Edwin Monk, Sr. was a prolific naval architect in the Seattle area whose collection of over 6,000 ship plans, along with several artifacts, reference books, and photographs, was donated to the Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society (PSMHS). Since the donation, PSMHS has received numerous reference questions and requests for copies of the plans. Although the collection is housed onsite, access and retrieval of information has been challenging. The collection needs to be cataloged in the organization’s database and rehoused according to best archival practices. Our project goal was to provide PSMHS with a processing guide for future volunteers and interns, a project timeline and an estimated budget. PSMHS will use these documents to develop a grant proposal for obtaining funding and resources needed to process the entire collection. Rehousing and cataloging the collection will help assure long-term preservation and enhance the accessibility of the collection.

We are performing a critical examination of the curricula of several of the top Information Schools, as determined by US News & World Report. Our intent is to determine whether these schools are addressing issues of diversity in ways that will prepare MLIS students for the 21st century workplace, where diversity is increasing and increasingly important. Our analysis is based upon the available literature as well as syllabi from the various schools in our sample. We intend to address possible omissions, areas for improvement, and places where diversity-related content can be integrated into already existing classes. We have compiled a resource list for instructors wishing to integrate more diversity-related content into their classrooms.

Early Childhood Literacy Storytime Aaron Negron, Online MLIS Early childhood literacy refers to the foundational elements that children learn about reading and writing before they can actually read and write. Parents and caregivers are a child’s first facilitators and they have the opportunity to support the development of early literacy skills through daily interactions. Public libraries are positioned to model and promote story time practices that stimulate early childhood literacy skills. This project resulted in a partnership between the Austin Public Library and the Young Fathers Program at LifeWorks Austin. A story time was presented for Young Fathers Program clients where they learned skills and techniques they could practice at home during their own story times with their children. The participants were enthusiastic about the opportunity to learn and expressed excitement about gaining new skills that would benefit and entertain their children. They also appreciated learning new ways to spend quality time with their children.

Parents and caregivers are their child’s first and best teachers. The first 2,000 days of a child’s life (birth to the time a child enters Kindergarten) are critical for cognitive, social and emotional development. Therefore, early learning plays an important role in preparing a child to be successful in school. Early literacy is a component of early learning that encompasses the skills needed for children to communicate and understand language before they can read and write. There are five fun and simple practices that can be incorporated into daily routines beginning at birth to raise successful learners: talking, singing, reading, writing, and playing. This project focuses on educating the community about these five practices, specifically through the use of a short video series that can be linked and distributed through many channels. Community education will provide people with the knowledge to help make a positive impact on young learners.

Today’s generosity for book donation is well-intended, yet there is a disparity between the books donated by NGOs compared to the need and relevance of receiving young adult readers in Ghana, Africa. Two critical components to the book donation process is missing. First, communication between the school in need of reading materials and the organization providing reading materials are not aligned. Second, donated books do not include briefing materials to help the educator or librarian make recommendations to readers. This Capstone project, Enriching the Joy of Reading for Young Adult Readers in Ghana recommends adding relevant steps and content to the process. By including a “book kit” sticker inside donated books or electronically loaded in the donated Worldreader e-reader, deeper insight to the content will result in a productive, perhaps exciting, reader services exchange between librarian and young adult reader and serve as a means to increase literacy.

Digital technologies can be powerful tools to empower marginalized communities. While libraries and community organizations provide free public access to these technologies, new users must learn to implement these tools in ways that are relevant to their lives. In order to engage with Latina women and their families around technology use, a group of University of Washington students partnered with Casa Latina, an education and worker’s center for immigrant Latino laborers, and library staff from King County Library System and Seattle Public Library. For the project, funded in part by the City of Seattle Technology Match Fund, I created a series of Spanish-language adult digital literacy workshops based on the expressed needs and interests of women at Casa Latina. I am facilitating these weekly workshops at Casa Latina and branch libraries over a six-month period.

Game Graph is a video game metadata graph database and web application that provides an easy and extensible way to create, store, and retrieve metadata about video games. Building upon the work done at the Seattle Interactive Media Museum (SIMM) and the Game Metadata Research (GAMER) Group, this application envisions every possible point of information within a property graph database framework. By utilizing the graph database model, users are able to easily explore the relationships of video games. The goal of this project is to provide a useful tool for cataloging video game metadata, while assisting research into video games as information objects. As a component to a larger system, Game Graph provides the structural foundation for digitally cataloging video game collections.

Online exhibitions for the Digital Public Library of America showcase some of DPLA's vast resources and make them more accessible to viewers. DPLA particularly wants to draw more young people to its collections and to be of use to teachers and students. In our exhibition, we chose a topic of interest to everyone: childhood. Our exhibition comprises 40 images, metadata, and text about children's home lives, school, playtime, and work. We focus on the transformation of childhood in America from the 1880s to the 1940s resulting from the migration from country to cities, the rise of the middle class, and the enforced assimilation of multiple cultures into one national identity — the production of "good citizens." Our digital exhibition shows how class, race, gender, and national origin shaped the invention of childhood, and that in the early 20th century, there was no single American childhood, but many childhoods encompassing myriad experiences.

Though Kitsap Regional Library had comic format collections for Children and Young Adults, comics outside of those collections were spread across Adult Fiction, Non-Fiction, and Biography. These items were difficult for patrons to browse and discover. The shelving caused them to be weeded without having added as much value as they might to the collection. After preliminary catalog searches to identify items that might be added to the new collection, Stacy Wyatt and Lisa Longmire searched each branch to find comic format items. These items were then labeled and added to the collection in the catalog, as well as being relocated to new collection shelving in each branch. This collection is now easily identifiable whether patrons are visiting in person or online. The collection will be able to be specifically monitored to help it grow in a way that will be useful and enjoyable for patrons of Kitsap Regional Library.