new librarian

Reflections on the past year

It’s been almost one year since I moved to Washington DC and began my residency position at American University. Last year, for my very first ACRLog post, I wrote a little about my job description as a Resident Librarian. Next month will mark my one year anniversary at American University.

I am glad to say that my first year has been fantastic. I have great colleagues and amazing support from the library. I have also had the opportunity to participate in symposiums, attend conferences, contribute to university service, and meet great people from outside the library and around the university.

Beyond my work at American University, I have been blessed to be able to write for ACRLog and obtain other opportunities through ACRL. While it’s been a great year, I have learned a couple of things that will make me a better librarian in the long run. I believe that even if you’ve had positive experiences, there are always new things to learn and ways to improve as a librarian.

Here are some things that I have learned the past year:

-Go outside your comfort zone. I know that for myself, I can be a bit shy. However, I know that I am also a professional and that going outside of your comfort zone and experiencing new things is vital for not only personal growth, but professional growth. For me, going outside my comfort zone means talking and interacting to people outside the library. I am currently working on a project where I have reached out to different departments in the university. Through those email exchanges and meetings, I have learned more about our students and the challenges that lie for incoming freshman.

-Participate when you can! One of the great things about my residency is that I have the opportunity to work with other departments, such as technical services or access services. I also participate in the marketing and social media groups, which has not only librarians, but other staff members from departments within the library. These are great opportunities to meet new people and learn about what others do at the library and what their interests are.

-Prioritize conferences. As a new librarian, I was excited about all the conferences and all the great locations they would be held at. However, these conferences cost money and with airfare, hotel, and food, it can get expensive! I am lucky enough to have professional development funds through my position. I also know that not everyone has funds through their place of employment and so they cannot attend many (if any) conferences that are not in their area. I would suggest looking within your own place of employment and finding workshops or small symposiums taking place. I have found these events very informative, especially since they relate to that specific environment. As I have been fortunate enough to attend a couple of conferences this past year, I have learned the immense talent that the librarianship profession has. One of my favorite parts of conferences is meeting new people and finding out what everyone is working on.

In terms of prioritizing conferences, it is going to be different for everyone. Personally, I like to go to conferences that have an emphasis in my own interests and my future career plans.

-Rejection is not the end of the world. Like my residency position ACRLog post, I also wrote one about rejection. While it hurts for a little while, you must learn from it and continue. It might have been the first time, but it won’t be the last time. So, how do we move forward? Over the course of a year, I have focused on a couple things. First, working with people on proposals is helpful. It allows you to not only write, but learn from others and different styles. Second, write for yourself. When I do this, I do not write about work. I write about my life, my dreams, and anything that pops into my head. What is important is that you move forward and try again.

-Volunteer. When I arrived in DC, I promised myself that I would take the time to volunteer. Specifically, I wanted to work with English as a Second Language speakers (ESL). However, I wanted to wait until I got settled in DC. A couple months ago, I started co-teaching ESL classes once a week. It’s very rewarding when a student who struggled at the beginning, begins to improve every week. Although this is separate than my library work, this experience has shaped how I teach. The ESL program that I am part of is very informal. Teachers have the freedom to either use the ESL book that has been provided with lesson plans or use their own content and design it their way.

I have been using a mix of two, but most importantly, I have learned how to better improvise. During the classes, students will begin to ask questions that cause myself and the co-teacher to further explain a topic. For example, we had a lesson about food and it turned out that a lot of students were unfamiliar with breakfast food vocabulary. So, after the break, the other co-teacher and I decided to do an activity to familiarize the students with that vocabulary.

I think that any instruction experience can serve to improve your teaching and having a diverse set of students will only help you improve and better understand different ways of learning and comprehension.

Finally, I always like to remember that my residency position and my colleagues are the reason that I have had great opportunities over the past year. I am also glad to say that I will continue with ACRLog for another year and look forward to writing more about my residency and the projects I am participating in, as well as collaboration within and outside of the library.

The Born Librarian: My Professional Identity in Librarianship

creation — Michelangelo Buonarroti [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

You may have noticed from my last post that lately I have been grappling with questions of my professional identity. For example, I tried to understand or argue for the importance of libraries, and my best answer was that libraries’ most important role is their role as a public space and gatekeeper of information. I have been using writing as a means to work through these important questions; my professional identity is very important to me, and I want to develop it deliberately and carefully.

