worlds, and technology is one of the biggest integrations in our community project.”
We asked John Nies what advice he would give for those interested in using the library: “[The] advice I would give to those interested in using the library is… GO! Spend some time walking around the displays in the main hall, visit the Special Collections, and wander a bit. The staff has always been helpful. The building itself is fascinating and it holds an eternity of interesting materials.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
My name is Erin, and I am a second year distance student in the BSN-to-PhD program at the MU Sinclair School of Nursing. My interest in researching type 1 diabetes (T1D) began three years ago, when my son (who was 9 years old at the time) was diagnosed with T1D. I have particular interests in data science and precision medicine, and my long-term goals involve the identification of pathophysiologic subtypes (i.e., phenotypes) of type 1 diabetes.
I am currently participating in a research practicum with Dr. Sonal Patil (MU Department of Family and Community Medicine) and as a part of this practicum, I am completing a systematic search of the literature pertaining to diabetes caregivers. Setting up and executing systematic searches can seem like such a daunting task (especially the first time around!) and Dr. Patil and my PhD advisor, Dr. Bonnie Wakefield, suggested that I talk with the health sciences librarians to ask for their assistance with developing appropriate search strategies. So I took their advice and went to the Health Sciences Library when I was on campus in early October.
Rebecca Graves
When health sciences librarian Rebecca Graves heard that I was at the library and that I had questions about how to begin my search, she stopped the work that she was doing that afternoon so that she could attend to my questions. Although I didn’t ask her to do that, my needs were important to her and she made time to give me the assistance I needed. She proceeded to work with me for quite some time, advising me on how to carry out a literature search, and walking me through a search in one database so that I could begin the process myself when I got back home.
During the last couple of weeks, I have had many additional questions about how to set up searches in other databases and Diane Johnson is the health sciences librarian who has helped me craft these other search strategies. Individuals who know me well know that I ask a lot of questions and Diane has been incredibly patient in answering my questions and concerns. For example, when I was having trouble acquiring search results in one database, Diane recognized that the issue was caused by a problem with the search syntax in that database (rather than by something I was doing wrong). She contacted the support specialists for that database,explained the issue, and she went on to craft a workaround for me that I could use to complete my search in the meantime! Her advice about fashioning appropriate searches in each database has been invaluable. She has even met with me online on two separate occasions so that I could share my computer screen with her, show her my search strategies, and request her assistance.
Diane Johnson
Effectively using research databases is challenging because the search syntax is different in each database. We are fortunate here at MU to have access to truly exceptional health sciences librarians who bring with them many years of experience and who possess the expertise that students need to be successful. Before you begin your research, do yourself a favor: reach out to the librarians and consult with them about your research needs. I’d also like to encourage graduate students to access the many additional resources available at the library including online and on campus classes and workshops , the after-hours “Ask the Librarians!” chat feature, and library email updates. Distance students can use MU Connect to schedule a time to consult with a librarian. These resources exist to help students be successful — so be sure to take advantage of them!
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like to submit your own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Last year, Cindy Cotner served as the Interim Head of Instructional Services at Ellis Library and oversaw a pilot program where new teaching assistants in the English department were each matched to an individual librarian for library instruction and research assistance for their sections of English 1000, the first-year writing course required of Mizzou students. Due to the success of the program, it has been expanded this year, with every English 1000 instructor matched to a librarian for their courses.
In April, Cindy and Anne Barker presented “Bringing the Library into the Classroom: Rethinking Library Resources” with Deanna Benjamin and Bailey Boyd, the English 1000 instructors they worked with, at the MU Composition Program’s Celebration of Writing and Teaching.
Collaboration with librarians is nothing new for Deanna Benjamin, a PhD candidate who, in addition to teaching a variety of courses here at Mizzou, has taught in St. Louis since 2008. Cindy co-taught two sessions regarding the research process with Deanna in her classroom. During the first class session, the class worked on “an exercise that connected Cindy’s introduction to the library and research with the semester research project.” They opened the second class session with a Q&A and then “visited with students individually while they all conducted research online.” Deanna says, “Our collaboration in class helped the students ask a variety of research questions that at least one of us was able to answer.”
When the students presented their research later in the semester, Cindy reinforced the library’s commitment to undergraduate research by attending the presentations.
During her master’s program here at Mizzou, Bailey Boyd first taught English 1000 and began collaborating with the library for research instruction. Now a first-year PhD student in creative nonfiction writing, her personal research interests include “uncovering new bits of information that have been hidden away, such as archival research and new sides to a well-known story.”
