odd stuff - Uncategorized

Blank Slate

January 5, 2013 by 0 Comments

Welcome 2013! A new year, a blank slate. I’m not a fan of new year’s resolutions (they have a bad reputation and far too frequently tied to failure) and yet the beginning of a new year is a good time to think about goals, changes, and challenges for the year ahead.

I’ve read somewhere (bad librarian, I can’t recall where) that the mere act of sharing your goals makes you less likely to accomplish them. That there is a sense of accomplishment in the mere act of sharing that means you are less likely to follow through with your goals. I’m going to throw caution to the wind and share a few of my work goals with you. I’m not going to call the following resolutions, but I would like to try to accomplish the following in the new year:

  • Actually use the time I set aside for research, for *gasp* research. I’m great at penciling in time to pursue research interests but I’m terrible at keeping it, sacrificing it for the greater good (usually meetings).
  • Pursue more partnerships: in the library, on campus, in the library field, in unexpected places. I love talking with others about what they’re doing, finding out new ideas and having a sounding board for my own ideas. Partnerships can make ideas, projects, and presentations stronger.
  • Share more. Share my projects with my library and my users. Share my process with others in the field. Document and communicate will be key words this year.

I’m sure I’ll be adding and readjusting goals throughout the year. It’s easy to make goals, lofty ones and little ones, but the follow through is always the hard part. Good luck with yours!

conferences - library

Bursting the bubble

September 26, 2012 by 0 Comments

I had the pleasure of being invited to speak at the Ontario Library Services North (OLSN) conference in Sudbury. One of the reasons I was excited to accept the invitation is that it took me out of my normal presentation audience. I love working in academia, but it often feels like a bubble. We’re so busy looking at our own issues that we don’t get to think about our colleagues in public libraries and the issues they face. This conference offered me a chance to try to think a little differently and, because it isn’t my area of expertise, I’ve been able to learn a lot so far, like working with First Nations clients and engaging your community. The latter is something I think academic libraries should be working towards: both our own university community but also partnering with public libraries to reach out to our greater community. Universities are very insular, but partnerships between the university, academic and public libraries can help open up the institution and engage their community in new and exciting ways.

I’ve really enjoyed breaking out of my norm and learning so much from my public library colleagues. It’s been a refreshing to look at librarianship through a new lens and I highly recommend taking the chance to learn something outside of your own field.

 

 

Academic Librarianship - change - ebooks

Money Money Money

September 12, 2012 by 0 Comments

We all know it’s budget crunch time. It has been for years. Libraries are constantly evaluating budgets in order to find enough funds to keep resources that we have, buy new ones and support both existing and new services. We keep hearing the adage: “Do more with less”. We just can’t do this anymore. By doing more with less, we set up expectations we just can not continue to provide. We burn out our staff and impact our users.

In the face of budget cuts, libraries need to start saying “Do less with less”. This, of course, needs to be done strategically. We need to find areas we can cut reasonably and yes, this may be felt by all.

What are libraries doing? There have been some interesting cases of libraries taking a stand against the publishers and vendors and the crazy fees libraries are often forced into paying. The library system that I grew up with, a very small library system, took a stand against outrageous ebook prices and stopped buying Random House ebooks. SUNY Potsdam examined the outrageous fees that the American Chemical Society charges and decided to walk away and move to a more sustainable solution.

These examples show libraries looking at their budget and realizing they just can’t do it all. They examined options and went with what they felt was best, both for their budget and their users. There are other ways libraries can make the budget work: evaluate services, discover the actual needs of the community and focus on those. Open access is slowly becoming a better option for resources. But in the end, we just can’t do it all. Understanding your community, talking with them, as SUNY Potsdam did with their faculty, and making informed decisions is key. Tough decisions will have to be made, but less money can not mean the same level of resources or services any longer.

Update: Seems another vendor has dramatically increased their prices. Hatchette is increasing their ebook prices over 220%. I hope libraries make noise!

Uncategorized

Testing, testing, 1, 2, 3

April 19, 2012 by 0 Comments

We’ve started doing some usability testing. I’m quite excited about doing usability testing. As the first go, it’s been quite enlightening. First, I’m terribly surprised by the number of people who are willing to stop to help out with testing. Sadly, I am usually one of those who looks away when survey takers look my way in the mall. Perhaps my new role will change this outlook – perhaps I’ll be more sympathetic and participating in more surveys.

