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More News October 15, 2018

The University of California, Riverside Library and campus partners will host several events in celebration of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Day.

This year, UCR will observe GIS Day on Thursday, Nov. 15.

GIS Day, first established in 1999, provides an international forum for users of geographic information systems technology to demonstrate real-world applications that are making a difference in our society.

The 2018 event will showcase the variety of disciplines using GIS, illustrate how GIS is used in both academic and community settings, and provide students opportunities for learning and networking.

“We’re excited to see that student interest in GIS at UCR is growing,” said Janet Reyes, the UCR Library geospatial information librarian who is coordinating GIS Day at UCR. “We hope this year’s GIS Day programming will inspire even more students to learn about the power of GIS to analyze and display location-based data, and will underscore that GIS is a sought-after skill for a multitude of career paths and disciplines.”

"GIS offers exciting opportunities for researchers, especially in the Humanities,” said Ademide Adelusi-Adeluyi, an Assistant Professor of History who uses GIS to analyze indigenous use of urban space in 19th-century West Africa. “It allows us to bring a sense of space and place to our work. Whether you’re in Gender and Sexuality, Ethnic Studies or Anthropology, there’s a meaningful place for you.” She added that she hopes that students and faculty from CHASS will come by this year and check out our posters, talks, and tables, and learn how GIS is already at work in the UCR community.

GIS Day 2018 at UCR will feature talks by researchers and community members who will share how they use GIS to advance their work. The talks will be held in Tomás Rivera Library, Room 140 between 1:00 and 3:00 on the afternoon of Nov. 15.

This is the second year a poster contest for students is being held. (Details on how to enter the poster contest are provided here. Abstracts are due by Nov. 1.)  Contest posters will be exhibited in the lobby of Rivera Library throughout the week, and the winners announced on the afternoon of Nov. 15.

Apart from the contest, the entire UC Riverside community is welcome to provide a GIS-related poster for a separate display in Rivera. Posters that have been used or will be used at other events are acceptable. The deadline to sign up is Friday, Oct. 26. To submit a poster to the display, contact Janet Reyes (janet.reyes@ucr.edu) or Margarita Yonezawa (margarita.yonezawa@ucr.edu) at the Orbach Science Library’s Map Collection, or call (951) 827-6423.

The campus community is encouraged to stop by an informational table near the bell tower during lunchtime on November 13 and 14 to learn more about GIS and enter a raffle. The drawing for raffle prizes will take place on November 15 at 3:45 pm in Rivera 140.

Cosponsoring the GIS Day events are the Center for Geospatial Sciences, the School of Public Policy, the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, the Department of Environmental Sciences, the Department of History, GradQuant, and Capital Asset Strategies.

More details about the GIS Day event schedule will be posted soon on the UCR Library website.

More News April 30, 2018

Eli Labinger is a fourth-year psychology major who works as a Student Assistant in Special Collections and University Archives at the UCR Library.

Labinger grew up in West Hollywood, California as the younger of two sons. His mother is a first grade teacher and his father is a wholesale bookseller.

UC Riverside was an easy choice to make for Labinger because he wanted to stay close to home for college, but also wanted to attend a research university. “When I first visited, I really loved it. It has a very intimate feeling about it,” he said. “It was just a really good fit for me.”

Working at the library also turned out to be a great fit for Labinger. “There’s a lot to love about this job,” he said. “It’s really the anticipation of working with new things or in new areas every day keeps me interested and excited. There’s always something new to experience here.”

One of his favorite work-related memories comes from a 2016 event for the Chancellor’s Associates. “Donors who were visiting the library stopped by Special Collections,” Labinger explained. “We had seven or eight display tables set up around the reading room. Each table had things representing a specific area, and I got to present on The Lord of the Rings as representative of the fantasy literature collection. That was cool.”

His interest in fantasy literature helped to establish a friendship with Science Fiction Librarian Jacqueline “JJ” Jacobson. “I have talked a lot with JJ especially about The Lord of the Rings,” he said. “That’s sort of my outside interest.”

Aside from his work at the library, Labinger also works in a research laboratory in UCR's Department of Psychology. “I’m working on a project right now for the Chancellor’s Research Fellowship,” he said. “Psychology is a really new field and there’s a lot of research out there but there’s so much to be done. There are a lot of important discoveries yet to be made. I think that global change is going to stem from research.”

