Professional Development

On Wednesday, July 29th, Mary Scanlon and I participated in the ACRL OnPoint Chat series, “Are Reference Desks Passé?” While no definitive conclusion was reached, many salient points were discussed. The format of this series was a Meebo Chatroom with 80 participants. Two parallel threads emerged during the 45 minute conversation: the medium and the provider of reference service.

The title challenged people to discuss different service points and varying technologies available for users. Service points included the traditional stand-alone reference desk, a single service point (reference and circulation) or virtual service points which included Twitter, IM, VOIP, video, text, email, walkie talkies, Vocera devices and software such as LibraryH3lp, Google Voice, and others. By and large the librarians in the discussion found that faculty were not users of chat clients, while undergraduates used both chat and text. No consensus was reached regarding the necessity of a reference desk, but many excellent questions were raised.

Who should staff the desk was the other dominant theme in the conversation. Current solutions ran the full spectrum, but a recurring theme was the de-professionalization of the desk staff. Numerous libraries are using a triage model to refer difficult questions to subject specialists. Another aspect of this discussion was that embedded widgets throughout a library’s website were viewed to be a powerful way to drive traffic to subject specialists.

As first-time participants in a chat session like this, both Mary and I were struck by the chaotic nature of the format. Participants were answering multiple questions simultaneously, creating a challenging discussion environment. However, in spite of these challenges, it was possible to see the overarching themes emerge and glean the experiences of other academic libraries. If you would like to see the transcript it can be found at: http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl/events/onpoint/index.cfm

I apologize for the length of this post, but it is encompassing both Saturday and Sunday, and both were extremely valuable days at the conference.

Saturday, March 14’s first session was called Weaving a new net: Hauling multiple services into a New Learning Commons at Seattle University. They discussed the trials and rewards of bringing together 4 discrete operations into a single “help area”. The 4 operations were not overseen or common to the library, but would be collocated there once their renovation was complete.They began planning in 2005 and envisioned a collaborative, stimulating interactive space that would assist users in multiple needs. This was all very exciting, but hard to envision. The Provost selected from a number of proposed operations to be moved initially into the space.The Research Assistance desk, Speaking Center, Writing Center and Learning Assistance departments were included. Left out of the initial mix, but under consideration were the Teaching and Learning Center, Circulation Services, Math Lab, Student Advising, and the Disability Services. Each of the four that were to be moved into the Learning Commons were from different buildings, different cultures, different operations, with differing levels of staffing and staff, and cultures. They each answered to different budget lines and different bosses as well and all had different levels of financial support. From this very awkward beginning, they started conversations in early 2006, and were glad that they had the benefit of time to figure it all out. It is to open in September, 2010. Some members of the panel expressed a discomfort with feeling like a “guest” to the library. They didn’t know at the outset what each other’s missions or best practices were. Others were still trying to figure out what the best practices were to be. There was a clash of cultures, (hierarchical vs. collaborative). They will continue to have separate budgets and reporting lines but said that with a common mission and vision, (they also expressed a little difficulty figuring out the difference between mission and vision) and lots of open communication, they were confident that it would all be a beneficial experience for the students but still had a little defining work to do. Questions from the audience were asking about whether there were plans to include media/technology support in the future or if it had been considered. The panelists agreed that there would be benefits to this, but the decision of what to include in the Learning Commons was entirely the Provosts, and it was not included at the outset.

Second session was with Veronica Bielatt and Judith Arnold, former colleagues from WSU who spoke on Creating Instruction Objects “to go”. They discussed the need for portable, large scale, point of need instruction to support three large classes of business/finance students, about 600 students in all.They moved to these little 1-2 minute teaching objects, developed in 3 “chunks” and portable across many formats, and provided for other people who may or may not have “pre knowledge”. The 2 minute micro lectures include demonstration of the skill and then user demonstrating the skill. They utilized online collaborative mind mapping, Mind Meister. Then compared Trailfire or Brain Honey for the teaching and Hot Potatoes for the self-test.

After lunch in a little café, (where we had to walk a bit because every restaurant near the convention center was packed with librarians), we did a tour of the Seattle Public Library, then back for the afternoon sessions..

I stayed a few minutes with Lauren’s “Charting the path to the Mountaintop” where we were supposed to describe in a catch phrase what our own personal path had been thus far. I decided the catch phrase for my path was “Taking advantage of surprise.”