I recently had a draft for this current post, only to decide that I was too negative about librarianship in it, that I questioned my professional role too much and had no sense of assuredness or confidence about the “fit” of the profession for me. The blog post was about being a generalist, how librarians are generalists, and how, essentially, I don’t want to be a generalist. My biggest fear is that to be a generalist means that I didn’t really know anything, that I have nothing in which to anchor my intellectual pursuits. Librarianship is very “meta” – all about access, discovery, evaluation, interpretation, use, creation, dissemination…but I want to know the substance and depth of this information that we are providing!

Then I asked my Dean and mentor, Patty Iannuzzi, to read the post, as it had been a direct response to learning that she values librarians’ being generalists, because it results in more balanced collections and services. The conversation was stimulating and a little unsettling, perhaps for both of us – for her because I have professional identity issues, and I’m not the only librarian who has them, for me because I realized, through attempting to answer her questions of me, just how shaky the ground is upon which I am standing in terms of my professional identity. Patty is the biggest champion of libraries that I know, and I felt badly revealing these doubts and insecurities to her. But I knew that if anyone could help me solve those issues, she could. Patty had several challenging questions for me, one of which was about why I do what I do, and what role librarians have. My answers for her felt grossly inadequate. They amounted to “helping people do research,” or “helping people access information.” My answers felt so simple, even shallow, and I wondered: what makes these activities unique to libraries anyway? The truth is, I am not sure that librarians are indispensable. After all, I went through all of my academic programs, up until library school, without ever having to really rely upon library services or sources even. I was required to purchase all my course texts, which were core readings in the disciplines.

Oh my! Have I chosen the wrong profession? I will admit, this was my second pick, an alternative to my original plan and dream for life. Certainly I would fall into the category of “failed academics,” (if such a category should even exist, but it sounds so negative)! I attempted to complete two PhD programs prior to entering the field. I finished a different master’s program with the intention of completing a PhD and going on to teach in a specific discipline. In all honesty, I chose librarianship because of its convenience, and chose to leave the program I was enrolled in to attend library school because I needed to move towards financial independence at a faster rate than I was currently. I needed something stable, and I needed something that would be more likely to land me an actual job.

I acted very quickly (deciding and then immediately applying in April, and receiving an acceptance letter a few weeks later for fall enrollment). As a consequence, I didn’t think too much about what it means to be a librarian, or the crises or growing pains that librarianship is experiencing as a profession. Maybe in the back of my mind I was aware of the clichés that librarianship was dying, but at the time, it seemed like a very good, practical career option; I knew there were still jobs out there. I believe that I made the right choice given my situation, because librarianship has provided me with a good, stable job and that was my top priority. I also happen to like what I do on a day-to-day basis, and when I tell others that I am a librarian, I say it with a sense of pride, because people respect and revere librarians. I simply have yet to figure out its significance for me as a profession – as a vocation or a calling. I am like Jason Bourne – I have an identity as a librarian, and I am trying to find out the truth about what that means. I don’t yet experience recollection in this role – it doesn’t feel familiar. It’s as if I have this new identity that comes with a past, a history, that is totally foreign to me.

I have faith that it will happen in time. In fact, I don’t think that attaining a sense of professional identity has to happen before one actually enters the profession and develops as a professional. That is because there are all sorts of factors we can’t predict before starting a career, and we can never really know what a particular career is like until we actually gain experience in it. Library school doesn’t teach you what librarianship is really like, only skills and some theory to help you work through or think about particular issues. Library school doesn’t take you to the essence, or the heart, of what it means to be a librarian. Library school doesn’t make you ask those important questions about professional identity. Now, library schools are becoming even more far-removed from actual libraries, becoming Schools of Information Science (including my alma mater). Does this mean they don’t even care about the physical spaces and services of actual libraries anymore? You can read more about that in Scott Walter and Carol Tilley’s College & Research Libraries editorial.

