“I Didn’t Know I Could Use the Library!” Meeting the Needs of Students Online

I’m at WILU 2013 – Workshop for Instruction in Library Use – a Canadian information literacy conference in Fredericton, New Brunswick: a great opportunity to network with librarians north of the border – or “south of the border” to them! I presented a session about implementing library services to online students:

“I Didn’t Know I Could Use the Library!” Meeting the Needs of Students Online

Session Description:
What do you do with students you rarely see in the library? University of Wisconsin-Green Bay has a growing online student population. Reaching these students can be challenging. Many still view the library as just a brick-and-mortar building, and not an online 24/7 resource. Librarians conducted an assessment of online students to investigate their needs. This session will focus on the assessment results and the information literacy outreach plan put into place. It will highlight several initiatives, including the embedded librarian program, faculty-librarian collaboration, marketing efforts, and learning tools geared towards online students. Based on feedback from students and faculty, an increase in reference questions, as well as high usage statistics from librarian-created tutorials and discussion boards, the outreach plan is working. Come and learn about these best practices for online learners and share your ideas, as well.

Here are some of the assessment tools, resources, guides, and tips mentioned in my presentation:

• Adult Degree Student Survey – Spring 2011
• Adult Degree Faculty Survey – Spring 2011
• Embedded Librarian Tips for Learning Management Systems
• Examples of Topics for “Ready to Go” Embedded Librarian Posts for the Learning Management System
• Embedded Librarian Checklist - questions for faculty to think about
• Adult Degree Student Library Guide
• Adult Degree Faculty & Staff Library Guide
• Plagiarism Guide & Tutorial
• Cite Your Sources/NoodleTools Guide & Tutorial
• Scholarly Sources Guide & Tutorial

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Postcards & Therapy Dogs: De-Stressing for Student Finals

It’s that time of year: Final Exams. To help de-stress students at my academic library, we usually plan some activities to help students relax and have a little fun too.

Yesterday I tweeted a postcard that my library is giving students to send back home to assure mom and dad that they’re studying for final exams. It proved popular! At last count, it was re-tweeted 37 times and favorited 31 times.

Final Exams postcard for students to send back home.

Library Postcards

So, how did the postcard idea come about? It’s all about partnerships. Our library director, Paula Ganyard (@ganyardp), who had read an article about a similar idea, approached our university’s marketing people–they thought it was a great idea. A graphics intern in their department designed two postcards for us to give to students.

For printing and postage, the partnership continues: the library, along with the university’s advancement office (the money people!) split the cost. Now before you think we’re spending money on postcards as opposed to books and databases, we’re not. We have a small amount of funds that can be used for outreach projects such as this. As academic libraries do more outreach, having money to do things outside of the normal “library” realm becomes more important.

So, what do we see as the “worth” in doing something like this? Our library director thinks it’s something fun and different for today’s college students. Used to communicating electronically, the postcard idea is a fun, retro way to connect with mom and dad. Building on this, it’s also great way for the library to connect with parents, promote the university’s new brand, and promote the library as Wisconsin Library of the Year. But it all ties back to the students: we hope that the small things we do add to students’ overall college experience, helps to retain them, and creates a fun memory for their library and their campus.

Therapy Dogs

In addition to the postcard idea, we try to do one “big” event for Final Exams each semester. For Fall Final Exams in December, we bring in therapy dogs–which has become one of our most talked about events.

One of our librarians belongs to a local kennel club. Their dogs have all passed the “canine good citizenship” test and do outreach at schools, nursing homes, and now our academic library. On the day of the event, we block off a two hour time span on one of library floors and invite anywhere from 12-15 therapy dogs.  Response from students has been through the roof, as evidenced in social media posts (here, here, here, and here). We even made the local TV news:

UWGB students use dogs to escape exams

The therapy dog visit demonstrates the library’s commitment to not only the academic needs of students, but to their general mental and behavioral well-being. It gives students a moment to relax, recalibrate, and re-energize before the next big exam.