Halfway through I left to catch the second half of the Reference Renovation project that was offered by former colleagues from Wayne State. The reference area renovation that they described was a two year project that began before I left there, so it was very interesting to me how it all turned out.In order to have the space work, they opened up vast areas of the first floor of Purdy Library, downsized their reference collection by 81% and put the reference desk in the center of the area that had previously been only rows and rows of computer terminals.They utilized a 3D modeling software to plan the changes and found it very beneficial both for identifying potential problems with their design, and using it as a valuable tool for showcasing the project for potential funders. They finally finished the project with the installation of the new work areas and reference desk in December/January of this year after having to make a few “seat of the pants” changes to configuration because the original “pinwheel” design didn’t work aesthetically and was not stable enough actually hold up the computers. But the end result is really a great renovation of what had been a really sad space.

The evening events have already been described by others, but I will say that the dinner was the best I’d had in Seattle, and the EMP and Sci Fi museum was really fun.

Sunday in Seattle dawned snowy.

After saying goodbye to Roz and Susan, I ran over to the conference center to see Robin Chase, the invited “green speaker.” ACRL made a commitment to have a “green” conference this year and 80% of the participants took the pledge. (I admit that I must have missed that part of the website, because I didn’t take the pledge, but did participate in the initiatives.) Some ways that that manifested itself are:

1. Sessions had no powerpoint handouts.

2. Each attendee was given a bag made of 10% recycled content. (I think they could have done better there.)

3. Each attendee was given a “shower timer” so that we could try to keep our showers down to only 4 minutes. (I used it and it worked and managed to get my showers to the shortest ever. One little tip, open the shampoo bottle before you turn on the water. Saves precious seconds.)

4. There were recepticles for recycling the program and the badge holders after the conference.

Robin Chase is the founder and CEO of ZipCar the worlds largest car sharing company, and also GoLoco, a ride sharing community. She discussed the importance of reevaluating how we all operate if we want to continue to have the same level of cultural wealth that we enjoy today. We should all recognize our unrealized capacity in everything and try to exploit it, efficiently using our resources, instead of continuing to deplete them. Examples she gave are the ZipCar program she started, which is essentially a time share program for automobiles. Also mentioned the “CouchSurfing” program, run through a website, where individuals needing low cost accommodations can sign up to sleep on the couch of a willing and available couch owner in the same town. (I have a couch that is available, but not utilized all night. You have the need for a couch to sleep on. That is the essence of recognizing an unrealized potential and utilizing it.) She was a very entertaining speaker and recognized the synergy between what she does and what libraries have always done…shared resources among many for the good of everyone. (She said something like, “You have know idea how much fabulocity is in this room!”) One of the questions that was posed to her at the end of the session was regarding how to begin to move the seemingly immovable like vendors who write restrictive license agreements that won’t allow for easy sharing of resources. Her answer, interestingly enough is to find the value of the service you want to provide to the seller, and sell them on it. It might mean that you give a different story to everyone you meet. She said that if she just told everyone in this room that we should all sell our cars and sign up for this timeshare that will be managed through the web and lessen the ‘available-ness’ of cars to you, no one would be willing to do that. But, when she says to city planners, you can, by promoting this, eliminate some of the road construction and maintenance that is projected, they respond to taht. When she says to individuals that you can save money on both autos, and insurance AND reduce air pollution, as well as building up your social network, they respond to that. And she says to schools and doctors that she can demonstrate an impact on the numbers of students with asthma, THEN people start to listen and recognize the value of this lifestyle. She challenged all of us to begin by just announcing to everyone when you are going anywhere in your car, and see if someone in earshot might like to share a ride. Get in the habit of recognizing unrealized capacity and utilizing it. Scarcity breeds a desire for ownership, but social sharing breeds a feeling of wealth and abundance.

Second session of the day was Improving on Excellence: Looking Beyond Information Literacy to the 21^st Century Educational Paradigms and Virtual Worlds. This session was on gaming and how gaming can be used to teach the core fluencies that all 21^st century users should have. The panelists were all from Ontario, Canada, and two of them were from McMaster University one from Earlham College. Shawn McCann, (another former colleague from WSU) is the Nextgen and Gaming Librarian (I kid you not!) at McMaster. He took us into the “World of Warcraft” game , and demonstrated all of the core fluencies, and how they are involved in the game. The fluencies expected of a 21^st century learner include: information; media; numeracy; business and economic, scientific, multicultural, and geospatial. It was a fascinating look at gaming, and I now have new found respect!