In response to my doubts and questions, Patty didn’t really have clear-cut answers for me, because I do not think there are clear-cut answers to such doubts. Those doubts are very real, and very personal. However, she did help me come to some realizations. She helped me to realize that it is okay to have doubts, that it is pretty normal at this point in my career – that is pretty normal for librarians in general – that I am not alone. She helped me understand that it is okay for me not to have a strong sense of professional identity right away, because that is something that I can develop over time, as I become more confident in the services that I provide, as I innovate more, and as I realize that my services are indispensable and beneficial to a large number of people. I can forge a path and make this profession my own. I know that this is possible because Patty, and many others, model it for me. I will simply develop my professional identity after-the-fact.

I once had a mentor who told me, “I want to help you become who you are.” I may not have been born a librarian; this hasn’t always been who I am, and I don’t quite yet own this identity. I have the potential to become who I am, though, and I am committed to this process. It may take patience. I’m not sure yet how it will happen. I just have to keep plowing forward, with openness to change, the willingness to innovate and create, and a lot of dedication to discovering out exactly what this means for my life, in this particular geographic location, and how I fit into the bigger picture of the profession. As I chase after this identity, this identity may actually chase after me too, and I’m sure there will be plenty of people, like Patty, to provide clues along the way.

January 2016 Collaboration with Hack Library School

ACRLog will be kicking 2016 off in a new and exciting way! Last fall, the ACRLog administrators had a discussion about the need for more LIS student voices on the blog. During our discussion, we recognized that Hack Library School (HLS) is the premier blog for LIS student communication. We knew that we wanted to honor this while still highlighting student voices and concerns to the broad readership that ACRLog has. As a result, a rich partnership with Hack Library School was created. This month, Hack Library School and ACRLog will be cross-blogging and co-blogging. This means that HLS posts from students–posts that focus on students’ lens, perspectives, interests, and anxieties–will be featured throughout January. These important pieces will replace our regular blogging schedule. All of the posts we’ll feature are written or co-written by HLS bloggers, LIS students, or very new LIS professionals. In return, HLS will be featuring ACRLog writers and other guests throughout January. Our ACRLog team will be writing about issues that we think might be of interest to students. Occasionally a post will be published in both venues. Regardless of if you’re a student, new professional, or seasoned librarian, we encourage you to follow both blogs throughout the month.

This initiative is based off of the belief that student voices are valuable to the profession and to practicing librarians. We truly believe that if practicing librarians are not listening to LIS students, they are not listening to the future of this profession. Our collaboration is meant to be a rich and valuable cross-pollination of voices and perspectives. We’ll feature posts that are co-written by administrators and students, posts that enable new professionals to reflect on the challenges of the last year, and posts that give students space to critically examine barriers and opportunities within their LIS school experience.

On a very personal note, this topic is near and dear to my heart. I started blogging for ACRLog as a student last fall. It transformed my last year as a graduate student in so many ways. It was invaluable to share to my reflections as a student publicly with the profession and engage with professionals before I formally became one. I’m thrilled that we’re providing a space for others to do the same. I know that I was given the opportunity to blog for ACRLog as a student because of the blog’s current administrators. The same is true of this collaboration. There are many practicing librarians that make student voices a priority. Maura Smale and Jen Jarson are two of them. I can’t thank both of them enough for not only believing in students but prioritizing them.

We encourage you to engage with both spaces and push the boundaries of this experiment. We hope it shapes your own practice, regardless of where you are in your LIS journey.

For more information about Hack Library School, please see Micah Vandegrift’s (HLS Founder) Leadpipe article.

Navigating (New) Relationships with Faculty: Valuing Service

I start my first professional position in less than a month. I repeat: less than a month! I’ll be one of three Information Literacy Librarians on Davidson College’s team. I have been thinking about what the transition will be like a lot lately and one topic really continues to stick with me, worry me, and challenge me. That topic is the idea of building and fostering relationships, not just with my fellow librarians but also with faculty.

The on-campus interview is so imperative for figuring out fit, not just for the employer, but also for the candidate. The older I get, the more I realize how important it is to not just to like the people I work with but also to have respect for them, share values with them, and have the capacity to learn from them. Moreover, if I don’t have a direct supervisor that will mentor me, advocate for me, and evaluate me fairly, I’m not sure any amount of money will make me a happy employee. I was lucky enough to find the right environment at Davidson.

