Prof Dev at UNCG's University Libraries

NCLITe meeting summary Jan 2012

2012-01-26T11:55:00.000-08:00

NC-LITe (NC library instructional tech group) met on Jan 4 2012 at WFU with over 10 campuses represented, to give campus updates and share ideas on the theme: Teach Better Tomorrow: Sharing Quick Tips for Library Instruction & Instructional Technology.

Notes from the session are available if you want to check out the discussion or find out more about the group. Also a good summary of the event is on Wake Forest Library's professional development blog. I really enjoyed the presentation by Anne Burke and Adam Rogers of NCSU on this really cool, game based, mobile learning orientation they created! [view their presentation] And the team from WFU who discussed the various methods they have for embedding at wake.

We meet up twice a year and the next one will be in May (hopefully at App State library!)
Anyone interested is welcome to attend

FREE online health info classes

2012-01-09T06:27:00.000-08:00

Asynchronous (log in and work whenever you have time) and authoritative. From the National Network of Libraries of Medicine (NN/LM).

Will Duct Tape Cure My Warts? Examining Complementary and Alternative Medicine. Starts this week - Mon 1/9/2012 - Feb 2/20/2012. Registration is still open!

Super Searcher: Enhancing Your Online Search Super Powers. 2/9/2010-2/23/2012

There are other online courses and webinars on the NN/LM training page.

Cheers,
Lea

NC3ADL Conference

2011-11-14T07:27:00.000-08:00

I attended and presented at the NC3ADL conference in early November - that is NC Community College Distance Learning Conference - with the theme Emerging Collaboration, Compliance and Clouds:Professional Development for Emerging Initiatives. It's great to attend non-library focused conferences, especially related to distance learning for me, and hear from academic faculty and instructional designers are saying about online and distance learning.

Documenting Student Learning Outcomes in your LMS
by Amy Brown, GTCC

Due to SACs, they created a tool that works with their LMS as a way to document student performance on their student learning outcomes.

Created their own tool in 4 area, lives outside Moodle but linked so no separate login for users.

Create teacher tool which links assessments to SLOs. Includes tutorials for teachers on how to. Rubric allows easily see slo, activity link, green/red/yellow to indicate if they are on track, and min for passing (60 but will be raising to 70) all w a code
Create student view, clear transparent way to let them know how they are doing. Video to educate them on what SLOs are. 4 colors including grey (haven't done anything yet)
Teacher view of student view - see how students see it. See a list of students with colors next to each of them for each SLO listed.
Administrative view - reports, submit new SLOs, etc

Session- NCLOR 5.0
by Jonathan Sweetin, NCLOR System Admin
http://Explorrethelore.org

NC learning object repository k- 20
Access via LMS or main interface
Search and add items via BB or Moodle courses
Contribute your learning objects (w login) via main interface

Collections include:

Duke u geriatric nursing collection
Health info technology workforce training collection
NC alliance of surgical tech educators collections
Nobelprize.org
Bionetwork
Smithsonian educator
History animated
I3d
Nroc national repository of online classes for grades 6-12
Open courses from Harvard, Yale and MiT
Vscoupe explored

Exemplary Courses in Blackboard
by Karen Lynden, Business Instructor, Rowan-Cabarrus Community College
Won 2011 BB Exemplary Course Award for her BUS253 Leadership Course

Check out her course and web tour of other exemplary courses :
http://kb.blackboard.com/display/EXEMPLARY/Exemplary+Course+Program

Best practices-

Call a menu button "Start Here" - to guide students at the start of the course.
Make sure its ADA accessible - Images must have tags & transcripts for videos
Highlight your Class Expectations - create a matrix that easily shows what is required and worth on syllabus; include rubric w disc board posts laid out w 3 levels (not points), included your discussion board expectations written out for students.
Have all assignment due exactly same date and time to be consistent
Add mulitmedia - TED talks, other videos such as from explorethelor site!
Open w a podcast montage of clips to welcome them as an overview of class OR video of instructor welcoming them and giving an overview of course topic.
Create your course into Learning Units instead of folders, w/ the unit's SLOs and then divide into 2-3 subfolders in each, w/ disc board in each, videos embedded, interviews by various experts.

NCLIVE articles and beyond for distance learners
by online services librarian Heather Klein

Nclive.org
media.nclive.org

About - 198 members, all colleges, funded through legislature and from each college, access to everyone in the state either through university I'd password or through public library card
In January doubling full text content to 8000 journal moving to ebsco complete
Database & articles links are permanent links
Videos - You can put a bookmark in a video and then students can watch just at that part. also will stream video through nclive if you rights to video for you.
Audio books will be Recorded Books coming soon! Will work w every platform from android to iPad.
Some specifically good resources to share:
Learning Express db for video tutorials like on Photoshop or Excel.
Skill drills - like bio, chem, finance, public speaking, math, etc
Career workplace improvement help like resume writing, goal setting,
Job and career accelerator db

NBC Learn - VIDEO

http://www.nbclearn.com/portal/site/learn
by Bruce Wilson (bruce.wilson@nbcuni.com) - he use to be publisher at chronicle of higher ed

Now in 3000 middle and high schools
only in 75 higher Ed institutions , mainly Community Colleges
Why? No brand recognition, but superior to anything else you have seen
Lives in blackboard
Content to engage and simulate discussion in online classroom
NO buffering, quick and easy to play videos
Cuecard- flip the item over (virtually) and have detailed metadata about the item
Includes transcripts and closed captioning
totally Ada compliant by start 2012
Subscription total student fte about $1 a student

whats included? Clips of past news and events and current events each week. Basically areas of content:

Archives
Current events
Decision 2012
Partner content (pre date tv content, etc)
Their original content (interviews, etc)

Beth's NCLA 2011 Summary

2011-10-19T10:24:00.000-07:00

I attended my first NCLA conference in Hickory, NC in early October and enjoyed networking with some awesome librarians from around the state - meeting folks I only knew only virtually, connecting with amazing distance learning librarians at our new NCLA Distance Learning Interest Group meetup (which I co-chair w/ Angela Whitehurst from ECU) and meeting newbie librarians that NC is lucky to have!

I was thrilled to teach a half day pre-conference session with Lauren Pressley (WFU) and Amy Archambault (UNCG LIS grad student) called Everybody Teaches: Creating effective online e-learning experiences, check out our wiki for details. It was an engaged crowed of over 30 folks from all different types of libraries around NC and we shared a lot together in the 3 hours (which easily could have been all day!)

I also gave a fun presentation with Mendy Ozan (UNCG MLIS grad '11) demonstrating various tech tools from our libraries' Instructional Technology Toolkit which she helped me initially research to create. The internet went down (of course!) right at the start of our session. Though we had screen shots of the tools, the point of the session was demonstrating how they work so easily so we were thrilled that a gracious attendee (DE librarian at WSSU - Melinda Livas you rock!) offered her hot spot for us to use so we were able to demonstrate tools such as Urtak, RTM, Tungle.me, to name a few (don't know these tools? check them out in the toolkit!) I also did a poster session on the Toolkit - posters a great way to get feedback while chatting with people about your project.

I attended a few interesting sessions too. One from Wake County Public Libraries on The Art of Capturing Ideas: Internal Crowd-sourcing. They developed a website (using ideascale) calling it 'wcpl ideas: share - vote -change' where staff could post an idea, others can vote on it and/or comment, and if its get 20 votes in 30 dates then it goes into "review" either will be process and happen or be closed but with an explanation of why on the website. Helps staff feel they have a voice and place to suggest ideas, all staff can participate by voting, and it helps with transparency of why we "do or don't" from administrations to staff. They had 22 ideas implemented in the first year and 76% of staff participated. Check out their presentation.

Another session I enjoyed most of was from the Center Creative for Leadership on Your Leadership Brand - What Image Do You Present to Others? the interaction was nice, lots of discussions, as she had us all pick these cool visual cards that we thought represented our leadership style; in small groups we discussed what others thought when they saw it to realize various perspectives looking at the same thing. We were to connect that image to what we do now for work and then come up with 3 words to be a brand tagline. We discussed our brand presence which is not really what you look like as much as how you act in various situations & with various people, and how you show yourself on your resume/cv, in interviews and on social media sites - both when looking for job and on the job. The conversation went on the job seeking tangent for a while (since so many students looking for jobs were in the room!) but it was worthwhile conversations and thoughts. One thing I learned was you should add your accomplishments to your resume not just a job description. Check out her presentation.

More NCLA presentations are available now on slideshare.net/ncla2011

Summary of MAC-MLA 2011 - Medical Librarians Cut Loose in Richmond, VA!

2011-10-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

Kidding!

Though I did hear a couple of librarians planning a night geocaching expedition. And yours truly engaged in a bit of sedate party-hardying - evening dine around at Sine, brief walk downtown to smooth out the adrenaline before presenting, and food spotting at a friendly cafe with a great salmon sandwich.

MAC-MLA 2011 officially ran from Sunday evening 10/9 to Wednesday afternoon 10/12, but I did it on the cheap. Drove up early on Tuesday so that I could attend the first full day of the conference then present the next morning before driving home.

Here are a few of the presentations and posters that caught my eye. No slur intended to all of the other cool projects highlighted at the conference!

NLM (National Library of Medicine) Update - Always one of my faves!!

Referencepoint blog for librarians - great entries, very useful
NLM Technical Bulletin - specialized, not sure whether all of the non-health sci library folks around here would be into it, but nice for me to keep in mind :)
NLM APIs - some of these look very cool. from what I can tell :P
PubMed Health - Resources for clinical effectiveness based on sources such as AHRQ and Cochrane. Systematic reviews and clinical guidelines, with consumer summaries and clinical summaries. Sounds great but didn't do well on three clinical questions that I worked on recently (then again, they were stumpers that each sucked down several hours-hard to say "time to stop" when you know patient care will be affected by the info that you find). Definitely worth keeping an eye on.
MedPrint - NN/LM and NLM print serials preservation program
Kids Enviro Health - "Connecting middle school students to environmental health information" (interesting potential for TED 495-01, instructional methods for middle grade sciences)
Health Data Tools and Statistics - has been updated. and thank goodness this awesome group has shorted their name to PH Partners. FYI, this link came from the blog not directly from the NLM Update. So double cheers for the blog :)

Brave New World: Developing Staff Competencies Around Mobile

View more presentations from Doug Joubert

Contributed paper documenting a year and a half long project.

Seems to have been very labor intensive, but the starting familiarity was low (14/44 never had a mobile device at work) and there was a good range of introductory topics:
· Mobile computing 101
· Twitter
· Dropbox and file sharing
· Cloud computer and Google
· Social bookmarks
· Spatial literacy and mapping
· Crowd-sourcing
· Etc.

Nice approach–
1. Pre-survey to measure employee interest and experience
· Interdepartmental team (ETT) responded to supervisor requests for mapping mobile competencies to employee goals/work plans
2. ETT provided
· Orientation
· brown bags on mobile technology apps and marketplace
· monthly mobile “show and tells” (device specific)
· set up device-specific user groups
· RA TECH challenge - 4 month training program for paraprofessional staff based on 23 things and mapped to employee work plans
3. Evaluation
· Difficult to develop outcome measures
· Survey responses required in order to keep the mobile device assigned to each participant

Abstracts for some of the poster projects that caught my eye (sorry so long and messy, from this point it's mostly copy/paste)...

Capitalizing on Our Strengths to Improve the Public’s Understanding of Health Information through the Radio – A team of health science librarians support YOUR HEALTH radio show and blog (hosted by UNC Family Medicine department). Librarians help develop and populate a companion blog with authoritative health info. Nice!! http://yourhealthradio.org/

Lara Handler, Health Sciences Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill
Barbara Rochen Renner, Health Sciences Library, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill
Christie Silbajoris, Health Sciences Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Jean Blackwell, Health Sciences
Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Karen Crowell, Health
Sciences Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Robert Ladd,
Health Sciences Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Purpose: Health Sciences librarians work with producers of a weekly
health-oriented radio show to improve consumer health information on the show’s
website/blog. Previously, librarians helped develop the show’s interactive
website/blog and worked with the show’s hosts and producer to improve website
usability.
Setting/Participants/Resources: Health Sciences librarians at a
major Southeastern university partner with producers of an interactive
website/blog and local radio show hosted by clinicians in the university’s
Family Medicine Department.
Methodology: Supplementing weekly show topics,
librarians provide consumer health links to reputable websites, supplying
additional information and health education to readers of the radio show’s
website/blog. Librarians also provide hosts with resources about communicating
health information at a literacy level appropriate for the public. Challenges
included communication about topics, division of labor, determining show
segments to support, and appropriate number of links per topic.
Results/Outcome: The library is listed as a sponsor on the show’s website
and is acknowledged on-air weekly, during the main interview segment. Hosts
mention librarian assistance when directing listeners to the website for more
information. Website statistics reveal that the library sponsorship link on the
website/blog sidebar is among the most frequently visited links from the show’s
site. It is hoped the partnership will increase radio show listeners’ access to
quality health information on the Internet, along with positive interactions
with the blog. Feedback from the show’s producer and hosts has been favorable
and the partnership continues. The show is in the process of syndicating and
expanding across the state.
Discussion/Conclusion: This is a unique
partnership allowing a health sciences library to collaborate with a radio show
to reach the public. The librarians have made valuable contributions in areas
including social media, design, knowledge and provision of consumer health
resources, and health information literacy.

Capitalize on Collaboration: Development of a Health Curriculum for Adult Education Students - Very cool grant-based community education project

Kelly Near, Claude Moore Health Sciences Library, University of Virginia Health
System
Leslie A. Furlong, Adult Learning Center of Charlottesville, Virginia
Cindy Westley, University of Virginia Health System
Objective: An
eight-unit multi-level health curriculum was developed for the Adult Learning
Center of Charlottesville, Virginia, in the spring of 2010 with funding from an
EL Civics Grant from the State of Virginia. It is a curriculum intended for
English as a Second Language (ESL) and General Educational Development (GED)
Students. Goals of the curriculum are:
1. To help students better navigate
the US health care system.
2. To help students understand their rights and
responsibilities within the US health care system.
3. To enable students to
become advocates for their own health and promoters of healthy living.
4. To
promote mutual information sharing among health care providers and adult
students.
Methods: The outreach librarian collaborated with center educators
to develop the health curriculum which was taught during the spring 2010 and
2011 semesters. A field trip to a hospital was included as part of an
educational unit. During the field trip, students were shadowed by volunteers
who accompanied them on a “scavenger hunt” where students were asked to find
various destinations within the hospital. The field trip was designed to help
students learn to navigate within the facility and to inform healthcare
administrators about potential barriers to access.
Results: Teachers and
students were enthusiastic about the health curriculum and it will become a
permanent part of the center’s offerings. Students provided significant feedback
to library and hospital personnel about their experience navigating through the
hospital and an online database of information collected during the field trips
was developed and will be maintained by the library. This information will be
shared with administrative personnel to help enhance future signage development
and communication efforts for hospital patients and families.
Conclusions:
Collaborations with adult educators to develop a health curriculum can be part
of effective community outreach activities for librarians and hospital
personnel.

Strengthening e-Professionalism: Discussing Social Media Dos and Don’ts with Students and Faculty – Interesting topic for library instruction, nice approach, seems to have been well received.

Gisela Butera, Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library, the George Washington
University Medical Center
Tom Harrod, Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library,
the George Washington University Medical Center
Alexandra W. Gomes,
Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library, the George Washington University Medical
Center
Anne Linton, Himmelfarb Health Sciences Library, the George
Washington University Medical Center

Objectives: To describe our
instructional initiatives in e-professionalism designed to encourage appropriate
use of social media among students within the George Washington University
Medical Center (GWUMC).
Methods: In Fall 2010, Himmelfarb Library created a
library drop-in workshop on Delving into Digital Dirt: Social Networking for
Individuals in Health Care, discussing social media best practices and how to
avoid posting content that could be detrimental to a health professional’s
career. The workshop included an interactive session reviewing examples of
blogs, twitter and Facebook sites using audience response system (clicker)
questions to evaluate content posted by medical professionals. It concluded with
recommendations on specific actions health care professionals can take to
improve their online social networking presence.
Results: The workshop
generated a lot of interest from students and faculty. Based on this feedback,
we developed a sample lesson plan for a more interactive session that included a
panel of experts. Faculty in the School of Medicine, Physician Assistant, and
School of Nursing programs expressed interest in working with the library to
integrate this material within their formal orientation or curricular plans. In
May 2011, the library conducted a session on e-professionalism for the Physician
Assistant Program and invited a GW faculty guest speaker who has written on the
topic to lead the discussion. We created an e-Professionalism: Social Media
LibGuide and included a reflection exercise to gather feedback on lessons
learned. Future plans include adapting this session for other GWUMC programs.
This poster will describe the evolution of the instruction from library workshop
to integrated curricular material, including details on the e-professionalism
content, lessons learned, and future plans.

Hosting a Library Resource Fair: Lessons Learned – Interesting outreach event in which vendors were invited to market and educate patrons about their tools. Important lessons that I recall from convo – start planning many months in advance, make sure to provide Internet access and power, and offer food to help attendance.

Tracie Frederick, Scientific Library, National Cancer Institute at Frederick, MD
Robin Meckley, Scientific Library, National Cancer Institute at Frederick,
MD
Objective: The intent of this event was to promote electronic resources
provided by the National Cancer Institute-Frederick’s Scientific Library, as
well as some freely available resources.
Methods: On March 8, 2011, the
Scientific Library hosted a five-hour Library Resource Fair, which featured
eleven vendors. Each resource representative was provided with a table to
distribute materials about their products and to answer questions from
attendees. Vendors were also given the opportunity to present a twenty minute
overview of their resources in a separate meeting room. As this was the first
time this type of event was offered by the Library, surveys were conducted of
attendees and the vendors involved to obtain feedback to enhance future events
like this.
Results and Conclusion: Overall, attendees and vendors were both
satisfied with the event; however, vendors would have liked to see more people
in attendance. Logistical and marketing lessons were learned by Library staff
that will help with planning future events. These lessons will be shared within
our poster.

Capturing and Sharing What Users Love About Their Library to Capitalize on Our Strengths – “Appreciative Inquiry” sounds interesting. Marketing, assessment, celebration, and more. Apparently this blog celebrating the Health Sciences Library is unmoderated. They haven’t had to deal with any rants or demands for $10,000 subscriptions, but it sounds like getting content has taken a lot of work. http://ilovemyhsl.org/

Barbara Rochen Renner, Health Sciences Library, University of North Carolina at
Chapel Hill
Matt Marvin, Health Sciences Library, University of North
Carolina at Chapel Hill
Robert Ladd, Health Sciences Library, University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Jake Wiltshire, Health Sciences Library,
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Program Objective: To
discover and share elements of the library that users value as important to
their success, via blog and an Appreciative Inquiry approach. With storytelling
recognized as one of the best ways for an organization to illustrate its value,
the objective was to create an ongoing vehicle for users to submit and share
stories of appreciation.
Setting: Health Sciences Library of a major
Southeastern university
Participants: librarians, library staff, and library
users
Program: Project creators developed and promoted a blog, integrated
into the library’s web presence, to capture and share stories of appreciation
and success in users’ own words. We called it, “I Love My HSL,” creating a fun,
social media environment to encourage user participation and launched on
Valentine’s Day.
Main Results: After 3 months, this approach has already
gathered more significant examples of what users value and appreciate than other
methods previously used. Library liaisons and others use submissions to assess
the value of their roles and of specific resources and services. Stories
gathered are part of an integrated marketing/communication effort. As the
library engages in high-level conversations/negotiations at the institutional
level, information gathered will be used to support the library’s value.
A
major challenge is building on the momentum, encouraging users to submit stories
at a rate that keeps the blog alive. We are focusing on creating more in-depth
stories, following up on submissions using multimedia, including audio and
video. Work has begun to analyze blog statistics and to work toward integration
with the library’s other social media, including Facebook and Twitter.
Conclusion: Blog submissions and analytics have provided the library with
rich data already used in a variety of ways. Analytics and anecdotal evidence
have convinced library leadership that the blog is a success, and we plan to
continue to analyze, grow and enhance the blog.

FREE online consumer health information workshops

2011-08-08T08:10:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

The NN/LM office for N.C. and other Southeast/Atlantic Region States is offering FREE online workshops on consumer health information for library staff.

I just finished their "Snakeoil" workshop (evaluating consumer health info). It was informative, well designed, and VERY convenient. Over the course of a month, I had the opportunity to log into Moodle at any time to read NN/LM advice on evaluating sites, post my own evaluations, and discuss concerns with other library staffers. The students were a mix of medical librarians and staff from public and special libraries - a varied and interesting group! There was one synchronous/interactive discussion at the end of the course. The course came with 3 hours of continuing education credit, but many students spent more than 3 hours on the work.

If you're interested in free online consumer health information workshops from the NN/LM SeA staff, check out this page - http://nnlm.gov/sea/training/chis

Best,
Lea

Webinar: 10 Tips for Improving Co-Worker Relations

2011-05-17T12:11:00.000-07:00

We all struggle at times with various people and personalities at work. This free webinar by Pat Wagner and Tim Sullard provides some simple concepts (though often difficult behaviors & attitudes for us to change!) that we can all use and apply in work and at home. Pat gives some great anecdotes and stories that make these top 10 ideas very clear and reachable. The session is recorded if you want to listen to the whole thing and the slides are avaialble on http://lifelongeducation.posterous.com/

My summary:

1. Describe behavior. You can't read someone's mind so describe what they do rather than state "this person was rude to me." This can lead to realization that the behavior wasn't directed at you - and not to take it personally and REACT. good to talk over a situation with your boss or buddy can help you see it was a different perspective. Don't start the drama. If others come to you with drama/gossip, just step back and don't add your energy to it.

