Friends of the UNCG Libraries

The University Libraries at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (UNCG) recently completed its fourth annual Staff Development Week May 11-15.  Designed as one of the responses to the Libraries’ 2011 ClimateQual Survey, Staff Development Week consists of a number of varied programs planned by a committee of paraprofessional and professional staff.  The week after graduation was chosen so that the event could be held during a week identified as low impact in order to allow everyone to participate. Examples of event types are personal enrichment; job-related skills; health and fitness; teamwork; career enhancement; and communication techniques and styles. Suggestions for events are solicited from the staff. The events have a foundation within the diverse experiences of existing staff as well as expertise brought in from outside the libraries. Several keystone programs are held each year during week, including presentation of the Staff Service Award created in 1997 "to ...

Tuesday, May 19 was Idea-thon day at UNCG's University Libraries as library faculty and staff took advantage of reduced summer traffic in Jackson Library to run two brainstorming sessions to generate ideas about possible changes to some of the public spaces in the builidng.  Facilitators guided groups looking at •    Materials and Resources •    Seating and Furniture •    Express Desk •    Technology •    Functions Said Dean of University Libraries Rosann Bazirjian, "we hope that this type of all-inclusive event will lend itself to the development of creative ideas, diversity of thought, teamwork and faster implementation since we will not be using a task force model."

Wrapping up a year of focus on Shakespeare and Galileo at UNCG, the University Libraries’ Jackson Society made a purchase of a rare quarto edition of Shakespeare’s Othello for the Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives.  As a result, UNCG will now be the only university in the UNC system owning one of the 30 known copies in existence of Shakespeare’s Othello in the seventh and final Quarto edition, published in 1705. Here is a description of the new acquisition: Othello. William Shakespeare.  London: Printed for R. Wellington, 1705. Seventh and final quarto edition. Lightly browned with some spotting and marginal dampstaining, small stain to title affecting advertisement at foot. Modern speckled tan three-quarter calf and marbled boards, gold-stamped red morocco spine label. Housed in a brown cloth folding box. Othello was first published in quarto format in 1622 and was then included in the First Folio edition of collected plays. It is o...