Complaints about allergies and noise have been minor. I think of it this way: it’s one day of the year, for two hours, limited to one floor of the library, and highly publicized. We also try to hold it right BEFORE final exams begin, to avoid any major disruptions. Also: if you want to do therapy dogs, don’t forget to check on liability/insurance issues. We had do some paperwork!

For more photos of our “furry” library friends, check out the UW-Green Bay’s Cofrin Library Flickr set.

The therapy dogs and other outreach activities we do are covered in a presentation I did with my colleague Renee Ettinger at the Wisconsin Library Association Conference in October 2012.

Include “Passive” Activities, Too

Besides postcards and therapy dogs, we also try to have a variety of “passive” activities: coloring, board games, easy crafts, etc. Anything to take students’ minds of Finals…if just for a bit.

I’m interested in hearing about what other academic libraries do for Final Exams. Let me know and leave a comment!

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Get ‘Embed’ with Your Librarian: Meeting the Needs of Students Online

The online market is a growing field for higher education. How does the academic library fit into all of this? My colleague–Anne Kasuboski–and I gave a presentation at the 2013 Wisconsin Association of Academic Librarians conference, held at Elkhart Lake.

We discuss how our library at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay surveyed our online students and faculty and developed an outreach plan to meet their needs.

It covers our Embedded Librarian program, which started out as a pilot program and expanded successfully across online courses, in addition to some face-to-face courses. It also includes information on the learning tools that we gear towards online learners, such as LibGuides, tutorials, and resources like NoodleTools.

If you have questions about being an “embedded librarian”–let me know! I would like to hear what other librarians are doing with programs such as these.

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Bringing the Annotated Bibliography into the 21st Century: Using a LibGuide as an Assignment

I’m a LibGuides aficionado. Students love them. Professors love them. It’s a great way to package only the most relevant library and research-related content and tie it directly to an assignment or course. Professors can then link to it from their course management system (e.g., Blackboard, Moodle, D2L) in an environment where students spend most of their online “academic” time anyway.

This semester I taught a course for my institution’s Information and Computing Sciences department: Information Science 410: Advanced Information Problems. This course takes a problem/solution oriented approach to a complicated issue – in our case, gun control – and examines the maze of information related to it.

As a librarian, I thought the best thing to do was to put together a LibGuide to direct students to good information. But then I thought, “Hey, these are information science students…let’s put them to work!” Because the course spends time on evaluating information, a course LibGuide project was a perfect opportunity for students to demonstrate their skills.

Using our gun control issue, students worked in teams to evaluate the best library databases for the topic, and gathered relevant books, websites, government information, and video. I taught them how to use the LibGuides system and gave an overview of “model” LibGuides. Each group was provided with a LibGuide shell. Students had “collaborator” access to the LibGuide allowing them to add content and edit the design.

After each group submitted their LibGuide, I had a panel of library staff evaluate them. We selected the “winning” LibGuide to be published on our site. The end result?: a non-biased and informational guide on a popular and controversial issue that can be used by all students on our campus to gather academic information.

The project gives students practice at evaluating and curating information. The LibGuide, combined with a written assignment where students explain their information selection brings the time honored annotated bibliography into the 21st century. It’s something that academic librarians should market to professors as an assignment that demonstrates critical thinking and evaluative skills.

LibGuide link: http://libguides.uwgb.edu/guns

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Edible Books Redux

Last year I blogged about hosting an Edible Book Festival – it’s a great way to get your community to think about books and reading in a different light. You’re also asking your community to contribute and show off their talents. And who doesn’t like some cake? I love the cleverness and creativity associated with this event. You can even promote it with fun tag lines such as:

It’s time to cook the books!

Did you ever want to eat your own words?