2. Choose how to respond. Especially on days you know you are off, tired, frustrated - take it slow and take the time to think about how to respond to things. For ongoing situations, take time to plan how you might respond, rather than jump in at the moment. And w/ co-workers -you will have to see them again, probably the next day. So what is the outcome you hope for short term and long term?

3. The world is a mirror. If you find all day long that people are grouchy or negative, the only commonality is YOU so maybe you need to change. You get back what you give out. How are people seeing you and responding? Take notice.

4. Details works. Look on your face, tone of your voice, your words, etc. These details are key to good relations.

5. The standard for behavior. Think about how you react to people you like and people you don't like. Then try to standardize your behavior for all people. Get rid of your JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL learned behaviors and attitudes. You get farther being more calm and positive then showing attitudes with people you dislike.

6. The key is "despite." Despite whatever is happening at your job that is unhappy or unfair you have 3 choices: Leave - which can be good, its good to go to a new place and get unstuck in your current job; Stay and learn to ignore whats happening; or Stay and go through the proper channels to fix the situation. But so NOT stay and sabotage the situation for others or you will turn in to a toxic person too and cause more negativity in the workplace.

7. Do something differently. We all fall into patterns. These patterns are not always good and sometimes we need to change. Get outside your comfort zone. Try a new approach. Respond differently.

8. Not perfect is okay. Sometimes being a perfectionist hinders working with others. You might need to try something new, different, uncomfortable, even if you don't feel like you are ready or perfect yet. You have to try it and risk to learn.

9. Basics work. Basic decency at work is key. These aren't your friends ,they are you co-workers. Saying no and thank you. Acting beyond the way your normally act. Be more formal, but not in an uptight way, but they way your would welcoming someone in your home for the first time.

10. Buddies are necessary. Find a buddy who can support you and critique you and tell you about your own behavior. Not someone who will just agree that "so-and-so is annoying" but someone who will point out how you are acting and tell you how you can change. We are all too close to our own stuff regardless of how old, how educated or how intelligent you are. Also, going to a professional to talk can be important (you go to a professional when you need your teeth cleaner or appendix out right?)

Find more session like this one at http://leadonline.info/

May NC-LITe Meeting Summary

2011-05-13T12:30:00.000-07:00

NC-LITe (NC library instructional tech group) met on May 3 at NCSU to give campus updates and share ideas on the theme of assessment. Notes from the session are available if you want to check out the discussion or find out more about the group. Also a good summary of the event is on Wake Forest Library's professional development blog. We meet up twice a year and the next one will be in December at Wake Forest library. Anyone interested is welcome to attend!

computer issues

2011-05-11T08:59:00.000-07:00

We'll be closed this weekend, so I don't expect a major impact, but FYI. If I get more specific info on how this will affect the libraries, I'll do an update, Mary

Starting Friday May 13th at 6:30 PM, UNCG Information Technology will take down most ITS campus services to perform upgrades on the back-end network storage system (see the list of included servers and departments at https://its.uncg.edu/News/2011/May/Service_Outage/Departments.pdf). These upgrades have been recommended by Dell to improve system performance. Services should be restored by 6 AM on May 14th.

Most campus services will be unavailable during this work. These services include: Novell application delivery, file, printing and authentication services; AD/GCN authentication, file, printing, application delivery services (including remote access via sslvpn.uncg.edu); Lotus Email Archives, SQL Services, Web services (including web.uncg.eduand www.uncg.edu), 6TECH Online, and various campus hosted applications. These campus applications include NOLIJWEB, Lectra, Compulink, Admissions Pro, Emergency Management AM Radio, Class Climate, FAMIS, and Medicat.

These servers and departments will be included in this downtime: https://its.uncg.edu/News/2011/May/Service_Outage/Departments.pdf

Free Webinar: Ten Tips for Improving Co-Worker Relations

2011-04-27T06:04:00.000-07:00

Info/Register

Tuesday, May 17, 2011 2:00 PM -3:00 PM EDT

Free Webinar: Ten Tips for Improving Co-Worker Relations with Pat Wagner

Sometimes the hardest people to deal with are your co-workers, the people with whom you might spend more time than your own family. Unfortunately, familiarity does not always result in good relationships. Misunderstandings can take on lives of their own. Is it possible to repair old conflicts and regain trust and respect? Most of the power lies in the details of your behavior, regardless of who "started" it.

Learn what you can do to change the dynamics of workplace relations with time-tested tactics borrowed from behavioral and cognitive psychology. If you are trying to improve the culture of your workplace, want to get along with co-workers better, want to improve your supervisory methods, or need ideas for a staff meeting discussion on internal customer service, you might find some useful reminders. [Warning: Although this program is about workplace conflict, you might find the same techniques work with family, friends, and neighbors!]

Pat Wagner is a management consultant with over 30 years' experience dealing with workplace conflict issues. She is known for her good-humored and practical programs. She is also the author of "Improving Workplace Relations", a self-paced online course from the University of North Texas Lifelong Education @ Desktop (LE@D

ACRL 2011 Summary

2011-04-07T11:58:00.000-07:00

Finally getting around to posting my notes from the great ACRL 2011 Confernce in Philadelphia in late March/early April. I was excited to present twice at ACRL this year - Fostering Library as Place for Distance Students: Best Practices from Two Universities by Beth Filar Williams & Heidi Steiner. (Presentation ppt | Summary of session) and Going the Distance: A Closer Look at Uniting with Remote Users by Beth Filar Williams, & Lizah Ismail of Marywood University Library & Angela Whitehurst of East Carolina University(Presentationppt). There was a virtual conference track as well where two of our awesome librarians presented On the Front Lines: New Opportunities for Embedded Librarianship by Jenny Dale & Lynda Kellam - but unfortunately going first, ACRL didn't have their act together for the recording and thus you cant hear their session! View other sessions materials. Here are the key sessions I attended worth sharing:

Value of academic libraries session
Presentation on The Value of Academic Libraries: A Comprehensive Research Review and Report, released in September 2010. By Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe, University of Illinois
Mary Ellen Davis, Association of College and Research Libraries
Megan Oakleaf, Syracuse University Meganoakleaf.info

If you cant read it all, just read these sections:

Checklist in back of report
Pages 94-10
Page 20-57

Demo-ing Value:

Value= use, commodity, competing alternatives, library impact, roi.
How can we demo our value to others? Key - value of library to overarching institution. With tight budgets everywhere now, need to promote value even more impt otherwise, "why should we give you money?"
Use is not enough! We need to show outcomes,impacts, benefits, etc.
Think about the shift from collections to service. Access is important too, but more so how to help the users makes sense of it and use it better. What do libraries do to enable people to do? What do they use the info for?
Little medical packets at a hotel that say things like: "help, I have a headache" or "help, I have a blister" ...can we apply this to libraries?
Librarians are very concerned about privacy (which is great but …) and have trouble gathering needed data sometimes. But we have to know who is using our services/resources and for what purpose - if you don’t know what people do or use how can you determine impact? Find ways to gather info.

Recommendations-

Define outcomes. What are your needs of institution and of library and where do they intersect? All librarians feel they contribute to students learning and outcomes but Can you explain why?
Use existing data. Data audit - what do we have? Gather from campus.
Develop systems to collect data on behavior but keep privacy.
Assessment management systems. Do libraries have this in place? Ex: Weave
Determine how the library contributes to the research agenda on campus.
Key- share results and needs w/ stakeholders!
What if you find out it's not valuable? Don’t just dump it... Determine why it's not, tweak it, maybe replace it, rejuvenate it, usability test it, or is it a marketing problem?

Also Read this report too “Futures thinking for Academic Librarians: Higher Education in 2025” and check out the Toolkit on using the value of academic libs report

To the Cloud! Exploring Tools to Enhance Teaching and Learning
Diane Schrecker, Curriculum Librarian, Ashland University Library
Sara Klink, Assistant Director, Stark State College

Animoto - to create videos, use free video styles, preloaded your pictures, add text, add music.
QR code generator
Voki.com - Create personalized talking avatars free. Can upload your own backgrounds. Type text and it's generates voice or record your own voice.
Twitter uses - Use in place of discussion, assess/learn key concepts or questions, use w students to follow current events

Bibliobouts session
http://bibliobouts.si.umich.edu/ (demo version: demo@bibliobouts.org and password demo)
Karen Markey, Professor, University of Michigan School of Information
Chris Leeder, School of Information University of Michigan

A web-based game that enables game players to gain valuable practice using online library
research tools and library collections while they work on their assignments. Uses zotero. Various rounds by various players. topics chosen by the instructor. First do searches on your own...then see others searches. People donate their searches and players review, rate, tags the given sources.Used in classes or in a class w instructor involved. Librarians can come into the class too.

Connecting through Course Guides Session
By Jacqui Grallo, Cal State Monterey Bay

Learner centered teaching
Teach less, they will learn more
Instruction vs learning
Use Course Guides during person sessions.
Instead of doing it on a whiteboard, use their course guide, and students comment in there, they can see it immediately, and you can review it later.
Use polls through their course guides too they see immediate feedback and poll results
Check out: http://todaysmeet.com/ for open source idea instead

Building Relationships through Embedded Librarianship session
By three librarians from McMaster University

Poll: Which works best for which - Building campus relationships and improving student learning? (conclusion: they all do, various methods combined to reach various students!)

Embedding into a program- librarian co-creating and co-teaching the curriculum, deeper the embedding the greater the improvement in learning. Participate in organizational actives for both program and library. located in the program facilities, but also they have space in the lib. Discipline specific example: Science literacy - co-teach w science prof 2 hours a week. Students blog formal science writing, others comment. Pros: deep embedding but doesn't have to be full-time. Con: not a large reach.
Embedding virtually - embed in your LMS using quizzes, discussion forums, pathfinders, learning objects, chat. Course by course level rather than larger community. Pros: reach multiple learning styles, asynchronous reviews, point of need help, anonymity. Cons: not accessible to all (some of their course arent in BB); not as deeply connected w/ students.
Embedding into Teaching and Learning Support Center - salary paid by the t&l center! Librarian created a digital media literacy course. Outcome based learning. Curricula level mapping of program level learning outcomes. Teaching Metaliteracy - 21st c skills/fluencies. Con: will you T&L pay for a librarian to be w/ them?

The Unconference (10 min sessions)
Kim Leeder, Boise State U - connecting w teaching faculty

Be confident. Be bold
Make the Connection. Get out there. Ask them about themselves
Reinforce the Connection. Follow up w people. Be multidimensional
Build the relationship
Go Collaborate
Be - make - reinforce - build - go

Read more about this session on her recent Blog Post :Collaborating W/ faculty: A 5-Step Program

Also view the recording or view the slides from the Technology in University Libraries Lightening Round Up session on ACRL conference.

A scholar from Spain finds the UNCG Ayn Rand Collections useful

2011-03-19T07:53:00.000-07:00

By Sha Li Zhang, April 26, 2010

I met Dr. José Rodolfo Hernández Carrión in late March 2010 at a chili party at the Casa Chu hosted by Dr. Clara Chu, Professor and Chair of the LIS Department at UNCG. As a librarian, I naturally asked Dr. Hernández what he thought about the UNCG Libraries’ collections in helping his research needs at UNCG. Without hesitation, Dr. Hernández told me that he was very happy with the Ayn Rand Collections at the Libraries. It was one of reasons for him to visit UNCG in 2010.

Dr. Hernández is Associate Professor in the Department of Applied Economics at the University of Valencia in Spain. As a visiting scholar, he came to UNCG on a three-month research journey in spring 2010. According to the announcement from the LIS Department which hosts the scholar at UNCG, Dr. Hernández conducts research on Economics Education for Change: Internet 2.0 and New Pedagogies in Teaching Economics. He studies social media, information and communication technologies (ICTs), and learns management systems and new pedagogies, with the purpose of acquiring excellence in new strategies to more effectively teach and enhance economics’ curriculum in the Schools of Law and Economics at his home university.

Since 2007, the UNCG Libraries established the Ayn Rand Collections located on the second floor of the main building at Jackson Library. The collections were purchased through a BB&T fund donated to the Libraries. Dr. Hernández commented, “I found the area, where the collections were placed, very familiar and enjoyable. In fact I am using some books for my teaching right now in Valencia and I think that your library very well provided the materials for Critical Thinking Literacy in the Economic field.”

Dr. Hernández spent a lot of time at the Jackson Library. As a matter of fact, he has a small study on the seventh floor in the Tower. Dr. Hernández notes that “about my favorite place in the library is the seventh floor where you can find similar books for Critical Thinking in Economics. I think that the titles are very good. I didn't check missing things so I am finding items here, what there is, more than looking for specific titles here.”

With more and more scholarly publications on digital formats and on open access modes, Dr. Hernández also expects the library materials related his fields are available online. During his visit at UNCG, when Dr. Hernández started checking out more print books, he sent questions to me and asked why the Libraries do not provide pdf files or digital format for this kind of material. He assumed that these materials “should be free access right now and perhaps it could be attractive and at low cost to digitalize the old ones.” From the aspect of preservation, Dr. Hernandez notes that “we have to contribute to preserve these old books that are getting valuable by themselves as rare and ancient.” I explained to Dr. Hernandez that we have increased acquisitions funds in purchasing materials in digital formats, especially for electronic databases, datasets, and electronic journals. For monographic publications, we also increased spending on electronic books in past two years. While some of the digital monographs (published prior to 1923) are freely available on internet via Google and other vendors’ mass digitization projects, access to electronic monographs published after 1923 still need to be purchased (vs. freely available via internet) by the Libraries. According to the current copyright laws, we may follow the same pattern for some years to come. This may be different from European countries. Nonetheless, we made several rush orders on the requests from Dr. Hernandez. The titles that he suggested will be added to the Libraries’ collections soon.

More photos on Dr. Hernandez's visit at UNCG are at http://www.flickr.com/photos/iminerva/sets/72157624463434057/

LAUNC-CH 2011: networked individuals & networked libraries

2011-03-18T07:44:00.000-07:00

On March 7 2011 I attended LAUNC-CH Annual Conference (Librarians' Association at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) at the Friday Center (yum, good food!) in Chapel Hill with this year's theme "Staying Vital in a Time of Change." My favorite part was the Keynote "Networked Individuals, Networked Libraries" by Lee Rainie, Director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project. His presentation slides are available online and worth checking out to see the latest data and details on social networking and technology adoption, the way people have changed the way they access, share and create info, and the way that libraries can adapt to this new information ecology to “stay vital” to their users. here are some of my notes from the session:

2/3 of Americans have broadband at home but digital divides are still really prevalent. Age still matters - after age 71 broadband drops off. Spanish speakers are less likely to be on broadband.

40% of people are now associated w/ religious groups that they did not grow up w. People are moving away from the family, small community,places where they grew up. They are developing their own beliefs and growing their own networked groups.

Wireless. Mobile. Fastest growing tech. 40-45% cell users surf internet on it. 55% own laptops up from 30% in 2006. Adults 57% use mobile Internet. But Hispanics and Blacks are higher users of cell than Whites. Prob more for money if they can't afford both. Rural is always lagging from urban regardless.

Apps world will rise and web will slowly die. Better for commercial world - you can sell them an app and learn more about the customer.

7%of adults own iPad type devices-up from 4% last year - and ebook readers growing too.

Info Ecosystem creates a sense of place and sense of presence. "Alone together" concept. Anywhere and any device. Contact people how we want, when we want, but on a social researcher perspective this is changing everything in how we related and communicate.
For libraries this changes not just collations but space - the world is becoming placeless! Be where your people are not hosting or expecting them to be in your place.

Social networking is growing to older adults too. Online videos growing, top area is comedy video. But second is news and educational. Older adults and women are top video creators. Online social networks and ubiquitous mobility. Libraries can be nodes in peoples network, to help them solve problems as well as learn from them too on what they want and need. Embedded librarians.
Expertise and influence in social networking has created amateur experts.

How networked information users are connecting:

Attention zones-hard to stay focused on one thing to get done . "Continuous partial attention." But also deep dives into info is possible, we all can become experts in any area. Info snacking (I love this term!) - quick 2-3 mins info snack, when you are waiting for something.
Media zones- social streams, toss a line in there every so often. Or try immersion like gaming. Creative participatory zone, libraries are adding to this creation. Study or work zones.

How networked information users reply on networks:

As sentries - word of mouth - from friends, login to facebook to see what friends are reading or doing, to share or ask opinions of them - what use to be city newspaper is now Facebook
Also as info evaluates- people go to their online "friends" - and ask friends is this true? and how much attention should I pay attention to it? what do you all think?
As forum for action- everybody's a publisher!

Time Management Workshop

2011-03-08T13:39:00.000-08:00

Here are the slides from the Time Management/Project Planning workshop. Please let me know if you have any questions!

Staff Dev Workshop: Time Management

View more presentations from Lynda Kellam

Non Librarian Conferences

2010-11-16T05:34:00.000-08:00

This Fall I attended and presented at 2 non-library conferences which I found worthwhile, seeing trends, gathering ideas and connecting with people beyond the library walls.

In October I headed west to Denver, CO for AASHE - the Association of Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education. My presentation - No Money, No Travel, No Problem! UNC Focus Forward 2010 - was about the virtual UNC system wide best practices in sustainability conference I helped plan and run last spring. The best part of this conference for me was the greenest of it (of course) - no paper handouts, compost bins by all trash cans, no water bottle (refill stations only), veggie/vegan meals way more than others, all compostable box lunches, etc (read more about the greening here). I enjoyed sessions though some not directly related to libraries:

Lots of green student run initiatives on campus like park(ing) day where they take over parking spots and make them a park; student led groups to bring campus beyond climate neutral; green RAs; Green Spring Break trip (have fun in Florida but service learning cleaning up and fixing up state park); one student group offers plate rentals for anyone having an event on campus for free!
Northwest Earth Institute in Portland creates and offers self directed, active learning, community based discussion guides.
There were some sessions on embedding green messages through campus garden, freshman sustainable read, sustainable play/theater, painted rain barrel contests.
A bike check out program was cool idea - students get one for 7 days, w/ helmet and lock - on campus where all parking is off campus w/ shuttles encourage pedestrian/biker friendly atmosphere.
There were presentations on the toxins in art materials in art programs on campus, creating a greener student theaters, a campus ban of "no idling on campus" (cars idling emit so much more CO2 so turn off your car when waiting), and student push to ban bottled water on campus (learn more about the marketing gimmick the water bottle industry wants you to believe) who's blind taste test show people prefer tap vs bottled which is unregulated, often from your own tap and costs $8/gallon vs free!
An interesting panel of administrations of campus discussed how to get your admin on board with a sustainability message from 4 very different campus.

In November I traveled to Wilmington, NC for UNC Cause 2010 - an ITS conference for mainly UNC system schools. I presented with Jenny Dale: Going the Distance Without Leaving Your Desk discussing the library's new Elluminate virtual room and the workshops and orientations we hosted online. Being an IT conference, the wireless was great (well except the morning we presented when it was down!), no handouts were given (yea! save a tree!), people had their tech of choice to take notes and engage with the twitter feed and all presentations were online. I tended to go to the social media and instructional technology sessions than the heavy IT sessions:

Yammer Time - a microblogging platform that is a cross between Facebook and Twitter used at ECU for cross campus collaboration and communication;
UNC-CH's session on Poll Everywhere, which I have used for a polling groups via twitter, the web or txting, but learned a lot more about its functionally and users needs as they shared their survey of students and faculty (presentation);
Delivering Digital Classroom Content: The Hybrid Theory of Classroom Capture where a panel discussed Mediasite, Podcast Producer with iTunes U, Camtasia Relay, and Podcast Producer for classroom capture possibilities - a lot of discussion was on video recording faculty issues & legalities, and back up & storage issues of large video files but interesting to learn about other possible capture products;
Video Games as Instructional Tools session discussed using videos for training, education, problem solving, quizzes, staff development, etc. Zach offered the Library Adventure Games files free to use too (created by Scott Rice).
Zaneta Summers of WCU, discussed their new management of multi-format software education for students by students (unconf discussion, no presentation to share). They build a software system to help more efficiently manage services: their students who are there to support other students when they need assistance with various software can now be managed through this system with allows students works to add their available schedule times, testing them on skill level by software and thus can link up student needing help with one who is available and knowledgeable; and these students workers can co-teach with staff and take training themselves to learn better how to teach and how gain skills they are lacking.
Learning Space Smackdown panel discussed how each of their campus improved and expanded their learning spaces . Some had lots of staff, some utilized student tech help, some went high end, some built their own desks but all offered some ideas in planning learning spaces (hope their presentation will be online soon!)
Alternative Reality Games (ARGS) on Campus was presented by UNC-CH folks (including librarians) about their spring ShBANGE who's goal was toe help undergrads learn to communicate better in relationships while playing a game with lots of clues and puzzles. Read more about it here.
I really enjoyed listening and learning from the last presenter Tim Jones from NCSU(sorry but yea many ITS people can be dry when presenting :) Where U At? Location Based Services for Higher Education. Based on Fouraquare and Gowalla, they created their own location based mobile app to personalize the campus tours (get facts and history via phone), collect and share student geo-tagged info (involved the students, then they will get interested), and offer incentives for attendance at events (let students know there is an event nearby). Even their chancellor got involved!

