Page 2 - 2017 Windows Newsletter

HORNED FROG | LIBRARY

from the
DEAN Spring (and warmer weather!) has
arrived. I am enjoying the display of
colorful tulips on campus and I am Spring 2017 • Volume 29, Issue 2
looking forward to seeing the students in Windows is a biannual publication produced by
the library as they prepare for the final the Office of Marketing at the Mary Couts Burnett
weeks of the academic year. Library.

I want to update you on a few of our Editor/Senior Writer/Creative
special projects we have been working on: Shelda Dean
digitizing back issues of The Skiff, the TCU
student newspaper and digitizing back issues Administrative Team
of The Horned Frog, the student yearbook. Dr. June Koelker, Dean
Both collections continue to be in Special Tracy Hull, Associate Dean
Collections and now are also available from James Lutz, Admin. Services Director
Kerry Bouchard, Automated Systems Director
the library’s website. They offer a wonderful
opportunity to browse TCU history. Department Heads
Cari Alexander, Music/Media
Planning for the TCU Library of the future Kisten Barnes, Access Services Librarian
is one of the projects we are developing Linda Chenoweth, Reference/Instruction Services
this spring. We started a multi-month effort Dennis Gibbons, Collection Development
to create a new Library Strategic Plan that Dennis Odom, Technical Services
will guide future initiatives to understand Cheryl Sassman, Circulation
the needs of TCU students and faculty,
will position the library to integrate new
technology into its services and will help us Horned Frogs
choose carefully among options available
to us in the future. This is a library that is STAY CONNECTED WITH US
well positioned now, but if we sit back and he Horned Frog (actually a lizard) has been TCU’s mascot longer than TCU has been the university’s name.
don’t prepare for future changes, we will Like us on Facebook Four students helped make the decision in 1897, when AddRan Christian University (renamed TCU in 1902) was
not be able to be good stewards of these Facebook.com/tculibrary Tlocated in Waco. Here are some other facts about the horned frog, one of the country’s most distinctive mascots:
resources. We recently completed a campus Like us on Twitter
survey called LibQUAL (www.libqual.org) @tculibrary The scientific name for this Texas reptile is Phrynosoma cornutum; in Greek, phrynos means “a toad” and soma means,
a survey that gauges user expectations and Like us on YouTube “body”; in Latin, cornutus means “horned.”
perceptions about services, facilities and TCULibrary101
collections. Upcoming strategic planning Like us on Instagram Their primary diet is red harvester ants; they would eat 80 to 100 a day. Unfortunately, red ants are falling victim to
activities include focus group conversations tculibrary
with students and faculty along with insecticides and to more aggressive fire ants in much of Texas.
interviews with key campus administrators.
The typical Horned Frog is three to five inches long.
Several exciting events took place in the Horned Frogs are cold-blooded animals and have an unusual pineal gland, resembling a “third eye” on the top of the head,
library this Spring: the TCU Debate Team
took on the Irish Times team in the Gearhart which zoologists believe is part of their system of thermoregulation.
Reading Room. Our Faculty Speak event When angered or frightened, horned frogs can squirt a fine, four-foot stream of blood from their eyes.
on April 4, featured authors distiller Rob
Arnold and TCU professor Eric Simanek as The Horned Frog was named the State Reptile of Texas in 1992.
they enterained us with insights from their
book Shots of Knowledge: The Science of In stories of Native Americans in the Southwest, horned frogs are depicted as ancient, powerful and respected.
Whiskey.
Archaeologists find horned frogs on petroglyphs, pottery and other crafts painted hundreds of years before Columbus set sail
for America. In some parts of Mexico, folklore persists that these creatures which weep tears of blood are sacred.

2 | TCU Library Spring 2017 15