Tiffany Norris with Julie Parker

As a part of Honors Day, the Birmingham-Southern College Library presented its annual awards for excellence in research and art to two BSC students.

The Excellence in Library Research Award recognizes a current first- or second-year student who best demonstrates research proficiency through a paper submitted to and published in the Southern Academic Review. In the published work, the awarded student must show an advanced understanding and appropriate use of the Library’s resources. This award comes with a cash prize.

This year’s Library Research Award was presented to sophomore psychology major Julie Parker for her paper, “A Comparative Analysis of the Red-Meat Industries of Australia, Brazil, and Texas.”

“The librarians agreed that this year’s submissions were all excellent, but Julie’s paper best fit the criteria that we’ve established for the award,” says Tiffany Norris, director of the Library. “We appreciated the variety of resources she used on this timely topic, and we all just found it to be a really interesting paper to read.”

Maddie Foss

The Library Art Purchase Award recognizes a student who has submitted work to the annual BSC Juried Student Art Exhibition. Proceeds from the Library’s used book sale fund this award, and the awarded piece is acquired by and displayed in the Library.

This year’s Art Purchase Award was presented to senior psychology and studio art major Maddie Foss for her piece, “The morning I thought it was all over.” GK Armstrong ’92, assistant professor of the Library and archivist, and Eric Kennedy, circulation supervisor, selected the piece, which will be displayed on the Library’s ground floor.

“In viewing this year’s Juried Student Exhibition, GK and I were most drawn to the works which had something to say about the world and which said it in a challenging way,” Kennedy said. “Maddie’s piece references blood by using embroidery thread and beads in vivid red on white fabric and was one of several pieces the artist created to speak to her experience of being a woman in today’s culture. The work is well-crafted and visually striking and leaves room for the viewer to wonder about the connection between the title and the imagery and to draw their own conclusions.”