Congratulations to Lily McCauley, the winner of the 2022 Library Research Prize! Lily is a first-year student at DePaul studying Film and TV, an artist, an aspiring director, and an outstanding undergraduate researcher.
Lily’s essay, “‘A Lack of Real Options’: A Cultural Analysis of Digital Art on Instagram and YouTube”, was produced as the final project for Prof. Delia Pless’ WRD 104 course. It explores the challenging relationship between digital artists and social media, raises issues of social media algorithms and the commodification of user data, and highlights a growing post-digital art movement.
The Library Research Prize is awarded to First-Year Writing students whose researched essays demonstrate excellence in the application of information literacy skills, including expertise in the discovery, evaluation, and use of information tools and resources. In addition to their essays, students also submitted a research statement that reflects on the use of library research tools, sources, and services at each stage of the research process, emphasizing what was learned.
Lily’s submission stood out to the judges thanks to a thorough research statement, which evidenced a creative search strategy across multiple library resources, and a thoughtful evaluation of sources. The integration of source material in Lily’s essay also impressed the judges: the essay puts sources into conversation with one another in order to come to a new conclusion.
The Library Research Prize is just one of the awards given to recognize excellent undergraduate work at the First-Year Writing Showcase. Honorees, joined by their professors, family members, and friends, were celebrated at an in-person reception on May 18 in Cortelyou Commons. Many thanks to the faculty and staff of DePaul University’s First-Year Writing Program; our Library Research Prize coordinators, Krystal Lewis and Firouzeh Rismiller; the Library Research Prize judges, Firouzeh Rismiller, Julia Wollrab, and Sveta Stoytcheva; and all library staff who teach and support our students and faculty in WRD 104 and HON 100. Your contributions make this collaboration with our First-Year Writing colleagues a success!
If you would like to learn more about the Library Research Prize for First-Year Writing or the library’s instructional program for first-year students, please contact Firouzeh Rismiller, Instructional Services Librarian.