Patrick Flanigan Receives the SDSU Presidential Staff Excellence Award for Innovation and Creativity
Patrick Flanigan, Programs and Operations Specialist in the University Library’s Digital Humanities Center (DHC), is this year’s winner of the Presidential Staff Excellence Award for Innovation and Creativity. He and the other awardees will be honored during the All-University Convocation on August 21.
This award recognizes staff members who "may have introduced cost-effective solutions, streamlined processes, or implemented new ideas that significantly enhance efficiency, productivity, or service delivery." The award also recognizes the "ability to think ahead, solve problems in inventive ways, and contribute to positive change [that] has made a meaningful impact within the SDSU campus community."
Flanigan has been a member of the library staff for 10 years and has worked in the Digital Humanities Center for the past two. The award recognizes his work there, especially his work to increase podcasting capabilities. Since joining the DHC, he has added three new state-of-the-art podcasting studios. That has increased usage from 96 reservations in 2022/23 to 373 for 2024/25. He has also overseen the renovation of the eLit studio, making it both more attractive and more functional. Everyone who attended the annual Digital Humanities Showcase and Electronic Literature Competition event in June saw Patrick’s dedication to the Center.
Pamella Lach, Digital Humanities Librarian and Digital Humanities Center Director, said, “Since his first day, Patrick has been absolutely indispensable to our daily operations, and he has single-handedly made our growth possible in these recent challenging years.”
Library Dean Scott Walter notes that DHC services have “proven to be an appealing and accessible approach to instructional innovation, building on the broader embrace of podcasting as an avenue for creative expression and the dissemination of popular, professional, and scholarly information.” He continues, “Patrick has been essential to our ability to meet the demand for these services and to provide direct support for instructional innovation, interdisciplinary scholarship, and creative activity throughout the university.”
Flanigan's work has also been recognized in the library field, including his selection to present a poster, “Next-Level Podcasting: DIY Podcasting Studio Makeover", at the 2024 Annual Meeting of the American Library Association.
In her nomination letter, Lach wrote:
The Digital Humanities Center could not operate without Patrick’s technical acumen, adaptability, resourcefulness, creativity, problem-solving skills, and innovative spirit, all of which are indispensable to supporting the broad range of activities and SDSU community members who flow through our space on a daily basis.
Most notably, we are home to multiple digital studios, including an electronic literature (E-lit) studio and four podcasting studios, where faculty, staff, and students can engage in critical making and digital storytelling. Countless faculty and students share that their experiences in the DH Center are transformative, inspiring them to think differently about their scholarship and creative activities. Patrick is essential to ensuring the conditions that make such transformation possible—emphasizing care, creativity, experimentation, process-thinking, and play to encourage students and faculty to let go of perfection, take risks, and have fun through their learning journey.
Jessica Pressman, co-founder of the Digital Humanities Center and an English professor, said, “I am excited about teaching new classes and offering old classes in new ways because of Patrick. His “Innovation and Creativity” has been a great gift to me, and I know that I am not alone.”
In closing her nomination letter, Lach said, “Patrick is an essential staff person in the Library, someone who toils endlessly to create meaningful and transformative experiences for our faculty, staff, and students. He embodies innovation and creativity in everything he does, and I cannot imagine the DH Center functioning without him. He has left an indelible mark on every person who has had the good fortune to learn from him.”
“I am truly honored and appreciative to have been nominated and to win this award. I find it very rewarding working in the Digital Humanities Center with Pam Lach and the DH community, as it allows me to collaborate and utilize my DIY/Punk Rock background to meet the needs of our students, faculty and staff,” Flanigan said. “When I'm helping them overcome creative challenges, it never feels like work, and I feel very lucky to have found such a place and position at SDSU that fits me so well.”
Congratulations to Patrck Flanigan for this well-deserved award!