Yesterday, my library held its 2nd annual Edible Book Fest to coincide with National Library Week. This year we did a few things differently. We changed some of the prize categories. This year we did:

• People’s Choice
• Biggest Wow Factor
• Best Interpretation of a Title
• Most Likely to Be Eaten
• “Punniest”

We also relied on “celebrity” judges to pick the winners for each of the categories–with the exception of “People’s Choice.” Last year, we spent too much time trying to tally up the winners, so we let our community vote for “People’s Choice” and then only had to tally up votes for one category – this streamlined things for us.

Take a look at some of our edible entries:

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How Ranking Library Schools is Like Ranking the Socks in Your Drawer

U.S. News & World Report just released new rankings of graduate schools in library science. Isn’t ranking library schools sort of like ranking the socks in your drawer? It does not matter.

I hope that prospective MLS students don’t read the rankings and think, “Gee, I need to go to THAT library school!”

These rankings have repeatedly been called into question. The prime reason is the methodology:

The rankings are based solely on the results of a fall 2012 survey sent to the dean of each program, the program director, and a senior faculty member in each program.

And this:

The library and information studies specialty ratings are based solely on the nominations of program deans, program directors, and a senior faculty member at each program. They were asked to choose up to 10 programs noted for excellence in each specialty area. Those with the most votes are listed.

Not a good research methodology, is it?–something that I suspect any MLS student could tell you. The issue of college rankings (both undergraduate and graduate programs) and the data that is gathered has been scrutinized by higher ed periodicals and websites. Just take a look at:

• Can You Verify That? – InsideHigherEd.com, Feb. 6, 2013 
• Yet Another Rankings Fabrication – InsideHigherEd.com, Jan. 2, 1013
• Alternative to Law School Rankings – InsideHigherEd.com, Nov. 1, 2012
• The U.S. News Seal of Approval Isn’t Free – Chronicle.com, Aug. 7, 2010

So what should a prospective MLS student do? I’ve written about this before, but when it comes to library school, just pick the cheapest (in state vs. out of state) or most convenient (online vs. on-campus) option that’s available to you. The coursework provides the base and the theory, but it’s experience that will get you a job. If you’re just taking the classes, you’re doing it wrong.

I remember students in my program complaining that the MLS coursework wasn’t “academic” enough, but I think it’s important to remember that you are in a professional program. You are training for a career, not writing a dissertation. It’s up to you to turn the coursework into something worthwhile. Work as a paraprofessional or library assistant during library school. Do an internship, practicum, or volunteer. These experiences will help you land a job better than any course you take.

I’ve never looked at anyone’s résumé and thought, “Wow, they graduated from a top ranked library school! Let’s hire him/her.” So ignore the rankings. Focus on gaining some relevant experience instead.

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Eat The Frog! Prioritizing Your Work

Eat The Frog!

Yesterday I attended a session about the work/life balance: practical tips, advice, and sharing of ideas. Up until this semester, I had a pretty good work/life balance: I have my friends and family, a hobby I’m passionate about (amateur photography), and I usually don’t take my work home.

But this semester has been a little crazy: I’m teaching a semester-long class on top of my full-time librarian gig, I’m chairing a university committee, I have two presentations to give in April & May, a week-long trip to London, a trip to Canada penciled in, and a commute that’s wearing on me. I know it sounds like I’m complaining. A trip to London? Boo-hoo. I’m not some Type A personality who thrives on this. That’s so “not me.” I’m just feeling overwhelmed at this point. I’ll be glad when this semester is over and things return to a more “normal” level for me. I know it’s temporary. So I’ll be OK…but rest assured, I’m counting the weeks until May!

One big thing I took away from the work/life balance session was the “Eat The Frog” idea to prioritizing your work (there’s even a self-help book about it). One of my library colleagues shared it with me. The idea here is to stop procrastinating with work projects and prioritize them. Picture yourself as literally having to eat a live frog every day at work. What could be worse than this? Would you put it off? Wait til the end of the day to do it? No! You wouldn’t want it to drag on. You’d be thinking about having to eat that frog all day long!

