From the Dean

Last year the Z. Smith Reynolds Library faculty and staff used the University’s strategic framework, Framing Our Future, to guide our planning for the coming decade. The result is Informing Our Future which provides a framework to help us advance the university’s goals while preparing the Library for our third century as an educational institution.

This annual report follows the thematic goals of Framing Our Future, illustrating how ZSR supports our students, faculty, and the greater community. Both documents help us remain true to our mission “to inspire learning, advance knowledge, and build community at Wake Forest University.”

Community of Learning

The Library strives to provide our students with a supportive learning environment that goes beyond the classroom and also supports their well-being.

• Student Employee Scholarships: Last year we awarded our first five scholarships to library student employees. For this academic year, we made ten awards. We also received our first endowment commitment for the program!
• Game Night: With help from WFU Esports, the Board Game Club, and Rook and Bishop, we hosted a fun evening in ZSR giving students a break from their studies.
• We also offered our second annual CozyFest – an event centered on crafting, relaxation, and tea. We teamed up with the World Tea Association, WakerSpace, WFU Symphony Orchestra, You Can Vote, and ZSR Special Collections and Archives to provide various activities and experiences that were perfect for a winter evening.

Community of Inquiry

Through our collections and services, ZSR works to provide resources that support the research and scholarly activity of our faculty and students.

• We offered workshops to help students, graduate students, and faculty organize their research and cite sources with the open-source software, Zotero.
• We hosted our annual Graduate Student Research Retreat with sessions on time management, copyright law, writer’s block, and Zotero.
• We invited scholars and writers to ZSR to facilitate interactions between the writers and students, staff, and faculty as part of the Sam Gladding Writing Experience
• We continued to process the highly significant archives of former Senator Richard Burr. We hope to have the collection open for research in the next year.
• As part of our Innovation Grants for ZSR faculty and staff, we awarded $2,000 to a team of library faculty to develop and offer a four-part workshop series designed primarily for new faculty (defined as faculty at any rank who have been at WFU for 5 years or less). In addition, ZSR faculty member Colleen Foy received a $700 grant to support her training to develop evidence synthesis (ES) service menu options at ZSR over the next one to two years.

Community of Partnerships

ZSR looks to actively engage with not only our campus community but the greater community of alumni and regional partners.

• Last fall we hosted a wide-ranging conversation between Jennifer Finkel, Acquavella Curator of Wake Forest’s Art Collections, and ZSR donor/documentary photographer Houck Medford concerning the role of philanthropy in supporting the arts and humanities
• We welcomed alumni back to ZSR and campus for Homecoming with a series of events.
• We took the archives out to the community with a pop-up history of Wake Forest exhibit on display at Wiseman Brewing.
• The ZSR Board of Visitors held their annual summer virtual book club with author Geroge Zaidan joining us.
• We continued to build the Expanding Wake Voices oral history project to offer more inclusive documentation of the student life experiences at Wake.

In Memory of Dr. Ed Wilson

We remember Dr. Edwin G. Wilson, also known as “Mr. Wake Forest” and namesake for the Wilson wing of the Library, who we lost last March.