Reference Class Learning Reflections

Introduction

In the last class session of the semester, my discussion group responded to the question, “A GSLIS student is thinking about taking this course and wants to know what to expect. What are the three most notable things they will learn or should expect from the class?” My classmates agreed with these suggested answers: 1. How to conduct the reference interview; 2. How to use excellent reference sources in print and online; and 3. Search strategies for best results. That summary encapsulates my own learning experience this semester.

Conducting the Reference Interview

The reference interview process follows many principles I had previously learned, that were refreshed by this course. I freely admit my bias but, in my mind, librarianship begins at the reference desk. This is why I signed up for this course early in my curriculum plan.

Our text is truly “a how-to-do-it manual for librarians”, as the publisher’s trademark states at the top of the cover. I plan to use this manual throughout my library career and refer back to it frequently. It is chock-full of examples, detailed instruction and step-by-step approaches on how to respond to patrons in reference transactions. I have already been putting that learning to use, but obviously more practice is needed to get it right.

The Readers’ Advisory situations are especially difficult for me. Upon hearing my first RA question in the library, I froze. I didn’t know the author, the genre or anything else, I was totally lost, and forgot to ask questions to get the patron to tell me those things. Instead, I thought maybe I should access a reference source (Novelist) and try to respond. By the time I got the application open and entered the author’s name, the patron lost interest in waiting for the “rookie librarian” to figure it out, and had moved on. Failure, in my first opportunity! Following the suggestions of Joyce Saricks, quoted in our text, I have reminded myself since this experience to be a better listener and get a conversation going with the patron that reveals interests. Saricks calls it having a fun conversation about books. What could be better than that? My next RA opportunities yielded better results.
Reference Sources

The source assignments were exceptionally well crafted to force me to use some sources I had never used before. While I retain a healthy admiration for Google and Wikipedia, I have learned that they are rarely the “perfect” sources for serious information-seeking. Learning about MedlinePlus, the Statistical Abstract for the United States, Books in Print, the Gale Learning Center resources has been a significant milestone for me. These are sources I had never used, certainly not online anyway, and this was a major revelation that so much detailed information is at our fingertips, on authoritative databases.

The assignments also took me to the physical collection in a way I had never experienced. I discovered new encyclopedias, such as the Gale medical encyclopedias, which were completely unknown to me previously. Also, I learned for the first time how to use certain Quotations and Dictionary sources, like the McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific and Technical terms. The diversity of encyclopedias was also a new experience. I had used large sets, like Britannica and Americana. Through the assignments, however, I was introduced to single or fewer volume encyclopedias that provided excellent articles on specific topics, such as The New Century Cyclopedia of Names, The Concise Encyclopedia of Psychology, The Columbia Encyclopedia and several others including the print editions of some of the online sources mentioned in the previous paragraph.

The geographic sources were used in a more in-depth manner than I had ever experienced. In particular, I found the CIA Factbook and The Columbia Gazetteer very useful.

Search Strategies

A third key lesson for me this semester was learning how to combine terms to make a database search effective and efficient. Through the Campbell and Fyfe article, I also learned that teaching others how to use the available information tools goes hand-in-hand with reference desk work. Knowing how to search is good, but knowing how to teach others how to search is even better.

This class has helped me to understand the importance of teaching during sort interactions, like using the OPAC or a database to find information. This is the very point of taking this class. For me, it is all about helping others become “information literate”. The information is available, but only if one knows how to retrieve it.

Further, I have learned to keep searching until the question is completely answered. An additional source may provide information not found in the first source. “Special topic” sources may give insights not available elsewhere, but still not contain the broad view of a more general source. At times, both are needed. It is also important to keep searching and verify the information in multiple sources in order to avoid biased or dated information.

Conclusion

Articles and statements from several contributing authors of the many works assigned for reading this semester, such as Catherine Ross and Marie Radford, have encouraged me that the future remains bright for reference librarians. They have eloquently articulated the point that information seekers will continue to need assistance and that the librarians who learn the basic techniques and skills and who are open to adopting new technology and methods, will be preeminently positioned to offer that assistance. It is exciting to hear experienced veterans express such enthusiasm for the profession and instills in me a deeper desire to be a part of it. I feel that my decision to take this reference class at the start of my study of Library and Information Sciences has been validated as an excellent choice, and I would encourage others with similar goals to do the same. In the spirit of Billie Walker at Penn State University (Radford article), I expect to enjoy being a “library dude” on campus someday!


Cited Works:

Ross, Catherine Sheldrick, Kristi Nilsen and Dewdney. Conducting the Reference Interview: A How-To-Do-It Manual for Librarians. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2009.

Campbell, Susan and Debbie Fyfe. “Teaching at the Computer: Best practices for One-on-One Instructions in Reference.” Feliciter 1 (2002): 26-8

Radford, Marie L. “A Personal Choice: Reference Service Excellence.” Reference & User Services Quarterly 48:2 (Winter 2008): 108-15.

Final Project

Group Assignment: Your information organization has received a grant to develop a small collection. All of the items in the collection will be of a single genre (Rare Books in our case). You will post the URL containing your report that explores the important issues and approaches to dealing with this collection.

And, here it is: The Corporis Humani Digital Collection

.

Models and Standards for Authority Control

Models and standards work well when agreement is reached on which models and which standards to use for an activity or process. An additional requirement for enabling models and standards to meet the objectives of their design is that those working within the models should also adhere to the standards. This paper will synthesize the concepts found in the text with the comments from two information researchers about metadata quality and the problems of not adhering to standards.
In recent weeks, our class discussion focused on the description of information resources using metadata that allows for retrieval of data related to names, titles and subjects. Further, in order for relevant, or the best, information resources to be retrieved, the metadata and the retrieval system have to be subject to the same description process and authority control. As the vast volumes of information resources expanded, it became necessary to develop models and standards for this authority control.
Over time, superior models have been adopted and eventually accepted by the professional community of information scientists, managers and users. So that today, we have the general bibliographic models of Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records (FRBR) and the Functional Requirements for Authority Data (FRAD). These two models outline the way that resource titles, their associated names, and associated subjects are related to one another and to other resources and also establish the way that those relationships are organized, categorized and classified. Like the models, the standards have also experienced lengthy development over time by way of constant improvement and upgrading until today several general standards exist. They are: Anglo-American Cataloguing Rules, Second Edition, 2002 Revision (AACR2); Dublin Core Agents, Metadata Authority Description Schema (MADS) and the soon to be launched Resource Description and Access (RDA) and the Statement of International Cataloguing Principles. These models and standards have been established, among other reasons, in order to improve metadata quality.
Many studies (cited in the Park and Salo articles) have shown that following these models and standards make retrieval of information, especially about bibliographic resources, possible and more accurate than if there were no standard methods of organization and classification. When the models and standards are followed, metadata quality is enhanced and information seekers have greater success in their information searches as more relevant information and greater amounts of information are found.
Examples of information sources that have been lacking in metadata quality and thus have led to ineffective searching for users are digital repositories and institutional repositories. Jung-ran Park identifies a number of studies on metadata quality that identify principles of “good metadata” and several other studies that help to identify the problems with metadata in digital repositories.
According to the National Information Standards Organization (NISO) there are six principles of good metadata, which are found on pg. 215 of the Park article. These principles are heavily related to standards and authority control. Obviously, following a standard makes the retrieval of data more successful because the standard has been intelligently established over time and will lead to better results in a search than if the data is organized, classified and indexed in a haphazard way. The essential key is to get submitters of data and the catalogers of data to follow the prescribed standards consistently and avoid making errors.
As mentioned, Park cites studies that uncover the problems with metadata quality in repositories. In summation of the many different problem criteria cited by the studies, Park simplifies our thinking on the subject by consolidating them into three common criteria: completeness, accuracy and consistency. She explains that by completeness she means that the metadata is complete enough to facilitate its purpose of making the resource to which it refers fully accessible in a search. Accuracy means correct entry of metadata and avoidance of mismatched metadata that is imported from data providers. She calls for consistency to be measured on two levels, the conceptual or semantic level and looking at the data format on the structural level.
Dorothea Salo, in her article “Name Authority Control in Institutional Repositories”, highlights these same problem criteria by showing how the methodology designed for the institutional repository did not protect against them. She may not use the same words, but she is emphasizing throughout her comments the problems with incomplete, inaccurate and inconsistent metadata.
According to Salo, the factors causing the problem in institutional repositories include the process of self-archiving by submitters of resources, ingesting material possessing no metadata control, and harvesting materials from aggregators and e-indexers which possess inconsistent metadata.
Obviously, Park’s recommendations for the improvement of repositories are to establish methods to improve the completeness, accuracy and consistency of metadata. Her recommendations include establishing metadata guidelines as a best practice for information organizations. This suggestion also applies to mechanized or automatic generation of metadata, leading into the further development of the semantic web technology. She cites several projects currently underway towards this objective. While Salo mentions several barriers to solutions to these problems with metadata inconsistencies, she does recommend finding a method to pass corrected metadata around between generators and managers of metadata. (I might add even involving users.) Salo suggests that use of the Open Archives Initiative and JISC are two paths to pursue vigorously.
Finding solutions to these problems is the challenge for the current generation of information scientists. Launching RDA and developing the Semantic Web will no doubt be the main focus for the near term. Establishing guidelines as best practices is one way, but this only gets results when others follow along. Development of the semantic web provides hope on the horizon, but again, information professionals engaged in the organization, cataloging and indexing of information resources must individually contribute to the completeness, accuracy and consistency of metadata in every aspect of their jobs in order for models and standards to take hold and take full effect. It will take personal commitment and engagement of all concerned.
Resources:
Taylor & Joudrey, Chapter 8. Metadata: Access and authority control (pp. 245-301).
Park, J.-R. (2009). Metadata quality in digital repositories: A survey of the current state of the art. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 47(3/4): 213-228.
Salo, D. (2009). Name authority control in institutional repositories. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly 47(3/4): 249-261.