So, what’s the strategy? Eat the frog first! Tackle the hardest or most unpleasant tasks right off the bat when you get into work. Get them done and out of the way. Then you can move on to things that you enjoy.

Eat a live frog first thing in the morning and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day. – Mark Twain

Another thing that helps me prioritize is my trusty office whiteboard. Electronic “sticky notes” or reminders on my iPhone don’t cut it for me. I must see my to-do list on my whiteboard at all times. It’s right at my eye-level, so as I’m going through emails on my computer, editing documents, working in D2L, doing social media stuff for the library–my to-do list is always within view. It’s how I stay on task.

So for me, it’s frogs and old school whiteboards that keep me in line! What about you?

My Trusty Whiteboard

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Poster Presentations 101: Creating Effective Presentations

Poster sessions are a great opportunity to get your feet into the water and show off research you’ve done, a project you have implemented, or a new service you are providing.

More low-key than a full blown conference presentation, poster sessions are akin to an elevator speech – “Hey, look at these cool things I’m doing!” – as a librarian, that’s what I love about them: I get practical ideas and advice in a short amount of time that I can adapt or re-tool for my library.

At the 2012 American Library Association Annual Conference, I presented my first poster session: Assessment into Action: Meeting the Needs of Adult Learners. It was a great experience. I enjoyed taking a topic that I was interested in and using my design/creative skills to come up with a poster to share the information.

This semester, I’m teaching an undergrad information science class at my university. One of the projects that students are currently working on is a poster presentation.

Whether the students go on to grad school or out into the work field right away, a poster session is something that they are likely to encounter. To get them thinking about poster presentations, I shared some helpful links with them covering content, design, and software to use. These links can be tremendously useful if you’re new to poster presentations, so I thought I’d share…

• Sample Poster Sessions – American Library Association
• Tips for Poster Sessions – American Library Association
• Ten Simple Rules for a Good Poster Presentation – PLOS Computational Biology
• Creating Effective Poster Presentations – North Carolina State University
• Poster Session Tips – Penn State University
• Poster Session Preparation – LibGuide from Arizona State University Libraries
• Presentations & Poster Sessions – LibGuide from Brandeis University Library & Technology Services
• Scientifically Speaking – The Oceanography Society
• How to Make a Great Poster – American Society of Plant Biologists
• Designing Effective Poster Presentations – Johns Hopkins University
• Poster Sessions – Colorado State University
• Design of Scientific Posters – Penn State University
• Pimp My Poster – Flickr group
• Presentations 101 (or, How to Avoid Death by PowerPoint) – LibGuide from Little Red School House & Elisabeth Irwin High School (not specifically poster presentations, but great design advice)

If you have any links to share, let me know!

My poster presentation for the 2012 American Library Association Annual Conference

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Disappearing Information

Let me be up front: I’m not a gov docs expert, but I do get irked when tax money that was used to collect Census info isn’t being used to make (or maintain) that information in an easily accessible manner to the public. It reminds me of last year’s debacle with the Statistical Abstract of the United States.

I’m talking about last week’s web conference on the recently re-designed American FactFinder from the U.S. Census Bureau. Basically, the issue boils down to this: American FactFinder will only contain data from the two most recent decennial U.S. censuses (currently 2000 and 2010). So once 2020 data is available, we can say “bye bye” to 2000, because then it will hold 2010 and 2020. This doesn’t make sense. You can find out more on this topic by looking at the GOVDOC-L discussion list archives from this month.

Researching trends with our populace over time is common among both social scientists and humanities scholars. You can’t tell me that a system can only “hold” data from two censuses. What compounds the problem is that the Census data is no longer released in a tangible format. So once it’s gone from the Census Bureau website, then it’s pretty much gone for good–at least as far as the general public is concerned. Now, the U.S. Census Bureau did say you could FTP to the older Census information, but that doesn’t boil down to easy access.