Library Assessment Conference

2010-11-05T10:41:00.000-07:00

Library Assessment Conference, October 24-27, 2010, Baltimore, MD

Mike Crumpton & I attended this conference for the 2^nd time. Once again, it was very valuable in providing both philosophical overviews and practical advice for assessment projects. Rather than give a blow by blow account of the sessions I attended I’ll just give some highlights. The overall theme was that we need to emphasize our value. There weren’t a whole lot of solutions but that is the big question. I encourage folks to check out the presentations on the conference web site: http://libraryassessment.org/

The Proceedings will be published as well. And be thinking about the 2012 conference in September in Charlottesville, VA – nice and close!

We’ve gone through 7 stages of assessment from chaos to new metrics. We now focus on process rather than product.
We need to organize date by outcome
Some think library space is the future major purpose of libraries. We need to assess how space affects learning and creating new knowledge. Also need to take virtual space into consideration.
Assessment needs to be about value not quality. (does good rather than is good). Customer drives values.
We need to assess how we help achieve institutional goals

MAC/Medical Libn Assn Meeting - Lea's report

2010-10-18T10:04:00.000-07:00

The 2010 meeting of the Mid-Atlantic chapter of the Medical Library Assn was an accessible, fun way to meet with other health science librarians and catch up on news. Here are some of the more interesting items...

-- Nifty ideas that I'd like to kick upstairs (for administrative attention) --

1. Annual Research Fair

Event started by the Tompkins-McCaw Library for the Health Sciences, Virginia Commonwealth University. They brought in the Office of Research Services, Creative Services, statisticians, and every other campus unit providing help somewhere along the research or publishing path. Each dept staffed a table, there were even vendor-sponsored booths.

2. Resources for Calculating Return on Investment/CBA (poster) - The report and guide include methods for evaluating “intangibles” and “social return on investment.”

3. What are the Effects that Two Author-fee Subsidy Programs Have on Researchers' Work Practices and Publishing Behaviors? -- UNC – CH provides $1,000/year to individual authors to reduce the impact of author fees.

4. Mapping patron needs and retooling staff duties

Information Sherpa: Assisting and Problem Solving along the Researcher's Path - Health Sciences Library, University of Colorado, Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, CO

Evaluated menu of reference and related services from the ground up – brainstormed to come up with a list of steps/needs along the “typical research path” for students and faculty. Used part of a vacant position to fill a large gap in services.

--Nifty ideas for me --

1. Mobile medical apps and mobile-friendly resources…

George Washington University developed a nice mobile-friendly site

* User surveys, content, library instruction/launch info reported in the poster Going Mobile: launching a mobile website and other mobile resources (pdf).
* LibGuide on mobile resources

The nice librarian staffing the poster confirmed the general, pain in the tush process for providing medical mobile resources to your patrons

* Mobile versions of vendor sites such as MD consult are easiest, since you just integrate them into your usual IP authentication system
* Mobile app download management can be time consuming, since each download (each patron) requires a serial number. The librarian must give a different serial number to each patron and keep a list (since the patron is likely to forget his/her number). She used to do this by sending a quick email to the students’ school email address (if they contacted her through a yahoo or gmail account, she would look up student info in their school directory). She has since delegated the provision and maintenance of serial numbers to a paraprofessional. VERY expensive, though DynaMed at least provides an unlimited number of downloads to academic institutions.

2. iPads are being adopted in health science and medical libraries. Deniz Ender (Rex Hospital Library and Information Research Center, Raleigh, NC) reported on the early stage of her grant funded project Using iPads in a Hospital Environment to Promote Clinical Applications. Ms. Ender compiled a list of the most popular free & paid medical mobile apps. She’ll make the iPads available to her users in November starting with an Open House.

Other librarians reported Open Houses or Sand box sessions in promoting new tech toys including iPads.

3. Updates from the NLM (National Library of Medicine) and the NN/LM SeA (National Network of Libraries of Medicine, Southeast Atlantic)

* PubMed Images database to launch in late October. Search for images in PubMed Central articles (will search the full text of image captions). PubMed abstract view will include image thumbnails.

* 1/4th of the abstracts added to PubMed are structured. Soon these will be searchable by section, eg “Methods.”

* The OLDMedline project (loading records from print indexes Cumulated Index Medicus 1960-65, Current List of Medical Literature 1947-59). Indexing records will go back to 1946, but budget issues have forced this project to come to a halt for the time being.

* Reminder that PubMed for handhelds is a research project (Lister Hill); it is NOT a production level system.

* Mobile Medlineplus http://m.medlineplus.gov/ - Reliable consumer health info with “universal” handheld device compatibility

* AIDSinfo mobile: http://m.aidsinfo.nih.gov

* TOXNET, including Hazardous Substances Data bank, Household Products database and more have additional content and linking

4. Upcoming workshops were mentioned w/out info on locations, dates, or links for calendar/registration pages

*2 day workshops from the NLM - Sequences, genomes, proteins, NCBI blast, human variation & disease (there “will be webinars” for these)
* Consumer Health – Dec workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region
* Nursing on the Net - Dec workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region
* Will duct tape cure my warts? – CAM workshop in Dec somewhere in the NNLM SeA region
* Health Literacy - Workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region, more details “available soon”
* Appraising the Evidence - Workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region, more details “available soon”
* PubMed for handhelds – Jan workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region
* E-science bootcamp – Summer 2011 workshop somewhere in the NNLM SeA region

Find Webinars!

2010-09-21T12:07:00.000-07:00

A blog post on the ALA learning round table offers some great resources for keeping current with online webinars:

Google Reader Bundle

RSS

webinars

Brad Ward’s Library Webinars blog

Stephanie Zimmerman’s Library-Related Training Opportunities Google Calendar

Fall e-learning from ACRL

2010-09-07T08:40:00.000-07:00

From online multi week seminars to 1-2 hour webcasts, check out some of these online learning sessions for academic libraries which you can attend without leaving your desk!

Here are the details from the 9/6/10 ALA News release:

Copyright and the Library Part 1: The Basics Including Fair Use (Sept. 13 - Oct. 1, 2010): Build an understanding of current copyright law, creating a “copyright palette” for your library and assessing a library’s legal risk with regard to current U.S. copyright law. Gain an understanding of the Fair Use clause, as well as how to legally apply fair use in the library, classroom and broader campus environments.

Designing Usable and Accessible Web Pages: Needs, Analysis, Design Planning, XHTML and CSS Standards, Accessibility Validation, and Usability Testing (Beginners) (Sept. 13 - Oct. 8, 2010): This hands-on course focuses on the basics of website planning, design and content development. The course will also examine Web standards, usability and accessibility. XHTML and CSS (external) will be introduced.

Creating Usable and Accessible Web Pages: XHTML and CSS Review, Navigation, Interactivity, CMS and Other Options (Intermediate) (Oct. 4 - Nov. 12, 2010): Participants in this online course will be able to use CSS layout to design highly accessible navigation and menus; create basic forms; use free JavaScripts to add functionality; design with multimedia; and understand strengths and limitations of CMS.

Successful Budgeting in Academic Libraries (Oct. 11-30, 2010): In this course, participants will learn essential budgeting skills, including how to develop and manage a budget and how to write a persuasive budget request.

Learning Objects: Creating Instruction To Go (Nov. 1-21, 2010): Find out more about learning objects and learn how to create a learning object using a Web 2.0 application or other suitable technology in this course.

The Not-So-Distant Librarian: Online Library Instruction to Engage Students and Faculty (Sept. 14, 2010): Learn practical tips and tools for designing, implementing and assessing online library instruction in this ACRL webcast.

From Idea to Publication Series: Understanding the Research Question (Sept. 23, 2010): Learn to formulate and define good research questions, select appropriate research methodologies and design the research study. Specific topics will include the development of useful questionnaires, techniques used in conducting telephone interviews, working with focus groups and constructing surveys to get the information they need.

So You Want to Create an Interactive Information Literacy Tutorial? (Oct. 19, 2010): Learn about the experience creating an interactive information literacy tutorial from beginning to end in collaboration with a multimedia designer in this webcast. Evaluate the potential of tutorial as an assessment tool and an opportunity for self-evaluation.

From Idea to Publication Series: Analysis and Writing (Nov. 4, 2010): Learn to apply the appropriate analysis methods to your project’s data or information, depending on the research methodology you are using. It is essential to have an understanding of the appropriate forms of analyses (along with their possibilities and limitations). Then comes writing. Readers must be able to comprehend your original question or problem, the process of selecting the appropriate methodology, your processes of analysis and the meaning of your findings.

Building a New Librarianship (Nov. 9, 2010): The future for librarians is bright, but not if we continue on our current path. We must bravely envision a new librarianship, one based on knowledge, activism and embedding ourselves deeply into the academy’s daily work. This session seeks to lay out a foundation for this new librarianship, with real world examples.

New Models for Credit-Bearing Information Literacy Courses (Nov. 16, 2010): Learn about best practices for credit-bearing information literacy courses in this ACRL webcast, based upon a literature review and several years of experimentation with various approaches to teaching a one-credit course.

From Idea to Publication Series: Submitting for Publication (Dec. 1, 2010): Learn how to select an appropriate journal or publisher, learn how to prepare a manuscript for submission and understand what the submission process will encompass. Also learn how to query editors and how to manage your own author rights, including open access licensing.

Online Forms: Interaction and Feedback without the “Paperwork” (Dec. 7, 2010): With courses and departments moving materials onto the Web or cloud computing platforms, review the possibilities available with interactive forms for the classroom and the department.

Complete details and registration information for all fall 2010 e-Learning opportunities are available online at http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl/proftools/elearning.cfm. Contact Kathryn Deiss at kdeiss@ala.org or (312) 280-2529 for more information.

Library Liaisons Meet

2010-08-12T10:55:00.001-07:00

The Library Liaisons met for a luncheon workshop on Wednesday, August 11. Prior to the luncheon, everyone reviewed four documents that concerned liaison responsibilities and policies. One document was a dated work entitled “Liaison Functions,” which was accepted by the UNCG Collection Management Committee in April 1998. The other three documents concerned liaison responsibilities and policies at three other universities—the University of Connecticut, Indiana-University-Perdue-University-Indianapolis (IUPUI), and Boise State University. Although the “Liaisons Functions” document from UNCG is dated and excludes user services responsibilities, it does provide some good information on collection management and development, as well as emphasizing the importance of communication and cooperation with teaching faculty. After discussing all four documents, the liaisons agreed that UNCG needed a new document that would summarize liaison responsibilities. The UCONN and IUPUI documents provide a good outline for such a new document—being 2-to-4 pages in length and highlighting both collections and user services responsibilities, as well as emphasizing the importance of communication and cooperation with teaching faculty. Stephen Dew and Kathy Crowe agreed to write the first draft of a new document for UNCG, which will later be shared with all liaisons for review.

The liaisons agreed that the luncheon workshop was a worthwhile event and that it was good to meet occasionally as a separate group, outside the regular monthly Collection Management Committee meetings, which include other members and focus entirely on collection responsibilities and issues. This summer, the Reference Department started a series of Round Table Meetings for liaisons to discuss instruction and user services responsibilities, and these events will be continued (probably just during interim periods). The liaisons agreed to continue the workshop luncheons (like this one) and to hold two each year, December and May, at the end of each semester.

ASERL's summer summit

2010-08-08T08:58:00.001-07:00

I attended the Association of Southeastern Research Libraries (ASERL) workshop because it was focused on the future of the government documents depository system in the southeast region. ASERL is trying to work within the system (and Title 44) to create a new model for depository libraries. The restrictions for being in the Federal Depository Library Program can be overly strict and at times archaic, but its overarching goal is valid--ensuring future access to government information.

The ASERL proposal attempts to create a regional focus for our depositories and to create Centers of Excellence (depositories that commit to collecting comprehensively in a particular agency or sub-agency). These centers would ensure that schools in the southeast have access to stronger print collections than one individual regional school could produce alone. (And I hear you asking already: "Isn't everything already online?" No, not everything is born-digital and no, not everything is being digitized. Not even all of the important stuff is being digitized. No one has the money to digitize it all, even Google). The idea is great and needed, but it will be a long process to get to that point. The group met (mostly government docs librarians and deans) to work through the report and brainstorm and collaborate on improvement. Hopefully this approach will make the FDLP system stronger! UNCG may try to become a Center of Excellence for a smaller agency or sub-agency, but more to come as we move forward.

"3 Topics in 30 Minutes" Schedule

2010-07-22T05:17:00.000-07:00

The ERIT department in conjunction with the Staff Development Committee welcomes you to join us in the CITI lab for the first two of five scheduled courses covering the Microsoft Office suite. Two sessions will be offered for each class, occuring at 9:00am and 3:00pm.

Excel I: String Manipulation
In this 30 minute session held in the CITI lab, you will explore Excel's functions that manipulate cells which contain text. Click on the link to open the invitation and sign up!

August 10th at 9:00am: http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/FMPUXTAYMKXYBMLGENRZ/excel1-9am

August 11th at 3:00pm: http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/EGNNRXSLKFJRQKEFURFI/excel1-3pm

PowerPoint I
This class will start with some presentation basics before examining techniques such as advanced transitions and importing video/audio to spice up the appearance of your presentations. Click on the link to open the invitation and sign up!

August 17th at 9:00am:
http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/MSUBVDTXYHAYVOUOQJFZ/ppt1-9am

August 18th at 3:00pm: http://www.evite.com/app/publicUrl/FQFCCWLZTWQMOBTHQMLD/ppt1-3pm

Thank you and we look forward to seeing you there!

-- The Staff Development Committee

Free online classes through HP

2010-07-07T04:44:00.000-07:00

Check out the classes available through the HP Learning Center - Free, online classes, available 24/7 in categories of digital photography, home office, business basics, IT basics, MS and Adobe, and graphic arts. Most classes contain 2-6 lessons with demos, quizzes, assignments, and message boards. Some are self paced and some have instructors w/ deadlines. You have to register to take classes but its free. More details here.

ALA Conference 2010

2010-07-01T10:50:00.001-07:00

ALA 2010 was held in Washington DC and during a hot weekend (I think it hit 99degrees one day) and of course, meetings were typically back to back, in one hotel and another one 2 miles away! But I love to walk and that is to be expected for ALA: lots of walking, lots of networking and lots of sessions from which to choose. This ALA for me was mainly committee meetings and networking events (and free meals and drinks when I could get them!)

I wrapped up my co-chairing of the ACRL Distance Learning Section's Bibliography Committee after 2 years of work with a fabulous committee, creating the 5th bibliography on Library Services for Distance Learning. Thanks to some of you UNCG Librarians who wrote some annotations for this bibliography!

I also met the wonderful ACRL University Libraries Section Executive Board, where I will now be co-chairing a committee Technology In University Libraries. I asked for this to be a virtual only committee - so none of us has to worry about money to travel to ALA next year and we can explore first hand virtual technologies. One of our committee goals will be to help the ULS carry on conversations and follow up after ALA annual meetings - including ways to collaborate, plan events, and meet - all virtually!

The exhibit hall had a vast amount to take in. I especially liked the Green Pavilion of exhibitors. The poster sessions were also interesting, particularly Games People Play (App State), and On Demand and Just in Time: Putting Tutorials into Subject Librarians' Hands (ASU).

The various socials allowed for time to network, discuss activities, share ideas and simply visit old friends and former co-workers. I showed off our new library video "Ask us @UNCG Libraries" to many people there and got lots of positive feedback and responses like "wow, you work at a awesome library!"

TLC workshops this summer

2010-05-20T12:22:00.001-07:00

Be sure to check out the workshop offerings this summer on campus through the TLC:

Video 101
Online Learning Activities
MERLOT
Online Assessment
Web 2.0 Tools
TEACH Act and Fair Use

https://freyr.uncg.edu/workshops/list_by_category.jsp?cat_id=77000233

NC-LITe Group Meeting May 18, @ UNCG

2010-05-11T06:37:00.000-07:00

NC-LITe (North Carolina Library Instructional Technology experiences)

Interested in library instructional technology? Join us at UNCG on May 18, 2010 for an open-space style unconference for anyone interested in library instructional technology. This group initially was formed between UNCG and WFU libraries, and has expanded to include NCSU, Duke, and UNC libraries. For this first expanded group meeting at UNCG, we are inviting local Triad schools to join us as well. (and Scott Rice :)

Please fill out this form to RSVP and offer your suggestions on topics you'd like to discuss. We will gather initially in the Willow Room of the Elliot University Center (EUC). Schedule.

Thanks!
BFW & Instructional Technology team at UNCG

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Webinar, white paper : Improving Nursing Practice with Info & Technology

2010-04-29T10:36:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

In lieu of travel, I'm tuning into as many relevant webinars as possible.

The session today was interesting b/c it reflected info gathered in our recent "Library To Go" marketing survey and included nifty tidbits that we hadn't investigated.

Improving Nursing Practice with Info & Technology (from Ovid LWW based on their marketing research, mostly internal unpublished reports)

Where do nurses access online info? 84% from home, 68% from work, tiny % at library. Pprint info had similar responses with slightly higher library use (n=1018)

Nurses and medical librarians reported that the most requested types of information are concise, evidence based, available through "Google-like" tools. FYI, Google was reported as the top information tool used by nurses. (since one of the top reason for going online was reportedly finding treatment info, this factoid is scary as H-E-double-hockey-sticks).

Nursing has been slower than other professions in moving to predominantly online information sources. Nursing2010 and AJN surveys reported 79% of nurses preferred print for reading full-text, in depth articles, though they preferred online for searching.

Top professional nursing websites:

NursingCenter.com
Medscape.com
PubMed/MEDLINE
Allnurses.com
Nurse.com
NursingWorld.com
WebRN.com
NurseZone.com

Nurses reported that staying up to date with nursing news was the primary professional reason for going online. They like to have information "pushed" to them, with electronic newsletters very popular.

31% of nurses reported using social media for professional purposes, with goals of learning about the profession, asking nursing-related questions, learning about upcoming conferences, etc. Top sources included listservs and YouTube (for educational and training purposes), though Facebook, Twitter, and other sites are gaining prominence. (n=700)

38% reported daily use of handheld, mobile devices such as smart phones. Most important professional reasons = finding general treatment info (61%), patient education info (48%), reading journal article abstracts (25%), viewing multimedia and podcasts (19%), etc.

The Ovid white paper stated that the use of mobile devices is growing quickly. The webinar emphasized the need for nursing administration to support the technology (adopt it to improve professional practices and deal with concerns about hipaa/privacy and frivolous/personal use of these devices).

Nursing topics most commonly researched using mobile devices: drug information, disease information, therapeutic recommendations, and differential diagnosis

Mostly commonly used handheld apps deliver synoptic rather than in depth info: ePocrates (drug db), Medscape daily news, etc.

Nurses ranked mobile app attributes (greatest to least impt): Readability of text, search ability, ease of download, cost of download, speed of download, visual appeal.

Top nursing blogs: AllNurses.com, NurseZone, and AJN’s blog, “Off the Charts”

Ovid predicts

the rise of simultaneous writing and peer review
multiple publishing/delivery methods (print, online, downloadable app) will become the norm
rich media will be ubiquitous

Last but not least, Ovid plans to develop for the iPad. Huzzah!!

Cheers,
Lea

NC SirsiDynix Users Group Meets May 26

2010-04-20T10:59:00.000-07:00

For those of you who haven't already gotten the news via the listserv, the NC SirsiDynix Users Group (NCSUG) meets May 26th at Guilford College, right here in Greensboro. Our own Tim Bucknall will deliver the keynote speech, "If the OPAC is Dead, When is the Funeral?" Later, Marcie Burton and Jennifer Mincey will present "Reports: Tips and Tricks" as one of the four breakout sessions. We will also have sessions on loading E-book MARC records, on Circulation and ILL issues, and on the latest products and programs from SirsiDynix. As NCSUG Secretary, I am involved in planning and organizing the meeting as well as managing registrations. Here is a link to the registration form with program for your convenience.

