IACRL Member Spotlight: Rob Morrison
March 20, 2024
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Member Spotlight: Rob Morrison, Teaching & Learning Librarian and Associate Professor, National Louis University
Interviewed by Janis Shearer, University of Illinois
What is your current professional position and what do you like best about it?
I am library faculty at National Louis and a teaching and learning librarian. I'd say that what I enjoy most is working with students, and also with faculty on curriculum. I have had many amazing conversations and I’ve learned so much from the students and the faculty, especially since I work with a lot of doctoral students. We end up talking about their whole dissertation journey. My work isn't all about research strategies, a lot of it is discussing how to manage the work and struggling through life and a dissertation at the same time. So that's what I really enjoy, that contact and engagement with students and faculty.
And how long have you worked at the Library?
This is my eighteenth year.
What would you like our membership to know about NLU’s Library?
That we have unique collections that may not be available elsewhere, one is that we have a strong collection of culinary cookbooks and materials for our curriculum and hospitality program. Many are in print, and available for loan except for a few rare ones and some that are on reserve, but a lot of them have historical recipes from different cultures. I know that when Kendall College, which was privately owned and not part of any consortium for a few years was absorbed by National Louis CARLI members were very happy that they had access to culinary books. Another print collection we have is called the Weinstein Collection. It's a collection of significant children's books that are really focused on the history and the foundation of children's literature. That's in our archive, so it is not digitized or available on loan. We also have a strong collection about our founder, Elizabeth Harrison, she was the first president of NLU and helped introduce kindergarten to the Chicago area back in the 1800s. She wasn't the only one but she really founded that movement here and was a key figure in Chicago. So we have an extensive history of the kindergarten movement here. Those are three very unique collections that we have.
Tell us about materials that make an impact within your collection.
That's a good question. I would say that our digital collections have a huge impact because we have multiple campuses around Illinois, one in Florida, and then we have online students everywhere. Also, since our faculty and students are distributed we really need to have that digital presence for them to get full text journals, ebooks, streaming videos, and other types of resources. The impact of our physical books really would be for Kendall College. The Weinstein Collection of children’s literature is in the archives so trying to measure their impact can be very difficult. They are used but especially since we have a large circulating children's collection, that's probably another impactful collection used by our College of Education. Those books are used as well, both digital and print. That's how I would define impact, but trying to get a real ROI for those right now, we just haven't been able to do that. We do a lot of curriculum development so we're able to directly embed and track our electronic resources and then freely available into classes.
If you had a year off with pay, what would you do?
I would travel the country by train (Amtrak), catch up on all the books that I have to read, and I would sit on the couch with my cats. Which I can do occasionally now, but not as much as I'd like to. I would also get outside and into wilderness areas and enjoy being outside more. Getting away from the computer after sitting in front of it all day is something I would do more of. While I had a sabbatical a year ago that's exactly what I did, though I still couldn't catch up with my book reading.
What do you enjoy during your free time?
I think in my free time I’d do everything except travel the country by train, that happens occasionally and for a specific purpose not just to enjoy the trip. Otherwise, I’d collect graphic novels. I do read a lot so I'm a traditionalist with books. I like to read them in print rather than online. Mainly because just staring at a computer for very long is not an experience I find very enjoyable.
Is there anything else you'd like the membership to know?
Yes, I am currently serving on IACRL’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee through 2026.
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