Utah Library Association 2016 Conference

With a goal of increasing graduation rates, a year-long freshmen cohort program was designed to foster relationships between hopeful engineering students who may not otherwise have a peer support group. After several years of poor results in student presentations, one librarian appealed for help from Special Collections and as a result, student interest & participation anecdotally improved, which merited a more formal curriculum. The collaboration between an instruction librarian and Special Collections archivists seeks to break down the traditional notion of who is a patron of Special
Collections, and introduce Special Collections materials as an integral part of library research. This presentation will explore novel Special Collections outreach ideas, the need for expanding library instruction with Special Collections and primary sources, and the unexpected outcome of improved collaboration between personnel in different areas of the library.