The final event, the closing keynote by Ira Glass, long awaited by yours truly, (big fan of This American Life did not disappoint. His story telling technique is epic. Others have described the lecture already…how he started the lecture speaking to us in the dark, just to illustrate the power of just listening. One lesson that resonated with me is when he demonstrated how he reels in the listener. At one point, to make his point, he stopped the narrative of one of his stories long enough to show all of us just what happens when we hear the beginning of a story, even a rather mundane story. It was driving me crazy not knowing how it would end, as he dangled that ending out in front of us like a carrot. It was like hearing a great set up to a joke, but not knowing the punchline! As he put it, “when the story starts to build, nobody turns off the radio just then.” One statement he made, (this may not be verbatim but it is the essence) is “the more idealistic the position you are trying to sell, the more cunning you need to be about encasing it in something people will want to hear or know about.” It made me think about our library services that we are so certain that faculty and students need to know about, but we have a difficult time sending that message out. We need to recognize that everyone else sees us differently than we see ourselves. Identify that which is universal and tell a story about what is at stake. His funniest moment was, as Lauren said, when he blamed the creation of the topic sentence for the current situation with the dearth of storytelling. Giving away all of the good stuff at the beginning takes all the fun and interest out of the story. He was a great ending keynoter for a very enriching conference.

Poster Sessions

Saturday’s ACRL was chock-full of opportunities for learning and networking. I don’t think any of us have mentioned that the “gate count” for the conference was 2841 face-to-face attendees and a minimum of 332 virtual attendees for a new record. So, the Convention Center was bustling all day long. As Lynn intimated in her post, Saturday seemed to have the most concurrent sessions of contributed papers, panel sessions, wrokshops, and Cyber Zed Shed presentations going from 8 am until the close at 5 pm. With round table discussions and poster session nestled in between, so that there was always something to attend! It was hard to decide which to choose.

I was very impressed with how they handled the poster sessions for this conference. At many conferences, they seem to stick poster sessions in a back corner (I remember one ALA were people were stationed right next to the restrooms). But as you can see from the picture above, ACRL 2009 poster sessions had the most beautiful space in the conference. And the space was adjacent to the exhibit area. They held 2 rounds of poster sessions on Friday and 3 on Saturday. These were scheduled to be competition free, meaning that everyone came in to visit vendor booths, talk to poster presenters and have their conference-provided morning/afternoon snacks. It worked out very well and gave a good level of energy to the activities taking place. Some of the poster topics that caught my attention were: Library Secrets: Packaging Tips and Tricks into Bite Size Pieces for the Hard to Pin-Down Student, LEAP to New Heights,-How your Organization can Inspire your Employees to take the Next Jump in their Careers, Rewarding Scholarship through the Library Research Reward for Undergraduates, and Exploring Effective Typography: Extending our Outreach Through Successful Signage.

I attended an interesting session first thing yesterday morning on “Using READ Scale (Reference Effort Assessment Data): Capturing Qualitative Statistics for meaningful Reference Assessment.” READ is a 6 point scale tool developed to provide more meaningful reference transaction statistical information. With this tool, every question asked is not a simple hash mark on the tally page. Instead, questions are weighted on a scale from 1 to 6 so that the emphasis is placed on recording the skills, knowledge, techniques and tools utilized by the librarian during a reference transaction. “Where is the restroom?” may be a 1, where an hour spent helping a student discover primary resources to support a research paper might be a 5. Fourteen institutions participated in a study to research the viability of the tool and 3 of the participants reported on their experiences. All were very positive about the usefulness of the tool for a variety of reasons - helping with staffing, providing statistics for advocacy reasons, and providing a much more realistic picture of what is really happening with reference transactions these days - there may be less of them from walk up patrons, but they are becoming more in-depth in the form of individual research sessions that more often come in via virtual methods. It was an interesting concept that I’d like to see us explore.