Computers in Libraries 2010

2010-04-16T06:47:00.000-07:00

April 12-15, Hannah, Amy, Lynda and I road tripped up to the Computers In Libraries conference in DC. We presented as a panel on Instructional Technology "its a team thing" and got some rave reviews from some librarians we admire including some blog posts (go us!) Lynda and I did an interactive presentation on Productivity Tools (read a review at LibConf.com) But we also attended some great sessions. I particularly enjoyed:

Library Engagement through Open Data Session - visualization: This session talked about data - how yes it can be boring and poorly used, but used correctly, it can be a an asset: to library benefactors - by highlighting where the library is lacking and generate additional funds; to Lib admin – justify, activities, success/trends, internal PR; to general public - marketing, clear msgs (ex: google map mashup of admissions and visitors to site) ; and to Librarians - find anomalies or data outliers and determine if on the right track. The panel discussed various data source and tools. Some worth mentioning: IMA dashboard, IBM Many Eyes, and Google Chart visualization tools. They ended with some key lessons learned: Get support from admin, Define audience, Define your story, A lot of data manipulation, Google doc as repository, Leverage your coworkers efforts, and Do and redo.
Gen X Librarians Leading from the middle: The panel discussed Gen X and Tech, @ work and w/ leadership. Gen X is only ½ the size of the generation before and after. They explained how we grew up seeing technology quickly evolve so we can (generally speaking) more easily adapt to tech changes (vs those before us who didn't have computer as kids and those after us who expect it and have always had it) An interesting comparison: 40 years ago a $10,000 mean income – $10, 600 "kitchen computer" and today $57,000 mean income - $3,499 home computer. At work we tend to be the sandwich generation, in the classroom & w/ coworkers, helping to bridge the gaps from print to electronic, understanding both sides, and become good trainers. With leadership, we show independence, innovation, and individualism (OR - is it self centered, skeptical slackers :) Generally speaking we are good at mediating change, translating cultural norms, promoting innovation and also tend to be loyal to our workplace. Some one posed a question at the end why aren't more Gen Xers in leadership positions - do they not want to lead or is it the org just not flexible for us? ... or are the position just not available yet.
Training in the Cloud: 30 things in 20 minutes was awesome and be sure to check it out on their google site.
Mobile Libraries panel was interesting - they mentioned tools and idea like:
Boopsie (customized mobile library aps); walk in mobile msg center (dok) that sends txt msg automatically to phones "Welcome to the library" along w/ some general info; offering charging stations in library; market the library w/ mobile – no print bookmarks please; group texting textPlus (like a blast email); offer contests - people like FREE; Terra (MSU); browser detection & feature detection (ex: NCSU – WURFL); mobilize your content now- start with lowest common denominator (even a simple mobile page will work w/ smart phones) - they compared lack of ada compliance (like elevators) to lacking access to mobile for those people today.
Ebooks - check out Copia, a social ereading experience; in California, everyone is moving to electronic textbooks; when getting started think about relevance to your library, cost, impact for your library, implementing correctly, cataloging (talk to them/include them!), possible problems (user error – training programs needed!)
Help us out here! Adapting library programming to other audiences: remember in training, you have to deal with the range from curiosity and fear; ask the public services staff, do you know what the patrons are asking for? awareness is a start; their goals are not the same as your goals; get them to feel comfortable; encourage coop and collaboration; fishing cowboys concept (think “shane”); we are coaches not teachers.

Lilly Conference 2010

2010-02-10T07:09:00.000-08:00

I attended my first Lilly Conference on College and University Teaching on February 5 & 6 (while you all were enjoying a "snow" day friday). The Lilly Conference was held at the Koury Convention Center in Greensboro and this year's theme was Evidence Based Learning and Teaching. I believe it benefits librarians tremendously to attend non library conferences: not just for learning about topics from another discipline's perspective, but to chat with others in different disciplines, network, and build relationships to benefit libraries and those we teach and serve.

Summaries of sessions I attended - eventually the presentations and handouts will all be on the Lilly Conference web site:

Service & Experiential Learning Plenary Session by marin burton and emily janke of UNCG - They led an interactive plenary session about these 2 concepts: Experiential education - a philosophy and methodology in which educators purposefully engage learners in direct experiences w/ focused reflection in order to increase knowledge and develop skills and clarify values; includes reflection, critical analysis, and synthesis; learner is actively engaged; its not a dichotomy - need to keep traditional learning/reading/reflecting as well as experiential learning. Service learning: service (in non profits, schools, agencies, business etc) w/in academic course materials with critical reflections areas. Advantage in final course grade/retention, helps w/ career exploration, chance to apply theory to real situations, increases critical thinking/problem solving/prosocial reasoning, see others perspectives; show them how to construct new knowledge (co-construct). The library is a natural place for experiential (& even service) learning but how can we do more in this growing, important area?
Just in Time Teaching (JITT) by Scott Simkins NC A&T - Scott had the attendee fill out a survey in advance and used the responses in his session to demonstrate JITT - the idea is to gather info outside of class like a survey or post a question that might define learning gaps or engage students more effectively and use that in your teaching the next time you meet. Not only then do student know what to expect in class, they are connected better to material/readings from outside of class, and allows them a little reflection in the process. Scott handed out some great resources and examples that should be online soon.
Who's reading What and Why (in teaching and learning) by Donna Baily of UNC - some good suggestions and discussions on the best professional literature for various aspect of teaching. Some interesting books I want to check out:
- Why don't students like school? : a cognitive scientist answers questions about how the mind works and what it means for your classroom by Daniel T. Willingham (library record).
- Brain Rules by John Medina (web site).
- Building online learning communities : effective strategies for the virtual classroom by Rena M. Palloff, Keith Pratt (library record)
Howard Gardner Theory of Multiple Intelligences and Higher Education by Susan Autry of CPCC - always good to remember we all learn differently; understand how to reach more than one learning style is important and so is expanding your idea of what is "smart." Need to integrate other ideas and effective instruction to reach more students more effectively. Some interesting statistics (from meyers and jones 1993):
- students only pay attend 40% of time
- students take in 70% in first 10min and only 20% in rest of class
- if you lecture more than 15min - student can take notes but not process info
- 4 months after taking college survey course students only know 8% more than those never taking the class
Criteria Driven Approach to Instructional Technology by Jane Harris and Bonnie Canziani of UNCG - an excellent, interactive, sharing session on tools we have retained or dropped and a useful chart to evaluate instructional technology tools. All info and forms on their googlesite.

Civic Engagement: The Process of Learning by Doing - Prof Darlene Rodriguez and her PSC300 @ UNCG planned and moderated an open discussion for the campus community in Fall 09 called Democracy’s Challenge: Reclaiming the Public’s Role. what a wonderful example of civic engagement, experiential and service learning, giving students a chance to move beyond justtheory and apply knowledge first hand and reflect. Details.

Virtual Executive: Digital Problem Base Learning Object by Wade Maki of UNCG and Karen Hornsby of NC A&T - They demoed a few learning objects they created using Quandry - an open source tool to create case study type mazes (a choose your own adventure style). These tools are both digital and portable; offers multiple learning styles; its interactive and students can do it more than one time; its an example of formative assessment.

Evidenced Based Exploration and Discovery by Pam Carter of NC A&T -an example of engaged pedagogy, active co-learning evidence based exploration and discovery. Used the process model of curriculum design - facilitative teaching. The process of learning is central - not the content. For this class, students engaged in a Green IT project of their choosing. They created a website to educate students on campus, went around and looked at computer labs, researched and made recommendations to lower energy consumption to the campus.

What Research Tells Us: Principals for Making Feedback More Hearable
By Kate Brinko of ASU - a very engaged interactive session where the attendees discussed in small groups stories of feedback - both positive and negative. From this we determined principals for hearable feedback: credible/knowledgeable/well-intentioned source; feedback told soon after event; sandwich negative btw positives; and give accurate, performance based (not personal), descriptive, and concrete feedback - and limit how much (people can only take in so much info at one time)

Feedback Session by Kim Cuny and Hema Yarragunta of UNCG Speaking Center - Discussed how feedback can be used in work environment, peer to peer, and subordinates to supervisor - basically create a more liner not hierarchical approach to feedback as they have done at the speaking center. How often as a supervisor/teacher do you ask you your students to give you feedback? In a diverse workplace today, feedback impt for all levels: helps newcomers learn the ropes in workplace, improves student performance, allows for consideration of opportunities of further development for all, maintains desired productivity which lead to students having a better chance to adjust their experiences; supervisors/teachers can learn from students as well and become better facilitators of knowledge.

ALA Midwinter and Emerging Leaders

2010-01-23T04:53:00.000-08:00

I wouldn't usually attend the ALA Midwinter meeting--it is committee meeting time rather than a true "conference", but this year I attended as an Emerging Leader, which meant that I participated in a day-long training session on leadership. Leslie Burger, former ALA President developed the Emerging Leader program in 2007 as a way to encourage leadership growth among newer members of the library profession and to encourage them to take active roles in ALA. Our own Mac Nelson was a member of the first cohort, and Jenny Dale was a 2008 Emerging Leader. Each EL is assigned to a project developed by an ALA organization. The groups start on the project at ALA Midwinter in January and then work towards ALA Annual where the project is presented to the group and to the wider community.

While it has had some growing pains--keep in mind how new it is--at the same time it has been a worthwhile program for many involved. The experience seems to depend partly on what people make of it, but also on the project to which you are assigned. My project is with the Library and Information Technology Association (LITA), a division of ALA. LITA tends to be one of the more innovative tech groups in ALA because a large portion of its members work with emerging technologies in their libraries--so, they focus their energy on discovery and developing tools to assist with library services. As such their projects are focused on technology. Below is a description of my project:

Project Description:
There seems to be confusion about when to use the LITA website vs the wiki vs the blog and now ALA Connect. Which tool is best for what purpose? LITA is comprised of multiple committees, interest groups, and task forces; these parts communicate to members in a number of ways using various media (print, electronic, social). What information is coming from where? Which communication channel can a person follow, when, or why? Team P will survey the "parts" of LITA and summarize the ways these parts contribute to the "whole" - i.e. the purpose of the organization - and detail the communication streams from each one, along with its strengths.
Expected Outcomes:

Team P will identify the various communication tools currently used by LITA Members and how each is being used to do the business and marketing of the Association.
Make recommendations for which communication tool is best used for each purpose.

While we are working for LITA, I realized that this project is important for many ALA groups. I asked my sponsorship group, the Government Documents Round Table, about their thoughts on this project, and they were enthusiastic about hearing the outcomes. Admittedly, the proliferation of web access points is a problem not just for ALA groups, but also for any organization. We hope to disseminate our findings widely. At this point though, I’m just happy to be working on a project that has wide implications for a large number of people.

Beyond the EL program, I also participated in the GODORT education committee. The Government Information Technology Committee talked about its list of tech tools that could be useful for instruction, both within our libraries and GODORT. The list includes Skype, dimdim, jing, delicious, google wave and other tools we use at our library. We also had small group discussions to share ideas about using these tools, which was helpful. Although I hated the small group format in school, I can really appreciate the usefulness of that format when the discussion is focused and purposeful. It worked well with this project.

I also attend some general membership meetings for GODORT and the ACRL Law and Political Science Section. The discussions were mostly focused on upcoming programs at Annual. I am excited about several of the proposed topics.

The final highlight was the LITA Top Tech Trends panel. You can read my notes at my personal blog if you wish.

It was a busy weekend and I have many things to absorb, but overall Midwinter was a great experience! Can’t wait for Annual!

Staff devpt presentation - State health plan changes

2009-12-07T14:06:00.001-08:00

Hi all,

Here are my notes from this afternoon's presentation by Melissa Barnes (UNCG HR) on state employee health plan changes. Sorry if they're confusing at times - some of this is up in the air and I'm no expert on our health care plan :)

If you have questions, Human Resources is the place to ask: 336.334.5009

If you are covering someone else on your state employee health plan, have proof ready that you're related (birth certificate, adoption or marriage certificate). You'll be asked to provide your proof at any time now.

There will be a health fair in February.

Starting this spring open enrollment for the state health plan will be online (shh! this will be publicly announced next month). Open enrollment will probably take place in March. In 2010-2011 everyone on campus will default to the 80/20 health plan. Remember to keep your ears peeled for info on how to get back on the 70/30 plan if that's the one that you want. One thing to watch for is an "I don't smoke" affadavit that will be included in open enrollment paperwork. If you don't return this affadavit during open enrollment, you'll be on the 80/20 health plan starting July 1, 2010.

Smoking initiative starting in the 2010-2011 health plan year
The 70/30 state health plan will ONLY be available to employees if they and their health plan dependents DO NOT smoke. There will probably be spot checks, possibly including making employees visit an office on campus to have their cheeks swabbed to test for nicotine. Human resources staff have been told that they will be involved, but the process is unknown at this time. HR staff are unsure as to how this rule would be enforced for dependents (they couldn’t really require dependents to visit campus to be tested, can they?). People will probably be allowed to stay on the 70/30 plan with a doctor’s note stating something to the effect of “So and so is using a smoking cessation program.” Important for anyone using nicotine gum or patches.

BMI initiative – Scheduled to begin Summer 2011
It is likely that in Summer 2011 the entire campus will once again be migrated to the 80/20 health plan. Only employees and their health plan dependents who are BELOW a certain BMI during open enrollment will qualify for the 70/30 health plan. At this point it is not known whether affidavits will be used, whether a doctor’s examination will also be required, etc.

BMI is a number calculated from your height and your weight. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC):

BMI 18.5-24.9 is normal
BMI 25.0-29.9 is overweight
BMI 30.0 and above is obese

At this time it is believed that the “cutoff” BMI will be 40 or over. Employees and health plan dependents would need to be under that BMI **and** take some as yet unknown action before open enrollment ends if they wanted to use the 70/30 health plan for the 2011-2012 health plan year.

It is likely that the BMI cutoff will be lowered to 35 for the following year, 2012-2013.

Want to calculate your BMI? Try this calculator from the CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/assessing/bmi/adult_bmi/english_bmi_calculator/bmi_calculator.html

It is likely that 4 nutritionist visits per year will be allowed under the state health plan in order to support weight loss.

Questions about the state health plan can be addressed to Human Resources: 336.334.5009

Benefits – Employee Wellness page includes list of smoking cessation resources and a link to a BMI calculator from the CDC.

Thanks,

Lea

Finding health information online

2009-12-03T07:36:00.001-08:00

Ever needed to see an image of an episiotomy? Wanted to learn about different approaches to treating lower back pain? Without using a medical dictionary to look up every other word?

The Consumer Health Complete database has encyclopedia articles, images, videos, and many other easy to understand materials on a wide range of health topics. Off campus access is restricted to current UNCG students, faculty, and staff with active Novell accounts. Consumer Health Complete is featured as the top subscription on the University Libraries' guide Consumer Health Information Online

By the way, if you have non-UNCG friends or family who would like to use Consumer Health Complete from home, just point them to this page on the NCLive site (Consumer Health Complete is the 3d db listed). They can contact their local NC public library for a password :)

Cheers,
Lea

SD Institute webinar on demonstrating value

2009-11-17T11:02:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Terry for forwarding notice of this afternoon's webinar We can count 'em...But do they count?

Ulla de Stricker discussed traditional library methods for demonstrating value (how much/how often we provide help/materials) versus making a business case for the library (why do we make these provisions/what impact do they have).

Some of the more interesting slides were text-heavy, but here were a few points that I liked...

Don't just report metrics, tell a story. Investigate the context of information needs

What is the universe of clients and needs?
What typical activities are they undertaking?
At what points and how often do they experience information needs (this can inform services that we should increase/develop)?

If we count attendees at events, do we segment by demographics and follow up to measure impact? We have lots of recent activity on this front in library instruction assessment :)

If we count reference questions, do we measure size/complexity of question, trace questions to dept, requestor, or even project?

For chat questions, do we follow up to ask why they use this medium and whether there are any difficulties in using this or other library services?

de Stricker emphasized the need to p/r (probe/realign) before undertaking traditional PR (public relations). She also listed steps that should accompany p/r such as investigating the market (context of clients and info needs).

The presenter suggested a number of PR activities. Overall she suggested that we "have the stakeholders/clients tell the story of library value" for us, though this requires that we reach out to get then deliver these stories. One example was a permanent "library value track" on the website/wikiyoutube (I believe that we currently have this in the library newsletter :)

The recording of the presentation and the ppt should be on the SirsiDynix Institute website in a week.

Thanks,
Lea

Upcoming campus presentations/workshops by Library Staff

2009-11-09T11:49:00.000-08:00

11/10/09
Getting the Word Out: Alternatives to Traditional Scholarly Article Publication
Today's community-engaged researchers have many options for presenting their work to the global community. Tim Bucknall will discuss subject repositories, institutional repositories, Google Scholar, local journal hosting, and other nontraditional ways to present research to a global audience. Sponsored by the Office of Leadership and Service Learning... a brown bag lunch series - bring your lunch, drinks and desert will be provided.
Presenter: Tim Bucknall, Assistant Dean of Electronic Resources and Information Technology, Jackson Library
When: Nov. 10, 12–1 p.m.
Where: Faculty Center
RSVP: alkeith@uncg.edu

11/16/09
Introduction to Creative Commons
The goal of this workshop is to introduce the concept of creative commons, how it relates to copyright, how to use a cc license, and how to find creative commons materials. Creative Commons licenses allow you to use and share materials such as music, pictures, videos, and other examples like the library's info literacy game and FIRST research tutorial. You can check it out on your own here or stop by the workshop and find out more!
Presenters: Lynda Kellam and Beth Filar Williams
When: Nov 16, 3-4pm
Where: CITI Lab/Jackson Library
REGISTER

11/19/09
Educating Yourself in Basic Herbalism: Be Your Own Medicine Man/Woman!
Jackson Library staff member, Stacey Krim, has been using and producing herbal remedies as her primary form of healthcare for about 15 years. With increased health care costs and a growing emphasis on preventative medicine, many consumers are turning to herbal remedies and dietary supplements to meet their health and nutrition needs. Stacey will discuss herbalism basics, varieties of information sources available, and how to educate yourself on finding good information, making intelligent choices when selecting herbal preparations, and using them safely. Sponsored by Staff Senate: Professional and Personal Development Committee
Drinks and Dessert Provided Seating Limited Reservations Required
Presenter: Stacey Krim
Where: Bryan School of Business, Room 416
When: Thursday, November 19, 2009
Time: 12:00 to 12:50 p.m.
REGISTER

Southwest Days Conference in Colorado

2009-10-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

I recently attended the Southwest Days in Durango, CO on Oct 8-9. Being a place I use to live and a workshop I use to help organize, I was thrilled to be back and enjoyed presenting both days of the conference on Creating a Green Environment @ your library. We had some great discussions as a group and found some new tips and ideas (such as libraries lending Kill-a-watt devices to patrons) all within the gorgeous new LEED certified gold, Durango Public Library.

I attended a few other sessions as well. Norice Lee - Head of Access Services @ NMSU Libraries - presented on library leadership, based on Daniel Goleman's Emotional Intelligence ideas. She offered ideas on how to be a highly succeessful organization - some non librarian-y ideas worth considering. Norice also mentioned a book worth reading called Change Your Questions, Change Your Life by Marilee Adams of Brookings Institute.

Going Social and Two Point Woah sessions with Michael Cox (Youth Services Librarian at pueblo city-county library) and Victoria Peterson (Technology Manager at Mancos Public Library) used the cool prezi presentation software to offer a jumping off place for the group to talk about any of the many subtopics such as Twitter, facebook, friendfeed or any other free online tools. As a group we jumped around to various tools, websites and apps, offering suggestions to each other and sharing since there are always new tools to explore. I discovered zamzar for free online file converting, National Geographic's Wildlife filmmaker/video mashup and animoto - a way to make quick, cool videos w/ music from your images. Irma Minerva also made an appearance as her facebook page was shown as a great example of a library (not a building or librarian) on facebook reaching users in a fun way.

Future of Libraries session was facilitated by Sharon Morris, Library Development Director of the Colorado State Library. Sharon led a wonderful group discussion first asking us what we loved about our job and then what we wondered about the future of libraries. Being a group of school, public and academic libraries, comments ranged but the overall realization was that librarians and libraries provide lots of benefits to users from teaching information literacy skills to providing unique gathering spaces in our buildings or online. One of the big issues is that we don't promote what we do or could do for people (for free!) well enough so people are not aware of the benefits of their libraries. We also need to be willing to shift, change and rethink what libraries are in order to stay relevant in the future. In thinking about the future of libraries, we determined a few ways we can strive to become more relevant to our communities:

We are the aggregators and creators of information; lets create ways to make it easier for our users to find what they need and start digitizing more unique resources we own.
Schools may be about teaching but libraries are about listening and self directed learning. Lets build our collections and create spaces that engage our community with ideas and stories.
We are the leaders in our communities; lets model behavior and ideas to guide us into the future.
Advocacy! we may think we are relevant and important but are we telling - and showing - this to our patrons ... or our non patrons?
Take time to look at your future: analyze stats, assess your needs (such as what are you demographics?); research changes over time, patterns and/or cycles; and most importantly stayed tuned in to new disruptive or revolutionary technologies to determine where the world might be headed and how libraries can play an important role.

