Paying lip service to information

One of the paragraphs in this week's modules struck me:
"It is often said that we live in an information age, and that the price of failing to act promptly to take advantage of positive new developments or to dampen the impact of negative ones is often likely to be rapid and painful. Yet there is plentiful evidence that sources of information, including both special and public libraries, are under-utilised by those in business and very often seriously underfunded. It is possible to conclude that business (like, one fears, some politicians, local government representatives, university administrators and school principals) is more likely to pay lip service to the importance of good information services than to support them in a practical way." (INF538, Charles Sturt University, 2014)

I think it is something that librarians have to battle with on a daily - if not some days, hourly basis. Yesterday was a case in point. Our library received not one, but two, lengthy requests for materials and resources (mainly really expensive books) to support curriculum.   Oh, but that's a good thing. It's a great thing you may think.  Teachers reaching out to libraries to support their information needs.   Yes.  And no.    You see, the need for information, the seeking of and the request for and the acquisition and dissemination of the same is not so much an "on / off" switch (or email request) as a dialogue.  And what was missing from these interactions was the dialogue.  

An information resource does not exist in a vacuum.  It has a context.  And in a school the context is made up of so many things.  And without the dialogue the quality is likely to suffer.

In our training, a big deal is made of the "information interview"  and there is reason for this.  We need to know details about what the client needs.  This includes the age group and reading and understanding level of the students.  Where the module fits into the curriculum for the year and where it fits into what has come before and what will happen in the next year.   The cultural composition of students.  The teacher needs to know what we have in the library.  What databases we have access to. What ebooks and digital materials are available.   Videos, youtube clips, and libguides we have created.  What other teachers have requested in the same and higher and lower grades.  

This is why the first step and not the last should be to pop into the library and have a quick chat.  That way there is less waste of time while teachers make lists from google or amazon that may be entirely inappropriate, or a duplication for what already exists.

"support them in a practical way" ... what does this mean for an organisation and a library service.  I think more than anything else, is to give it credit as an integral part of the information flow in the library.  Not an add on, but embedded.

And now the chicken and the egg question.  Is it the responsibility of the library / librarian or the administrator?  Where does one start?  How slowly must the process move?  At least one teacher said during a meeting yesterday (adhoc, impromptu and sudden for an 'urgent' reactive need)  "I wish I'd talked to you earlier".    To which we responded by just fitting in with their plans and agreeing to meet their needs.   I can't help thinking about the time management boxes that were so popular a while back with the "urgent, important etc. blocks"   Clearly something structural needs to occur.  But what and how?

Everyone is trying their best. Everyone has time and other pressures.  There never is a steady state.  So how do we become drivers, or at least co-pilots instead of passengers on this trip?

My first LibGuide

I've managed to make my first LibGuide, otherwise known as a pathfinder or guide.  It was a requirement for my current course INF406 "Information Sources and Services", which to be honest I enjoyed so much that I've decided to change the way I'm going on this degree from "youth and adult services" to a more digital and reference librarian bias.

Once I got my assignment I asked at school if there was anyone who wanted / needed a pathfinder and the Economics head asked for one on Development Economics.   I have to admit that Economics was never my favourite subject, neither in my undergraduate degree nor in my MBA.  Well, I liked and was terribly interested in the concepts and case studies, but hated the graphs and so called "academic rigour" that was applied to something that I found totally behavioural and that didn't follow any of the supposed "rules" or "theories".   Luckily things have moved on somewhat and it was quite a fascinating process deciding what to include and leave out of the pathfinder.

I was terribly (and luckily) constrained by the demands of the assignment that it was kept to 20-25 information sources, included at least 5 journal articles and 2 books and a limit of 2500 words. Otherwise it would have grown like topsy - speaking of which, Topsy.com is a rather nice new social media tool where you can agglomerate what's happened on the web within a specified time frame... cool for some time wasting if you're not busy researching anything else (try "chinese" and "homework" for some fun).

Anyway, here is my "official" libguide, which was submitted and the "unofficial" one, or rather the one the school will use which is much more extensive.  There are some pretty cool videos - and I've found a new favourite economist - Esther Duflo! Check her out.