Learning objects are a hot topic (Lauren’s Toolkit project is a prime example), so I enjoyed a presentation by former colleagues of Mary Beth’s from Wayne State. They instructed the audience on what learning objects are: an online resource or set of resources that has been developed to achieve a specific learning outcome and that has been developed in such a way that it is portable and can be reused in other learning environments. It needs to be topically focused and narrow in scope, it need to stand alone out of any contextual framework (like a specific vendor interface) and should include a “check for understanding.” They did a very capable job of introducing the audience to the value of these in supporting point of need instruction.

After a quick visit to the Seattle Public Library at lunchtime, my afternoon was filled with attending ZSR presentations. I wanted to attend everyone’s, and it was really wonderful to see how well all three presentations by Lauren P., Lynn and Roz were received by their audiences. I was the self appointed photographer (see below and my Flickr site.)

Lauren

Lynn

Roz

We finished up the day with a nice dinner out and an all-conference reception at the Experience Music Project/Science Fiction Museum. The exhibits were very cool (remember Invasion of the Body Snatchers? How about the Attack of the 50 Foot Woman?). But, the real attraction can be seen in the picture below, where you can see us taking advantage of the huge assortment of desserts offered to all of the guests!

Overall, I thought this particular conference was very valuable with plenty of content that will provide us with much to think about. Too bad that today is the let-down day. I’m writing this sitting at the airport waiting for my flight that hopefully will get me back to Greensboro by 11:30 tonight. This is when I wish some of the stuff in the Science Fiction Museum was real: a transportation machine that would zip me back to W-S in the snap of a finger!

A busy day today started with

The Proquest Breakfast . Roz and I attended the presentation that was meant to showcase the new Summon Unified Discovery Service.In order to frame the issue, first Alison Head spoke about, “Project information literacy:Through the lens of the Student Experience“

She shared a YouTube video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cvZPMmYeR4) that summed up the results, and discovered 7 out of 10 students start with Wikipedia first, to get “presearch”.They do not cite, (because they have been told not to use it), but do use.The second speaker, Jane Burke, began by taking a position that if more than half of the academic library’s money is spent on electronic in academic libraries, then the collections have become electronic.They did anthropological research:they went where the students are conducting research…in their dorm, library, coffee shop.Solicited student participation through facebook, asked if they would let Proquest watch while they did research…for money.In the course of discussion, they discovered that students believe that libraries provide superior sources for quality… Web research gives a lot of junk, therefore the library is the most efficient place for research.HOWEVER, the use of Google and GoogleScholar is on the rise.How to explain the dichotomy?When time is tight they go to Google…and they aren’t procrastinating, they are busy!

Conclusions:Why is the library not the first place people go?Libraries provide no clear and compelling starting place.”It is difficult to discern what is the appropriate resource for me”. ” I’m short on time, don’t have wherewithal to start “investigating” where to begin.”She quoted“How do you know that?An investigation of student research practices in the digital age.” , another study, shows the library is seen as intimidating and inconvenient…especially in its primary purpose…helping with research.

Then she introduced “Summon:single search unified access tool”.Not a federated search, but a precoordinated metadata delivery service.Single search, preloaded with content (like Google’s web crawler) that provides the full breadth of digital and physical content available in the library, and to the libraries users.It brings together print, electronic, courseware, databases, institutional repository, conference proceeding, dissertations, your digital library, and all given equal presentation, equal weight.And only provides that which is available to your users…respecting copyright, respecting licenses.This is in beta at Darmouth and Oklahoma State and about to go into University of Liverpool and University of Sydney.

From there I headed to the Cyber Zed Shed and a session that discussed optimizing web pages for mobile use.The presenter told how they condensed the content of web pages and distilled the whole website down to 5 pages.The best take away for me…using Twitter to update the pages when things like “hours of operation” or “changes to a library event” require quickly pushing content out to the web.

Post literacy:Michael Ridley, CIO and Chief Librarian, University of Guelph-Ontario

Fascinating presentation on post literacy, Michael envisions an age when we move beyond literacy to an era of human communication that exceeds and replaces written language.Since we can think so much faster than we can write, literacy is inefficient and slow.Post literacy will provide an opportunity for greater and faster collaboration, utilizing technologies that allow for greater sharing of thought.Like the BORG in Star Trek, we will give up the “I” for the benefit of “we”.His most provocative statement:Literacy is over.Post literacy is an advance:Difficult transition to post literacy, but it is coming.Once we are in a post literacy society, libraries will be unnecessary.(He did say, however, that everyone in the room could relax…our jobs are not immediately threatened.)