Library's Instructional Tech Team: annual summary of activities

2009-09-29T06:45:00.000-07:00

The library's instructional tech team was created in summer 2008. The initial meeting involved a number of library staff working in areas of technology and instruction, in which we defined instructional technology, generated goals for the team, listed current projects, brainstormed various ideas, and created high/low matrix to prioritize all these possibilities. After this meeting the team consisting of Beth Filar Williams, Lynda Kellam, Amy Harris and Hannah Winkler, began meeting every other month and have accomplished a number of items - with help of others - over the past year:

Created and maintaining a weekly podcast blog of events, news, interviews - and now including videos created by BFW's LIS practicum student over the summer - relating to UNCG library called Irma Minerva's Audio Magazine. So far we have created 31 podcasts (or blog posts).
Shift Jackson Leaks from PDF newsletter format to blog format with 51 posts as of today.
Started the UNCG library's Professional Dev blog with 50 posts as of today.
Training and assisting librarians w/ Blackboard portal push of resources.
Netopschool software now installed in citi lab (thanks ERIT!) and has been used by several librarians for workshop/classes.
Clickers have been borrowed from TLC and used now in several classes and presentations
Worked with Terry & BethB to make sure the AskUs! icon, link and/or widget is embedded/available from a failed search in our catalog and in some of the major databases.
Created a blog for the instructional tech team to post links, ideas and cool tools.
Pre and post tests in Blackboard have been tested and now promoted with other librarians.
Tutorials: tested numerous tutorial software packages, and finally due to budget cuts, decided on using the free Jing software. Created over 20 new tutorials - mainly Flash screencast type with audio. Created a best practices guide for using Jing to create library tutorials. Also created a tutorial web page to better organize and make accessible these library tutorials. Tutorials are being disseminated through course guides and blogs as well.
Created a library Slideshare account to post presentation slides in blogs. (see Lynda for more info)
Facebook and twitter are now being used actively by the team to promote and inform others about library resources, services, and events.
Before budget freeze in spring, the team researched and purchased a video camera, tripod and wireless mic, for video tutorials & video podcasts.
Creating video introductions for librarian liaisons to use throughout the website/Blackboard. (Example on Steve's Econ Page)
Met with WFU and NCSU libraries for a multi-library instructional technology sharing day, which will be repeated each semester.
Assisted (Danny & Richard) with content for the creation of an assignment calculator which will assist students in planning their research papers, which is now available (eventually will also be available in blackboard)
Taught a few library instructional tech workshops such as on Zotero (w/ Lea!) and Intro to Creative Commons.
Created form & guide for planning an online class using Elluminate software. Taught one online class (BFW & MaryK), and are now promoting this service with all disciplines. The library now has its own "room" w/ Elluminate to teaching online workshops not connected to a specific course. (see BFW for details)

Lilly Conference 2010

2009-09-15T09:27:00.000-07:00

The 2010 Lilly Conference will be February 5-7, 2010 with the theme "Evidence-based learning and teaching." It will be held at the Joseph S. Koury Convention Center in Greensboro. The call for proposals is out now, due by Nov 9. There are also mini-grants available through the TLC for UNCG faculty but there may be a limit on how many are awarded this year.

Notes from Liaison Brown Bag Meeting

2009-09-02T10:18:00.000-07:00

Liaison Brown Bag
Brainstorming about Liaison Qualities

From Stephen Dew:

On August 20, the Library Liaisons gathered in Jackson 574 for a Brown Bag Luncheon to discuss ideas and mutual concerns as the new academic year approached. Steve Cramer facilitated the discussion, and the brainstorming session resulted in the following list of qualities that are desired for liaisons, as well as the additional lists of actions that would support four of the desired qualities.

Q: What qualities would faculty like in their liaisons?

A: The liaison should be…

Proactive
Able to listen
Flexible
Informed about the department
Responds to questions promptly
Involved with teaching
Informed about the discipline
Open to change
Communicates new trends in libraries
Not annoying
Available but not pushy
Informative

Q: What can a liaison do to exhibit each quality?

We discussed the following four qualities:

Staying informed about the discipline:

Get a degree in that field
Read professional listservs and blogs; read library specialty listservs
Peruse the core journals
Work with student groups
Learn what the PhD students are working on – they are often more cutting edge than the faculty
Read the syllabi, especially for seminar classes
Ask
Join the academic (not librarian) professional association

Informed about the department

Go to faculty meetings
Review curriculum changes we learn about through Undergraduate Curriculum Committee
Keep up with Information Literacy mandates and plans, and info lit ideas
Use the Statement of Needs forms
Stay in touch regularly
Read their publications/listen to their performances: These are often posted on the departmental web site and NCDOCKS
C.V.’s posted online; Research projects (don’t always become peer-reviewed articles); Web of Science
Research assignments: Ask about; Talk to T.A.’s about; Get added to Blackboard; Bulletin; Look for syllabi posted online

Being available but not pushy

Have office hours
Reminders of your availability
Leave things in the student lounge / utilize those spaces
Attend receptions, events, special lectures – be seen, especially outside of normal business hours
Cold calls to teachers
Short visits
Use the Blackboard library interface; use liaison chat widgets

Don’t be annoying:

Limit your communication to important things
Don’t go to all events
Ask how you should communicate
AA = Avoid Acronyms
Stress positivity (remain realistic)
Remain user-centered, not library-centered

ETD 2009 -- Bridging the Knowledge Divide

2009-08-03T08:56:00.000-07:00

ETD 2009: Bridging the Knowledge Divide, the international conference on electronic theses and dissertations organized by the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD), was held June 10-13. Hosted by the University of Pittsburgh,
the symposium was cosponsored by West Virginia University (WVU). Other sponsors included ProQuest/UMI, Open Thesis, and EBSCO. Right: photo of downtown Pittsburgh.

Travel fund freeze or no, I attended because I had a poster to present. Along with the inherent exposure and networking opportunities, I gleaned plenty of information on current developments in the field. A few highlights:

Keynote speaker Stevan Harnad (Universite du Quebec a Montreal, University of Southampton (UK)) was introduced as the "leader and theoretician of the green open access movement." As Harnad, a cognitive scientist, explains on his blog, open access (OA) is the free, immediate, and permanent full-text access to scholarly articles. Green OA is the self-archiving of all published journal articles, as opposed to Gold OA in which articles are published in only OA journals. I didn't realize that authors pay a fee to publish in a Gold OA journal (with Springer, for example, $3000 per article.) Southampton was the first university in the world to mandate open-access publishing for faculty in 2005; Harvard, in 2008, was the first US institution to do so. Freely available research has been shown to have a 25-250% greater impact across all disciplines. For students, open access (as in our IR NC DOCKS) can similarly increase the impact of an ETD, and early downloads of a paper correlate with its higher citations later.

Harnad recommends immediate deposit for even embargoed ETDs but with only the title and abstract displayed, along with a button to "request a copy" once the embargo has expired. Theses for creative writing are frequently embargoed because writers fear their work won't be picked up by a publisher if it has appeared online. One speaker's solution: allow the creative work itself to stay hidden, but require a thesis containing an academic analysis of that work to be made accessible.

The retroactive digitization and posting of older theses and dissertations is a growing trend, but must you obtain author permissions first? UNCG's lawyers advised us to do so, but several speakers' institutions do not -- they take down any whose authors object, which happens rarely.

We enjoyed welcoming speeches from conference co-chairs Rush Miller, Hillman University Librarian for the University of Pittsburgh; John Hagen, ETD Program Coordinator at West Virginia University; and Ed Fox, Director of the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations (NDLTD). In addition to organizing the symposium, Hagan has created a thorough blog. All conference papers, posters, and presentations can be accessed at the conference web site. There are also NDLTD groups on Facebook, Flickr, and of course Twitter.

Each day included a choice of three breakout sessions in addition to the plenary sessions. Wednesday I chose "Practical Solutions for Workflows, Training and Systems," in which "ETDs, IRs, and open access" discussed a survey of ETD practices at small to medium sized institutions in the US and UK. Done two years ago, it found that the UK was way behind in moving to ETDs; many of its institutions have made the switch since then. A major factor: "outspoken academic departments" demanding greater accessibility of ETDs. Only half of US respondents had an institutional repository for ETDs; many of those used DSpace or Virginia Tech's open-source system. Also interesting: 25% of US institutions in the survey include bachelor's theses (we do not) while none do in the UK. Only half put ETD catalog records in their OPAC (we do) and those that do, say their IR and OPAC records are "equally detailed." Other topics: the creation of ETD training tools for students, cataloging and metadata migration, and ExLibris's Digitool.

The first two days included an hour-long poster session. I enjoyed the opportunity to discuss my poster, "Current ETD practices and workflows in North Carolina," distribute handouts to all who would take them, and peruse the other posters.

Like any good conference, ETD 2009 included great meals and celebrations. The first evening featured a welcome reception with hors d'oeuvre and drinks, live music, and speeches in the incredible Cathedral of Learning. (It has 2,529 windows!) We heard from Rush Miller and James Maher, University Librarian and Provost at U. Pittsburgh, and Frances O'Brien and E. Jane Martin, Dean of Libraries and Provost at West Virginia University.

The next day's program was packed with more fascinating presentations and panels on topics such as new trends in scholarly communication and repository building, inter-departmental collaboration, and the future of open access. After a "networking lunch" in the Pittsburgh Athletic Association, we had two plenary panel sessions. Highlights:

The NDLTD Union Catalog is a collection of metadata for over 600,000 ETDs from universities around the world. It also does "focused crawling" of selected university repositories (like ours), and has developed a categorization system inspired by Library of Congress classifications and Wikipedia, to "organize the ETDs semantically."

ProQuest reported on their recent, "first large-scale survey of dissertation information-seeking behavior." Survey says -- almost half of users searching their database are working on their doctoral or master's degree, meaning that a majority are not studying for an advanced degree. Academic library websites are an "extremely important" influence in accessing the database; and the disciplines most often associated with these searches are the social sciences, business, and education.

The explication of the "Semantic Electronic Scientific Thesis" was simultaneously fascinating and baffling to my word-oriented brain between a "journal-eating robot that extracts semantic chemistry" and the technical arguments in favor of replacing the PDF with Scholarly HTML.

Thursday night's dinner at the Carnegie Music Hall was delightful. The incredibly ornate and beautiful Foyer (Photo, right) was the setting for the annual awards ceremony with live music provided by WVU's Samba Nova Quartet, featuring conference organizer John Hagan and speaker Dr. Daniel Ferreras.

Friday's program included more on global outreach, regional approaches, and open access, another networking lunch, and discussions of lessons learned. Disappointingly, I had to leave before the Gateway Clipper River Boat Cruise dinner banquet -- and the next day's optional tour of Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater -- as I was staying over only two nights to minimize expenses.

I was not disappointed, however, to leave the dorm where I had spent those nights ... Panther Hall (photo, right) offers "amazing views" of Pittsburgh and the surrounding campus, thanks to its location atop a steep climb of maybe 200 steps. The first night, I made the climb fully laden with suitcase and bags, via the hairpin-curving streets; after that I used the stairs, never yielding to the temptation of the convenient shuttle bus. The dorm itself was a bargain and a great place to stay -- except that it was nearly empty. The eerie, deserted atmosphere was exaggerated by an invisible suite-mate, sheets with no blankets, the awkward height of my upper-bunk bed on the floor, and a malfunctioning window that couldn't seal out the noise of all-night construction and some very loud birds. (I knew someone was sharing my suite -- I heard her in the shower and saw the necklace she left briefly in the bathroom. I looked for that necklace on conference attenders all the next day, but our paths never crossed!)

Aside from the climbing and creepiness, attending the ETD 2009 conference was personally and professionally a wonderful and worthwhile excursion!

Intro to Creative Commons Workshop

2009-07-31T12:18:00.000-07:00

On Thursday, July 30, 2009 at 2pm in the CitiLab, Lynda Kellam and Beth Filar Williams presented a workshop introducing Creative Commons. Creative Commons licenses allow you to use and share materials such as music, pictures, videos, sounds, etc. This workshop was an introduction to concept of creative commons, how it relates to copyright/fair use, how to use a cc license, how to find cc material, and how/why you might apply a cc license to your own materials. As a group we found some good examples of creative commons usage and engaged in interesting discussions on the complexity a copyright-creative commons-web 2.0 environment.

If you missed the workshop, check out our Intro to Creative Commons Web page. You can also view this fabulous overview video from creativecommons.org:

Tongji University Library Presentation, 7/20/09

2009-07-30T06:19:00.001-07:00

Here is the powerpoint presentation from the Tongji University Library Presentation.

Tongji University Library Presentation, 7/20/09

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Kathy Crowe's ALA Poster Session

2009-07-29T18:24:00.001-07:00

I did a poster session at ALA on our work with Student Affairs. I want to thank everyone in the Libraries who participates in this program whether it's staffing a table at SOAR, serving as a liaison or providing a program. It’s a vital part of how we market our services and resources to students!

Kathy Crowe's ALA Poster Session

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UNCG Libraries Hosted a Delegation from Tongji University Library

2009-07-28T10:58:00.000-07:00

By Sha Li Zhang

On July 20 -21, 2009 , The UNCG Libraries hosted a delegation from the Tongji University Library in Shanghai, China. Led by Dr. Jinhua Shen, Library Director, the Tongji University library’s delegation includes Mr. Furong Zeng, Deputy Director, Mr. Zhiming Lu, Head of Circulation Department, and Ms. Hong Wei, Head of Cataloging.

During their stay at UNCG, the members of the delegation had the opportunity of touring the Jackson Library and Music Library, met with librarians and staff, gave a presentation on library services and programs from their library, and had a meeting with AAG members at the University Libraries.

The delegation came to U.S. and attended the ALA 2009 Annual Conference held in Chicago in July 2009. At the Conference, the delegation received 2009 ALA President International Innovative Award on behalf of its library. The Library was awarded for its outreach programs to serve local industries. The Library launched an innovative program - the Auto Industry Information Services Platform in 2006. The platform was strategically designed for planning, collecting, integrating, managing of automobile data, and providing services to local communities. The Library has promoted the platform to local automobile industries through the internet. In past three years, the user group of the platform has been expanded to include 200 local auto companies and more than 2,000 individuals. The Library has conducted nine training sessions and workshops for end-users. The document delivery has reached to 2,650 end-users. Through the platform, the Library provides the users from the local auto industries with the table of contents of 24 auto periodicals. The platform is now being used by major auto companies in China such as Shanghai Auto Corporation. The Library’s innovative approaches to serve local industries are also being recognized by the city officials in Shanghai and the auto industry communities for its visionary leadership, innovative approach as the driving force to help economic development and research activities in Shanghai and beyond.

The Tongji University Library has been ranked as one of the top academic libraries in China for its innovative library services and programs. At the 2008 Chinese American Librarians Association’s 21st Century Librarian Seminar Series held in Kunming City, China, Dr. Jinhua Shen gave a presentation and shared this platform with the audience at the seminar. Mr. James Rettig, ALA President in 2008-2009, was also invited to give a keynote at the seminar. Mr. Rettig was very impressed with the innovative program at the Tongji University Library. In his blog, Twilight Librarian, Mr. Rettig states that “I commend Dr. Jinhua Shen and her staff for their innovation and strategic thinking. It has identified an under-served, perhaps even un-served, community and has developed services that will contribute to the community’s success.”

In her presentation, “Better service, better library” at UNCG Libraries in the morning of July 20, Dr. Shen gave an introduction to the Tongji University Library, its service and administration. Founded in1907, Tongji University offers a wide range of programs in science, engineering, medicine, arts, law, economics, and management. The University’s civil engineering, architecture and urban planning, automotive engineering, and life science programs are among the prominent programs in the country. The Library serves 6,187 faculty and staff, and over 55,000 students. With the Mission of Service Supreme and the professional values on People Oriented and User-centered Idea, the Library applies a variety of ways to enhance students’ learning experience at the University, including hosting lectures, exhibitions, movie weeks, dance performance, and essay-writing and creative multimedia competition at the Library and campus. To support research activities and the area economic development, the Library created automobile industry information platform, biomedical and life science subject service platform, and portals of construction information. In her presentation, Dr. Shen also outlined several trends at the university libraries in China, including the openings of new libraries with new space, furniture, and equipment at many universities; increased the proportion of the electronic recourses; remarkable differences between university libraries in eastern and western regions in China, and challenges on the increasing needs on physic space, qualified staff, and financial difficulty in the rapidly changing information acquisition environment. Dr. Shen’s presentation was well received by the UNCG Libraries’ librarians and staff. After the presentation, a Q &A session was followed.

At the meeting with Administrative Advisory Group (AAG) at the UNCG Libraries in the afternoon, Rosann Bazirjian, Dean of University Libraries, welcomed the delegation. She shared with the visitors the major initiatives at the UNCG Libraries: planning additional learning space at the Jackson Library based on LibQual survey results; using Blackboard to promote electronic resources to the end-users; providing 24/5 learning place at the Jackson Library for UNCG students; building NC DOCKS to support open access movement in disseminating UNCG scholarly publications; offering laptop computer checkout option to UNCG users; increasing electronic resources to meet teaching and research needs of the UNCG community; aggressively seeking external donations and funding to support the Libraries’ mission and goals, etc. The AAG members also answered questions from the delegation at the meeting.

The delegation spent another day visiting the UNC Chapel Hill on July 21. They visited the Davis Library and Wilson Library in Chapel Hill. The delegation heard the reports on “Academic Libraries at UNC Chapel Hill” and Public Services. The delegation also visited the production site of the Carolina Digital Library and Archives where they saw how a piece of a print document or artifact becomes a digital image . Sha Li Zhang, UNCG Libraries’ Assistant Dena for Collections & Technical Services, accompanied the delegation to their visit to UNC Chapel Hill. The delegation left for China on July 23, 2009.

Residency Featured in "Carolina Peacemaker"

2009-07-26T01:00:00.000-07:00

From Jason Alston

I am just never short of shock when I think about the fact that the field of library and information science is having a difficult time bringing minorities – particularly young minorities – into the profession. Even though librarianship is rewarding work, stable work, and well-paying work, it seems that getting young ethnic minorities to consider becoming librarians is as difficult as pulling teeth… out of the mouth of an angry crocodile.

I have my own multi-pronged theory as to why it is difficult to get ethnic minorities to consider librarianship as a career, and these theories are, of course, the same theories shared by many other practitioners. One of the many prongs, naturally, is that librarians aren’t vocal enough in letting targeted groups know that librarianship is a legitimate, professional career path and that career opportunities in libraries are fair game for those young and old, male and female, black and white, and everything else.

While it’s no secret that librarians haven’t been vocal enough in selling the profession to its potential future practitioners, it seems, oddly enough, that little is being done to change the course and engage the public through a PR campaign to spread awareness of what today’s libraries do and who today’s librarians are. Librarians who are interested in recruiting and retaining a new generation of minority librarians need to realize that library science recruitment doesn’t have the natural PR that other fields like law, business, medicine, and even education have. If we are going to keep libraries alive through the 21^st Century, we must diversify these institutions to keep pace with changes occurring in our ever-diversifying nation. And if we are to diversify libraries, we must use every single tool at our disposal to reach out to those populations that otherwise may have never considered the field.

So with all that said, I was elated earlier this July when I was contacted by the Carolina Peacemaker, Greensboro’s black newspaper, about doing a story on my residency position here at UNCG. I knew I needed to use this opportunity to urge the Peacemaker’s audience to consider librarianship as a career choice, but given that the print report would only capture a portion of what I discussed with the reporter, I was somewhat nervous about how the finished product would turn out.

Thankfully, the Peacemaker honored us with quite a spread.

The report does mention the thesis project I did while earning my MLS at North Carolina Central, a project with a focus on minority recruitment. Given that print inches in the news media are ever precious, however, the report was not able to go into great depth about the findings of the research project.

If you’d like to see highlights of the findings of that research project, I offer a brief synopsis below:

The main part of the study was me attempting to test six predetermined factors that may affect an African-American undergraduate's decision to enter library school after college or consider librarianship. The six factors were:

1. Would participant consider a graduate program they hadn't previously considered if offered a scholarship.

2. Would participant consider library school if offered a scholarship to do so.

3. Would participant at least learn more about librarianship if they thought they could get a scholarship to library school.

4. Did participant believe they would enjoy working in a library environment.

5. Did participant believe they would enjoy working with technology in a library environment.

6. Did participant believe African-American friends and family would be supportive of them if they pursued librarianship as a career choice.

88 black undergraduate students (and one student who identified himself as “non-black”, his ethnic background is unknown but he was counted with the other students in this study) at NCCU participated in the study, most of them sophomores. Some key findings:

38 males and 51 females participated. Of these:

-2 males and 0 females said they definitely wanted to be librarians.

-8 males and 8 females said they welcomed the possibility of being librarians even though it was not their first career choice.

-9 males and 21 females said they'd only consider librarianship as a last resort.

-19 males and 22 females said they would not become a librarian under any circumstance.

- It appears that maybe the affect of peer pressure if overstated. The central tendency for black males and females in this study appeared to be that they thought black friends and family would support them if they decided to become librarians.

- The central tendency for black females was to not believe that they would enjoy working in a library environment; however, the central tendency for black females was to believe that they would enjoy working in the library environment if they could work with technology. In the discussion, I mention that the field of librarianship needs to overcome the belief that librarians do nothing but work with books all day. Working with technology is a huge part of the reference, cataloging, and other types of librarians' job and if more black women understood this, more may be enticed to consider the field.

- The central tendency for participants who would consider becoming librarians under no circumstances was to not believe that they would enjoy working in a library environment but to believe they would enjoy working with technology in a library environment. The previously stated information about black females applies.

- Scholarships would not be an effective tool in drawing people who refuse to work in the field of librarianship. For those who would only consider librarianship as a last resort career however, scholarships could possibly be an effective recruitment tool.

Outside of this primary portion of the study, there were some other assorted pieces of information polled for and included. Interesting parts of this information were:

- There was no significant preference among those polled as to whether they felt black youth should be recruited by members of the library science field in elementary, middle, or high school. However, only 2.2% of participants thought it was appropriate to begin recruiting African-Americans into the field when they were in undergraduate school, so the belief is that it may be too late to sell them on the profession by this point.

- For some reason, 44% of the psychology majors who participated welcomed the idea of becoming librarians even though it wasn't their first career choice. This was a much higher percentage of positive response than any other major that I got participants from. I argue in further research that this is something that should perhaps be probed further.

- Unsurprisingly, 43.8% of participants who welcomed the idea of becoming librarians consider the ability to help and serve others as the most important trait of a new job.

- 95.5% of the participants said they had never spoken to a librarian about the possibility of becoming a librarian or what opportunities were out there in the field. These numbers, I believe, are applicable to the entire African-American undergraduate student population in the U.S.