Yet, thinking beyond my tiny department often makes me anxious. One of the great things about Davidson College is its faculty. I won’t be explicit here but when I was interviewing, I often found myself drooling over some of the accomplishments of faculty there. One example is the creation and development of a digital studies program, which makes critical analysis and ethical consideration of technology and its role in our lives a priority. The digital studies website lists the following as goals: “procedural literacy, data awareness, network sensibility, entrepreneurial thinking, iterative design, digital citizenship, information preservation and sustainability, and the ethical use of technology.” Talk about a librarian’s dream! It’s heartening to see these topics integrated into the curriculum in a meaningful way.

Nevertheless, it’s naïve to think that two or three faculty members’ values represent the majority. Moreover, even though I know this department does awesome work, how do I even reach out? Do I bank on healthy relationships already being established? (This isn’t always guaranteed. Sometimes new professionals actually have to spend time re-building relationships that were previously broken.) Do I go out of my way to schedule an appointment or audit one of their classes? Or do I take a more passive approach? I know that I might be complicating this a little bit, but I think this is a valid concern many new librarians face. New librarians in almost all areas, from data management to instruction, have to work with faculty and we have to start somewhere.

A better question I might ask goes beyond just establishing a relationship, one where the faculty member e-mails me once a semester to ask that I “demo the databases,” but also asks how I establish a fruitful, collaborative partnership where my work is seen as complementary and necessary to the instruction that that faculty member is doing. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, mostly because of the great conversation our profession has been having around this topic.

First and foremost, it is worth noting that this question isn’t just of concern to new librarians; even seasoned professionals are still grappling with how to improve their relationships with faculty and help faculty better understand their work. Maria Accardi’s new blog, Academic Library Instruction Burnout, addresses this issue often. In a recent post, “I do not think the Framework is our oxygen mask,” Accardi writes:

Despite my consistent and intensive and strategic outreach efforts, despite my partnering with faculty members who are indeed library champions who do get what we do and why, despite all of my efforts to chip away at the culture that marginalizes the very real teaching and learning work we do in the library, I’ll get a writing teacher sending his class to the library, with no notice, with a fucking scavenger hunt assignment that requires students to work with print reference books only. Please excuse me while I *headdesk* forever.

This frustration is echoed in Lauren Wallis’ post entitled “Smash all the Gates, Part 2: Professional Silenc*”:

This happens when you pitch an idea to a faculty member (perhaps at a campus schmooze event), and they act at least mildly interested–and then when you follow up via email, they never respond. It happens when a faculty member books an instruction session but then refuses to engage in a discussion about what that session should look like. It happens when faculty members don’t accompany their classes to library instruction. There are a lot of examples, all frustrating. All of these silences serve to maintain a situation where subject faculty have absolute control over their students, their assignments, and (to a certain extent) the content of library instruction sessions.

Why does this happen? Why are librarians disregarded, silenced, and misunderstood? Both of the writers above make it very clear that these problems in no way represent the majority of the faculty they work with. Still, why is this a reoccurring issue across campuses?

On June 9th, a Pratt SILS course taught by Jessica Hochman, LIS 697: Gender and Intersectionality in LIS, led a #critlib discussion on feminist contributions in LIS. There were some great conversations on how the feminization of LIS inhibits our work and creates stereotypes that “pigeonhole(s) us in one-shot service models”. There were also examples of librarians’ work and expertise being undervalued and sometimes even ignored. Here’s a great summary of why:

The feminization of our profession means that we are often only seen as a profession that serves. Our work is often undervalued or forgotten because service is undervalued and many times, forgotten. Our society sees service work as less than, below “making” or “creating”. In “Why I Am Not a Maker,” Debbie Chachra states that the problem with making is that it is “intrinsically superior to not-making, to repair, analysis, and especially caregiving—is informed by the gendered history of who made things, and in particular, who made things that were shared with the world, not merely for hearth and home.” And yet, “not making” is, as she says, is “usually not doing nothing,” and often involves doing things for others, including teaching and educating students.