He feels most passionate about research that focuses on children and adolescents. “It’s such rapid growth period, and by the time we learn new things about these people, the people we’re studying grow up and grow out of our findings. A lot of things become out of date really quickly. There can’t be too much research with younger people.”

Between classes and working at both the library and the psychology lab, Labinger has little spare time for other hobbies. “I haven’t been able to do all the things I like to do, like read for pleasure.”

After graduation, Labinger will be moving to Portland, Oregon, to complete his PhD at Portland State University’s applied developmental psychology program. As a graduate student, he will be assisting Dr. Andrew Mashburn in his research, which includes assessing the effectiveness of early interventions for improving school readiness in preschoolers moving to kindergarten.

“I am especially interested in understanding the types of children and families for whom such interventions work best, and in using this information to find programs that work for all students and that have lasting positive effects,” Labinger said.

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More News September 27, 2023

More News September 24, 2018

“Mark Glassy and Frankenstein: Men of Many Parts” features UCR alumnus’ passion for science and science fiction. His SF collectibles will be on exhibit through Dec. 14.

Over the decades Mark Glassy has collected more than 100,000 science fiction items.

Visitors to his home office are greeted by B-9, the Robot from “Lost in Space.” Glassy, a 1978 UC Riverside graduate-turned-cancer research scientist spends most of his evenings sculpting figurines that capture scenes from his favorite science fiction films.

His  creations and a small selection of his collectibles became a special exhibit titled “Mark Glassy and Frankenstein: Men of Many Parts” at UCR’s Tomás Rivera Library’s Special Collections and University Archives in honor of the 200^th anniversary of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

The 12-week exhibit on the fourth floor of the Rivera Library will feature guided tours with Glassy. In October and November he’ll offer six guided tours, including one on Halloween. Visitors who arrive at the Special Collections and University Archives will hear how his fandom for science fiction grew over the decades and will also learn how his sculptures evolve from an idea to an actual piece of art. Included in the exhibit are sculptures, comic books, posters, and other Science Fiction and Horror collectables that reflect Glassy’s life-long passion.

Exhibit events also include UCR Professor of English and Director of Speculative Fictions and Cultures of Science program Sheryl Vint, who will lead a conversation with German author and journalist Dietmar Dath, on Oct. 15. Dath is currently working on a Frankenstein screenplay.

All events are free and open to the public, but RSVPs are recommended, as space is limited:

• Guided Tours with Mark Glassy: frankenstein-tours.eventbrite.com
• Dietmar Dath with Sheryl Vint: dath-vint.eventbrite.com

Glassy’s connection to UCR goes back to 1975 when he started his doctoral research in biochemistry. He said UCR granted him both support and independence while he spent endless hours in the lab, designing his own experiments and researching B-lymphocytes, a type of white blood cell that supports the immune system by fighting off germs and diseases. For the past 37 years he’s been working at UC San Diego, most recently taking a role as a visiting scholar at UCSD’s Moores Cancer Center. Throughout those decades, Glassy has developed pritumumab, a pharmaceutical drug designed to cure brain cancer. His drug has been submitted to the Food and Drug Administration for review, he said.

UCR’s education helped steer his career. When Glassy heard UCR Chancellor Kim A. Wilcox speak during a San Diego reception two years ago, he was impressed with UCR’s growth, diversity, its mission to support first-generation students, while simultaneously supporting faculty who conduct world-class research.  

Glassy’s two passions: finding a cure for brain cancer and delving into Science Fiction, lead him to his home office every day. There, he either writes articles for the scientific journal he founded, Human Antibodies, watches films that inspire his art, or sits in an old elementary school desk, surrounded by wire and stainless steel molding tools, small paint bottles, and jars of Apoxie Sculpt clay.

“In terms of the research environment, I cannot separate the two, science and science fiction. It’s impossible for me. When I’m at the lab, I’m still making analogies and metaphors,” said Glassy, who has authored three books.

Shelves line the office walls, holding thousands of little mementos of decades of Science Fiction history: triceratops, R2-D2, Stormtrooper masks, Pez candy dispensers, a Superman comic book collection from the 1950s, an 1831 edition of Frankenstein the novel, and a human-sized Creature from the “Black Lagoon.”

“It’s me. Look around, it’s me,” said Glassy, 66. “No matter how hectic, how stressful my day has been, when I walk into my room, it all washes away. I can’t help but smile.”