Anne Barker
Last year, Bailey met with Anne early in the fall semester to discuss how the library could help her students with their projects. Bailey requires her to students to “select a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph, analyze that photograph, and then use research to fit that photograph within its original historical and cultural moment.” In conjunction with that assignment, Anne “put together an amazing course guide where the students could explore different research on eras, all collected in one place!” For this semester’s library visit for the same assignment, Anne went a step further. Bailey says she “had pulled out old Time magazine archives and Harper’s Bazaar archives so that students could see–in real, tangible form–what people in different decades would be seeing. Students were able to surround themselves and immerse themselves in that world for a short while.”
Bailey saw the effect of library instruction very clearly in her students’ final essays for this project. She says, “The research I saw in their papers was quite extraordinary–some students relayed background stories of famous photos that had changed their minds about the photographs. In my opinion, this research led to richer and more in-depth analysis of their photographs–every essay was interesting and thought-provoking.”
When Bailey wanted to assign her students the Ellis Library scavenger hunt, which can be completed by students on their cell phones, she worked with Anne to customize call numbers to the food research and cookbook area “so that they were led to the stacks that had the information they would need further in the semester.”
Inspired by this collaboration, Bailey has incorporated some changes into her curriculum. She says, “I’ve already increased our class library visits from one visit to three and now require my students to consult with a librarian at least once on their own time throughout the semester. These past semesters of library collaboration have really shown me how important early incorporation of the library truly is.”
Anne says that “the collaboration has allowed us to be more proactive and engaged with the TAs, so that the library portions dovetail more with their objectives for the class. We’ve also been able to experiment more with providing handouts, online lessons, guides, and brief videos that can be used outside of the classroom time, so that the time we have together with students can be a bit more interactive.” Because the level of collaboration between librarians and English 1000 instructors is still evolving, she finds being able to work with the same teaching assistants for multiple semesters helpful.
Deanna and Bailey shared some advice on how to take advantage of library services. Deanna advises teaching assistants and faculty to meet “with a librarian before the semester begins to talk about the topic and goals of the course and ways in which the librarian might use some of the instructional time to get to know students (and for students to get to know their librarian).” Bailey recommends a library tour for everyone new to Mizzou. She advises her fellow graduate students to form a relationship with their subject librarian “because we’re more likely to ask questions if we’ve established that relationship.” In her case, that was also Anne, whom she also visited for research help on her master’s thesis. She says, “I can’t really express how much Anne has helped me these past two years. I don’t think I could have accomplished many of the things I wanted to accomplish in my classroom or as a student if I hadn’t had that relationship.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
PhD student and essayist Corinna Cook’s personal research interests include the lyric essay, literary journalism, indigenous literature and cinema, and posthumanism. As a teaching assistant, she reached out to Paula Roper for library instruction for her English 1000 courses exploring mass incarceration. Both her on-ground and online students benefited from Paula’s help navigating library resources related to the course’s theme and their specific research assignment.
Corinna’s students read Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness and then identified an aspect they’d like to research and consider from other perspectives. They were required to consult a source cited in the original text in their research essays. As Corinna says, “Her book incorporates an enormous amount of research, so virtually any passage/topic they’ve chosen to supplement will include references and citations.” Paula concurs, “Alexander uses citations from a wide range of materials including books, books chapter, magazines, journals, newspapers, reports, and court cases.” In terms of their own research, students were also required to use one popular and one scholarly source.
For the in-person library session, Paula introduced students to the library and demonstrated the stages of research required for the assignment. Corinna says, “Paula incorporated passages from Alexander’s book, linked them to references from Alexander’s endnotes, and demonstrated research steps that exactly mimicked the assignment’s requirements. Paula was also on board as our class librarian: she met with students one-on-one, answered emails, and supported individual research processes as needed.”
Paula Roper
Paula then adapted this lesson, splitting the information into smaller lessons Corinna could integrate into her online course. One lesson illustrated how to use Discover@MU to find articles from popular publications, while the other focused on how to find the sources cited in The New Jim Crow. Corinna describes the lessons as “clear and detailed,” including links to resources from the library and beyond. “Again,” she says, the lessons were “specific to students’ assignment of doing supplemental research responding to The New Jim Crow.” Paula encourages students to reach out for assistance after the library instruction session if they need further assistance, but if they don’t, “it might indicate that the lessons served to answer questions they may have had regarding the library research needed for their work.”
Paula calls Corinna “a clearly dedicated and enthusiastic English 1000 instructor.” She says, “As an important part of the university’s educational effort, the Libraries encourage participation in these collaborative opportunities. Workload considerations coupled with the responsibility for designing lessons demonstrating some of the intricate complexities of research made this effort challenging but worthwhile.” She looks forward to more successful collaborations, “convinced that this enhanced the educational experience of our students.”
Corinna found Paula through a circuitous route: “I think I went scrolling around through the subject librarian pages. Why did I do this? I don’t remember. Following a rabbit hole for something unrelated to teaching. Best rabbit hole ever: I found out we have a social sciences librarian affiliated with the Black Studies program who had created pages and pages of these elaborate library guides–on slam poetry, on the contemporary African diaspora, on hip hop, on historical trauma. . . . In other words, I accidentally found out there was an expert invested in teaching research skills on themes related to my own class.”
Her advice to other instructors is to contact the subject librarian in the field of your class’s theme. “Dig around, click around, do your homework,” Corinna says. “Take the initiative to introduce yourself, bring a clear plan to the table, then ask genuinely open questions and listen to the feedback.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Assistant teaching professor of physical therapy Brad Willis found out about the Fridays @ the Library workshop series after enrolling in the educational leadership and policy analysis program through the College of Education. He became full-time faculty in 2015 after several years of practice as a physical therapist. He teaches advanced courses on geriatric rehabilitation as well as foundational science courses in the doctoral program. He says, “As I grow into my new academic role, I hope to investigate curricular assessment strategies for allied health programs.”
In September, he attended “Staying Ahead of the Curve,” taught by Kimberly Moeller. Brad says, “During my previous coursework and early career as a faculty member at MU, I did not fully appreciate the scope of resources available to students and employees.” The workshop provided him with an overview of library resources and services, ranging from the vast array of specialized databases to “the individualized attention and subject expertise of trained library science staff” to “ways young and experienced scholars may increase the visibility of their work and tools to greatly improve the efficiency of academic writing.”
Kimberly Moeller
Kimberly enjoys the opportunity to show that Mizzou Libraries have a lot more to offer than just books and articles. She says, “Sharing the different resources is a pleasure.”
Impressed by Kimberly’s teaching and audience engagement, Brad admits, “It was apparent that we were only skimming the surface during this session.” He says he will use her tips and tricks for years to come in his dual role as a faculty member and PhD student. Brad recommends getting to know your subject librarian and attending programming targeted to your interests and needs. His only regret is not attending a Fridays @ the Library workshop sooner.
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Erin Dannecker is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physical Therapy. Since 2004, she has been teaching Evidence-Based Practice to between 44 to 60 Doctorate of Physical Therapy students with Rebecca Graves’ assistance. “Health professionals must learn how to search literature databases quickly and efficiently because they have little time in between treating patients. Rebecca teaches our students to do just that by delivering professional lecture recordings, a guest lecture, and individual tutoring. Without Rebecca’s expert and dedicated assistance, I would have to decrease the rigor of the course’s assignments dramatically.”
Rebecca Graves Education Librarian
Rebecca has also helped Erin with her own literature searches, which Erin tells her students. “I’m always hesitant to write ‘no studies were located’ in a manuscript without using the literature searching skills I have learned from Rebecca and sometimes asking Rebecca to double check for me. It is important for our students to hear about collaboration among researchers, clinicians, patients, and academic librarians and to make the most of the amazing resources that the Health Sciences Library offers such as fast and free interlibrary loans and online and face-to-face training.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
The Routledge Handbook of Landscape and Food, to be published in 2018, features the chapter “Using the Senses to Write Food Culture and Landscape” by MU’s own Nina Mukerjee Furstenau. As Director of Food Systems Communication and Instructor in Science and Agricultural Journalism, Nina has relied on Noel Kopriva, whom she calls “a jewel in the crown of subject librarians,” for research help many times.
When Nina found herself in need of “research materials on using sensory writing in food and landscape storytelling and how that type of writing effects communication across cultural borders,” she searched on her own but found that her searches were not producing results relating to her particular angle on the topics. That’s when she asked Noel to step in.