Our tax dollars go to support the collection of this information. We deserve to have this information (current and historical) displayed publicly, online, and in an easy-to-use format. Librarians have stood aside as the “gatekeepers” to information. Now we emphasize “access.” But we’re losing that now, too.

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Advice: Being a Librarian…10 Years On

As of today, I’ve logged 10 years as a librarian. I started my first professional library job as a reference librarian at Sam Houston State University in Texas in February 2003. A couple months prior, I was getting ready to graduate with my MLS from Indiana University in December 2002 when I managed to snag three librarian interviews in Texas, South Carolina, and New Mexico. I was geographically free to move anywhere, and in the post-9/11 economic slump, I was grateful for what I had. The Texas job matched my skills and interests and I took it! Since TX, I’ve logged time in IL, NH, and WI.

In the 10 years since I became a librarian, much has changed. I was actually taught command line searching in library school because it was thought that I might encounter it. Never did. We also put together a lot of paper bibliographies on various topics–but of course that’s what today’s Libguides do. An ebook was an annoying thing you *had* to read on your computer via the NetLibrary database – not a device you could take anywhere! A cell phone was not “smart” – just a device to take/make calls. Facebook and Twitter did not exist, which is funny since social media has evolved into a major component of my job.

I’ve enjoyed being a librarian. I don’t say I *love* it–that’s reserved for family, friends, and free-time. But it’s so nice to have a job where you *enjoy* coming into work (or at the very least, don’t *hate* it). A lot of people can’t say that. For me, being a librarian has always been about connecting people with information. This is what I like. It’s not the books. It’s not the technology. It’s People + Information.

So, for 10 years, here’s 10 quick bits of advice on being a librarian:

1. You’re not going to please everybody
   Don’t try. Do your job. Do it well. Some people are not going to like you no matter what you do. Get over it.
2. Say yes to new opportunities
   Don’t be afraid. Yes, it can be overwhelming, but ultimately worthwhile. If I hadn’t said “yes” I would have missed out on side opportunities like teaching some fun credit classes (“Podcasting 101″, “College Life Through Film”)  and the chance to work as an instructional technologist.   
3. Attitude Matters
   Be positive. Sometimes just being “nice” works–but make sure it’s genuine. I guess a more formal term is “collegiality” – you need to do it, otherwise you’re in the wrong field.
4. You don’t have to be the expert at everything
   We all have our strengths. It’s OK to ask someone else if YOU don’t know the answer. “But wait, we’re librarians…we’re supposed to know EVERYTHING.” No! But we know WHERE to find the answer.
5. Don’t let anyone make you feel like you are not a professional
   You know what you’re doing. You have the skills. Speak up for yourself, because sometimes no one else will.
6. The patron (customer) is not always right
   Many business ideas are applicable to libraries. But this one bugs me. The patron is NOT always right. Be clear, concise, courteous, and reasoned in disagreements. However, bad behavior from patrons should not be rewarded. See #5.
7. You never stop learning
   I like reading blog posts and discussion postings from “newbie” librarians. But then I think: Hey, I feel like that too! Because libraryland changes so much, I still feel like a newbie. That’s what I love about being a librarian.
8. Sometimes getting a job is just luck
   I know this bothers some people, but it just is. Maybe the preferred candidate turned down the job and you as the 2nd choice got it? Maybe you made an outstanding presentation when compared to other candidates? Maybe it was a Friday and the hiring committee was just ready to get the job offered to…someone. Unfortunately, some things are just beyond your control.
9. Trust your instincts
   Does something not sound/look quite right? It probably is! Creepy patron, weird job interview, strange chat reference questions?…yep.
10. Work/Life Balance
    Take your vacation time. Be passionate about something non-library related. Disconnect from email/voicemail in your free time. Give yourself a chance to re-charge, and return to the library feeling energized.

What advice would you give?

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