Outreach at the University Archives

2009-07-24T12:30:00.000-07:00

As part of our outreach at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro’s University Archives, Hermann Trojanowski offers two programs for the University Studies (UNS) students. UNS is a one-semester course designed to help students make a successful transition to the University and covers topics such as adjustment and expectations, time management, learning styles, personal responsibility, goal setting, choosing a major/registering for classes, wellness, leadership and citizenship; and skills such as writing, note-taking, studying, test-taking, and learning about the history of the University.

The first program is a presentation titled “The History of UNCG and Campus Ghosts” and is taught in the Hodges Reading Room located on the second floor of Jackson Library, Main Building. During the presentation, the UNS students learn about the history of UNCG as well as the three ghosts that allegedly haunt Aycock Auditorium, Mary Foust Residence Hall, and Spencer Residence Hall.

Charles Duncan McIver Death Mask

In addition to the presentation, Trojanowski sets up a small display for the students consisting of the 1906 Death Mask of founding president Charles D. McIver and several items from the University Archives Textile Collection such as a 1906 Marshal Dress, 1913 Gym Suit made of black wool, and a 1917 World War I military uniform worn by Dr. Anna Gove and made by Abercrombie & Fitch.

UNS Summer Launch Class in front of the Charles Duncan McIver Statue

The second program is a 50-minute historic walking tour of the campus. During the tour, students learn about the founding of the school in 1891, the typhoid epidemic of 1899 during which thirteen students and one staff member died, the burning of Brick Dormitory in 1904, and brief historical facts about the buildings on the tour as well as the three campus ghosts that allegedly haunt Aycock Auditorium, Mary Foust Residence Hall, and Spencer Residence Hall.

Trojanowski also offers historic campus walking tours to faculty, staff, and visitors as well as parents during the annual Parents Weekend each September.

JiTT-Just in Time Teaching

2009-07-21T15:42:00.000-07:00

RIS Dept
Lea Leininger

Big thanks to earlier posters for spreading the word about FREE professional development and July TLC workshops. Here's my summary of a nifty TLC session that was offered today.

Scott Simkins, Director of the NC A&T Academy for Teaching and Learning, spoke about "Just in Time Teaching."

JiTT is supposed to increase the interactivity and effectiveness of class meetings. You assign students to answer a few questions on the topic to be covered *before* class meets. In this way you could potentially skip or skim topics that are well understood. Realistically you'll spend more time clarifying muddy points. But it is important mud!! And you have evidence that you're in splashing around in the correct puddle.

You start class by showing responses (no names attached) to questions. Students get excited to see their info shown at the front of the room. This should be part of an active learning exercise, but I suppose it could be an intro to a standard lecture instead.

Simkins gives the following advice for creating and administering questions:

Only ask one or at most two questions
Questions should be tied to your instructional objectives
Questions should call upon students to use skills on the upper end of Bloom's taxonomy. No asking "How do you get help from the library."
Set due time as close as possible to class meeting time, between 3 and 12 hours beforehand.

I disagree with point 3, at least for library instruction. If you are able to get a professor to go along with JiTT for LI, why not shoot for the moon? Give a reasonably short list of questions ranging from basic to demanding so that you can "cross off" the easy stuff.

Anyway, interesting stuff. I especially liked Dr. Simkins' comment that the NC A&T Academy for Teaching and Learning likes to collaborate with UNCG, hence UNCG faculty are welcome to attend their workshops. If any instruction buffs out there want to supplement UNCG campus workshops on pedagogical methods, keep the ATL in mind. Very easy on the wallet :)

Current Literature and the State Budget

2009-07-21T11:35:00.000-07:00

Acquisitions Department
Christine Fischer
20 July 2009

What to read when you want a break from scholarly material?

Popular new book releases are just the thing. For the past two years, we have participated in the McNaughton book lease plan offered by Brodart. Each month we received newly published general fiction, non-fiction, mysteries, thrillers, romance, science fiction, and biography. The collection has grown to 700+ titles.

For those of you who regularly visited the Current Literature area in the main reading room to pick up the latest by Sedaris, Patterson, or Evanovich, the reduction in the state budget means the cancellation of this service effective July 1, 2009. No more shipments will be received.

The University Libraries will take advantage of Brodart’s low price purchasing option to keep those books with the most checkouts as well as those most recently received. We’ll ship about half the collection back to the vendor (with free shipping due to the volume) within the next two months.

The Acquisitions Department has enjoyed working with these materials, and we know from circulation statistics and word of mouth that this collection has been very popular. Director’s Station statistics from today indicate that 87% of these books have been checked out at least once. Eric Jerome Dickey’s Waking with Enemies has circulated 35 times! One hundred of the books were borrowed 10 or more times. We’ll hope to reinstate popular book leasing in the future.

Sirsi NC Users Group, May 20, 2009

2009-07-20T11:33:00.000-07:00

The Sirsi NC Users Group met at the High Point University on May 20, 2009. Those present represented a cross section of public, academic, and consortial libraries. President Drew McNaughton of NC-Piedmont Automated Library System (NC-PALS) convened the business meeting. After Ruth H. Bryan, NC Community College System, provided the treasurers report, the new officers were announced. David A. Wright of Surry Community College is moving into the presidency for the coming year. Liz Wade of Guilford College is the new vice president/ president elect, a three year position. Ruth agrees to be treasurer for another year, and I have the honor of being secretary. Drew reported that he has developed a website for the Users’ Group and will stay on as webmaster for the time being.

Stephen Abram, Vice President of Innovation (how’s that for a position title?) at SirsiDynix delivered the keynote address, “Provocations about the future of libraries.” The speech was a dynamic, entertaining riff on the familiar themes of keeping up with changing technology and the importance of marketing librarians’ skills. Playing with my new netbook, I took unnecessarily copious notes, but I’ll give you just a few interesting tidbits. Did you know that the top ten donors in the recent presidential campaign were copyright owners? Or that having a library in a school system increases its test scores by twenty percent? How about this one: two-thirds of the money spent in the presidential campaigns went to search engine optimization. Because Google is geography-based, it gives different results on college campuses, and Google can charge more for ads targeted to the college demographic. Speaking of the young, when Sirsi mapped the eye movements of different generations, they found that people under 25 move their eyes differently when looking at a website. And because they spend more time on video games, boys now do more reading than girls. (I predict some raised eyebrows, but the new games I see my kids playing do contain big chunks of text.)

Of course, Sirsi has forecasted and prepared for change as they develop their products. They are working on an “advanced and different discovery model” since most retrieval systems are “just so last century.” Stephen is excited about mobile devices and apps, like Sirsi’s “pocket circ” that lets roving librarians check books in and out as they wander the stacks. In another arena, the company made medical databases accessible from doctors’ PDAs, and saw their institution’s death rate fall by five or ten percent.

Stephen concluded with a long list of recommendations for libraries; we’re right on target with many of them. Here is a sampling: rethink the operating model; focus on user needs, continuous innovation, digital identity, vision, leadership, etc.; expand the metrics (we use their statistics tool, Director’s Station). Libraries should have “bricks, clicks, and tricks” and to “watch the kids and their toys.” Build sustainable social networks because people take questions to their friends and colleagues first. (Did you know that half the librarians in Second Life have both cleavage and wings?) Libraries’ value is in the librarians, not the books. Think about e-book readers, embedded technology, and the “23 things” of web 2.0. Invent the future! Be the change!

Following the introduction of the new president, we were treated to company and product updates from SirsiDynix representatives. Software as a Service (SaaS) is Sirsi’s “most important trend.” They offer new training programs and subscriptions to help us keep up with updates and take advantage of all features (training should, of course, be done yearly). Hyperion, their digital media archive product, will release a new version by year end. Also expected is the Web Services Application Programming Interface (WS API), which adds a layer for interoperability of APIs. Enterprise 3.0, coming soon, is a new discovery layer that works on top of Symphony, Horizon, etc. and “sets a new standard for local control in a hosted discovery tool.” Finally, Symphony 3.3, the update to our ILS software, is coming soon, with exciting features like the Acquisitions Vendor Interface Port (VIP), Enhanced Usability Wizards, Group Item Circulation, and MSSQL support.

After a great lunch (which seemed familiar – I think they repeated last year’s menu) in the Slane Conference Room, we returned to a choice of afternoon sessions. The 1:00 lineup featured “Software as a Service (SaaS) Information Sharing session” by Dr. Carol Jordan, Library Director at Queens University of Charlotte, and Sarah Greene, Youth Services & Technology Librarian of Caldwell County Public Library; “Maestro, Musician or Wannabe? Community Building and Sharing for Symphony Users” by our own Terry W. Brandsma, Information Technology Librarian; and “The Adventures of Loading Authority and Bib Records” with Mary Jane Conger and Marcie Burton, UNCG Catalogers. I attended the latter session; Mary Jane and Marcie did a terrific job, as expected. After a break for refreshments, we went back for more: a Horizon Sharing session with Tommy Joseph and Mike Maynard of the Greensboro Public Library; "Doing the Numbers: Using Sirsi Reports for the NCES, NCHED, and Other Statistical Surveys" moderated by Christine Whittington, Library Director at Greensboro College; and “Methods of Discarding in Sirsi” with Lisa Kushner (Forsyth Public Library), Linda Sparks (Forsyth Public Library), and Cindy Zaruba (UNCG). Since weeding has been a hot topic lately at Jackson Library, I attended the discarding session. Cindy Z. had agreed to a “panel discussion” and adapted beautifully as it became more of a three-part presentation on an unexpectedly complex topic – who knew there were so many ways to discard items from the catalog?

As you can see, this year's Sirsi Users Group meeting was well worth the trip. I'm looking forward to the challenge of helping, as secretary, to organize next year's meeting.

FREE Professional Development...

2009-07-13T11:35:00.000-07:00

Right here at UNCG! The University Teaching and Learning Center has a wide variety of workshops that faculty and staff can register for. For example, on Wednesday there's a workshop called Learning Styles that will teach participants about learning style inventories and how to teach people with diverse learning styles. Cool, huh?
For those of you more interested in technology-related training, there's an Intro to Powerpoint on July 21 and an Intro to Excel on the 23rd.
By now, you may be asking yourself, "How did Amy find all these great workshops?" Well, my friends, the answer is... The TLC Workshop and Events calendar. On the calendar, you can see all upcoming trainings and sign up. They even send you a reminder email the day before! To see the events coming up in the next 30 days, visit https://utlc.uncg.edu/workshops/list_by_month.jsp?months=1 or the main page at https://utlc.uncg.edu/workshops/ New workshops are constantly being added. Happy Learning!!

July TLC Workshops

2009-07-13T10:07:00.000-07:00

Free and open to anyone interested. Sign up now!

Tuesday
Jul/14/2009
11:00 AM

Tuesday
Jul/14/2009
12:00 PM

TEACH Act and Fair Use
Brown Bag

Ray Purdom

McIver 140

Wednesday
Jul/15/2009
02:30 PM

Wednesday
Jul/15/2009
04:30 PM

Learning Styles

Ray Purdom

McIver 140

Thursday
Jul/16/2009
12:30 PM

Thursday
Jul/16/2009
01:30 PM

Narrating PowerPoint Presentations

Amanda Schipman

McIver 140

Tuesday
Jul/21/2009
11:00 AM

Tuesday
Jul/21/2009
12:00 PM

Just in Time Teaching (JiTT)
Led by Scott Simkins, Director of the Academy for Teaching and Learning at NC A&T.

Ray Purdom

McIver 140

Wednesday
Jul/22/2009
02:30 PM

Wednesday
Jul/22/2009
04:30 PM

Cool & FREE Technology Tools for Education

Amanda Schipman

McIver 140

Preservation Committee Yearly Summary

2009-06-22T08:29:00.001-07:00

Outgoing Preservation Committee Chair Hermann has asked that I (as outgoing secretary of the committee) post a summary of the committee's activities over the past year.

***

Our main concern this past year was addressing the preservation issues brought on by recent policy changes, specifically 24/5 *and* allowing food in the library. Both of these together means much more trash is left in the library, especially on the weekends when we have no trash service. This could lead to bug and rodent infestation.

-Members of the preservation committee took photographs of the trash and recycling bins on a Sunday afternoon, and presented these photos as well as a summary of our concerns to Rosann, who agreed that our concerns were significant and asked that we work with Michael Crumpton, who is now a member of the preservation committee, to address them.

-Carolyn worked with Ben Kuka (Office of Waste Reduction & Recycling) to secure 20 new recycling bins for the tower. Each tower floor now has 3 commingled bins, plus bins for each group study space. Michael also ordered 20 lidded trashcans, to help keep the food garbage from the detection of hungry six-legged scavengers. We will have five additional trash cans for the library first floor when school starts.

-We brought up the need for library staff to be aware of food trash at the yearly library meeting, and thanks go to Melvina for her weekly trash removal reminder emails.

-We have also looked into weekend trash service and installing clean-up stations in the tower, but each of these items remains on hold due to budget/staffing/liability concerns.

-We have also begun planning a public relations campaign to encourage students to help us keep the library infestation-free. Stefani has designed bookmarks and table "tent" signs encouraging awareness of common preservation concerns, and a subcommittee led by Stacey is working on videos, including one featuring a giant cockroach and one for the theme of "your mother doesn't work here (but what if she did?)."

***

Additional points:

-The committee decided to do the HF Group tour every other year to benefit new members.

-We do not want to do another preservation self-assessment until after renovations have commenced, but we can make the existing completed worksheets available to the designer.

-"Book-friendlier" bookdrops are on hold until we have money for them, but our outdoor bookdrop relocation might help-- Audrey Sage will keep the committee informed.

-Drain flies in the basement women's restroom: housekeeping added "liquid live" treatment twice a week.

***

Feedback:

Anectdotal evidence shows that housekeeping likes having fewer small bins to empty and students support our efforts to be greener.

***

Moving forward:

Hermann and Michelle are rotating off the committee. Beth Ann Koelsch and Jennifer Motszko have joined. The new Committee Chair is Beth Ann, with Stacey Krim as Secretary.

4th Annual Metrolina Library Association Info Lit Conference

2009-06-19T12:08:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Lynda and I went to the Metrolina Library Association Info Lit conference in Charlotte. It's a great conference that always has interesting keynotes and sessions. Plus, it's at Johnson and Wales University, so the food is always good. Since most of you probably aren't terribly interested in IL, I'll just throw a few relevant points at ya.

Keynote
1. She used the phrase "Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood Syndrome". This means that every library thinks it's special and can't use anybody else's idea since it's so unique. Won't you be my neighbor?
2. Self-studies are good. We should probably do one to see what it is we're actually doing here.

Our session
1. Was awesome. You shoulda been there.
2. I don't have notes on it because I lived it.
3. Take a look at our powerpoint if you are bored!

Library Instruction 2.0
1. Led by a colleague of former intern Amanda Click at American University in Cairo.
2. Lots of discussion of different technologies
3. The Ref Desk at Perkins Library @ Duke Twitters. http://twitter.com/askref Cool!

Evidence-Based Librarianship
1. A good way to gather evidence to improve services
2. Cool open-access journal called Evidence Based Library and Information Practice
3. I need to learn more about this.

There were also poster sessions, one of which was from two recently graduated interns Keeley and Kathy. They represented the University Libraries well. Overall, it was an awesome conference and a chance for me to meet up with other instructionophiles from libraries across NC. And (note to self) I probably shouldn't write these posts on Friday afternoon.

From the Staff Development Committee’s “Open House Sub-Committee”

2009-06-16T11:57:00.000-07:00

Over the past year, many people in departments throughout the Jackson Library and the Music Library hosted “Open Houses” inviting peers into their realms to experience what each department does for our patrons and faculty.

Through the Staff Development Committee and organized by the Open House Sub-Committee, the University Libraries staff was invited to visit each department for an hour where brief tours were performed of the departments, snacks were shared, and most importantly staff were given a chance to meet or re-acquaint with the faces behind all the great accomplishments that are done daily.

Although it was fun to see the “aged” donut in Preservation Services and to get a look at the Music Library’s organ, the intent of each open house was to bring to light the individuals who bring the University Libraries to life each and every day. Interest was regularly high with attendance by 20-25 people for each open house. Also, departments added their own personal touch by providing snacks – many of which were homemade and amazing!

The departments that participated in the open house program were SCUA, Reference, Access Services, Music Library, ERIT, Preservation Services, Acquisitions and Cataloging. The Administration Office will have an open house in the fall of ’09.

Thank you to everyone who attended the open houses and also, of course, thank you to the hosts of each open house as they invited their peers into their workspaces! Watch for the Administration Office open house in the fall and for the next round of open houses sometime in the future.

Annual meeting of the Ohio Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Association (OETDA) in Columbus, Ohio

2009-06-08T06:37:00.001-07:00

On April 2nd and 3rd, I attended the annual meeting of the Ohio Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Association (OETDA) in lovely Columbus, Ohio. (Photo: Downtown Columbus, from http://commons.wikimedia.org )

Hosted by the Ohio State University, the conference was a veritable feast of information on every aspect of ETDs: cataloging, metadata conversion tools, embargoes, reviewing, preservation plans, repositories, file format standards, and more. (Photo: OSU campus)

Why Ohio? Aside from the fact that I have family there, this conference was worth the trip because Ohio has been a leader in the development of ETD programs and procedures. This leadership is the latest iteration of Ohio’s tradition of innovation in library automation, from the birth of OCLC in the 1960s to the 1996 debut of OhioLINK, the statewide, consortial online catalog.

In 2001 OhioLINK opened its ETD Center, a freely accessible database or shared institutional repository for scholarship from Ohio colleges and universities. The ETD Center utilizes the Open Access Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting (OAI-PMH) to enable retrieval of ETD metadata in any one of three formats: Dublin Core (DC), a customized DC known as ETD Metadata Standard (ETD-MS), and now also MARCXML, the web-transmissible format for MARC catalog records.

The first morning’s program was billed as a “Cataloger’s Showcase.” We heard from Michael Farmer, head of cataloging at Ohio University, who catalogs each of their 300 ETDs per year and estimates he has now done about 5,000 of them. Michael Kreyche and Sevim McCutcheon, Systems Librarian and Catalog Librarian, described Kent State’s ETD cataloging process. Kreyche discussed the OhioLINK ETD MARC Cataloging Interface, which he recently designed to generate MARC records for ETDs. McCutcheon talked us through Kent State’s ETD cataloging process, reminding us that OCLC guidelines say “digital originals should be treated as published items,” so ETDs (unlike their paper predecessors) are considered published items rather than manuscripts. We also heard from Susan Banoun, cataloging head at the University of Cincinnati, and Rocki Strader, who catalogs ETDs at the Ohio State University.

That afternoon, Thomas Dowling talked about developments at the OhioLINK ETD Center, where he is Assistant Director of Library Services. He provided some fascinating statistical tidbits, such as the nations originating the greatest number of downloads (India and China, after the US) and which files are most often or widely downloaded. This year’s “winner” for the most downloads (9633) is “Characterization of Vertical Interconnects in 3-D Monolithic Microwave Integrated Circuits (3-D MMIC)” by Qinghua (George) Kang, and with 2788 unique download locations, the most widely accessed ETD is “Flutists’ Family Tree: In Search of the American Flute School” by Demetra Baferos Fair.

The first day’s session concluded with the enthusiastic John Hagen, Manager of West Virginia University’s Institutional Repository, providing updates on the ETD 2009 annual conference of the Networked Digital Libraries of Thesis and Dissertation (NDLTD), which I will attend next week in Pittsburgh, PA. (Photo: downtown Pittsburgh.)

After a great dinner at the Faculty Club, I enjoyed another night’s stay at the luxurious Blackwell Inn, “the only on-campus hotel and conference center at The Ohio State University.”

The following day’s program began with a talk by Kristy Webber, Survey Director at the Survey of Earned Doctorates, with updates and information on data collection and processing issues. She was followed by Angela McCutcheon, Director of ETD at Ohio University, who shared their methods for assuring manuscripts are placed online accurately, reducing rework, and establishing procedures and policies for highly functional ETD operations. The next presenter was a ProQuest/UMI representative who described the process used to handle and review thesis/dissertation documents, and the conference concluded with an Adobe representative who did his utmost to persuade us of our need for the latest version of Acrobat.

Once again, the OETDA conference (my second) provided useful and timely information, great networking, and a generally pleasant experience. If you want to know even more, many presentation materials are available online!

There are other geeks like me!!

2009-06-05T12:18:00.000-07:00

I adore a good librarian-focused conference like ALA or ACRL, but I often have to explain my position to other attendees—“No, I’m not a metadata cataloger. No, I don’t work in the IT department with servers.” Public service oriented data librarians are becoming a more common breed in smaller libraries and are able to ban together in a professional organization just for them and other data professionals. This organization is IASSIST, the International Association for Social Science Information Service & Technology. IASSIST’s membership is wide-ranging—from data librarians in reference departments to data archivists to data producers. The common interest is data—numeric, spatial and otherwise.

Because IASSIST is an international organization, the site for its annual conference rotates between the United States, Canada, and other countries throughout the world (usually in Europe). The 35th annual conference was held in Tampere, Finland and was hosted by the Finnish Social Science Data Archive, which was celebrating its 10 year anniversary. Tampere is 2 hours north of Helsinki, Finland. I will write a separate post in Jackson Leaks about the trip.

