Students, faculty, and staff from a number of Pennsylvania liberal arts colleges—including Bryn Mawr, Haverford, and Swarthmore—gathered on the Bryn Mawr Campus in July for the Digital Scholarship Student Symposium.
The symposium was made possible by a grant from The Pennsylvania Consortium for the Liberal Arts. In addition to the Tri-Co, members include Dickinson, Franklin & Marshall, Gettysburg, Juniata, Muhlenberg, Ursinus, Washington & Jefferson, and Lafayette colleges.
Bryn Mawr students taking part in the symposium represented programs run by Digital Scholarship and Educational Technology Services (ETS), both departments in Library and Information Technology Services (LITS).
ETS is supporting three different digital technology internships for students (Audio-Visual Production, Digital Curriculum, and Information Security Education Program).
Megan Pemberton '20, part of an ETS group that presented about “Building Digital Competencies at Bryn Mawr” is an example of the diversity of interests represented by the Bryn Mawr students.
“My work is predominately in film," says Megan, "but I am actually an English major at BMC (a film studies and visual studies minor as well). I got involved with LITS during my sophomore year making promotional videos for the Digital Competencies program. Even though my work is predominately interested in the stories of marginalized and oppressed people, I pursued this internship because I wanted to branch out a little. I do not often work with STEM students/programs and felt that my portfolio/academic pursuits would benefit from a little variety.”
Along with Megan, Romy Dangol ‘19, Tiana Evelyn '20, Leslie Goloh '19, Julie Gonzales '19, and Eun Soo Jang '20 comprise this cohort.
Tanjuma Haque '21, Elia Anagnostou '21, Arianna Li '19, and Linda Zhu '20 are Digital Scholarship Summer Fellows and presented at the symposium about the work they’re doing on “The History of Women in Science Project.” As part of the project, the group is using 3D technologies to model spaces like the early 1900s biology and chemistry labs of Dalton Hall.
“I learned a lot of new skills,” says Tanjuma. “How to use Unity 3D, SketchUp, and photogrammetry. Unity 3D is one of the main programs used for game development. SketchUp is a 3D modeling program, and photogrammetry uses photography of an object to make its 3D model.”
Elia plans to major in physics and computer science, but says it was the chance to do historical research that really drew her to the project.
“I had no experience with historical research prior to this fellowship," says Elia, "So this is unique to me in that it has taught me how to combine information from multiple sources—such as president’s reports, students’ diaries, and course catalogues—to come to reasonable conclusions about people in the past. One of the things that surprised me was the ability of history to captivate people. Even coming into direct contact with a person’s handwriting from 1907 can be a thrilling connection.”
Arianna Li, a double major in French and history, is the only declared humanities major on the team.
“The research skills I gained as a history major have been valuable in a subtle, yet essential, way for this project,” says Arianna.
The Digital Scholarship Summer Fellows (DSSF) program is an opportunity for undergraduate students at Bryn Mawr College to learn digital scholarship methods and gain professional experience by applying their digital competencies to a local project.
The 2018 DSSF program is be led by Jessica Linker (CLIR Humanities and Digital Scholarship Postdoctoral Fellow and Director of the DSSF Program), Alicia Peaker (Director of Digital Scholarship, Critical Making, and Digital Collections Management), and Stella Fritzell (Digital Scholarship Graduate Assistant and Assistant Director of the DSSF Program), and runs from June 4 to August 10. Students in the program learn through a combination of primary research, online tutorials, discussion, and hands-on activities. Regular visitors and experiential learning trips further the students’ understanding of digital scholarship and related fields.