The College now subscribes to Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), which provides a blanket license for many sources used in course packets. An online workshop on Thursday May 11th at 11:00 will discuss how to use the CCC, and answer questions regarding course packet creation through the campus bookstore. Register for the workshop here.

Starting in Fall 2023, faculty may order course packets through the bookstore. While technically an option in the past, the cost was often prohibitive due to the copyright fees associated with printing.

The potential cost of course packets has been substantially lowered by the college’s new subscription to the Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), which offers blanket copyright permissions for many sources to be used in course packets. Faculty will be able to search the CCC database to see if their readings are covered by this license. Costs of course packets containing covered material will be the cost of printing plus a modest surcharge per packet to cover the annual licensing fee. (Faculty participating in a pilot in Spring 2023 found their course packets ranged from $34-$55, depending on length).

This subscription allows a way for interested faculty to use course packets, which many prefer for pedagogical reasons. It also allows students to buy course packets along with their other books, which is more convenient and allows students whose scholarship covers books to purchase course packets more easily.

Course packets for Fall 2023 can be ordered by emailing a full pdf of the course packet to bookstore@trincoll.edu by August 1 to ensure time for printing.

Trinity faculty and staff can access the CCC database (The Copyright Clearance Center RightFind tool) by visiting https://academic.copyright.com/rs-ui-web/welcome and registering as a new user. A workshop demonstrating the CCC database and answering questions about course packet creation will be held on May 11 at 11:00am via Zoom.

Please register to attend the workshop.

For course packet printing and logistics, please contact Doug Stewart, at bookstore@trincoll.edu.

Please direct questions about the CCC to Amy Harrell amy.harrell@trincoll.edu.

Small local bookshops are rare gems and Trinity is lucky to have several close by.  Earlier this year the library set up an account with one, the River Bend Bookshop in West Hartford, and have started purchasing books from them for the Wellness, Leisure Reading, and Graphic Novels collections.  In the last two months the library has purchased more than twenty books from the River Bend Bookshop and we look forward to buying many more.

The River Bend Bookshop is an independent small bookstore with locations in Glastonbury and West Hartford.  Both locations are quintessential cozy bookshops, visiting either is a wonderful way to spend the afternoon for any book lover.  But if you can’t make it to their physical stores they also have a website that offers lists of staff picks, upcoming releases for pre-order, best sellers, indie books, banned or challenged books, and digital audiobooks.  You can place orders for pickup or delivery, and even order signed copies of certain titles.  You can visit their website at the following url: https://www.riverbendbookshop.com/

As an official collection development policy takes shape this summer the library will discuss our commitment to supporting small local businesses and finding alternative vendors to large corporations that dominate the industry.  We hope that this partnership with River Bend Bookshop is not only the start of a long relationship, but also the precursor to others as the library works to directly support small businesses in the Hartford area and beyond.

The Library is expanding its resources for our maker-minded students. Creativity is a wonderful way to express ideas and de-stress, and we want to provide the space, how-to, and supplies for you to make something new!

The new library of arts & crafts supplies in the RLITC was inspired by Trinity’s Nest Artists and funded in part by a grant from the Wikimedia foundation on behalf of Art+Feminism. It includes a variety of materials for you to borrow or keep, such as paints, papers, brushes, easels, paint by number kits, hot glue gun, sewing machine, yarn, knitting needles, and more.

The arts & crafts library is located in room 134, RLITC Level 1, Center for Educational Technology, and is accessible 24 hours with your student ID.

Nearby on Level 1 right outside the Blume center, there is a new Creative Technology book collection! Here you will find a range of books to provide inspiration on podcasting, paper crafts, sewing, writing, and more. All books can be borrowed for 28 days.

Finally, if you are looking for a crochet or knitting group, bring your current work-in-progress Fridays from 3 – 5pm in RLITC Room 181.  You and your student colleagues can unwind, listen to music, work on your projects, and plan your weekend! Need Lessons? Contact Amy Harrell ahead of time and we’ll make sure you learn the skills you need.

As part of an ongoing initiative to develop photogrammetry capabilities for teaching and scholarship in collaboration with an alumni request, several LITS staff members [Dave Tatem, Amanda Matava, and Benny Bauer] worked to generate a 3D model of an antique Trinity doorknob using high-resolution photographs, a lightbox, a mechanized turntable, and Nikon camera this past September.

Some of the final images of the doorknob, which were successfully used to create the model. Click on the image to see animation!

Staff acquired the lightbox prior to the beginning of the semester in order to test the photography using  the camera on a tripod. The doorknob was manually turned 360 degrees and then turned upside-down, turned 360 degrees, and finally, turned on its head and photographed again, generating around 80 photos of the item. Unfortunately, manually turning the doorknob did not generate the results hoped for in Agisoft Metashape, the software used to generate the 3D model. Staff attempted to photograph the doorknob again using a makeshift turntable, and then finally, with an automated turntable. The automated turntable, which can will turn at even intervals using a remote control, provided the most consistent results. Dave also printed out a photogrammetry marker, upon which the doorknob sat while being photographed, to provide more data once the images were ingested into the software.

By photographing the 3D object from all angles, an object can be measured and analyzed in photogrammetry software, which extracts data from the digital photographs and allows for construction of a 3D model, wrapping the images over a mesh to the exact size and shape of the physical object. The photographs must be taken with 60-80% overlap, in order to ensure that all data of the object is captured. In this case, as the item was a doorknob, turning the object upside-down allowed for photographs to be taken of areas that were in shadow during the first pass, and turning the doorknob on its face allowed for more data to fill in any missing gaps.

In this case, the third time was the charm — and a wonderful 3D model was made! Dave posted the model to SketchFab, where it can be accessed publicly. After the success of the first photogrammetry session, Amanda and Benny plan to photograph and create models of the other two antique doorknobs.

The 3D model

Please join us on October 20 for a talk by Hartford advocate Sharon Lewis, Executive Director of the CT Coalition for Environmental and Economic Justice.  Local and federal environmental policy decisions disproportionately harm CT’s BIPOC and poor communities, and systemic racism means our already vulnerable populations are unfairly burdened by the effects of accelerating climate change.  Sharon will teach us about these ongoing inequities and how to be part of the solution.

When: Thursday, October 20th from 12:15 – 1:15
Where: Engelhard Reading Room on Level 1 of the Raether LITC
A sustainable lunch will be provided. Please bring a reusable water bottle and/or coffee mug for beverages.

Sharon Lewis is the recipient of the EPA’s 2022 Environmental Merit Award. As the Executive Director of the Coalition for Environmental and Economic Justice (CCEEJ), she leads a statewide coalition of diverse organizations that share the vision of abolishing the systemic and institutionalized rules, policies, and laws that give rise to unequal environmental burdens borne by low-income and people of color.  Sharon was instrumental in developing the “Citizen’s Guide to the Permitting Process,” a curriculum that taught state agencies to better communicate with those in Environmental Justice Communities. This became the cornerstone of CT’s 2009 Environmental Justice Law.  Sharon currently serves on numerous statewide committees and coalitions, and promotes a Zero Waste economy as key strategy to help ensure the human right to clean air, water, and lands.

This talk is inspired by the 2022 International Open Access Week theme, Open for Climate Justice. When pursued in an inclusive manner, Open Access publishing systems “can create pathways to more equitable knowledge sharing and serve as a means to address the inequities that shape the impacts of climate change and our response to them.”

Sponsored by the LITS Libraries & Digital Learning department.

Photo by veeterzy on Unsplash

Learn how to crochet with Isabelle Duval ’23 and create a tapestry that will be displayed at Trinity College Library.

• October 14, 12:00 – 1:00pm
• Raether LITC Room 181
• Yarn and supplies will be provided!

No experience necessary! All levels of crochet experience are invited to join. Bagged lunches will be available.

Please RSVP for this event. 

The Library has site licenses for the Financial Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post. Current Trinity faculty, staff, and students may register for an account with FT.com, NYTimes.com or WSJ.com. Access to the Washington Post is via the Trinity network; no account is required.

For questions, please contact Jennifer van Sickle (Jennifer.vansickle@trincoll.edu)

Cover of the 2020 Color Our Collections coloring book

As part of #ColorOurCollections, a national movement started by the New York Academy of Medicine to transform its collections into coloring pages, Library & Information Technology Services will be publishing its annual coloring book in December 2022. This year’s book theme is “Trinity past, present and future,” whether that is a phrase, an image, a group represented, or something else!

Trinity College’s own #ColorOurCollections was organized in 2020 as a way to showcase its robust digital collections, which included print and image materials housed in JSTOR and BePress. The first coloring book featured three student submissions and was published in March, 2020. 

Important Dates! 

• November 13, 2022: Deadline for Submissions
• November 14-19, 2022: Contest Voting 
• December 9, 2022: Coloring Book Launch Event in LITC 182, 1-4pm (with food!) 

This year, the coloring book has been revived in order to highlight new digital collections but more importantly, more student creations, as we prepare to celebrate 200 years of Trinity history. It is our hope that moving forward, #ColorOurCollections will be an annual event that highlights student artists of all styles and experience, as well as educate on what collections Trinity offers to the interested and curious researcher.  

All students are invited to submit original artwork as coloring book pages in our 2023 #ColorOurCollections contest. The winner, chosen from votes cast on our Instagram page and by visitors to the library, will receive a Jerry’s Artarama gift card. All entrants, regardless of winning status, are eligible to have their work included in the book.  

To enter the contest, submit an artwork in coloring book style to trinitywellness@trincoll.edu under the following guidelines:

• Black & white
• PNG or TIFF image
• 300-400 ppi
• 8.5 x 11 inches.
• Traditional art is welcome, as long as it meets the size requirements and is scanned into the correct file format.
• Images larger than 30MB cannot be sent as an email attachment, but can be shared via OneDrive.  
• Please note: we can assist with image conversion but may have to alter submissions in order to make them suitable for publication. Any altered images by us will NOT be eligible to win the contest.  

Please email all questions and submissions to trinitywellness@trincoll.edu by November 13, 2022.

“Time for a Blanket Nest” by Seb Kryspin ’20

As you will find in the coloring book, 200 years of history includes people, buildings, plants, organizations, thoughts, ideas, and much more. We are so excited to share the completed Bicentennial #ColorOurCollections book when it is published later this year. You can find the 2020 coloring book in the Digital Repository.

Faculty: Please join us  for JumpStart, Wednesday, August 24, 10am – 2pm in the Raether Center for Educational Technology. This event is designed to help you — and your syllabus — get ready for the fall semester. Join drop-in sessions with librarians and instructional technologists on FAQs like using Moodle, building research assignments, teaching with primary sources, and designing digital projects.

Event details

Please note: Masks are required for this event.

Library Tours will be available on the hour at 11:00, 12:00, and 1:00.

Drop in to ask questions in the following areas between 10:00 – 2:00. You can also meet with your library and instructional liaisons in one-on-one appointments. Can’t make JumpStart? Make an appointment with one of us.

Feel free to join us whenever your schedule allows, or stay for the full session. Morning coffee/pastries and to-go lunches provided.