Academic Librarianship

Academic Librarianship

Save the maps!

September 28, 2006 by 0 Comments

As a back-up for our maps and data areas, I thought I would post this:

As of January 2007, Natural Resources Canada will discontinue the printing of paper topographic maps and will close the Canada Map Office. Our government wants to get out of the business of producing maps.

As of January 2007, Natural Resources Canada will discontinue the printing of paper topographic maps and will close the Canada Map Office. Our government wants to get out of the business of producing maps.

Many Canadians place a priority on the paper map service the Government currently provides. Natural Resources Canada's digital mapping policy will effectively cut off access to the majority of Canadians. However, our politicians see this issue as a minor one. ACMLA, which represents both the public and research communities, would like to convince them otherwise. This policy will have an enormous impact on the Canadian
public and our map users. The Minister of Natural Resources has a responsibility to listen to our point of view. This is not a minor policy amendment but a major change that has implications not just for map librarians but for the ordinary Canadian who is looking for a map for their cottage or who wants to go snowmobiling or hiking. Canada can be a vast and unforgiving country without a map in hand.

How you can help:

This is a political issue and we must get the message out to as many Canadians and organizations as soon as possible. An independent website has been set up to lobby and inform Canadians. ACMLA asks its members to support this initiative by sending emails to inform associations, university departments, schools, individuals, etc. of the Government of
Canada's decision to abandon printing paper topographic maps. Let your M.P. and your Minister of Natural Resources know what their constituents think of this decision.

Support Access to Maps for Canadians mapsforcanadians.ca

Academic Librarianship - library 2.0 - reference

Find it here!

September 28, 2006 by 0 Comments

There’s a radio commercial that I heard this morning for the yellow pages (I think, I’m still waiting to hear the commercial again to confirm this). They are advertising themselves as the Find Engine. This got me thinking about our library catalogues again. The debate has been raging about how our OPACs suck and there is a lot of merit in the arguements for this. The biggest question is whether our students can Find It; are we a Find Engine, should we be? The number of students who come to the research help desk looking for materials in our catalogue, I’d say we are not a great find engine.  I’m not going to wade too deeply in the catalogue debate but perhaps we need to think of ourselves as Find engines.

Our library is presently undergoing transformation, a very exciting time as we start surveying all of the exciting opportunities we could be a part of. Part of a discussion at a meeting today turned towards blended librarianship. By considering learning theory, how students and faculty learn, rather than straight librarianship we may be able to move towards a catalogue that acts more as a Find engine. By considering how people learn, how they search, we can design more intuitive catalogues and help simplify the process. I’m interested on how this way of thinking would affect all aspects of the library, especially for instruction. A thought I think I will mull on for a while.

Academic Librarianship - library 2.0 - web 2.0

Better Than Beer

June 8, 2006 by 0 Comments

A CNN newsreport makes mention of a survey of 1200 college students that was taken to find out what they consider to be the "in" by undergrads. Tops on the list: iPod. Second Place: Tie between Facebook and Beer. Pretty telling as to what the students are into at the moment. The survey also provides support for those who want to see the library have a presence on Facebook (the students are obviously there) or introduce podcasting to the library. Oh, and the last time the 18 year survey saw beer dethroned from the top spot: 1997, by the Internet.

Academic Librarianship

Reference Reflections

June 2, 2006 by 0 Comments

We are just finishing up a Reference Week where I work. It's been a wonderful week of getting back to the basics of Reference Service and a great opportunity to find out what's new and what's changed in the world of reference. In this world of fast-changing products and services, I  recommend that all take a moment to think about the basics, as well as the best way to serve our patrons. It helps us remember why we wanted to join this profession and can help reignite our passions. This also comes at a time when major conferences are about to occur (CLA, ALA), another excellent means to reignite passions.

As a complete aside, take a look at this article from the New York Times about the US government considering the possibility of Website Companies keeping web use statistics.

Academic Librarianship - info lit - library 2.0

Info Lit 2.0

May 18, 2006 by 0 Comments

A recent post on the blog Alt Ref has gotten me thinking about information literacy in the 2.0 world. In his post, Brian stats that info lit is "very Un-Library 2.0 (the 'proper way vs. your way)". Why is this and how can it be changed?

The IL standards are broadly: Know, Access, Evaluate, Use and Ethics. IL should ideally help the students recognize when they need information, how to get that information, how to use it and do so ethically. The clash comes in the access/retrieval part of the process. Part of the problem is that the resources that we are trying to teach students to use in academic libraries are not library 2.0 oriented themselves. The 2.0 world is very social and database creators and vendors are not following suite with the library 2.0 trends that we see elsewhere (ie. they don't allow tagging, etc). In order to get half decent results, students need to be taught how to use the product. But does this mean that information literacy is un-library 2.0?

Web searching using Google and the like is not necessarily a bad thing. However, we do need to teach students how they can get the most out of the search engines and especially how to evaluate the sites they find. Many students don't look past the first page of returned results. I don't think it's not a bad thing to teach them how to search better. The proper way does not necessarily mean that their way of searching is wrong. Often times, their way of searching leaves them frustrated and in need of help. By teaching them how to search better, or perhaps properly, we are saving them time, frustration, and hopefully they can produce better papers. Furthermore, evaluation skills are incredibly important in the 2.0 world and information literacy is essential in forming this skill.

So how can we reconcile the two (library 2.0 vs. info lit; 'proper' way vs. your way)? Perhaps we can try creating wikis instead of pathfinders, which will help the students identify appropriate resources. Students can add to the wikis and tags can be implemented. We need to let vendors and database creators know that there products are not serving our patrons as well as they possibly could.

These are just some quick thoughts on the topic. I plan to do some more thinking on this. I've got lots of questions, such as: does information literacy need to be 2.0 and if not, is that a bad thing, if so, how can we achieve it? Look for more to come.

Academic Librarianship - library 2.0 - odd stuff

My Librarian

May 16, 2006 by 0 Comments

Here are a couple of things that have caught my eye in the world of librarianship.

A decision will soon be made regarding the opening of a Nazi archive. Previously, the archive was only open to survivors of the Holocaust, to allow them to track survivors. A panel of 11 international legal experts will be deciding whether or not the archive should be open to the general public. A wealth of information could be opened to historians and other researchers of the Holocaust.

The library marketing blog The "M" Word has a post about personal branding. More companies are pushing the "my" aspect (my card, my Coke). Libraries have often used the copyrighted phrase "@ your library". Perhaps in the age of library 2.0 we should be using the "my library" approach. Some libraries already allow customizable features. Many services that our patrons use now offer such features. Yahoo has joined the bandwagon and is allowing users to customize their page. Customization and self-centeredness are becoming the norm.

An idea I really like is the "my librarian" idea. This sounds very close to the notions of a liaison librarian found in academic libraries. The liaison librarian is associated with a department and the faculty often think of the librarian as "my librarian". Why not promote this notion? It helps promote an idea of personal service. Students of that department or faculty will know who to turn to for assistance. In some universities, librarians are assigned to a particular year of students (ie. all first years). By promoting the My Librarian idea that The "M" Word suggests, we may create a more intimate atmosphere and who knows, we may reach patrons who previously felt intimidated by the library and librarians. Definitely an idea I'd like to pursue.