Featuring Glassy’s works and collection brings to the exhibit “the things that make him a ‘Mad Doctor,’” said JJ Jacobson, UCR’s Jay Kay and Doris Klein Science Fiction librarian. Jacobson is one of two exhibit curators. Glassy’s anti-cancer drug addresses brain tumors, the “the way one of his beloved comic book heroes cleans out a secret lab full of supervillains,” Jacobson said.

“Mark has the kind of vision, passion, energy, and concentration that make it really fortunate for the rest of us is that he’s not the kind of Mad Doctor who wants to rule the world. Instead, he’s mad for science fiction, comic books, and horror movies; absolutely mad about the range and power of the human imagination, and, of course, really mad at cancer,” Jacobson said. “There are many collectors out there who love Frankenstein, there are many model makers who do wonderful work, but what sets the material in ‘Men of Many Parts’ apart is all that combined with Mark’s incredible eye for detail, the scientific understanding with which he views the popular culture of monsters, and his extraordinarily wacky sense of humor.”

- Written by Sandra Baltazar Martinez

More News October 27, 2017

Moises Martinez Cortez is a fourth-year Global Studies major who has worked as a Front Desk Assistant at UCR Library since fall quarter of his freshman year.

He grew up in the Lynwood – Downey area of Los Angles as the youngest of six children, raised by a single mother who immigrated from Nayarit, along the central west coast of rural Mexico. Cortez says, “I love her to bits.”

Though he’s the youngest in his family, Cortez is the first person in his family to attend a four-year university. “My older brother and sister went to community college for a while, but ended up dropping out,” he explained.

At first, Cortez considered attending UCLA so he could live at home, but a few things about UC Riverside helped to change his mind. “I come from a low-income background and UCR I felt had the right resources, both financial and the right kind of community, to carry on my education here,” he said.

While he felt out of place for the first quarter, he adjusted quickly, partly due to working at Tomás Rivera Library. “I’ve met a lot of people at the front desk,” he said. “I feel more connected to campus as well. I’ve made a lot of new friends with fellow student employees and also expanded my academic network.”

After getting better acquainted with many people here at UCR, Cortez added, “It’s the community that makes us stand out. There’s an environment of, ‘We want to collectively get ahead, make sure our students graduate, we want to grow.’”

He’s also grateful for the mentors he’s met here at the library. “All the staff in Circulation are super helpful, and Leslie [Settle, Access Services Desk Coordinator] is hands-down the best supervisor I’ve ever had,” he said. “She tries to help us out however she can. She always sends us emails about events on campus, and where we can get free food.”

“Moises is a selfless employee who always looks out for the interest of others,” Settle commented. “He’s willing to help where needed and never hesitates to do what is best for the team. Moises is innovative, in that he developed a communication chain for student workers.”

Cortez’s understanding and appreciation of the intersection between cultures is part of what led him to pursue a degree in Global Studies.

“It’s a major that’s becoming more and more relevant with the interconnected, global world that we live in,” he said. “A lot of political issues that are relevant here are also relevant in other parts of the world, as well. Climate change, global security, so many other things.”

Cortez studied abroad last fall as part of a human rights and cultural memory program in Buenos Aires, Argentina and Santiago, Chile. This experience gave him an outside-in perspective of the 2016 Presidential election. “It gave me an inside view of how people around the world view American politics,” he said. “The fact that they knew so much about the US really surprised me, and made me wonder why people in the US don’t know much about people in this part of the world.”

He currently divides his time between work, study, painting (primarily working with acrylics and graffiti art), and tutoring Italian, French, and Spanish for the Academic Resource Center.

“I’m kind of a nerd, to be honest. I really like learning languages,” he said. “I get a kick out of learning how to communicate with somebody else in a different way, in their language. I’m a native Spanish speaker, and I picked up French in high school. I studied Arabic and Italian here on campus. I’m currently trying to learn Portuguese because I’ll be studying abroad in Brazil in January.”

After he graduates, Cortez hopes to work for the US State Department as a Foreign Service Officer. “I’m interested in working abroad in US embassies with foreign governments, working on issues like security, immigration, development, and seeing what I can do as a representative of the US to help foster that growth and that development,” he explained.

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More News July 30, 2018

If you’ve visited Rivera Library in the past three years, you’ve likely seen Mohamed Jawara’s smiling face behind the front desk.

