I just HAVE to tell folks about this project. Really, I do. It’s a requirement.

As part of my grant application, I indicated that I would share my findings with colleagues. Keeping up this blog, and its companion, is only one way to share my research. Bringing a number of stakeholders to the same room and talking about the research is my usual way of sharing. Last week, I held a meeting with those stakeholders. I invited 25 faculty and administrators to participate in an activity using primary documents (about 30 minutes) and a presentation of the research findings (15 minutes). Only eight people came, but they were so engaged and enthusiastic that the group remained long after the session was over.

Many of the research findings have already been shared on this blog; but, some data was compiled only for the purpose of the meeting. I want to share it as you may be surprised by the findings.

Let’s start with numbers.

Below is a chart, showing the number of students, by discipline, taking an archives session between 2007 and 2011 (before my research began). “Other” refers to students in Theology and Interdisciplinary courses, which did not come every year. 

 

Here is a chart showing the numbers of students, by discipline, receiving an archives session between 2011 and 2013 (during the time of this research). “Other” refers to Psychology and English course.

 

Before this research started, the numbers of students having archives sessions were already very strong. During this research, the numbers became stronger. This increase came with no publicity on my part; the faculty heard about my sessions and asked for a session without my prompting. 

You can see from the charts above that History continues to grow. Education dropped off in 2012/13 because of a leave, but I already have a class booked for the summer term and expect their numbers to rise again. Kinesiology and Nutrition are expected to continue booking sessions in the Fall.

Now for the sessions themselves...

With respect to the “learning packages” we hoped to develop, there were great results. Our grant application stated that we would develop packages for eight courses; instead, we developed twelve packages and delivered ten. These packages fit into six categories and future sessions will be developed to fit within them. They are:

1.       Information: to provide an overview or introduction.

2.       Speed dating: to quickly assess many, course-relevant sources.

3.       Discovery: to slowly explore a source or group of sources for a common theme.

4.       Questioning: to explore a source in order to answer a specific question(s).

5.       Research Workshop: to practice course-specific research.

6.       Combination: some or all of the above sessions in various combinations.

I cannot state strongly enough the important of my research assistant, Amber Klatt. Her experience and education was vital to the success of this research. She has helped me understand how to create meaningful archives sessions that give the students the right tools to actively teach themselves about primary sources. I have said time and time again, the success of this grant was not what we were doing, it was how we were doing it.