#PRMapathon

In October 2017, I served on the Penn Libraries #PRMapathon organizing committee with the resident librarian at the Fisher Fine Arts Library and the Digital Scholarship team. In a week, we promoted an event to teach people in Philly how to use OpenStreetMap to identify buildings in the Northwestern region of Puerto Rico, an area devastated by Hurricane Maria. Over 5 hours, 40 attendees were able to map 20% of the buildings covering a 450-square mile area of the island. This event sparked more #PRMapathons around Philadelphia, including one at Penn Engineering and Temple University. Shortly after my residency ended, the Iowa State University Alumni Association named me one of its 2018 Iowa STATEment Maker for Career Achievement in part to due my involvement in #PRMapathon.

In my role as the Community Health and Engineering Librarian, I utilized the #PRMapathon model to plan a #citeNLM Wikipedia Edit-a-thons at the Biomedical Library in honor of #HealthLiteracyMonth in October 2019 and October 2020, which have continued as an asynchronous virtual volunteering activity in the 2020 - 2021 academic year. In partnership with the Penn Medicine Patient & Family Education Committee, based out of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, I held a virtual synchronous edit-a-thon in October 2021. In January 2022, I will partner with the Anti-Violence Partnership of Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania African American Resource Center to co-host Virtual Grant Funder Research-a-thon during the Martin Luther King Jr Symposium on Social Change.