Roxanne Shirazi’s brilliant talk, Reproducing the Academy: Librarians and the Question of Service in the Digital Humanities, offers a similar analysis. She states that once women start to make up to close to 50% of a workforce, that work is devalued and no longer pursued by men because it becomes seen as “women’s work” or service work. Within her talk, Shirazi begs the question, “do librarians work in service of scholarship or are they servile to scholars?” (original emphasis). She concludes that because librarians’ work reproduces the academy, through teaching students, organizing scholarship, and preserving information, we are often seen as less than and at the bottom of the hierarchy that is academia.

In essence, what is feminized, what is service, what is emotional and affective labor is devalued in our society not only because of the type of work it is but also because of who has historically done that work. Chachra notes, “Almost all the artifacts that we value as a society were made by the order of men.” Worse, the devaluing of our work is often connected to stereotypes of librarians and their function within the academy. In “Ice Ice Baby: Are Librarian Stereotypes Freezing Us out of Instruction?,” Pagowsky and DeFrain write, “Our stereotypes are not just annoying or humorous illustrations of us, they can seriously impact the work we do and the respect we are afforded” (emphasis mine).

Pagowsky and DeFrain find that librarians are in a difficult position, often seen as too “warm,” because of their helping and nurturing status but also often too “cold” or “sterile,” because of the librarian stereotype centered on uptightness and introversion. Moreover, they find that warmth is often seen as mutually exclusive to competence which creates a challenge for “librarians who want to both be taken seriously on campus… and yet who also endeavor to effectively reach students and show care.”

I’ll admit that I’m a little depressed and overwhelmed. Are you? I won’t pretend to offer any solutions here. I think it’s safe to say that this issue is much more complicated and complex than that. I think, though, that all of the insightful librarians that present these issues also leave the profession with something to build an answer upon.

I was originally going to title this post “Establishing and Advocating for Relationships with Faculty: Moving Beyond Service.” Huh, moving beyond service? Reading all of the blog posts, talks, and articles above made me realize that we don’t need to move beyond service. Service is why I joined this profession. I love that I get to broaden and expand my worldview every day simply by helping others do research about topics that I would have never been exposed to otherwise. I love teaching students about the intricacies of information creation and value. I love connecting faculty with information that will improve their research, their research practices, and maybe even the world. My love of service is not the problem. The problem is that service is seen as less than, below, unequal to other functions in the academy.

I realize now that this problem is pervasive to my work, but I can’t solve it alone. Can I solve it at all? Wallis asserts that there has to be some level of acknowledgement of “the fact that there are different power relations at play in these collaborative [faculty-librarian] relationships” and that these relations are “embedded in the hierarchies that make up academia, in both the social stratification of varying job ranks and the hierarchical classification of service and scholarship.” In addition, even though Pagowsky and DeFrain ask that librarians stop thinking of the warm/competent binary as mutually exclusive and instead think of their work and presentation on a spectrum between the two, they conclude that “our place on the spectrum is contingent, in part, on society as a whole changing its expectations.”

It would be absurd to claim that librarians must carry the full weight of changing how they are perceived and valued. The way our society devalues work that is seen as feminized, even though it is critical, central work, is not our fault. It is a structural issue that furthers the oppression of some communities and the power of others.

I think, though, that there has been a call for librarians to start advocating for themselves and the value of the work that they do. Angela Pashia, Kevin Seeber and Nancy Noe led a conversation at LOEX this year entitled “Just Say No: Empowering Ourselves and Our Expertise.” The session walked participants through why, when, and how they should say no to faculty and also gave them a space to practice saying no and reflecting on what that felt like. Here is the litmus test the presenters gave participants for whether or not they should say no:

But what does saying no really mean for our profession? Wallis suggests that when we always say yes, not only are we reinforcing “the exclusionary nature of academic Discourse,” while also “acting as gatekeepers while simultaneously accepting and perpetuating our own marginalization.” By saying no, are breaking down some of these barriers, little by little. We are practicing what we teach to students, that all voices in a conversation matter and that there is value in all different types of contributions.

