The TRW Aesthetic Experience
About
this project and acknowledgments
When the core courses began in the mid 1990s, TRW students would troop
en masse to the College Archives to research a piece of campus art. Realizing
that fragile clippings and documents would not last long at this rate,
staff and student workers in the library made photocopies of everything
and put them into a massive three-ring binder. TRW students had to come
into the library and ask for this binder, making photocopies of what they
needed. While an adequate solution, students needed to come to the library
and often the binder was in use by another student. Over time, pertinent
documents began to disappear and the pages became worn.
In a 2003 meeting of the Library Web Advisory Committee, systems librarian Amy Shaw commented "Wouldn't it be nice if this information was online?" With those fateful words, Kathi Rickert, liaison to the TRW Subcommittee, secured the subcommittee's support and a curriculum development grant to hire a graduate student to perform research. Cheryl Oestreicher, a graduate students in the college's Library and Information Science department, was hired as researcher. The rest, as they say, is history.
It is fitting that this project was completed as the festivities surrounding the college's centennial celebration were beginning. The college's commitment to educating women to lead and influence most certainly includes an awareness of art. It is important that we all discover for ourselves the meaning and value of art in our lives.
The CSC Library would like to thank the following, in no particular order:
- Cheryl Oestreicher, MLIS '04, principal researcher for the project, for her research skills and extremely organized mind
- The CSC
Academic Community Development Committee for the grant to fund the research
for this project
- The TRW
Subcommittee (Suzanne Hendricks, chair) for its support and encouragement
- Sr. Margery
H. Smith, College Archivist, and the archives student assistants for
patiently securing the documents we sought
- Aimee
Houser, for her invaluable technical assistance
- Belinda Lawrence, CSC Library Circulation Supervisor, for her ideas and support
- Photos by Meena Nagappa, Kathi Rickert and College files
Questions and comments about this project may be directed to:
Kathleen
Rickert, project coordinator
Reference Librarian, College of St. Catherine Library
Email: kdrickert@stkate.edu