Some thoughts on the reference desk as a space for teaching, student formation, and care
It has been a few weeks since commencement, and the switch that many of my colleagues said would happen at the start of the summer when I began my role almost a year ago has happened. The reading rooms and common spaces in my institution’s main library are near-empty, the only commotion coming from staff conversations, campus tour groups, and facilities workers going to and projects in the building. Traffic at the reference desk has also slowed considerably, creating the benefit of a much slower pace and offering the benefit of more time to get work done but also the challenge of staying vigilant of users who might approach with questions. As I’ve adjusted to this change in atmosphere and tempo, I’ve started to think more deeply about the past semester and how I can improve my own reference practice. One improvement I have been thinking about is how to better incorporate instruction into interactions I have with users, especially students.
Reference as Formation and Care
As I think about how I can connect my reference and instruction work more closely together, I am also trying to be realistic that most of the questions I will receive will likely be directional and about our policies, while fewer will concern the type of needs (namely research or citation support) that would make formal instruction necessary. Despite this, I want to make sure every interaction I have, no matter how brief or transactional, has instruction as part of a continuum of formation and care. Within the context of my Catholic Jesuit institution, this continuum looks like putting into practice the term cura personalis (“care for the whole person” in Latin) which is a Jesuit spiritual practice that emphasizes holistically paying attention to and caring for the mind, body, and spirit of ourselves and others (Otto, 2013). This continuum also looks like forming users into individuals concerned not just with acquiring knowledge but also better understanding their moral and ethical centers and how their bodies respond to social conditions around them
Who do I Serve?
In the eight months or so that I have staffed my library’s reference desk, I have encountered a range of different requests. Undergraduate and graduate students in search of help finding sources for an assignment or dissertation, course reserves, or a quiet spot to study. Prospective students and their families requesting building directions and the best place to get lunch on campus. Faculty searching for access to an award-winning film or an out-of-print novel. New staff from other departments wanting confirmation that, yes, their benefits do extend to library material access. Visiting scholars from other states or countries bearing a page full of call numbers. Alumni requesting copies of yearbooks or transcripts from the last century. Residents of communities surrounding the university who inquire about using WiFi or guidance on navigating municipal government services.
These are just a few of the users who have stopped by the reference desk, usually short on time and having unsuccessfully looked for the thing they needed on their own, even if that thing might not be fully understood and require dialogue with someone else to define and find. I have found when dialoguing with users that I have had to practice engaging with and excavating the explicit and implicit elements of users’ needs with patience, empathy, care, and respect, making sure that interactions end with a path toward a thing (be that a physical or electronic material or a referral to another area of the library) they can hold. I am constantly trying to improve my use of dialogue to chart a path for users in their scholarly or information search. I am also recognizing more and more that reference is also not just about getting to users’ core needs but using those interactions as opportunities to provide instruction on library-use, research, and more.
Fostering Connections Between Reference and Instruction
Though it might seem easy to categorize reference work and library instruction as two different areas, I have noticed quite a bit of overlap between them. In the case of reference and one-shot instruction, both appear to have a transactional quality: users receive information they need or are referred to someone/place else with an answer, and the interaction ends without expectation that the user will come back in the future. Both require adherence to strictly marked out time slots and teach users directly or indirectly fundamental skills in searching for and evaluating information and navigating library systems. On the flip side of the transactional overlap I mentioned, both carry the opportunity, even if not guaranteed, of relationship-building. There is a name and face that a user gets for the help they received, making it possible that they will return with another need.
Where do I hope to go?
Going forward, one other point of overlap between instruction and reference work I want to focus on is the potential of both to help form students into informed citizens and critical thinkers. There are a few ways I think I could make this happen. First, I might devote more time to providing attention and care in each reference interaction by not rushing a user to an answer but slowing down and working with them to discern from source/s of information: “what do I need?” “What am I curious about?” “What questions am I discovering?” Second, I might help patrons interrogate sources of information for power dynamics, privileged voices, biases, and harmful and oppressive ideas and systems of knowledge embedded in them. Third, I might model the habit of getting informed about the somatic and psychological condition of others and how they are searching for and processing information by asking how their semester has gone, what they have enjoyed, and what they are struggling with. While I know these three approaches won’t be possible in every interaction, I do want to keep them available as another tool in my reference kit that I can bring out when the moment is right.
References
Otto, A. (2013, August 15). Cura Personalis. Ignatian Spirituality. https://www.ignatianspirituality.com/cura-personalis/