This is not easy work. Wallis is right in her assertion that “coming out of silence means we will make some people angry.” But our profession will never be one of true partnership and engagement unless we break our silence. Advocating for our value and the value of our work will, unfortunately, continue to be a very necessary skillset. Wallis asserts that we will have to break our silence as a group, as an institution, as a profession for there to be progress. We will have to share successes (and criticisms) with each other, learn from others’ experiences saying no and then hopefully (eventually) heartily saying yes, and start a larger conversation that teaches all librarians—especially new librarians—that their work is worth advocating for and that they have the support needed to come out of decades of practicing silence.

This brings me to my final point. What advice would you share with the greater library community? When have you said no? How have you been empowered? What tips would you give to new professionals or librarians just starting at a new institution? How do you establish healthy partnerships with faculty members? How do you talk to faculty members that don’t understand the value of librarianship, information literacy, metadata, data management, digital scholarship, preservation, etc. etc.? How do you converse with faculty members that are champions of the library? How do you advocate for your time, resources, and expertise? How do you let help faculty and administration understand that service is central to the mission of your campus?

References:

Accardi, M. (2015, May 14). I do not think that the Framework is our oxygen mask. Retrieved from https://libraryinstructionburnout.wordpress.com/2015/05/14/i-do-not-think-that-the-framework-is-our-oxygen-mask/

Chachra, D. (2015, Jan 23). Why I am not a maker. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/01/why-i-am-not-a-maker/384767/

Pashia, A., Seeber, K., & Noe, N. (2015, May). Just say no: Empowering ourselves and our expertise. Presentation at the annual meeting of the LOEX, Denver, CO. Retrieved from http://www.loexconference.org/presentations/pashiaPresentation.pdf

Pagowsky, N. & DeFrain, E. (2014). “Ice ice baby: Are librarian stereotypes freezing us out of instruction?” In the Library with the Leadpipe. Retrieved from http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2014/ice-ice-baby-2/

Shirazi, R. (2014, July 15). Reproducing the academy: Librarians and the question of service in the digital humanities. Retrieved from http://roxanneshirazi.com/2014/07/15/reproducing-the-academy-librarians-and-the-question-of-service-in-the-digital-humanities/

Wallis, L. (2015, May 12). Smash all the gates, part 2: Professional silenc*. Retrieved from https://laurenwallis.wordpress.com/2015/05/12/smash-all-the-gates-part-2-professional-silenc/

The Making of an Instructional Design Librarian

I’m now in my sixth month and second semester as a tenure-track Instructional Design Librarian, which is a new position at my library. In December I completed my second master’s in Educational Technology (specializing in instructional design) so now I can call myself an instructional designer with confidence. I’m a new academic librarian AND a new instructional designer, and my job is to wear both of those hats, often at the same time.*

I spent a lot of fall semester figuring out exactly how an Instructional Design Librarian should fit in at my institution. Figuring out my role(s) and mastering the intricacies of the tenure-track handbook has been an enormous, time-consuming challenge. (Spoiler: I’m far from having it all figured out).

Instructional Design Librarians, Please Stand Up

As far as I can tell, there aren’t a whole lot of people like me – at least, title and primary responsibility-wise. There are oodles of instruction librarians, lots of emerging technology librarians, many online/distance education librarians – and multitudes of librarians that have taken on instructional design/educational technology as an additional duty or interest. I discovered this last group in the wonderful Blended Librarian Online Learning Community, which offers fantastic webinars. A term coined by Steven J. Bell, the “Blended Librarian”

first combines the traditional aspects of librarianship with the technology skills of an information technologist, someone skilled with software and hardware. Many librarians already demonstrate sound technology skills of this type. To this mix, the Blended Librarian adds the instructional or educational technologist’s skills for curriculum design, and the application of technology for student-centered learning (2003).

My position and skills certainly fall under this definition. I think that a large percentage of academic librarians have at least some of these skills. Sometimes I say I have the librarian job of the future (at least for academia) and I think that more and more librarian jobs will require these skills going forward.

