Fourth annual UAS Author’s Reception Celebrates the Faculty Authors of UAS UAS’s Literary and Art Journal

By MELISSA SCRIVEN

Staff Writer, UAS Whalesong

Instead of a gold star for effort, faculty received golden seastars and other fun awards at the UAS Author’s Reception.

Recently published work by UAS faculty was recognized at the fourth annual event at Egan Library on April 5. 

“The main purpose of the event is to celebrate faculty scholarship, research, and creative activity,” said Elise Tomlinson, UAS Library Dean. 

“The original idea was that we wanted to start a Friends of Egan Library group through the alumni association,” Tomlinson said, “and then we were looking for an event each year that would be sort of exclusive for UAS students, faculty and staff, and also members of the public who were friends of this group.”

Friends of the Egan Library launched roughly four years ago, during Egan Library’s 25th anniversary. Tomlinson said Chancellor Rick Caulfield had the idea for a faculty awards celebration based on his previous campus experiences. 

“The first year it was really boring, because we had never done it before, and we didn’t really know what to do,” Tomlinson said. Speaking with the head of another library in California, a contact provided by Provost Karen Carey, sparked some new ideas.

“We decided that we would kind of create our own fun you know, little gimmicky gifts and stuff to kind of make it a little more light-hearted, not such a snooze-fest,” Tomlinson said.

This year attendees could browse poster displays of published faculty work upon arrival. A Harry Potter themed competition asked people to vote on which faculty work title would make the best title for a Harry Potter book.

Tomlinson said that every year a featured faculty author talks about some aspect of their recent research. Jason Amundson, Associate Professor of Geophysics, said his recent sabbatical and wok in Finland was an extremely valuable experience. 

“Having that time to focus is super important,” Amundson said. 

Tomlinson gave out certificates to faculty members who had recently published, but it wasn’t all serious. She also gave out fun themed awards, such as the golden apple of knowledge, the golden harmonica and the golden tape measure. Based on aspects such as length or musicality of article titles, or amount of work published, these awards were received with smiles and laughs. 

Jonas Lamb, Egan Library Public Services Librarian and Associate Professor of Library and Information Science, spoke about the Open Access Initiative, which aims to make educational and research material more available to the public. 

Open Access materials can save students money by reducing the need to buy pricey textbooks. 

The author’s reception is still a fairly new UAS tradition, but the event continues to grow each year. 

“This is a bigger crowd than it was the year before, which was a bigger crowd than the year