In April, USC became the first North American university to participate in the Outstanding Academic Papers by Students (OAPS) program when the USC Libraries and USC School of Social Work presented a collection of student research papers at the 2010 OAPS Conference. USC was joined at the conference, held at Xiamen University in China's Fujian province, by prestigious universities from China, Japan, Hong Kong, Korea, Macau, Taiwan, and Thailand.
Launched in 2005 by Professor Steven Ching of the City University of Hong Kong, OAPS is an international program by academic libraries to encourage, recognize, and preserve excellent student scholarship. For USC's inaugural contribution to the program, the libraries partnered with the School of Social Work to submit ten outstanding papers by social work graduate students in book format. The libraries plan to continue their involvement in the program and expand participation in future years to other USC schools.
Please see our previous post for a full downloadable version of USC's 2010 OAPS contribution.
Cherry Short, assistant dean, community and global initiatives, at the USC School of Social Work (fifth from left) and the libraries' Hugh McHarg, executive director of communications and public programming (sixth from left), with other conference participants.
Representatives of OAPS member institutions plan for next year.