The annual conference always covers a wide range of topics from statistical literacy to different data sources to metadata standards for datasets.Often the sessions will present new projects and projects under development at various libraries and data archives. Below is a sampling of projects and presentations:

Ryan Womack at Rutgers University has been using Captivate to create video tutorials on various data sources. Check out his blog for more information. I have been doing a similar thing with a free software called Jing, but the cool thing about Captivate is that it allows for direct export to YouTube. His video on World Development Indicators has had more hits than the official WorldBank videos!
Moscow State University unveiled its University Information System that provides access to socioeconomic data from the Russian National Statistics Office. Students can graph, map and create timelines of available data. The site is currently in Russian, but they plan to create an English version in the future.
The International Household Survey Network is a network of international organizations including the World Bank that work to improve the quality and use of survey data in developing countries. They currently provide lots of data collection and analysis guides and recommendations. They are creating a Question Bank that will be a repository for questions, indicators and more where users will be able to find sample questions and get assistance. It will hopefully launch in September 2009. I can’t wait to see it!
Michael Batty from the University College of London Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis (CASA) gave our final plenary. He discussed their efforts to present data visually using a wide range of web technologies. A major project is MapTube which allows sharing and mashing of maps and features a new map daily. CASA is doing some really cool stuff. I would check out their website for some visualization fun!

Overall, this was the most useful conference I attended this year. I expect grand things from my IASSIST peeps and they always deliver!

Web 2.0 classes and success

2009-05-20T13:16:00.000-07:00

There was wonderful support and participation in the University Libraries nine week Web 2.0 course which can be found at : http://uncglibweb20.blogspot.com/

In fact, it was so successful that the Staff Development Committee is looking at furthering the content and instruction in the future.

Most of the sessions were held in the CITI lab or in Room 774. The instructors and contributors to the Web 2.0 blog were members of our talented staff! Thank you to all who participated and those who instructed. More updates on Web 2.0 technologies will be sent out via this blog and updates put on the Web 2.0 blog. Thank you for your continued enthusiasm and please contact the Staff Development Committee with any suggestions for topics.

Society of North Carolina Archivists (SNCA) spring meeting

2009-04-02T06:56:00.000-07:00

Beth Ann Koelsch’s Notes from the Spring 2009 SNCA (Society of North Carolina) meeting at Duke University, March 12-13, 2009

On Thursday, March 12 I attended the all day workshop: “Photographic Formats: Identification and Preservation for Archival Processing” taught by Stephen Fletcher, Photographic Archivist, UNC-Chapel Hill. Fletcher provided information about the physical characteristics of different photographic formats and taught us ways to identify these different formats and how to best preserve them. The second half of the workshop focused upon the enclosures, storage containers, and environmental conditions. Fletcher emphasized the importance of maintaining a consistent microclimate.

If you haven’t seen this, the UNC-Chapel Hill photographic archives has a GREAT processing blog at:
http://www.lib.unc.edu/blogs/morton/

On Friday, March 13, the opening plenary was a talk by historian David Cecelski about his use of archives and how archivists helped him with his research for his new book, a biography about the slave, abolitionist, and Union spy Abraham Galloway. Cecelski was a great speaker and his story about his research that took him to over 50 archives was very entertaining.

The first session was a project update from Endeca EAD Task Group of the Triangle Research Libraries Network (TRLN) which is exploring how to index finding aids. TRLN is a collaborative consortium comprised of Duke University, North Carolina Central University, North Carolina State University, and The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Endeca is a search application with metadata support. The goal of the project is to allow users to be able to simultaneously search the online catalogs of the member institutions from one portal, thus making collections more visible and increasing inter-institutional borrowing.

The group has completed the harvesting of MARC records and transformed them into a new data model as well as bringing metadata in from other sources. They are working towards enabling the discovery of EAD content with full text catalog browsing by merging MARC and EAD into XML using Endeca. They discussed the merging of data from MARC fields with elements in EAD. One of their aims is to make finding aids more user-friendly by eliminating jargon (e.g. changing “Bioghist” to “Historical Note.”)
The group had been working with Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations (XSLT), which is “an XML-based language used for the transformation of XML documents into other XML or "human-readable" documents” (Wikipedia). The strength of this method is that the user can go directly to the search term in the finding aid. However, the current limitations are single word search capability and the lack of date range search option.

The next step was EAD/XSLT 1.0 which allowed for multiple word searches and date range searches, but a search could only find exact phrase matches and could not handle neither “the” and “a”, nor punctuation.

XSLT 2.0 has solved those problems but there are still issues such as date searches and problems with nested tags that need to be sorted out.

The greatest challenge to the project is that member institutions not only have idiosyncratic finding aid styles, but also has inconsistencies among their own finding aids.

Information about the TRLN Endeca project can be found at their website at: http://www.trln.org/endeca/

The final session was “The Sky is NOT Falling: How to Keep Your Institution Afloat in a Bad Economy.” This panel discussion covered strategies that archival repositories are using to operate in the current financial environment. Jan Blodgett, the College Archivist and Records Management Coordinator at Davidson College, related that there is a hiring freeze at Davidson and they plan on reducing access hours by 50%. They also are temporarily eliminating conducting oral histories, cataloging of archival collections, and postponing conservation projects. Sarah Koonts, Head, Collection Management Branch, North Carolina State Archives discussed strategies for economic survival. She advocated educating oneself about the budget process and the people who make the budgeting decisions. By cultivating relationships with budgeters and learning how the process works, archivists can better present their case to the people who control the purse strings. Koonts also emphasized making sure that your institutions are serving users’ needs, looking at your mission statement to ensure that you are focusing on your core functions, asking donors for processing funds, making use of interns and applying for grants.

Finally, one of the most important aspects of any conference is the opportunity to network with other archivists and share news about what is going on in other local archives.

Lilly Conference (better late than never)

2009-03-31T08:52:00.000-07:00

To echo Lynda, I saw many great presentations at the Lilly conference, but here are the notes I took on a session entitled "Meeting the Millenials: Using Wikipedia to Teach 21st Century Literacy Skills to First-Year Writing Students"

46% of students 18 and over have used Wikipedia
More popular than m-w.com
Students like it because:
• it’s the first result in a Google search
• Multimedia
• Links within articles
Assignment:
Have students change article, to show how easy it is
Look at the Discussion Tab to see how articles are rated and read what’s being said about the article. People discuss things such as possible plagiarism of articles, order, etc. See BF Skinner for an example.

Students can also look at the History tab to see what has been changed and who changed it.

*Controversial articles are locked (Barack Obama, Scientology) and only admins can change them. Notice that there's no "Edit this article" tab. As an interesting and completely unrelated side note, while Scientology is locked, Presbyterianism and Friends are not.

Point: Say why it’s not good, don’t just tell them no.

ACRL Conference in Seattle: programs on assessing usage of Libguides and 2.0

2009-03-30T10:50:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I attended my first ACRL national conference. It was great being in Seattle again -- cool yet sunny the first two days, then rainy, and a little snow!

I took the most notes for a panel discussion about using improv in research instruction (UCLA librarians hired an acting coach). But Libguides and Web 2.0 was all over the program. Two short paper presentations actually got into an assessment of usage. The presentations were back to back, and were the only standing-room only (literally) events I attend.

1. Do the Outcomes Justify the Buzz?: An Assessment of LibGuides at Cornell University and Princeton University

"This study goes beyond the “”2.0″” dogma to empirically determine if LibGuides lives up to its publicity:

Critically examine LibGuides assessment results in order to comprehend patterns of user engagement with “”Web 2.0″” features for teaching, learning and research
Discuss Libguides survey data in order to make well informed decisions about the purchase, development, training for, and roll-out of new library systems
Observe guide creation and use patterns at Princeton and Cornell in order to understand what guide types (Course-Specific vs. Subject-Specific) are in highest demand in “”Library 2.0″”, and how to target publicity and discovery appropriate"

In general, the presenters provided data that web 2.0 tools in Libguides were lightly used except when required by the professor. Libraries at the two schools tended not to use the 2.0 tools in favor of using the Libguides to post links and locations of library resources.

2. If You Build It, Will They Care? Tracking Student Receptivity to Emerging Library Technologies

"The Library 2.0 movement has fostered extensive technological experimentation among academic librarians. Many question a prescriptive approach to such tech-based innovation, arguing that a user-centered focus results in more successful services. This paper presents findings of comprehensive research into student technology adoption and library usage patterns at Ohio University. "

Older patrons tended to prefer wikis, Second Life, blogs, and del.ici.ous.
Younger students tender to prefer Myspace, texting, IM, Youtube, and Facebook.
Twitter use was 0.2-0.3% for students between 18-22 years old. 23-26 years old reported 0.7% usage.

Birthplace to workplace-Breastfeeding & Feminism Symposium

2009-03-30T06:18:00.000-07:00

Birthplace to Workplace (EUC Cone, Thurs 3/26-Fri 3/27) - It's been several years since I attended a conference in one of my liaison areas, I'm now wondering why I waited so long :)

It was nice to see faculty and students from SoN, NTR, and PHE and my poster got raves (woo-hoo!). Too many presentations to list, here are a few -

York University anthropologist Penny Van Esterik on how modernity disrupts birthplaces and workplaces. I admire her approach (participatory, applied) and especially her wake up call to health professionals. The Q&A turned to recent popular backlash against breastfeeding such as Hanna Rosin's Atlantic Monthly essay, The Case Against Breastfeeding. Van Esterik delivered several telling points:

There's no one right way to breastfeed
We need to start embracing bottle-feeding mothers

Didn't seem as if conference attendees were ready to hear this last message.

Dr. Ana Parrilla-Rodriguez, MPH, on Medicalization of Birth as Violence Against Women. Content was compelling even to a mainstream conference attendee. This was a qualitative study of birth experiences in Puerto Rico. The rate of induced labor in Puerto Rico was reported at over 50%, with induced labor being 4x more likely to result in C-section. Ouch!

Ami Goldstein, CNM, FMP on Women's Experiences with Birth: Promoting Positive Experiences and Outcomes. Hands-down best presentation. Great speaking style and fabu content. Common birth practices that lack evidence vs. evidence based practices. Interactive, brief, pithy, well-referenced.

Dr. Alison Stuebe on Empowering Women from the Birthplace to the Home. Great review of transition challenges (postpartum depression, low self-efficacy) to breastfeeding, suggestions for practice, plus a reference to a classic research study The let-down reflex in human lactation that was pubd in the J of Pediatrics in 1948. Apparently these researchers measured how much milk a research subject was able to give while having her feet dunked in ice water, then while having her toe pulled, then while being asked math questions and receiving electrical shocks. Not surprisingly, all of these interventions had serious effects on let-down.

Dr. Deborah Dee of the CDC on the Nationary Survey of Maternity Practices in Infant Nutrition and Care (mPINC). Responses to questions on best practices in labor and delivery (maternal-newborn skin to skin contact), breastfeeding support, etc. Detailed results only provided to the hospitals who responded to the survey, but more aggregated info will be made available in state reports.

Jake Marcus on Lactation, Law, and the Workplace. Don't cringe, fellow librarians, but I'm linking to this lawyer's non-refereed open Web article Pumping 9 to 5. It's well referenced and includes a link to a nifty map summarizing states with breast pumping laws. Twitter hashtag #bfing

Dr. Miriam Labbock's Evolutionary, Biological and Economic Perspectives on Maternity Leave had an interesting cost-benefit analysis on health system and household savings for paid maternity leave. Data were illustrative estimates, though.

I was wishing that Rachel, our esteemed HR librarian, could have listened to presentations and participated in discussions on benefits (Barbara Carroll, NCSU Associate Vice Chancellor and Chief HR officer) and on work-life balance research (Dr. Marian Ruderman of the Center for Creative Leadership).

One of Steve's faculty gave a nice talk - Dr. Yu-Chin Hsieh on Lodging Manager's Coping Strategies for Balancing Work and Family Life.

TRI-IT Spring 2009 @ Elon -- PART 2

2009-03-26T14:09:00.000-07:00

Campus updates:

Elon: Meeting w/ faculty to find out how they integrate with technology and how to better support them on their own ground. Created Gallery Builder using PHP as a collection of faculty's research that can be produced in poster form. Syllabus Collection online (voluntary) . Using blogs, wikis, podcasting for faculty. Wordpress software on their server. Wetpaint wikis. Video - such as clips of chemistry faculty showing howto use various tools and techniques. Flip cameras can be borrowed by faculty to use in their classes.
UNC: Voice Thread new Web 2.0 tool to create discussion and annotation around multi media objects. E-textbooks project. Lost Second Life and some IT training staff due to budget cuts. Distance learning is increasing tremendously.
Wake Forest: Using Sakai and Moodle. Studio for recording lectures in the library. Been supporting blogs, wikis and podcasts for a while including running their own server of these applications.
Duke: Duke Digital Initiative for next year; planning for instructional tech showcase April 24, 2009

Peda-Blogy Session
Rick Palmer/Matt Lewis (Elon)
Professor wanted to make her classes' group project/powerpt presentation more interactive, collaborative, and 21st century. Decided to try a blog: classroom presentation as knowledge sharing collaboration in creation of a resource on a topic. (using Wordpress) Responses --> Students like the idea of doing it on their own time, whenever they wanted, valued final project, thought there were only minor tech glitches. Faculty thought it was easy simple and clean (IT assisted to make this easy for them) and liked the less "present" time in class and more active learning and fun. Check out it out: http://idd.elon.edu/blogs/pedablogy/

Web 2.0 Applications and Usage

Lauren Pressley (WFU): Do training on how to use the tools and host some as well for librarians and faculty/staff on campus. Role of the library is to archive and preserve things happening on campus thus use Blogs wikis and podcasting. Will sit down with anyone to figure out the best tool for them. Use facebook, flickr, etc as a course management tool. Multimedia projects supported by library. Will teach a class to train the students for a prof on a tool. Google calendaring to embed. Google Voice starting to use. Twitter and 12seconds (like twitter but with video) TED talks invite others to join in. Nings!
Randy Piland(Lecturer in Communications @ Elon) & Scott Hilldebrand (Dir of Instruc Tech @Elon): Suggested some new tools - VuVOx collage (video) Issuu.com (magazine publishing portal) cooliris.com (photos & videos, search by theme, w/ captions, through all news archives) Thumbstrip - firefox plug in, add various sites and they appear as thumbnails in bottom of screen (preloaded and ready to gofor a class)Photosynth (MS, people submit photos and it pulls similar ones together). Kalabo (online music collaboration) Glypho (create a story collaboratively)

Cool Tools Sharing Session

grooveshark (search for a song)
dimdim (cheap teleconferencing)
prezi (artist, zooming presentation tool)
mixedink (collaborative writing tool)
tineye (reverse image look up)
timzon (asynchronous discussion)
etherpad (simultaneous collaboration of up to 8 people)
live question tool (for large group presentation, audience can submit questions, others can add or vote)
ultralearn (bring in multiple functions for one lesson)

TRI-IT Spring 2009 @ Elon

2009-03-26T06:20:00.001-07:00

BFW and I attended a one-day (free!) informal information sharing opportunity for Triangle and Triad instructional technology people - instructors, programmers, web designers, librarians all under one roof. It was good opportunity to meet with a mix of people with varied backgrounds and skills; in fact I was surprised to learn that many of the non-librarians had MLIS/MSIS degrees!
I attended sessions on blogging, podcasting, interactive instructional multimedia and freeware and open source. A couple of highlights:

Learned how Elon Law School is incorporating podcasting for law professors (Christie Dickerman). They use a service that allows professors to record podcasts over the phone. Dickerman then edits the "voice recordings" as 18-20 minute long podcasts. (Longer podcasts are too big for BB to handle.) Students can listen to the podcasts - mini snippets of their class lecture on Blackboard or download them in itunes and listen to them on the go. Dickerman said that at first the students said it was "a little weird" but then it felt as though they were getting a one-on-one lessons with thier professor -- then, three years later they have to reapply the information on the bar exam, and can listen to it again for a refresher.
The interactive instructional multimedia presentation made me realize just how far instructional technology has come in such a short amount of time and also just how behind the library is. UNC teaching and learning center showed us some of the dynamic online courses they have prepared for some schools on campus. These were large-scale collaborative projects that demanded the skills of many different people on many different projects -- programmers, web design, graphic design, writers, producers, etc -- to have an end product. For example -- some online videos class modules for the nursing school took two days for video production but 5-6 weeks to edit with the team. (That was a short range project!) On the other hand it took two years to create 9 web-based class module courses. (A free demo is available to view here.) The shortest was 1 hour of narrated animation but that is without the quizzes; In total there was 800 hours of narration, (831 files) completed. All of the modules were interactive -- drag 'n drop, fill in blank, multiple choice.

Sidenote: Wake Forest ZSR has a reward scheme built into their Professional Development blog. People who attend conferences (etc.) and post on their PD blog get more funding; those that don't post on their blog get less funding. hmmm.

2009 UNC TLT Conference

2009-03-20T13:20:00.001-07:00

This year the 10th Annual UNC Teaching & Learning with Technology Conference was held online only (and free to attend!) There were both synchronous and asynchronous sessions. Here is a summary of the sessions I found worthwhile:

Reusable Multimedia Resources to Enhance Information Literacy
(NCSU librarians)

Info Lit: how to use a tool or do a process VS. giving more context to understand the tool process or concept. (EX: how do I identify a peer reviewed journal? vs what is a peer reviewed and why is it impt? OR can I use wikipedia in my research? vs how does the info get created in wikipedia?) Teach the "back story" - instruction about how info is created, vetted, stored, accessed and used.

NCSU Libraries e-learning resources project: suite of online learning materials, stand alone for instructors or librarians, and share among other institutions. These are generic videos so can be used across disciplines and at other campuses --> anyone can download the zip file and host on their own site!

Peer Review in 5 minutes: 1) understanding the big picture of peer review process 2) why peer reviewed articles are different peer review 3) what happens on college campuses. 4)Knowing where to go for help.

Lit Review for Grad Students: 1)what is a literature review? 2)What purpose do literature reviews serve in research? 3) What should a student expect as part of the process of conducting a literature review?

Enhancing Student Learning Through the Use of NetOp School
(UMC-P Sharon Bell, Ollie Bishop)

View the Windows Media Video of the presentation.

To capture students' attention in a lab setting, fostering critical thinking, and enhancing collaboration in an active learning environment technology, try Net Op School
During class, students participate, collaborate in teams, and take responsibility for their own learning.
The professor facilitates discussion while solutions are critiqued.
The success of this teaching approach and use of this active learning classroom environment is not discipline specific.

Expanding Library Instruction Online: Using Elluminate to Reach Both On-Campus and Distance Education Students
(NCSU libraries)

Already working with de students for course specific or program specific workshops, but would students attend an online library workshops regardless of whether they are on campus students? YES!

How to get started/factors to consider:

cater to de and on campus students, esp grad students across several depts rather than a specific class.
timing is important! not late in the semester; try fall and early in the semester.
don't send long emails w/ too much info - they wont read it!
give meaning to the workshops.
faculty are interested and supportive of this - get leverage from them.
most workshops ended up being weekdays 7pm for 1 hour 15min max - best for working students and even on campus students.

Judge Success of Project:

reach different types of students.
same number of more students than f2f equivalent.
positive feedback - created a survey to take after they attend.
reuse the archival workshops - others can watch it later.

Second Step:

create web pages w/ workshop descriptions and info, tech info, registration (which is beneficial to know how many are planning to attend)

Promotion:

through classes, email, flyers, e-board, blog...

Who attended:

Majority were on campus students actually!
Majority were grad students, esp doctoral students.

Lessons Learned

critical to partner with faculty and other student support staff to market workshops.
hard to find good scheduling time for everyone.
web based content guides is very impt and helpful.
make it easy to join - if its complex for a group then just let them click a link and join.
re-use archival sessions instead for individual students or a class.
know that students dont come in masses.
why not create a library online of these links to recorded sessions in one place for others to grab and use?
use ellumniate to record shorter sessions, in place of a jing/camtesia tutorial.

Course Management with Social Networks
(JD Knode, Methodist U and Steve Knode, U of MD)

Using Nings instead of BB for class. More flexibility! More collaborative work!
Add photos or videos. Chat/threaded discussion. Each person has a page of their own to tweak and personalize. They have their own blog too.
Small groups can be created w/in the ning - with their OWN tools to discussion collaboratively and collect docs etc.
Invites tool to ask people to join network. Can keep it private.
Privacy/wavier/permission - asked students to try this and experiment w/ this tool and they were all ok it and w/ sharing this experiment with others.
You can set parameters on what students can and cant add to their pages in the ning. They can set who can see what they post as well.
Went through all the customization and aspects of using a ning.
Can set up notify to email you when changes occur in areas you specify so you dont have to log in all the time to check.
Don't have to be a techy person to use the ning. Its easy and simple to drag and drop to set things up.
This doesn't have to be a class ning, it could be a group, committee, organization or people with common focus.

Effective Screencasts for Maximum Learning at a Distance
(East Carolina U)

CAMTESIA INFO:

Provides editing features similar to ones available in movie editing programs such as Windows Movie Maker and Apple’s iMovie. May edit the screencast from either a timeline or storyboard.
At any point in the screencast, you can delete video and audio content or can insert new video, graphics, or audio clips. Also can even out volume levels and remove noise.
Can add a quiz with multiple-choice items; fill-in-the-blank items; and short answer items.
Camtasia will grade the multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank items.
Developers may publish a screencast in any combination of these formats: Web & blog (MP4); Flash (SWF); iPod/iPhone/iTunes (M4V); CD/DVD/lossless export (AVI); Silverlight-compatible (WMV); QuickTime (MOV); RealMedia (RM); Animated GIF; Audio only (MP3)

ASIST Training

2009-03-16T04:59:00.000-07:00

On March 11th and 12th, I attended Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST), sponsored by the UNCG Student Health Center. ASIST provides intensive training and practice in recognizing individuals in danger of committing suicide or engaging in suicidal behavior, assessing the immediate risk of such behavior, as well as how to intervene and assist someone in an obvious suicidal situation.