What you might never have guessed is that Jawara took the job at the Circulation / Reserves Desk to help him conquer shyness and to improve his communication and interpersonal skills.

“I saw how the staff at the front desk would help patrons, and I thought it would be a great way for me to get out of my comfort zone,” Jawara explained. “Working at the library, it’s a really positive environment. Everyone is very caring and supportive and they’ve played a great role in me improving myself and becoming a better person. We treat each other as a family.”

“Mohamed is a true servant leader at heart,” said Leslie Settle, Rivera Library's Access Services desk coordinator. “As a student supervisor, he sets the tone for the front desk and is an exemplary example of phenomenal customer service. When I think of training others in leadership and customer service, the things I have seen Mohamed do come to mind -- from how to greet patrons to making everyone feel like they belong.”

Born in the Republic of Sierra Leone in West Africa, Jawara immigrated to the United States in 2008 with his mother, a certified nurse assistant. At first, they stayed with his uncle’s family in Torrance, CA, but eventually settled in Loma Linda.

In 2016, Jawara’s younger brother and two sisters arrived from Sierra Leone. His father, formerly an accountant for the Sierra Leone Ministry of Defense, finally joined his family in May 2018, more than a decade after his wife and eldest son first came to the U.S.

“I felt like my mother did a great job trying to substitute whatever support my father would have given me, had he been here,” he said. “Even though it was difficult, she made the process a bit easier.”

He chose to attend UC Riverside because of its proximity to home. “It’s easy to commute here, and it would have been very expensive to live in the dorms,” he said.

Once he arrived, he was pleased to discover that UCR lived up to its reputation as a diverse campus. “It’s been great to meet people with different backgrounds of different races and develop friendships with them. That has enhanced my education here at UCR.”

Jawara graduated with the Class of 2018 with a Bachelor of Arts in political science with a focus on law and society. He hopes to pursue graduate study and work in the field of public health, an interest that stemmed from tragedies he witnessed in his homeland.

Before Jawara came to California at age 12, he saw many horrors in the midst of Sierra Leone’s civil war, which only compounded challenges the country already had with meeting basic healthcare needs.

“I was born in the middle of that upheaval,” he said. “Growing up, I got to see those casualties of war, people who had limbs amputated. It was common to see close friends that I grew up with dying from malaria. I also had an uncle who suffered from a liver condition. The right professionals weren’t even available, so he relied heavily on native healing. Unfortunately, it just got worse and he ended up passing away.”

His father and siblings were still in Sierra Leone during the Ebola crisis of 2014. “It was really excruciating to hear their calls and how frightened they were,” he said. As a result of these experiences, Jawara has devoted his studies to learning how to improve healthcare so that he can someday make a difference in Sierra Leone by building more hospitals staffed with trained medical professionals.

Settle commented, “Mohamed was born to understand and love all people in sincerity without judgment. Not only is he talented, but he has a purity about him that is unexplainable.”

How can someone who has seen firsthand so many gruesome tragedies still have such optimism? In a word: travel. “It plays a big role in me having a more positive outlook on life because I’ve had the opportunity to see the difference between having to struggle for basic things,” Jawara said.

“See how the rest of the world lives. By traveling, you get to compare and contrast and have a much deeper appreciation for what you have, no matter how little,” he added. “For you, it might seem like it’s nothing, but to someone else out there, it’s the whole world.”

In June 2018, Jawara was hired as a Research Assistant at UC Riverside's School of Medicine's Center for Healthy Communities. Additionally, he continued at an internship with the Riverside County Department of Public Health.

While interning and working, Jawara will begin applying for a variety of graduate programs in social science and healthcare.

More News January 29, 2018

Special Collections & University Archives staff are constantly working to process recently acquired collections and make those materials ready for use by students, faculty, and researchers.

Each quarter, we will provide a list of UCR Library's newly processed archival and primary source collections. Check out the list below to see if there are any items that fit your research area, or share with a friend!

Below you'll find brief descriptions and links to the finding aids or collection guides for each new collection. To use any of these materials, simply click the "Request Items" button at the top to submit a request, and log in with our Special Collections Request System. For more on conducting research in Special Collections, see this page.

SCUA is open to the public on weekdays from 11:00 am – 4:00 pm. Check here for closures or other changes to our regular hours.

For questions, email specialcollections@ucr.edu.

Newly Processed Collections – Winter 2018