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Campus disconnect: Cara Bradley, Distance Ed and Outreach Librarian at the University of Regina-Saskatchewan

Cara surveyed campus staff who are not on the teaching faculty and found that the majority of staff have information needs, but do not turn to the library for assistance.To the users in this study, when ranking what is most important, first is accuracy, currency, and convenience.She asked “if you don’t use the library, why not.”An astonishing 14% said they forgot about the library.This response was given in a free text box.She hadn’t included it as a choice on the survey.It never occurred to her that this could be true.The staff indicated that they would be more apt to use the libray if they had a designated contact person, someone to build a rapport with.Library isn’t important to respondents in this survey, but more than half would like to see the library play a larger role when they are looking for information.Recognized benefits:stress reduction; opportunity to learn and reuse new strategies.They would feel more authoritative, credible, and efficient.

Others have already commented on other presentations and I won’t duplicate them here. Lunch provided by Gale, (with Roz) showed off many new and expanded full text databases. They highlighted GREENR, the new database that brings together content for environmental studies and sustainability was particularly interesting.

Today was a busy one, full of educational sessions, vendor meetings, and poster sessions. My day started with a breakfast session about “Leveraging the Institutional Repository to support the institution’s strategic mission.” An interesting resource that was mentioned during the presentation was ROAR: Registry of Open Asccess Repositories that monitors the growth of eprint archives (current total is 1295). Some have languished, some have thrived. The presentation content was not new, but reinforced the things we have learned thus far about how to improve the chances for a successful IR. The presenter was Richard Clement, Dean of Libraries, from Utah State. He talked about the importance for the mandate for an IR to come from the top down. If the Provost deems it to be a priority, it is much more likely that the deans will agree. It is helpful to bring in an outside expert to help make your case.

I met with my ALA Editions editor to talk about the “next generation” of my web-based instruction book. So much has changed since the last edition, it is time for a major update and perhaps time for other organizational changes, including placing some of the content on an accompanying web site. One thing for sure, it will be a busy summer since I’ve committed to getting the draft done by September.

Wanda and I attended a Counting Opinions users meeting over lunch. We’ve been beta testers for the a good part of the past year (have you seen the survey that is available from our main site home page?). The company has the product ready to offer to other institutions and wanted last minute feedback from the beta testing libraries.

I attended the afternoon round of poster sessions. It was a lively area, with lots of people attending. Topics were wide ranging: from writing grants, to information literacy, library partnerships, research commons and “exploring effective typography” (Mary Beth and Craig, I was thinking of you all during this one!).

The last session I made it to was a debate: “Resolved: the Master’s Degree in library science is Not Relevant to the Future of Academic Libraries. Arnold Hirshon took the affirmative (they are NOT relevant) and made 10 minutes of good point at a rapid clip. His reasons included that library school curriculum is devoid of content unique to libraries, that they lack good predictive admittance criteria and they are teaching the wrong things . The negative side was addressed by Liz Bishoff, and to be honest, her points were less than compelling. I almost felt sorry for her because she sounded like she didn’t really believe what she was saying……It seemed to be a slam-dunk for the Affirmative side.

After that, I let Roz talk me into supporting the Deacs by watching the WFU-Maryland game for the ACC tournament. She had done her research and we found a nearby sports bar with enough big screens that they let us turn on the game. Too bad the outcome of this activity was as disappointing as the library education debate

Roz, Susan and I started out the day with the “Chocolate, Wine and Waterfalls” tour. The tour was populated with two buses full of librarians, so I guess there were plenty interested here at the conference. (The tour of area glass blowing facilities, didn’t make it, however.) It was a fun and engaging tour of the region. I’ve been here to Seattle several times since both of my sisters live here, but hadn’t ever done a real organized tour combining these three fabulous things.

Roz and Susan sat together on the bus with me on the seat behind them so I had an opportunity to meet a librarian who sat down next to me. His name was Nigel, originally from Belfast, who used to work at Notre Dame, and now works as the Univesity Librarian at Franklin College in …wait for it…Switzerland! He was very easy to talk to, but somehow we never got around to sharing stories of challenges in libraries, aside from the economic situation, which is truly worldwide. Over lunch, we discovered he had worked with Caroline Numbers, and wrote her a letter of recommendation before she came to Wake Forest. Small world.