I've learnt a TON by doing this. After I'd submitted a fellow student and experienced reference librarian who is a LibGuide ace - and taught me how to use it, showed me hers - I have a way to go yet, baby steps!

International Experience Portfolio

The entries below constitute the International experience Portfolio.   First a summary of each organisation is presented through the Study Visit report, and then the aspects I wish to highlight are presented.

Although I'm living as an expatriate in Singapore, which is its own cultural experience, one realizes you can experience culture on a number of levels.  Each organisation we visited had their own unique culture and identity.  

In the libraries this was expressed through the design of the various spaces, the emphasis of the collection and the staffing choices.  At each organisation what was very striking was the way in which employees expressed their identity through the organisation of their desks.  At Singapore Press Holdings for example the open plan office was filled to the brim with hundreds of indoor plants of all descriptions.  There was even an aquarium on one desk.  At Singapore Polytechnic, employees had used the desk lamps to hang a myriad of little figurines and toys and all attempts to create a truly open plan office were being thwarted by staff needs for privacy and their own space. 

Libraries where the head librarian was 'politically' well connected or where the organisation head was vested in a thriving information community were better staffed, better resourced and had more vibrant, innovative and enthusiastic feel to them.  That's not to say that other libraries didn't do an excellent job of managing their resources and putting library users first.

Instead of writing this chronologically, I've divided the experience into the areas that I found most interesting in the visit and where there were noticable differences between the libraries:

* Collection

* Reference Services

* Promotion

* Physical Environment

In conclusion the trip was extremely valuable both from a librarianship and a cultural point of view. 

Reference services and Information Literacy

A desk with "help" for primary pupils

Chinatown library has no librarian only a phone

When visiting a library it is always interesting to see where the reference services are located and how they are manned.  In terms of design, rounded desks or structures were a common theme.  Naming varied between "help" for the infants and juniors, to "information" or "reference" at they poly's / universities.  The public library in Chinatown had a "cybrarian" as it is a volunteer run library without permanent staff.  Should users have a research or other question, they can phone through to a reference librarian at the central library who is able to assist them with their request.

A few of the libraries employed the "roving" reference librarian model, or a combination of roving librarian and desk located.  One library had the reference librarians located in an office with the possibility of appointments for patrons.  NTU had specialist librarians who had a degree in the subject they were covering.  SMU dedicated a librarian to each school who is responsible for the collection, reference services and database.

An impressive structure in the reference section of NLB

In addition to the reference services, Information literacy (IL) was an important theme.  

Different libraries had different approaches.  Some had integrated IL into the curriculum, some had it as a separate compulsory topic and others offered it on a voluntary basis.  At Ngee Ann, a combination approach was employed.  First year students completed an online library orientation at the start of the school year.  Later, the librarian was invited as a guest lecturer into the classroom.  In further years the library worked in conjunction with lecturer request for more specialized or specific IL or citation or information retrieval needs.

SMU had a "compulsory" information literacy course.  When questioned on how this was enforced and whether it was credit bearing, they admitted that it was an administrative detail that students had to have attended to in order to graduate, like paying their fees and settling outstanding fines!  This was an interesting cultural insight as they explained that Singaporean students would generally not question the fact that something was compulsory, and would merely comply with the requirements. In fact they had a compliance rate of around 97%.

We also learnt about how SMU was using Wiki's in order to teach IL.  Law students for example had to research a particular aspect of Singaporean law and create a wiki on that.  In the process they learnt about research, searching, citation and the credibility (or not) of sources.  Their own posts were then exposed to scrutiny and the authority rating process.

Most of the libraries created some kind of a game or quest, particularly for their orientation programmes.  Some were on paper, and some made the use of mobile devices.  In the case of mobile devices, often the specifications had been set out by the librarians and the programming or design was done by students at their institution.

NTU has an instructional services arm which helps with creating awareness of the library, tutorials, literature reviews, tools, citation analysis and scholarly communication.  Each librarian is expected to be a teacher.  The take-away for me here is that IL does not stop with first or second years, but can also be vital for people further up the feeding chain as they find out how to market themselves and their research in an increasingly digital academic world. I was very impressed with their services in combining their technical and digital and library knowhow to the needs of lecturers and professors. They also have a youtube channel for self-education.

A little bit of fun on roving reference librarians: