OCTOBER 2018

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DID YOU KNOW?

Mercyhurst University’s Writing Center assists students at all academic levels with their writing projects. We are usually the go-to service for students writing research essays for their courses, but we also assist students with other writing projects. These include lab reports, essays for graduate school applications or scholarships, as well as senior thesis projects. The Writing Center can help students no matter where in the writing process the project is: we can help with anything from generating topics to evaluating arguments to checking proper citations.

Our writing consultant staff is made up of selected undergraduate and graduate students who have excellent critical reading and writing abilities and who have been trained to teach writing skills. The Writing Center is not a “fix-it” shop where students bring “broken” essays. Instead, our writing consultants work with students to identify difficulties in the writing and work to teach students how to improve those difficulties. Our consultants are critical readers of writing so that they can identify areas that could use improvement and help students make improvements to their writing projects.

Each writing consultation session is scheduled for one half-hour in order for a consultant to work on one or two improvements. This limited time also means that consultants likely will not be able to address multiple areas in one session so that they may spend the consultation working specifically on an issue. To get the maximum benefit from the Writing Center, students are encouraged to plan for several sessions with consultants on the same project. In fact, we see many students leave a consultation, do their revisions, and come back in for another consultation in the same day!

Students may book a consultation in several ways. The first is to stop by the Writing Center during our drop-In hours (see below). Students will be seen on a first-arrived, first-served basis. Or students may book an appointment through TutorTrac. Sometimes appointments will be scheduled during drop-In hours and sometimes outside these hours. Finally, students may submit their essay (limited to 10 pages) to the Online Writing Center. The same consultants working in the drop-in Writing Center staff the Online Writing Center. We will work to get the student’s writing project back within 24 hours (although we may take a bit longer during peak times, such as mid-terms). Access to the Online Writing Center is through Blackboard under the "Courses" tab. First-year students are not permitted to use the Online Writing Center.

The Writing Center is located on the main floor of the Hammermill Library. Our drop-In hours are:
Monday-Thursday: 10 am to 1 pm and 6 pm to 10 pm
Friday: 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Sunday: 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.
 

—Dr. Justin Ross, Director of the Honors and Prestigious Awards Program & Director of the Writing Center

 

HANDSHAKE, FROM THE CAREER DEVELOPMENT CENTER

 

Mercyhurst's Career Development Center (CDC) provides a variety of services to help students locate internships and achieve employment. The latest is Handshake, a platform for jobs and career advice that was created specifically for students starting out in the workforce. Here you can find job postings, get in contact with recruiters, and find tips on job searching, interviews, and more.

— Karen Niemla

 

 

WORK STUDY OF THE MONTH: SARAH DENARD

 

Freshman Sarah Denard is October 2018’s Work Study of the Month. She has multiple interests, having double majors in Forensic Anthropology and Early Childhood Education, and has come to Mercyhurst all the way from Dallas, Texas. What she likes best about working in the Hammermill Library is being at the Circulation Desk to interact with library patrons and check books in and out. She has a Pomeranian-Yorkie mix dog named Baby. After graduating, she hopes to work with the FBI and then perhaps become a pre-kindergarten teacher later in her career.

— Angela Okey & Karen Niemla

 

 

 

 

 

MERCYHURST DIGITAL SCRAPBOOK COLLECTION

The university archive is currently working on the digitization of early Mercyhurst College scrapbooks from 1926 to 1955. The scrapbooks contain newspaper articles, photographs, and information about the early days. The first scrapbook has been completed by University Archivist Bryan Colvin and student employee John Benko. The digital PDF was produced using the new state-of-the-art high-resolution scanner. Twenty-five hours of work went into the creation of a table of contents and scanning this wonderful part of Mercyhurst history. The scrapbooks will be included in the archives database upon completion. Follow this link to get a sneak peek: https://summit.mercyhurst.edu/digitization/Scrapbooks/Scrapbook_1926-1931.pdf

— Bryan Colvin

NEW SUBSCRIPTION DATABASE: LGBT LIFE WITH FULL TEXT

During the summer, Hammermill Library received a new EBSCO database for LGBT literature, LGBT Life with Full Text, which includes academic journals, books, news press publications, and abstracts. Despite the "LGBT" in the title of the resource, it contains titles which may be useful for Gender and Women's Studies and researching related aspects of human society. Its interface is similar to other EBSCO-family databases, and it can also be searched via the "Search Everything" box on the library home page.

—Karen Niemla

STAFF PICK OF THE MONTH: YAYOI KUSAMA: INFINITY MIRRORS, EDITED BY MIKA YOSHITAKE

It's true that you can't judge a book by its cover, but sometimes it helps a lot, which is why many modern library catalogs now include them. When I saw the cover image for Infinity Mirrors I recognized the artwork on it immediately; even though I hadn't remembered Yayoi Kusama by name, I could never forget her work. As a teen I first saw her art when she collaborated with pop musician Peter Gabriel for his PC video game EVE and again on a music video for his song "Lovetown." The yellow and black polka-dotted pumpkin piece on the cover is a well-known piece of Kusama's, and dots in general are a frequent element in her work, as are bright, high-contrast colors. Although the book is named for her best-known works, the Infinity Mirror Rooms, the book encompasses much of her career, going back to the 1950s and beyond, including images of her paintings, sculptures and installations, as well as historical newspaper images and candid photos. Besides the art itself, the book provides background information on Kusama, including coverage of her past works, interviews, a timeline of her career and life, and more. Throughout the book are academic essays that include research notes and the book has an annotated bibliography, which will be a useful feature for academics and Kusama fans alike. Unfortunately there is no general index, though there is a list of artworks by title with locations and page numbers. The titular Mirror Rooms are usually small spaces with infinitely reflecting mirrors on all the walls and three-dimensional artworks within that create a visual expanse and multiply those artworks. However, there is a painful aspect to the book in that it's clear from the photographs that Kusama's Mirror Rooms are something that would be best viewed in person to get the full effect of the visual expanses created by the mirrored patterns, yet most people who find this book probably did not get the chance to visit them. Like many art installations, it's not entirely permanent. In a way, that makes it even more special. There are videos of Yayoi Kusama's art online that also capture the motion and scale of Infinity Mirrors, but there is an elegance in the still photographs of this book that isn’t reflected even in HD video elsewhere. The layout of the text combined with the images is in itself an example of competent graphic design, such that reading and viewing the book is one of those experiences for which the print medium is uniquely suited. If you're a fan of Yayoi Kusama art or her genre in general, you'll likely enjoy this book. If you're researching Yayoi Kusama, it will be indispensable for years to come.

—Karen Niemla

STACKS CRACKS

—Karen Niemla