The other thing I’m interested in more than I expected is designing better surveys and questions. Again, I suppose this isn’t terribly surprising given my position – I need to know how to do this better. As we go through our first testing, I’m finding issues with wording. I’m seeing the advantages and disadvantages of open questions and other testing methods. I find I’m interested in reading more about creating proper surveys, better forms and figuring out the best testing for given situations. Now, I just need the time to get all of this reading done.

I have a feeling that another thing I will need to learn is not to over test – it is possible to ask about the same element using two or three different methods. In some cases, follow up will be required but it is important not to fall down the rabbit hole of continuous questioning. Like all projects, it’s important to know when to stop. I’m looking forward to more testing so I can hone these skills. Bring on the testing!

conferences

Code4Lib Great Eastern

April 9, 2012 by 0 Comments

I’ve been posting this on Facebook and Twitter – it’s time I said something here too. I’m really excited to be working with colleagues to bring the first Code4Lib Great Eastern conference together! I’ve attended Code4Lib North and thought it’s time to bring together the techy folk on the east coast for a similar experience.

Code4Lib Great Eastern will run May 26-27 at the Killam Library at Dalhousie University in Halifax. It is rather unconferencey in feel and definitely in price. You should come – it’s free – just sign up here! The first day will be a mix of short presentations (20 minutes) and lightening talks (5 minutes) and the second day is Hackfest. You can find details here. Tell us about neat projects you’re working on or want to work on – simply put your topic on the wiki. The day really relies on participation, so be sure to sign up.

As the first get-together, I’m hoping we can get people interested in keeping this moving forward. Come with ideas on how you’d like to see Code4Lib Great Eastern grow into a thriving community!

conferences

Super Conference Roundup/Libday8

February 7, 2012 by 0 Comments

I usually participate in Libday postings and was looking forward to sharing things from my new job but this year’s round ended up during OLA Super Conference, so it’s a two for one posting.

  • Day 1 was spent travelling to the conference. Nothing exciting there.
  • Day 2 was spent doing final touches for the conference. I had a packed schedule and a number of responsibilities to prepare for.
  • Day 3 was a combination of fun and responsibility. As always, the best part of the conference is networking and I started by networking over high tea. This should be the start to all conferences. The networking continued throughout the night. The evening was filled with my last dinner as part of the OLA board. This was followed by duties as OLITA President 2011 to partake in the Art of Networking event (always a fun time). Then the first plenary and more networking at the party. Did  I mention I like networking?
  • Day 4 was the first full day of the conference. My major responsibility was my presentation on QR codes (slides are already up). Then, learning in sessions and more networking.
  • Day 5 I convened a session and ran the OLITA AGM – and guess what, more networking. I am now officially past-president/treasurer of OLITA. We had an awesome year at OLITA and did some amazing things, including the technology lending library, Planet OLITA, appetizers (small intros into tech on our blog) and an amazing Digital Odyssey. I worked with a  mind-blowing council and it’s been great working with my council. I’ll be posting more on OLITA in another post.
  • I don’t usually include a Day 6, but as the conference went into the weekend, here it is. The highlight of this day was the OLITA Spotlight, which I convened. I also was a human book for the first time. My title was The Accidental Techy and I had a good time answering some questions. Needless to say, after all of this, I was exhausted. I’m still recuperating!

Needless to day, this was not my typical week and in fact I’m still trying to figure out my “typical” week. As always, Super Conference was great and I’m looking forward to catching sessions I missed through the virtual stream. 

web

The Power of Observation

January 27, 2012 by 0 Comments

I’m new at this whole web services librarian gig. I’m still excited and have tons to learn and read. One of the top things on my to do list was to get a better idea of how people are using the library website. Of course, I’ve fiddled with it but I don’t search like everyone else. Now that we’re into the throes of the winter term, I took the opportunity to watch some of my colleagues as they taught library resources to students. It’s been an enlightening experience in many ways. True to form, no two librarians taught the same way and they all approached using the library website and library resources in slightly different ways. I’ve come away from the experience with a new understanding of the website and a list of things I could change to help make things a little easier.

