Angela Perkins is a Research and Instruction Librarian and Director of the Digital Humanities Summer Scholars Program at the Lafayette College Libraries. She earned her Master in Information Studies in May 2017 from The University of Texas at Austin, where she specialized in archives and preservation. While pursuing this degree, she was Document Control Coordinator for UT System’s Institute for Transformational Learning, where she was first introduced to working with OER. Prior to studying at UT, she earned her M.F.A. in Screenwriting from The American Film Institute (AFI) Conservatory, and B.A. in Political Science from Bates College. Her professional interests include digital humanities and scholarship, film and media studies/preservation, and accessibility to education.
Angela’s capstone project is concerned with creating a survey of student needs and preferences regarding affordability of educational resources at Lafayette College, providing the Lafayette OER and Textbook Affordability Initiative with a valuable overview of how the Lafayette College student fits into the regional and national open education community. In addition to research on pre-existing OER student surveys and the process of administering campus-wide surveys at Lafayette, considerable inroads were made in terms of communication with students interested in discussing affordability, culminating in a student committing to being the student liaison for the initiative. As a student liaison, this student has already assembled a group of students who will collaborate on creating questions for the OER student survey, as well as help with the process of engaging students through campus events.
