By Rebekah Sherman
Who says that love and data cannot complement each other? Well, the week of February 10 to February 14 marks an exciting celebration and spreading awareness of love for data during International Love Data Week. The librarians at D’Amour Library jumped on the idea by creating a fun event: Data Valentines in the Clarke.
On Monday, February 10, 2025, the Data Valentines in the Clarke event was held in the Clarke Reading Room in D’Amour Library from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. Thirteen people participated in the event by creating data or personal valentines, including Western New England University students, faculty, and of course, D’Amour’s well-loved and appreciated librarians.
“I would say that part of our goal in the library here is to promote information literacy, and the event…is all about data literacy, a sister to information literacy,” said Caroline (Carrie) Evans, D’Amour Library’s Instruction and Assessment Librarian and co-initiator of the event. “We also wanted to do something fun.”
Evans advised participants to make out their data valentines to either a specific faculty member, staff, club, or college of their choice or person in general, which added to the relaxed atmosphere. Participants had plenty of crafting materials to choose from, including heart doilies, paper and felt stickers, glitter glue, stamps, and scrapbooking paper. Treats and coffee were provided, courtesy of Evans, including Dunkin’ Donuts munchkins and delicious homemade heart-shaped gingerbread cookies.
The Data Valentines in the Clarke event was a team effort event, and the librarians Elin O’Hara, Director of D’Amour Library, Evans, and Bridget M. Kennedy, D’Amour’s Information Literacy Librarian, were the ones responsible for planning and organizing the event. Evans created and printed out the valentine slips and QR codes, which contained helpful links to information about International Love Data Week and D’Amour Library’s Data and Statistics Research guide to promote data literacy. O’Hara had the idea to decorate Evans’ data Valentine slips, while Kennedy provided most of the craft supplies.
Evans was inspired to create the event by reflecting on the importance and relevance of data literacy in contemporary society.
“Data literacy and information literacy are deeply connected,” said Evans. “Data is the raw material of research,” which can be “analyzed and communicated. Data literacy is an important skill” to have. Also, when “it comes to AI, AI is basically made of data. It is important that we are…conscious of the data that we use because it is a part of our everyday lives.”
Evans also reflected on how the Data Valentines in the Clarke event fit into International Love Data Week.
The International Love Data Week is a “multi-institutional outreach hosted by the University of Michigan’s Institute of Social Research,” said Evans, in which “so many universities participate.” This year’s “theme of Love Data Week is ‘whose data is it anyway,’” which “questions us to think critically” about “who’s creating data sets, why they are creating data,” and “why we collect it. I think it’s important for us all to think about this and think critically” especially during “this time in history.” The Data Valentines in the Clarke event was “our first soft launch of participation” and “this year for us is spreading awareness of the event and data resources in the library.”
Evans hopes to involve other colleges on campus next year to celebrate International Love Data Week, like the colleges of Business and Pharmacy, who directly “deal with data sets. It would be good for next year to do more collaboration with other departments, faculty, and students who work with data.”
Although Evans knew about the International Love Data Week beforehand, Kennedy mentioned that this was the first time she heard of it.
“Carrie saw it online and thought it would be something fun to do,” said Kennedy. “Carrie came up with [the Data Valentines in the Clarke event] on Friday.” Kennedy agreed that “building community” is important, which the Valentine event helped foster.
Brianna Beadle, a creative writing major at Western New England University, attended the Data Valentines in the Clarke event. She said thought the event offered a positive experience.
“I really enjoyed the Love Data Valentine’s event because it was both therapeutic and informative,” said Beadle. “The staff in D’Amour Library are always welcoming and helpful, which I appreciate.”
Some of the faculty of D’Amour Library helped distribute the valentines, including Kennedy, Mike Mannheim, Associate Director and Health Sciences Librarian, and Deborah Beagle, D’Amour Library’s Interlibrary Loan and Informational Specialist, by hand-delivering the data valentines across campus on February 11, 2025, braving the cold for two hours.