What’s next? Putting some of these changes in place where I can. I also plan to observe on the reference desk when I return from Super Conference (say hi if you see me), as I expect there will be further issues that are highlighted there.

While observing my colleagues as they teach and use the library website is useful, they are not the average user. Observing in classes, I was able to observe the students as well and see if they tripped over navigating our resources. Watching my colleagues is useful but I must admit, I’m really excited to start observing students and faculty without library aid. We will get a much better idea of how our users approach our website.

So, why am I doing this? In regards to observing my colleagues, it helps provide a context as to how they use are resources. The same will happen when I expand observations to students and faculty. Why do I want context – to design a better site. We’re in the process of evaluating possible CMS and the more I know, the better informed decision I can make. I recently attended a webinar on website usability. One of the things I took away (and strongly agree with) was simply this: move decisions from opinion to data. That’s what observation is helping with – I’m collecting data on how people actually use the site and from there, I can help make the library website a more useful resource.

Uncategorized

Stay vigilant

January 7, 2012 by 0 Comments

Libraries – all libraries – need to pay attention to recent legislative moves. The United States has two worrisome pieces of legislation at the moment. There’s been a lot of discussion about SOPA and now there is the Research Works Act (RWA), which is in opposition to recent Open Access movements and barrs federal agencies from unauthorized free public dissemination of research funded in part by federal money but published by the private sector.

Some Canadians may be thinking so what, that’s the US, but it’s vital we stay vigilant and be aware of what is happening. We are going through our own issues with copyright; bill C11 is in second reading. Is what is happening in the US a sign of things to come elsewhere? Maybe. At the very least, it gives us good insight to what publishers are thinking. Libraries are still fighting the ebook fight: experiencing limited uses, differing catalogues of items, and the issue of renting rather than owning material. This is not the last time copyright, ownership and open access will be battlegrounds.

Both SOPA and RWA are library issues, regardless of borders. We need to not only be aware of what’s affecting our field but to take action where we can. There are still things that can be done, as New Jack Librarian points out.

Publishers are trying to figure out new models for publishing and it’s affecting all libraries. This will not be the last battle – stay vigilant and be ready to fight.

 

 

ed tech

Teaching with Tech

January 5, 2012 by 0 Comments

Educational technology is an area I still have a lot of interest in, so I thought I’d share a couple of new resources I’ve run into that I think might have some potential for info lit classes.

A Google a day – Google offers a question to search each day that will highlight techniques and tips for searching Google more effectively. I think it would be neat to incorporate this into a class – offer a few, see how fast students can find the answers and discuss the techniques they used.

Barkles – I will admit, I haven’t had much chance to play with this but it interested me. I have run a debate in a class (we were discussing copyright). I think this might be a neat way to continue the debate outside the class, although I’m betting that clear policies on what is appropriate behaviour may be needed.

Uncategorized

Another year

January 4, 2012 by 0 Comments

Well, I suppose it’s that time to the obligatory end/new year post. What a year 2011 was, filled with high and low points, change, excitement, conferences, networking and more.

I’m not one for resolutions but I do have a number of things I’m looking forward to this year. One of my goals is to learn more about programming. While this is particularly important in my new role, I don’t seem to be alone in this goal. I signed up to learn code in a year with CodeAcademy – over 100 000 others also signed up within 48 hours and I’m not the only librarian. Even if I was in my old position as a liaison, I think I would have learned more about coding. As more of our world is about interacting with technology, I think it’s important to have a basic understanding of what’s going on. We need to be able to talk with other coherently if we want our library resources to function in ways that make sense to the user (stress on the to the user part, something we don’t seem to be great at yet). If you know of other good training opportunities, lemme know.

I will have another full plate this year – we’re going through strategic planning and I’ve got some lofty plans I hope we can accomplish this year: a new CMS, moving forward with mobile resources for the library and more. I also have a number of research interests, including responsive web design in libraries – if you’re doing something with this, lemme know, I’d love to chat. I’m finishing up as President of OLITA and slipping into the less demanding role of  past president/treasurer this year – a great group that I highly recommend and will be posting more on in the future about my time as pres.

And of course, I’ll be learning more and settling into my new job. It’s hard to believe I’ve been here 2 months. Still lots to learn!

So, 2012, bring it!