Nursing Student Finds a Creative Escape in UML Library

As a nursing major, Eden Adams spends much of her time preparing for a career caring for patients and advocating for women’s health.

But through her campus job as a learning services and media creator with the UMass Lowell Library, Adams has found an unexpected way to exercise a different set of skills: creating digital content, developing marketing ideas and producing immersive experiences for her fellow students.

Her latest project was the library’s third annual escape room, “Disco Fever.” Adams helped develop the storyline, write clues and construct props for the recent two-night event at O’Leary Library on South Campus and Lydon Library on North Campus.

“It’s turned out to be super-fun and educational, too,” says Adams, a junior honors student from Worcester.

The project also offered Adams a creative escape from the demands of nursing school. She spent about a month collaborating with students from several majors — including the Francis College of Engineering Ambassadors — to design and build the experience, which combined a 1970s disco theme with a Halloween-style mystery.

In the storyline, library mascot Dewey the Duck learned that his friend had disappeared into a cursed disco mirror. The friend contracted “Disco Fever,” a mysterious illness with symptoms resembling a zombie outbreak. Students had to “enter” the mirror, follow the clues and find the antidote to save Dewey, his friend and themselves.

Escape rooms — interactive games in which teams solve puzzles and complete challenges to “escape” a themed space — have become a popular group activity, combining socializing with teamwork and problem-solving. 

For the library, the annual escape room event is a whimsical way to introduce students to resources they can use for their coursework. Yolanda Hood, the library’s first-year experience and instruction coordinator, describes that approach as the “pedagogy of play” — using games to encourage students to think critically, take risks and become more willing to ask for help.

That approach connected with Bernadette Beirne, a first-year business major from Berlin, Massachusetts. Beirne’s writing professor brought the class to the escape room to help students become familiar with the library before beginning research papers.

“It’s a fun way to learn about the library,” says Beirne, whose team of five “escaped” its first room at Lydon with several minutes to spare.

Adams works about 10 hours a week at O’Leary. Her position initially grew out of an Immersive Scholars award, and she returned to the library this year with support from library funding.

“I had to learn a lot of digital tools at first, and there’s a lot of marketing that goes into it as well,” says Adams, who also helped produce last year’s escape room.

Adams especially enjoys the job’s creative and collaborative nature, as well as the supportive community among the library staff. She hopes to return to the library during her senior year through an Honors Fellowship. 

Adams is also gaining hands-on experience in health care as a pediatric diabetes clinical intern at the Barton Center for Diabetes Education in Oxford. At UMass Lowell, she serves as an orientation leader and is involved with the Student Nursing Association and the Pre-Law Society and Mock Trial.

After earning her nursing degree, Adams hopes to build a career in women’s health, caring for patients’ mental and physical well-being and helping them advocate for themselves.

Her library job has given her a chance to develop her communication, collaboration and creative problem-solving skills while working on projects that bring students together.

“Sometimes you just need a break from all the health stuff you’re learning about,” Adams says. “This is a good step outside my comfort zone.”