Taking Stock

When I started this job, I realized my new library desperately needed new and innovative ways to reach more students. Only 23** librarians (including me) serve 38,000 students and 2,000 faculty. Our YouTube page hadn’t been updated with fresh content in years, and there were no communal, reusable learning objects*** to speak of. After settling in last fall (truly settling in will take years in this position), I started my work by doing lots of brainstorming. It was clear from the start my time is limited. Since I am wearing “two hats,” I have to carefully manage my time to fully attend to my librarian duties (liaison subjects, instruction, reference hours, tenure-track work) while striving to make enough time for instructional design. I talked about keeping a work diary in my last post, but I use the same online notebook to sketch out loads of ideas. Holy cow, do I have a lot of ideas: badges, learning object repository, an information literacy curriculum customized for our campus, interactive tutorials, design workshops for librarians, instructional videos, assessment plans… I’ve also been instructed to work on improving my library’s existing online resources, namely, LibGuides.

Last semester, I strove to meet everyone that works in our very large library building and to meet the instructional designers on campus. Our campus has an Academic Technology Center (ATC, which falls under IT), the Faculty Development Center (FDC), a resource called Online Academic Strategies and Instructional Support (OASIS), as well as the University Extended Education (UEE) department. Each of these has one or more instructional designers, and confusingly these centers tend to overlap in their offerings. I spent a lot of time tracking down needed software – Camtasia for the videos, Adobe Captivate for interactive tutorials. My office computer died once and had to be replaced. I had to figure out which librarians I had to talk to about getting YouTube access and my own corner of the website for tutorials (still working on my own corner of the site, but I want to have a mini-repository of learning objects like that from University of Arizona libraries).

Jumping In

In my ACRLog posts so far, overwhelm is a prominent theme for me. So I started small. My library is currently suffering through a stacks closure due to an earthquake last spring, so I created a brief video on how to page materials. By consulting with librarians, I came up with a shortlist of other basic videos and developed two more on searching for library materials. I also took a course on Universal Design for Learning, while concurrently taking a course on writing a journal article in twelve weeks, both through our Faculty Development Center. Per my assignment sheet, and my personal interest, I’ve also been working hard collaborating with another librarian to revamp our assessment model (using the draft ACRL IL framework) for the information literacy component of our campus’ First Year Experience (FYE) program.

Partly due to the stacks closure, and partly due to coming re-organization and major renovation, I moved to a new office the day before winter break. I’m now consolidated in the same hallway as all of the other instructional designers on campus – from ATC, FDC, OASIS, and UEE (holy alphabet soup!). I’ve already learned a lot from them and am excited about the possibilities for collaboration and promoting the library and its resources. Under a grant last week, we were all able to attend two days of training on Quality Matters and our university system’s version, Quality Online Learning and Teaching. I was inspired to think about ways to develop and offer rubrics to allow librarians to self-evaluate learning objects.

Now on to Spring Semester

I continue to work hard on the assessment redesign for our piece of the FYE program (my colleague and I are presenting a poster at SCIL Works, and we submitted a poster proposal for ACRL, look for us if we get accepted! [Edit: Accepted for virtual con]). We’re also working on a grant proposal for release time to assess the pilot once it’s completed. I’m meeting with librarians to talk about developing videos/tutorials for their subject areas. I’m working on developing resources to help students and faculty use library resources like eBooks and streaming video. I’m working with members of our library’s Open Access Team to create presentations on utilizing open educational resources. I want to work with librarians to improve their instruction and their instructional materials, and I’m planning to employ social justice themes in information literacy instruction. I’m also following the critical librarianship community, as I’m from a blue-collar background and sometimes feel out of place in academia.

I get asked a lot what I do as an Instructional Design Librarian. I am certain that my answer will change as I embark on new projects and as I explore new possibilities, but I have come up with a short-ish answer. My new elevator-length job description/mission statement is that I endeavor to design and develop reusable learning objects that can be embedded into online learning environments, and to inculcate effective instructional use of educational technology among campus faculty.

Yep, that’s a mouthful.

Reference
Bell, S. J. (2003). A Passion for Academic Librarianship: Find It, Keep It, Sustain It–A Reflective Inquiry. portal: Libraries and the Academy, 3(4), 633-642.

*I want a button that says “ASK ME about cognitive load!” Because IMHO many, if not most, librarians excel at inflicting cognitive overload in their instructional materials.
**Give or take a few positions in flux.
***At my in-person interview for this position, I was required to teach my audience how to create a reusable learning object (in 20 minutes or less, yikes!). I taught them to make an educational slideshow using myBrainShark and assessed their learning with Poll Everywhere.