SWON Libraries

Four SWON Libraries members were awarded LSTA Innovative Technology Project grants through the State Library of Ohio this spring. Congratulations to LaSalle High School, the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, the University of Cincinnati, and Wright State University.

The Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County was awarded their grant for the expansion of its digitization program. The grant along with a matching gift from the Greater Cincinnati Foundation Thomas R. Schiff Donor Advised Fund and income from scanning items from other organizations’ collections, will be used to purchase a Hasselblad camera, computer equipment, and other equipment necessary to allow for larger items to be digitized. The new equipment will be used to expand an existing program to digitize portions of the Library’s collection for worldwide use in the growing Virtual Library. Among the first materials to be digitized from the Library’s renowned genealogy, local history, and rare books collections are 1,000 prints and maps from Cincinnati and vicinity from 1819 to 1940.

The University of Cincinnati will receive funding to digitize early volumes of the University of Cincinnati yearbook, The Cincinnatian. Currently these volumes are used by researchers and the public for genealogy purposes, documenting urban history, and tracing the growth of higher education. The University will contract with the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County to digitize 56 volumes, 16,000 pages. The digital files will be available through the University of Cincinnati’s website, the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County Virtual Library, and the OhioLINK Digital Resource Commons.

The Wright State University Libraries has always provided a positive and enriching link between area high school students and the library through various programs and initiatives. In order to expand this link and outreach to disadvantaged high school students, Wright State University Libraries partnered with the Upward Bound program at Wright State University in 2008 to offer the pilot course “Creating with Multimedia.” Upward Bound is a pre-college program designed to motivate and provide academic skills for area high school students from first-generation and low-income families who are interested in pursuing a higher education program after their successful completion of high school. The purpose of project to be funded by the grant is to provide the continuing Upward Bound students with an advanced multimedia course and correlated assignments, as well as to continue the basic “Creating with Multimedia” course for twelve new students. Class participants will obtain exposure to a university library environment and receive hands-on experience and instruction designed to enhance their communication and organizational skills and enable them to apply technological concepts in a meaningful way.