Memorial University has a writer-in-residence, occasionally dancers- and filmmakers-in-residence, and now, for the first time, it has a Wikipedian-in-residence.
Writer Jenny Higgins has taken on the part-time residency, which will be based in the Centre for Newfoundland Studies (CNS), and is funded by a generous donation bequeathed to the Queen Elizabeth II Library.
Media-rich environment
Colleen Field, acting head of the CNS, felt the position was a great fit for promoting the resources of the CNS, as well as the Archives and Special Collections. The two units preserve and promote materials that deal with many aspects of Newfoundland and Labrador culture and history.
She remembers a time before the media-rich environment gave rise to Wikipedia. She witnessed first-hand the magnitude of work that went into producing multi-volume encyclopedias.