Noel Kopriva
Nina admits that she, of course, needed the information “pronto” and was out of the state at the time. She says Noel “not only had good ideas on how to approach the topic, she pointed out specific references and was able to walk me through how to get far-flung sources winging their way to Columbia. She made the entire experience manageable, accessible, and pleasant. Tip of the hat to Noel!”
Noel says, “It was a delight working with someone like Nina, who combines so many disciplines in her writing—makes it really fun to help her do research. She is an amazing patron and person, and I am grateful to have been able to help!”
“Make use of all the offerings at the library—databases, journals, statistics, and more,” Nina advises, but especially “the people there—the librarians—devoted to the exploration of knowledge and how to access it.” She says of Noel, “My personal opinion is that she performs magic.”
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
Judith Goodman, the Interim Associate Dean of Research for the School of Health Professions, and Gina Scavone, Executive Assistant to the Associate Deans, contacted the Health Sciences Library for help with gathering journal, article, and author metrics for all School of Health Professions faculty. They wanted a better idea of what and where their faculty were publishing, and the impact of their research. Gina Scavone had previously asked for help in Summer 2016 when she was asked to find this same information, but wasn’t sure where to start. Taira Meadowcroft sat down with Gina to show her how she gathered this information, and throughout the summer, Taira, along with Rachel Alexander and Gemille Purnell, gathered the required metrics. Fast forward to Spring 2017, when the School of Health Professions asked for updated metrics, on a short deadline, for their newly added faculty. The Department of Public Health merged with the School of Health Professions, and this merger added a few new faculty members. “We needed to have the most up-to-date data concerning our faculty’s research profiles with a ridiculously quick turn-around for a presentation. We asked Taira Meadowcroft to find both the WOS and Scopus annual and cumulative number of publications and citations, the h-index, and journal impact factors for each tenured/tenure-track faculty member in the School of Health Professions. She did this efficiently and cheerfully! This partnership of MU Libraries and SHP enabled us to quickly pull together a presentation of SHP’s research growth for UM’s new president. We were so grateful for Taira [and the library’s] help in letting us tell our story.”
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
Cycle of Success is the idea that libraries, faculty, and students are linked; for one to truly succeed, we must all succeed. The path to success is formed by the connections between University of Missouri Libraries and faculty members, between faculty members and students, and between students and the libraries that serve them. More than just success, this is also a connection of mutual respect, support, and commitment to forward-thinking research.
Linda Hillemann, Clinical Instructor/Online Education and Field Support Specialist in the School of Social Work, works off campus and supports online students in southern Missouri. She was updating a lecture on the history of social work on Canvas when she realized she didn’t have a credit for a diagram by Mary Richmond, one of the founders of social work. Linda describes her research process: “I have digital copies of some of her documents and was pretty sure which one it came from, but I was wrong! Not only was it not from her book Social Diagnosis, it wasn’t in any of the other documents I have. So I started Googling. There are only so many websites devoted to social work history so I was pretty confident I could find it back, but it was much harder than I expected.”
After searching all the sites she knew with all the search terms she could think of to no avail, she contacted her subject librarian, Kimberly Moeller, for help. Kimberly was able to reverse engineer a search, and Linda says, “A mere two hours later I had the reference and a link to the document.”
Linda Hillemann
Kimberly found the original pencil drawing in conference proceedings over a century old. She explains, “The diagram was first presented and published at the National Conference of Charities and Corrections in 1901, which didn’t originally come up in the search I ran. However, Richmond’s colleagues were apparently so impressed with her work that the diagram was mentioned in numerous iterations of this same conference, referring back to the proceedings from 1901.” Kimberly provided Linda with a link to the scanned version of the proceedings available through the digital library Hathi Trust, which meant she had immediate access.
Linda had never seen the conference proceedings before and found it be a fascinating historical document. More importantly, it provided the reference she needed to include vital information in her course. She explains that the diagram “demonstrates a clear line of a basic social work concept from our beginnings to current practice. That was something I wanted to demonstrate in this lecture: our connection today to our remarkable history, and thanks to Kim I was able to do that.”
Kimberly Moeller
Linda and her online students rely on Kimberly and other librarians to help them locate and obtain materials since they are not able to visit the library in person. When it comes to using the library or needing research assistance, Linda advises, “If you need something, ask, even if it seems like a pretty wild-eyed request. I think these librarians can pull rabbits out of a hat.”
If you would like tosubmityour own success story about how the libraries have helped your research and/or work, please use the Cycle of Success form.
