We're thrilled to bring you a wrap-up from our hosts that they've shared with their own library:

On Tuesday evening, DePaul Special Collections and Archives welcomed members of the local professional organization, Chicago Area Archivists, as well as a few graduate students enrolled in MLIS programs (19 attendees). Morgen MacIntosh Hodgetts, Derek Potts, and Emily Swenson led groups in rotation around three areas/topics. Attendees all toured our closed stacks, learning about our collection strengths and how faculty members have been instrumental in connecting us with individuals and community organizations whose lives and work intersect with the University’s focus on social justice issues and advocacy for marginalized groups. We also showcased the department’s new Andrew T. and Alice O. Kopan Seminar Room which allows us to offer space for small groups of researchers to engage with collections together while individual researchers can still experience a quiet reading room. We also use the Kopan Seminar Room for the department’s new approach to exhibits. Since reopening after the pandemic, we’ve moved towards hosting temporary pop-up exhibits with selected resources set up in the Kopan Seminar Room on tables rather than using traditional exhibit cases with heavily curated exhibits. These pop-up exhibits give us an opportunity to highlight a variety of topics and heritage months throughout an academic year. During the Open House, attendees also learned about our instruction program by participating in a “pair and share” primary source activity designed for Discover and Explore First Year students. We received positive feedback from attendees including the following: “Many thanks to you and your staff for the wonderful event yesterday. I learned so much about your department in a very short time.” and “This was my first impression of DePaul and I was blown away.”

A huge thank you to our hosts at DePaul for coordinating this wonderful event - as an attendee I learned a lot and really enjoyed the opportunity to learn and socialize with my fellow CAA colleagues. Please enjoy images from the event below.

Morgen providing an introduction and logistics for the rotation.

Discussing marginalia in the Berrigan book collection on the stacks tour.

Emily talking about exhibits in the seminar room.

Derek leading a mini instruction session on the Young Lords.