ASIST training is referred to as “suicide first aid.” The training helps people in any role or profession reduce and eliminate the immediate threat of suicide, as opposed to training for the long term care of potential suicide victims. ASIST training supplements the UNCG Cares initiative through the Dean of Students office as well as Safe Zone training offered by the UNCG Wellness Center. Although many people attending this program were mental health professionals, my fellow trainees included people from Campus Ministries, the Office of Multicultural Affairs, and Housing & Residence Life.

ASIST is the most intensive training program offered through LivingWorks Education, Inc. Additionally, there are 2-3 hour programs (suicideTALK & safeTALK) and day-long training sessions (WorkingTogether & suicideCare). Healthcare professionals as well as informal facilitators attend these programs.

Why is it important to have suicide awareness and intervention training when working at a university? According to 2005 statistics, suicide is the third cause of death among Americans 15-24 years of age. In fact, over 1,000 students commit suicide on college campuses each year, and 1 in 12 students has planned his or her suicide at some point. Based on this statistic, of the 28,429 undergraduates who can borrow from our library in 2007-08, 2,370 have considered suicide at some point. Of the 7,646 students seen in instructional sessions by our Reference Department in 2007, at least 638 have had thoughts of suicide. With statistics like these, campus-community awareness and training is a necessity.

For more information about the ASIST program and other prevention and awareness training, visit: http://www.livingworks.net/

For more general information concerning suicide, visit: http://www.suicidology.org/web/guest/home

2009-02-22T05:37:00.000-08:00

On February 20 and 21, 2009 I attended the 2009 Lilly Conference on College & University Teaching with Amy Harris and Mike Crumpton. They may submit their own summaries, but as we went to different sessions, I’ll hit just a few highlights. Lilly is a series of conferences and institutes held all over the country to promote excellence in college teaching. The Lilly South conference is hosted by a consortium of local universities, colleges and community colleges. The UNCG Teaching and Learning Center coordinates most of the UNCG efforts. I had never been before but I’ve always heard good things about it. UNCG faculty qualify for a mini-grant to cover the cost of registration (about $400), so you shouldn’t let the opportunity pass you by. Most of the materials will be available from the conference site.

The theme of the conference was Millennial learning, but many of the sessions were focused on technology or active learning techniques (not specific to millennials). While little of the tech was innovative or new, the sessions were good about exploring possibilities a bit more in-depth. For instance, I attended a session on using clickers in the classroom to encourage deep and critical thinking. Most of my exposure to clickers had been at a superficial assessment level. This session explored ways to encourage deep engagement with the material by combining the use of clickers with small and large group discussion. For instance, before doing a demonstration, the instructor could have students predict what would happen using the clickers to vote. Then they could ask students to pair up and discuss their predictions, vote again, and finally do the demonstration. I love this approach because it transfers intellectual authority to the students before being claimed by the professor.

I also attended two sessions on theories of teaching. Barbara Millis from the University of Texas, San Antonio discussed cooperative teaching techniques, such as think-pair-share and other forms of group work. Todd Zakrajsek from UNC discussed various theories of social psychology and their relation to teaching. Both were wonderful speakers. My favorite factoid from Zakrajsek’s talk was a chart in Bligh’s What’s the Use of Lectures demonstrating that as the time of a lecture increases student heart rates decrease significantly. The reinforces the reality that people can only take about 15 minutes of lecture at a time. Zakrajsek gave suggestions for classroom activities that can engage students with the material and promote student learning, such as various forms of pair-shares.

Finally, I attended a session on classroom communication and immediacy in teaching given by Kim Cuny and Erika Lytle of UNCG’s Speaking Center. Immediacy is the perception of closeness both physical and psychological. Teachers with higher immediacy tend to have increased student learning. Although environmental factors in a room can interfere with your immediacy (too hot, too uncomfortable), there are nonverbal techniques a teacher can adopt (good eye contact, pleasing facial expressions) that can increase your immediacy. I hope Amy will invite Kim to come over to our library and give a workshop. All teaching librarians could benefit from these techniques and reminders!

ALA Midwinter 2009 Summary

2009-02-19T07:43:00.000-08:00

Lucky me, I flew into the Denver area early and got to enjoy the 70 degree weather for hiking and visiting with Colorado friends. But when Friday arrived and ALA midwinter officially began, it was the usual cold, snowy January Colorado day, a good time to be inside attending sessions on various topics. Here is a summary of some sessions I attended:

RUSA/STARS ILL Hot Topic Discussion

Many libraries are having major budget crises in their library - from 50% budget cuts to full time staff layoffs. Several librarians from U of AZ, U of OR , Colorado State University, Baylor, LC, etc. discussed their issues and ideas for dealing with budget problems:

Generate income streams/revues. (EX: rights and reproductions of special collections materials)
Use RAPID.
Use other people from various areas of the library (tech services folks esp good for searching) Put ILLiad software on computers in reference and spec collections and train others to use it. Night staff does ILL requests at night. Note: 30-40% of ILL work is NOT from ILL dept. (U of AZ)
Everyone ILL dept is cross trained.
Students are trained in all areas of ILL, more so than staff – they are easier to train, pick it up faster, esp technology. And they use ILLiad - not just pulling books or mail. (CSU)
No physical reserves! (U of AZ) Video streaming is used esp for DVDs. Doc delivery for all physical books.
Hired back retired staff to work part time, is very reliable, but costs less than fulltime staff.
Only borrow from IFM libraries.
Went through every possible procedure and cut back on any unnecessary task and paperwork to save time. (U of OR)
Don’t worry about overdues - waste of time for staff for what $5.
Stacks does the pulling for all lending (they are quick and know the stacks well) and this benefits both b/c the stacks folks then are needed more and less likely to have positions cut.
Reserves Dept does the scanning and doc delivery - works well, since their busy time is not same as ILL busy time of semester. Also, ILL and reserves processes are similar and was a nature combo.
Using technology to train staff such as a wiki of info everyone can post to (ex: how to fill a difficult request), youtube videos on how-to do a task, post resources and help on blackboard … staff can use this as a reference instead of always needing an actual staff person to go to - especially relevant at night for ILL work. (Baylor)
Mobile scanning station - take it with you around stacks instead of gathering print, bringing down to ILL, scanning and taking back up again to stacks. (someone actually calculated this saved 40 hours a week )
Supporting borrowing side with lending revenue; take revenue to fill staff/student positions; or some us it for UPS costs.

LITA Distance Learning Interest Group Session

Check out their blog: http://dlig.wordpress.com/
(regis) Library does a 2 week faculty orientation to library course via blackboard. Reach out to adjuncts and new faculty. Usually 15-20 people each time.
Text from catalog to cell to find your book in library stacks (included call #, title, and location in library. (WFU)
Screen capture tools/tutorials: Captivate (regis) - you can track stats via google analytics (shockwave flash embedded) including how far user has gone, buttons clicked, etc. Can do this in Viewlet Builder as well (VB is best for multiple buttons in tutorials) set resolutions at 800 x 600. Also using Jing and Wink for quick, on the spot chat references.
Ants projects: ants.wetpaint.com - Canadian project, librarians can post tutorials that all can use and edit if needed. Also turn them into a tutorial on Bliptv (better resolution than youtube)
Check out the Horizon report to see whats coming down the road in tech -- this time mobile and cloub computing
Slideshare.net - see many presentations here from conferences or just someone sharing a presentations.
LibX toolbar - recommended by many libraries.

ACRL Distance Learning Section Discussion Group

After running my committee meeting as co-chair of the Bibliography Committee, we all met as a large group and discussed two reports on scholarly communication - Current Models of Digital Scholarly Communication Nov 2008 by Marion and Smith; Ithaka’s 2006 Studies of Key Stakeholders in Digital Transformation in Higher Education (PDF) August 18, 2008 by Housewirght and Schenfeld. Then discussion shifted to budget issues and paper vs electronic journals. Most libraries are getting rid of paper copies of ejournals (esp JSTOR) – some say they get initial complaints to hold on to them, but most faculty are okay after they are removed from the collection. Someone suggested that we have to push back to get more support and realization to faculty that of what we do and offer. Most libraries goal is to make things seamless as possible. What about an embargo and the currect copy is not available? Then go directly to ILLiad to request it. Someone mention if we all get rid of everything paper, then who can we borrow the embargoed copy from? As long as one library keeps it we'll be alright :>

Task Force on the Environment (SSRT)

I also attended a working group session of TFOE. We discussed a program for ALA Annual in Chicago with the hope to have some brief presentation but mainly focus on attendees forming into groups to discuss small, practical, things they are doing or could be doing in their libraries, offer this chance for networking with others, and to share and work collaboratively on greening your library ideas. Also discussed was next year 2010 will be 40th anniversary of Earth Day and 10th anniversary of ALA's Libraries Build Sustainable Communities, so some good green planning should be started now to make it an ALA wide event in 2010. Join the listserv and stay tuned!

2009-02-17T10:31:00.000-08:00

Here's a really long post to go along with a brown bag presentation scheduled for Feb. 18. It's my report on Reference Renaissance: Current and Future Trends held August 3-5, 2008 in Denver. Almost all of the presentations have Power Points online and there are some podcasts as well.

Some of the presentations that I found most illuminating were those of David W. Lewis, Dean of the University Library, Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis “Reference in the Age of Wikipedia, Or Not... “ Lewis discussed the idea of disruptive innovation stemming from the works of Clayton Christensen. We have several of these at UNCG and currently all except a brand new one are checked out.

Christensen, Clayton M. Disrupting class : how disruptive innovation will change the way the world learns / Clayton M. Christensen, Michael B. Horn and Curtis W. Johnson. New York : McGraw-Hill, c2008. Jackson Library In process, LB1027 .C4662 2008 (c.1)
Christensen, Clayton M. Seeing what's next : using the theories of innovation to predict industry change / Clayton M. Christensen, Scott D. Anthony, Erik A. Roth. Boston : Harvard Business School Press, c2004. HD30.28 .C54 2004 (c.1)
Christensen, Clayton M. The innovator's solution : creating and sustaining successful growth / Clayton M. Christensen, Michael E. Raynor. Boston, Mass. : Harvard Business School Press, c2003. HD53 .C495 2003 (c.1)
Understanding consumer behavior / [contributors, Stephen Brown ... [et al.]. Boston, MA : Harvard Business School Pub., c2002. HF5415.32 .U5280 2002 (c.1)
Christensen, Clayton M. The innovator's dilemma : when new technologies cause great firms to fail / Clayton M. Christensen. Boston, Mass. : Harvard Business School Press, c1997. HD53 .C49 1997 (c.1)

Here are some quotes from Lewis’s talk:

“One bedrock finding from our research is that companies innovate faster than customer’s lives change. In other words, what people are looking to get done remains remarkably consistent, but products always improve. Thus, products eventually become too good.”
“Don’t ask you customers what they want, rather watch what they do.”
“When a profession has been created as a result of some scarcity, as with librarians or television programmers, the professionals are often the last ones to see it when that scarcity goes away. It is easier to understand that you face competition than obsolescence.”

It’s particularly interesting to find out what’s going on right down the road – so I attended a presentation by some fellow North Carolinians. Night time virtual reference (VR) collaboration between the libraries at Duke University, North Carolina State University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. This “Night Owl” chat collaboration began in 2003 and allows the libraries to offer their virtual reference services later in the night by sharing the task of staffing it. During the day, each library staffs its service separately, only answering questions from its own patrons. Librarians and a software developer have produced Library H3lp – to help them manage a chat service staffed at multiple points.

Josh Boyer, Associate Head, Distance Learning and Research & Information Services, D.H. Hill Library, North Carolina State University.
Jean Ferguson, Head of Research and Reference Services, Perkins Library, Duke University.
Eric Sessoms, co-developer of Libraryh3lp, is Executive Consultant for End-to-End Data Operations and for the US National Radio Astronomy Observatory.
Pam Sessoms, co-developer of Libraryh3lp, is Electronic Reference Services Librarian, Davis Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
Amy VanScoy, Ph.D. Student, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Associate Head of Research & Information Services, D.H. Hill Library, North Carolina State University.

This was another session I really liked: “Traditional" vs. "Hipster" Librarians: How can we alleviate tensions and reconcile the differences between old-fashioned, “traditional” librarians and tech-savvy “hipster” librarians? This presentation takes a look at the paradigm shift from “system-centered” to “user-centered” librarianship in order to understand how and why these differences have arisen, and anticipates the next paradigm shift to “knowledge-centered” librarianship. Presenter: Hannah Kwon, Ph.D. Student, Rutgers University, SCILS, NJ

Another presentation I enjoyed, reminding me that students see Facebook as their domain and don’t necessarily want to be was:

“Okay, This is Just Too Weird: Identifying Outreach Opportunities in Facebook” (Panel) Elizabeth Edwards, and David Bietila, Gelman Library, The George Washington University, Washington, DC
Social networking sites like Facebook offer libraries unique opportunities for reaching students. We present the findings of our mixed-method study, which examined students' use of Facebook and library resources, and made recommendations for our library's Facebook initiatives.

One of the most interesting talks was the plenary panel including R. David Lankes of Syracuse U, Jamie LaRue of Douglas County Libraries, Marie Radford of Rutgers and Carla Stoffle of Univ. of AZ . It’s available on the site as a podcast, and I’ll have to say that Dr. Radford is one of the most dynamic speakers I’ve ever heard! There was universal agreement by panelists that reference staffing and service provision models are changing radically and that librarians should be ahead of the curve in anticipating what patrons will need for the future. One study quoted says that 85% of questions don’t require librarians – based on this, what staffing patterns should we follow? Shift in Reference to more and more paraprofessionals at the desk – in academic libraries, often more emphasis now on working with faculty and classes.

In the end, all of the different ways to provide service and reach our audience confirmed a strong desire to connect people with information in the most efficient and effective ways possible.

Mary Krautter

Exploring Web 2.0 Launches!

2009-01-23T10:05:00.001-08:00

The Staff Development Committee is happy to announce that the "Exploring Web 2.0" program web site is now up!

This program will run for nine weeks starting February 2 and covers many online technologies that make the Internet more productive, easier to use and even more fun.

Each week features new technologies and web sites and will include a one hour presentation by tech-savvy volunteers from with Jackson Library. This is your chance to see where the online revolution is headed and see how it could affect how Libraries "do business" in the future.

Begin your tour here: http://uncglibweb20.blogspot.com/

Library 2.0 Schedule:

Week One - Introduction - February 2-6

Class Session: February 3 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Two - Blogging - February 9-13

Class Session: February 11 3-4pm, CITI Lab

Week Three - Photos and Technology - February 16 -20

Class Session: February 18 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Four - RSS and Newsreaders - February 23-27

Class Session: February 24 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Five - Play Week! - March 2-6

Class Session: March 5 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Six - Tagging, Folksonomies and Technorati - March 9-13

Class Session: March 12 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Seven - Wikis - March 16-20

Class Session: March 17 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Eight - Online Applications and Tools - March 23-27

Class Session: March 25 3-4pm, Room 774

Week Nine - Podcasts, Video and Downloadable Audio - March 30-April 3

Class Session: April 1 3-4pm, Room 774

Library Instruction 2.0 Conference Teaser

2008-11-20T09:58:00.000-08:00

Here is just a small teaser from the Library Instruction 2.0 Conference on November 17 & 18 in Chapel Hill, NC. It is the powerpoint for the presentation Amy and Lynda gave. More information will be coming soon!

OLAC-MOUG Conference Highlights

2008-11-14T13:07:00.000-08:00

The OLAC-MOUG Joint Conference took place in Cleveland, Ohio , September 26-28, 2008. The OnLine Audiovisual Catalogers (OLAC) association meets biennially in various cities. Because of the overlap between the two groups’ areas of focus, the Music OCLC Users Group (MOUG) meets jointly with OLAC every six to eight years or so. This year’s event was well worth the trip, both personally and professionally. I had the privilege of staying with old friends who provided meals, chauffeur service, and good company as well as a bed.

And I enjoyed making new professional contacts, renewing old ones, and attending informative presentations in the beautiful, historic Renaissance Cleveland hotel.

from hotel’s website

Lynne Howarth’s opening keynote speech, Rocking the Metaverse, set the tone for the following discussions of exciting cataloging trends. The fields of audiovisual, music, and online resource cataloging, built on the hoary traditions of the card catalog, are rushing headlong into the digital future. I’ll spare you non-catalogers the details of fixed fields, delimiters, and so on – if you’re interested, you can find handouts for all the workshops and presentations at http://www.notsl.org/olac-moug/Handouts.html. I attended workshops titled Integrating Resources Cataloging, Metadata for Audiovisual Materials and its Role in Digital Projects, Electronic Resources Cataloging, and Advanced Sound Recordings. All of these workshops were excellent, informative and thorough. Although I learned plenty, I was also reassured to find that our practices for these types of resources are mostly up-to-date. Poster session topics included digital project metadata workflows, the use of Macro Express, cataloging for video game collections, RFID implementation, Web 2.0 tools for catalogers, and more. A particularly hot topic was FRBR (Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records) and its incorporation in the elusive RDA (Resource Description and Access), which is the controversial successor to AACR2 cataloging rules and which may (or may not) be coming soon to a library near you. A large group session on the final day offered two speakers with contrasting views on RDA. Glenn Patton, a 25-year veteran of OCLC and liaison to ALA’s ALCTS Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access, shared an insider’s official perspective. He confidently described the history and current status of RDA’s creation along with the timetable for its testing and implementation. Patton was followed by Heidi Hoerman of the School of Library and Information Science at the University of South Carolina. Hoerman, who claims to have “no horse in this race,” explained why she believes RDA is actually destined for a slow death.

Friday night, the conference held a reception at the Cleveland Museum of Art.

I missed the actual reception because I was happy to wander the museum, absorbing the beauty of the works in its collection.

I also missed the tour of the Ingalls Library and Archives, which support and document the museum's current and future collections, research, exhibitions, publications, lectures, programs and activities. Ingalls Library participates with Case Western Reserve University in a joint art history program and maintains collections that include over 100,000 volumes and 500,000 art slides.

I’ll end with an image of my friend Ruth’s gorgeous garden. A few more photos from the trip are available for your viewing pleasure on my Facebook page.

UNCG Safe Zone Training 2008

2008-11-12T12:01:00.000-08:00

On Friday, November 7, 2008, Carolyn Shankle and Stacey Krim attended UNCG Safe Zone Training 2008 offered through the Wellness Center by Jeanne Irwin-Olson. The goal of Safe Zone training is to create a network of allies for Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, or Questioning persons.

After a couple of “ice breakers” – an exercise playing on stereotypes as well as one of connecting a word to the correct definition – the program got underway. The first presentation was Issues Facing GLBT Youth given by Karen Favereau and Amanda Gerson. Both presenters are graduate students in the Department of Counseling and Educational Development. One of the mind-opening exercises they had the attendees complete is the Heterosexual Questionnaire. For those who are in the heterosexual, or dominant culture, this questionnaire works as a way to make one more sensitive to the obstacles faced on a daily basis by those in the GLBTQ community.

Jeanne Irwin-Olson led the next presentation, What It Means To Be An Ally. She offered examples of policy activism at UNCG, such as the inclusion of sexual orientation in our Policy on Discriminatory Conduct. As of this writing, sexual orientation is not protected under state or federal guidelines.

During lunch – yes there was a lunch presentation! – Rebecca Mann of Equality NC led a discussion on Equality NC’s legislative efforts on behalf of the GLBTQ community in NC and how federal legislation as well as legislation in other states affects their progress. [Proposition 8 in California, anyone?] She encouraged us to contact our legislators either by telephone, self-composed emails, hand-written correspondence, or in person to support pertinent legislation. You know those email petitions that get forwarded? Turns out they do little good since the legislator receiving such a petition does not know if the names are legitimate or even of actual constituents.

UNCG’s Dean of Students, Dr. Jen Day Shaw, gave a presentation titled Hate Crimes – UNCG’s Response. What is difficult is to distinguish between a “hate incident” and a “hate crime”. She provided many examples – some drawn from events at UNCG and others from educational institutions around the nation.

The last presentation of the day was Transgender 101 given by Stephen Wiseman and Rachel Wertheimer of UNC’s School of Social Work. This presentation marks the first time transgender was a presentation topic for Safe Zone at UNCG. Wertheimer provided a background on transgender issues and stages to put Wiseman’s story in a larger context. Wiseman shared his story of transgender discovery and the process. His courage was evident in his opening his life story to an unknown audience for questions.

All participants received their UNCG Safe Zone Training 2008 certificates, a Safe Zone UNCG pin, as well as permission to use the Safe Zone UNCG logo to identify themselves. The Safe Zone Information Manual is now published on CD to allow for hyperlinked documents.

I found this program to be well-planned and valuable to those who wish to be publicly demonstrative in their ally status. Having also participated in the UNCG Cares presentation, given by the Dean of Students, on an earlier occasion, Safe Zone was a continuation of becoming more sensitive and aware to issues facing not only our student population but the population at large.

You will find more information about the Safe Zone program on this website.