Teaching and Learning

Archives Research Project Included in “The Teaching with Primary Sources Cookbook”

Take 2 library professionals.
Add 25 high school students.
Mix in a specially curated collection of archival materials.
And let simmer over a 90-minute class period.

Cover image of The Teaching with Primary Sources Cookbook, edited by Julie M. Porterfield

This is the recipe Reference and Outreach Librarian Molly Brown and Arts, Humanities, and Experiential Learning Library Regina Pagani have perfected while working with students and teachers from the Boston Public Schools over the past few years and it is now included in The Teaching with Primary Sources Cookbook, a collection of first-hand accounts from librarians, archivists, and other educators who use primary sources to teach information literacy skills to various audiences.


Brown and Pagani’s project is detailed in chapter 28 and titled “A Potluck of Expertise: Inviting Boston Public Schools’ Juniors to Use Northeastern’s Archives and Special Collections’ Pantry to Build Their Recipes.” They detail an ongoing project they have developed with BPS educators Chris Madsen and Katherine Petta where students work in groups to write a biography of an activist who advocated for racial equality in Boston’s public schools, using primary sources from the Archives’ vast social justice collections.

Regina Pagani and Molly Brown teach a class of students in the Archives Reading Room
Regina Pagani and Molly Brown (standing) lead Lucy Maulsby’s architecture class on a lesson in archival research, similar to the types of classes they teach to BPS juniors. Photo courtesy of Mary Hughes.

The chapter provides a detailed account of the project, with suggestions for ways to alter it based on different archives’ collections. The 2021 edition of The Teaching with Primary Sources Cookbook, edited by Julie M. Porterfield, is available through the American Library Association.

To learn more about the different ways Brown, Pagani and other Northeastern University Library staff members have utilized the Archives’ unique collections to teach primary source research to students at Northeastern and at the Boston Public Schools, visit the Teaching with Archives page.

Library Launches Podcast Publishing Service with Northeastern Classes

Is your class starting a podcast? Several Northeastern classes have adopted podcasting instead of the usual term paper or final project, and the library’s Podcast Publishing Team is here to help. Over the past few semesters, Jon Reed from the Digital Media Studios and Brooke Williams from the library’s Research and Instruction team have worked with classes in English, History, Architecture and other departments to help students learn how to create, record, edit and publish their own podcasts.

One of the questions the team was asked when working with faculty was “how do I get my class assignments into Apple Podcasts?” Using the university’s Digital Repository Service and the Library’s CERES WordPress platform, the Library is able to create a stable website for your class assignment to be sent out to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and the world. The first podcast published was Speak Up! Podcast, coordinated by English Professor Elly Jackson. 

“The library podcast opportunities are as good as they get and should be blasted all over the campus and around the world,” says Jackson. “My classes set up podcast assignments that have now reached 25 published podcast recordings from undergraduate research, and these are up on Apple Podcasts. I believe educational podcasting has a great future and I am proud of the tram at our library’s podcasting service. This is a stellar partnership and I cherish their talents and commitment to experiential education.”

Some examples of podcast episodes produced by the Speak Up! students include “Death By Chocolate” and “Jet, Set, Go – A Podcast on Medical Tourism.”

Sarah Sweeney, manager of the Digital Repository Service, and Patrick Murray-John, Associate Director for Systems, have both played major roles in getting the podcast publishing program up and running.

Interested in bringing podcasting into your remote classroom? Email the team at Library-PodcastTeam@northeastern.edu. We look forward to working with you closely if even physically afar!

Access to Kanopy limited during summer

Beginning in May, Northeastern University Library will be reducing full access to Kanopy videos. From April 27 through August 24, Kanopy will be a mediated library service and access will be limited to instructional use and research support for faculty and students. Films that are already triggered (licensed because of usage for one year) will appear on the site and in Scholar OneSearch, but other films will have to be requested. 

If you have films you know you will use in teaching and research this summer from the Kanopy collection, please notify Erin Beach (e.beach@northeastern.edu) or Amy Lewontin (a.lewontin@northeastern.edu) and we will ensure that the films are activated in ample time for the summer sessions.  You can also use the request form on the Kanopy site after April 27, and if you identify that the film is for class use, we will expedite the activation.  Please note that this can take a day or two so be sure to build in adequate lead-time. 

If you live in the Boston area and wish to use Kanopy outside of academic use, the Boston Public Library offers Kanopy for free, and one can watch four films a month, once you obtain an e-card. More information is available here.

Thanks for your understanding of this necessary cost-saving effort and please let us know if you have any questions.

Important Temporary Access to Digitized Versions of the Library’s Print Collections Available

The Northeastern University Library is a member of the HathiTrust Digital Library, a major international repository for the digital preservation of digitized versions of print library materials. Normally, there is no access to content which is still under copyright. During the current crisis, as many libraries have closed, HathiTrust took an important step and temporarily opened up copyrighted material in their digital library to member institutions with copies of those items in their physical collections. This means that any books available through HathiTrust which are also in Northeastern’s collections will be available to you while the library is closed. HathiTrust’s online collection contains approximately half of the Northeastern Library’s book collections.

We are working to add this temporary access to Scholar OneSearch. In the meantime, to take advantage of this resource:

  • Visit ​hathitrust.org​ and click the yellow “LOG IN” button.
  • Select “Northeastern University” and log in using your NU credentials.
  • Use the site to locate the item you wish to view.
  • Click on the Temporary Access link at the bottom of the record, if present, to Check Out the item through the Emergency Temporary Access Service.
  • You will have 60 minutes of access to the book during any session. If you remain active in the book at the end of the session, access time will automatically be extended, unless someone else has requested to read the book.
  • You will not be able to download the whole book, although you can download individual pages. You are mainly able to read it online in an active session while using HathiTrust. This is to protect the author’s rights.
  • You will be able to search within the full text of the book.

If you have questions about using this temporary service, please contact help@northeastern.libanswers.com.

Expanding Services to Supporting Online Learning

In the past few months, the Online Learning team has been hard at work to expand library services to our global community. We’ve worked with various departments across the university and the library to offer robust and dynamic online programs. Here are a few of the ways we’ve expanded over the year. We are constantly looking for new ways to innovate, improve our services and offer even more programs and online opportunities for our students, faculty and staff. We welcome comments, questions, or ideas for new online initiatives. Please feel free to reach out to Lindley (l.homol@northeastern.edu) or Dina (d.meky@northeastern.edu) at any time.

—Lindley Homol and Dina Meky