I think that Susan’s pics will tell more of the day than my words will, but aside from the fact that the tour was very rushed, (they planned too much, but needed to get back to the Conference Center in time for the Keynote speaker), it was well done. Expect some chocolate on our return!

I wasn’t expecting to enjoy the keynote speaker, Rushworth Kidder. He was filling in for Naomi Klein, author of No Logos, and I had been looking forward to hearing her speak. We all agreed after Kidder’s speech that he did a good job. He clearly defined the problems of our time as attributable to a lack of ethics more than the result of economics or politics. He galvanized us to continue to cling to our ethical roots, and honored the profession of librarianship several times in his speech.

From there, we went to the Exhibits floor where I met up with several former colleagues from Wayne State. We had dinner at the hors d’oeuvres table. Tomorrow the conference begins in earnest.

Hello, fellow ZSR-ites. I’m a bit groggy after traveling all day. Got here in time to check into the room with Wanda and then head over to the convention center. First person I see is Jim Williams, Dean of Libraries at Colorado-Boulder, and an old friend of mine (from the 70’s!) from Wayne State.

The conference keynote speaker canceled at the last minute but ACRL had a back-up in line, so we heard a fine speech by Rushworth Kidder who spoke generally about ethics and specifically about the topics in his latest book, The Ethics Recession: Reflections on the Moral Underpinnings of the Current Economic Crisis. He described an ethical dilemma as one being between right and right, rather than right and wrong. He congratulated librarians for standing for ethics, that is, for trying to find the “higher” right. I like that.

Kidder says we, in America, are in an ethics recession, threatening free enterprise and democracy, and need to build a national culture of integrity. Pundits typically frame questions in either the language of economics (bottom line) or politics (power)but we are now moving on to ethics, as crises like Bernie Madoff have set off a moral outrage seething through the country. He described four drivers of dilemmas: truth v loyalty, individual v community, short-term v long term, and justice v mercy (I confess I borrowed this sentence from a twitter feed set up on the Virtual Conference when I got distracted for a minute - not bad for an old woman, eh?) His definition of moral courage (another book of his) is willing endurance in significant danger for the sake of principle. He gives librarians credit for being willing to face the tough issues and act as standard-bearers for our communities. His last point was that law will rush in to fill the void if there is a dearth of ethics; self regulation is ethics, external regulation is law.

After the keynote, everyone rushed down to the Exhibits, where Wanda and I met up with Susan, Roz and Mary Beth, and where it seemed like I ran into everyone I’ve ever known. That’s one of the great things about library conferences!

Today was a long travel day to arrive in Seattle for tomorrow’s start of ACRL 2009. Mary Beth and I caught a 6:25 am flight from Greensboro and arrived at our hotel around 1 pm (western time) after 7 hours of flight time and a stop in Houston. Roz flew on a different airline and showed up mid afternoon. Since the conference doesn’t start until tomorrow afternoon, Roz and I took advantage of the beautiful, if cold, afternoon to ride to the top of the Space Needle and visit Pike Place. We ended up at the Convention Center to pick up our conference materials so we can plan out the next few days (which we are doing as I type). The conference is being touted as being their greenest one ever. The conference bags are made from recyled material and the opening reception tomorrow night will use bamboo plates and compostable silverware. Tomorrow morning all three of us will taking advantage of a social networking opportunity as we join up with other conference attendees to go on a tour. Tune in tomorrow to hear about the “Chocolate, Wine and Waterfall” tour!

This afternoon 18+ folks gathered in LIB204 for a webcast from ACRL on Information Commons. The sections was led by Joan Lippencott. Here are the notes from the session - it will be available online from ACRL and I will post the link here when available.

She began by discussing the concepts of Information Commons and Learning Common.

• Not just computer labs - need to incorporate the role of content and levels of service that computer labs don’t.
• Many also make room for other campus services (writing center and Teaching and Learning Center)
• Info Commons emphasize areas for groups, collaborations, food, art, etc. as opposed to quiet individual study
• Need to provide an environment that engage learners
• Most are in libraries, but some are in academic buildings or student centers

Vision and Goals

• Who will conceptualize the vision and goals for your commons? Who other than library staff need to be involved? Encourages direct representation on committees by students.
• How does your library serve the community?
• Link your goals to the goals of the University as a whole.

