Outreach and Communications

Key Activities and Accomplishments

• This year, outreach and communication functions moved from their home in the department of external affairs and advancement and are now under the leadership of Associate University Librarian for Research & Instructional Services Steven Bell. As part of this split, Sara Wilson was hired as the new Library Outreach and Communications Administrator. The team also includes Rebecca Dashiell, Editor, and Kaitlyn Semborski, Lead Administrative Specialist. Kaitlyn continued to work with external communications through the end of the fiscal year.
• Despite the department split, the outreach and communications department worked closely with external communications throughout the year to support their goals, collaborating on ongoing projects like the newsletter, appeals, and calendar, as well as one-off projects such as materials for donor events. A major point of collaboration for the teams this year was the lead up to and announcement of the naming gift for the new Charles Library. For this project, we worked together on materials and coordinated the announcement to internal and external stakeholders.
• The Libraries’ Beyond the Page public programming season held approximately 40 programs in FY ’17-18. We welcomed an estimated 2,000 students, staff, faculty, and community members to the Libraries for lectures, panels, performances, and more. Programs maintain and build new audiences within the Temple community and expose these audiences to broader library resources and offerings. To assess our programs and expand our audience, we created new online forms for mailing list sign up, and online avenues for programming feedback from both attendees and faculty.
• Our curated programming for the year explored the role of communities in our lives. We asked questions like: how are we shaped by the language we use, the institutions we take part in, the places we’ve lived, and the people around us? We partnered with Temple Contemporary to bring lexicographer Kory Stamper, hosted a screening of the film Quest by Temple alum Jonathan Olshefski followed by a Q&A with the director and film subjects, and served as a site for an exhibition of never-before-seen photographs of Michelle Obama and a talk from the White House photographer who took them. We experimented with new programming formats, such as a live recording of the podcast Book Fight! by Temple English faculty Mike Ingram and Tom McAllister, and a follow up workshop about podcasting for academics.
• Our programming also included many ongoing series and collaborations, including Beyond the Notes, Chat in the Stacks, and the Midday Arts Series. These collaborative, interdisciplinary series involved partnerships with the Office of Sustainability, Temple Contemporary, the Tyler School of Art, the College of Liberal Arts, the Klein College of Media and Communication, the Center for the Performing and Cinematic Arts, and the Boyer College of Music and Dance, among others.
• We promoted the Livingstone Undergraduate Research Awards, now in its fourteenth year, through new channels and ended up with a historic number of applicants. Our goal was to get over 100, and we received 124. Awards were presented in six broad categories: humanities; social sciences; STEM disciplines; creative works and media production; sustainability and the environment; and an award for general education courses.
• The Libraries’ first print and digital annual report was published in the fall of 2017, and work began on a second.
• We worked with the web team to promote the new Library Search updates.
• The Outreach & Communications Strategic Steering Team started meeting in February 2018. Between then and the end of the fiscal year, the team created their own charge and goals, started a Google calendar for programs and meetings open to all staff, oversaw the formation of the Public Programming Working Group, and launched an internal communications survey for staff.
• We developed the Save Time! campaign to promote LRS, and worked closely with library staff to promote their workshops and initiatives.
• We continued Crunch Time Cafe offerings, and expanded our offerings to include a partnership with Campus Rec to offer yoga in the lecture hall.
• We promoted various library week initiatives such as Banned Books Week and National Library Week, with tabling, displays, and social media coverage.
• We developed new web initiatives, such as increased social media posting, more interaction with our followers, and a new series of blog posts featuring upcoming Beyond the Page speakers. We also explored social media as a site for advertising and received positive outcomes for posts we paid to promote. (For example, we promoted the Livingstone Awards and received a historic number of applications. We also promoted the talk with former White House photographer Michelle Lucidon and had standing room only at that program.)

Strategic Directions FY 18-19

Designing and building a dramatically new library environment to serve as a catalyst
for academic enterprise at Temple.

Enriching the environment for learning and student success.

Developing programs, services, and resources to enhance intellectual productivity,
scholarly infrastructure, new modes of research, and clinical care services.

Exploring new opportunities in publishing and scholarly communication.

Seeking partners in innovation and experimentation to add value to library programs
and to identify new avenues for economic support.

Serving as a center of intellectual and cultural life. 

Serving as a repository of record for archival, rare, and unique materials and providing
broad access to those collections.

Building a world-class staff for leadership in the research library enterprise.

Sharing the vision, making connections, broadening support.