Scholarly Collaboration and Small Colleges in the Digital Age

I’m in Claremont, CA (Pomona College) attending a NITLE workshop on collaboration in the Digital Age.  Wow!  I’ve seen and heard about some great things going on “out there.”

The one that excited me most, since I can see an immediate use, is using a wiki to make a resource available online. Michael Tinkler and I have been talking about collaborating on a book about the campus building.  The wiki seems like the perfect way to attack it.  I can start it with the information I currently have as a static webpage. I envision adding a timeline, and pictures of each building.  I could possibly have more than one picture, looking at different time periods.  Michael and his students could then add more information as is it discovered. I suspect it would be best to restrict revisions to those in Michael’s classes, but we would need a way to get input from alums and the community.  I’m already thinking of other resources to handle this way.

My thanks to John Anderies and Robert Kieft of Furnam University for their presentation, “Creating the Digital Dictionary of Quaker Biography: The Wikification of a Hallowed Reference Source.”