For What Purpose

• Convenience
• Increase ability of students to work in groups
• Make more technology available
• Provide services efficiently and effectively
• Provide new services
• Promote a sense of community
• Enhance learning — should be your primary focus

Linking the Info Commons to Learning

• Deeper Learning
  • Social
  • Active
  • Contextual
  • Engaging
  • Student-Owned

Physical Space Slides showing examples of spaces from Info Commons

Collaborations and Partnership

Issue is do they become partners or just tenants? Not much leveraging of the physical proximity.

• Co-location - adjacenct service points and opportunities for informal crossover staff contact
• Cooperation
• Collaboration - developing shared mission and goals, joint planning, pool expertise to develop new services, each contributes resources.
• Dartmouth Center for Research, Writing and IT. http://www.dartmouth.edu/~rwit/
• GA Tech Information Commons

Staffing Issues:

• What will be the key uses of your commons?
• What types of services do you anticipate?
• Who will be your partner organizations?
• Will services with other units be co-located?
• What mix of professional, support, student staffing will be needed?
• What kind of training is needed and who will provide it?

Assessment

• Gate counts
• counts of use of workstations
• use surveys
• question counts
• satisfaction surveys
• quality perception surveys

• Frame assessments in the context of your institutiton’s learning priorities
• Partner with assessment experts on your campus
• Communicate to staff what type of information would be valuable to administrators and funders
• Assemble stakeholders to shape the assesment effort
• consider both quantitative and qualitative measures

5 Ideas You Can Do Now

• Form group spaces in open areas
• Add inexpensive equipment to promote student collaborative learning
• Improve promotion of content and services through signage and displays
• Begin pertnerships and joint training with other units
• Do needs assessments

Planning Issues

• Develop a vision related to learning
• Develop goals
• Determine partners
• define and gain resources
• determine location
• define what you want users to be able to do
• define services
• determine staff needs
• Later you can work on the specifics

I arrived in Denver, CO on Friday afternoon.After I unloaded my luggage at the hotel, I had dinner with Susan, Lauren C., and a couple of our Elsevier reps.On my way to dinner, I was happy to find a Starbucks near my hotel.

On Saturday morning, I went to the ACRL-Science and Technology Section All-Committees meeting.I am a member of the Membership and Recruitment Committee, and we discussed plans to create an ACRL-STS New Members wiki page, which would provide helpful information for those who are interested in joining a committee or becoming a chair of a committee.We also discussed plans to organize the New Members Breakfast, which is held every year at the ALA Annual Conference.

On Saturday afternoon, I attended the ACRL-STS Hot Topics Discussion Group.We discussed Assessment in the context of instruction.This topic has been on my mind lately, as I am planning to teach my second semester of LIB220.I shared my experience teaching LIB220 with my colleagues, and we had a lively discussion about various assessment techniques. I’m happy to share if anyone is interested in hearing more about what we discussed.

Next, I attended a discussion group on Embedded Librarians sponsored by the ACRL Heads of Public Services Discussion Group. One of my colleagues made a good point that Embedded Librarianship can inform our collection management decisions. They also provided a selected bibliography of publications about Embedded Librarians, and I will be happy to share this bibliography with others if anyone is interested.

On Sunday, I went to the Exhibits before my second committee meeting.This year, I am serving as Chair of the Scholarship Committee of the Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA).Every year, the Scholarship Committee selects a librarian to be sponsored by APALA in the ALA Emerging Leaders Program and awards a $1,000 scholarship to a graduate student in library school.More information on the APALA Scholarship is available at http://www.apalaweb.org/awards/scholarship.htm. I have served on the APALA Scholarship Committee since 2005, and I have really enjoyed working with my colleagues on this committee.

I stayed at the Curtis Hotel, which was a unique, fun hotel.It was great rooming with Lauren P. at the conference, and we were able to grab dinner a couple of nights.On Saturday night, I had dinner with Steve and Lauren P., and we also ran into Debbie Nolan after dinner. It was also nice seeing snow again this winter in Denver.Overall, it was an enjoyable, productive conference.