Reader's Advisory Services

In the Catherine Ross text on Conducting the Reference Interview (pg. 237), Joyce Sarick is quoted as having said, “There are fifty thousand answers to the request, ‘Give me a good book’.” Sarick further suggests that the readers advisory interview requires some knowledge development activity before the patron ever arrives. I suppose in the past this was done by reading a lot of books, book commentaries, reviews, etc.. It seems to me that today, this process of knowledge development requires the same activity of reading like it did in the past, although today, for the most part, it is done by using electronic resources. By becoming familiar with the many different electronic resources, a librarian can understand the strengths and weaknesses of each and deftly use the right resource when the requests are made. In this regard, reader’s advisory is exactly the same as the reference advisory, in that knowing the best resource for the real information need makes the advisory process so much more efficient and efficacious.

Sarick goes on to describe the reader’s advisory interview as having a fun conversation about books, primarily by getting the patron to do most of the talking and the interviewer doing some careful listening. This approach makes the process seem much less daunting and after all, aren’t most librarians and information specialists in the field exactly because they enjoy having this kind of conversation about books? What a perfectly appealing way to describe it.

Another key point for me in this weeks’ reading was the cautionary advice to refrain from falling into the trap of responding with one’s own opinions about a book or an author. Although the question sometimes comes out that way, the requester is not really asking for the librarian’s opinion on another “good author”, “good book” or “good read”. What the librarian might like may not be what the requester will like. Staying focused on finding out what the patron likes came across to me as very sound and key advice.

About Aboutness

Introduction
Subject analysis is a vastly important and challenging area of information organization. The literature reviewed in this week's reading assignments has not only outlined the process of subject analysis but brought to the fore several difficult aspects that have kept information professionals unsatisfied with its current condition in general, and with indexing for information retrieval systems specifically. According to Taylor & Joudrey (T&J)(pg. 303), being able to identify “precisely an item’s subject matter (often referred to as aboutness . . .)” is of significant value. Of equal value, and generally less definitively accomplished is then carefully and accurately assigning appropriate terms in an index to represent that aboutness. In this reading response, a brief synthesis is provided of the M. J. Bates (not so brief) article and the Taylor & Joudrey text. They are supportive of one another in their discussions of aboutness and the difficulties in achieving a database and retrieval system design that is completely satisfactory to its users. The conclusion is that there have been many changes in the subject analysis space since Bates wrote her article, and there is yet more on the near horizon that will further solve some of the inherent challenges.

Synthesis of Concepts
T&J informs that much literature is extant that points out that aboutness is more than just the words in the text used by an author. Accurate aboutness takes into consideration, among other things, the intentions of both the author and the users of the resource. This suggests there must be a connection between the person developing the vocabulary of the index and the end user, or at least an understanding of the latter by the former. Otherwise, the index is of great value to the indexer, but less so to the user. Bates (pg. 4) reinforces this concept by pointing out that the information seeking user doesn’t know what the resource is yet. The user has no idea what it is about, or what it can answer, or even how to ask for it. The indexer doing the analysis has the record in hand. There is no gap in understanding the resource. The main challenge for the indexer is to add to that “hands-on” knowledge by anticipating how the user will search for the resource. Even to the point of anticipating which terms the searcher might use, based on the information need. If the user’s guesses in the search don’t match the indexer’s description, then the resource is not found in the search and it is of little value to the user.

Further, Bates contrasts the indexer’s experience (with the subject analysis process) to the information seeking experience of the user. The indexer is highly trained and educated in the subject analysis arena, whereas the user is not, and may not even be experienced in the search process. So, having their thought process match is unlikely, unless the indexer thinks in terms of the potential searcher.
The main points of the Bates article are that human, database and domain factors impact the subject analysis and search processes. Those impacts can be negative if indexers don’t follow careful and well thought-out methodologies. Inherently, the indexer wishes to build something of great intellectual and scholarly value. Potentially, the more logical and sophisticated the retrieval system design is, the less it will resemble the inexperienced searching techniques of the user. The indexer must take into account the user community as well as the domain or environment of the users.

T&J describes the process of analysis and assigning terms. The text gives three examples of approaches (or methodologies) to the process, which are identified by their authors, Langridge, Wilson and Lancaster (as a representative of the Use-based Approach). Each approach consists of steps that generally follow a basic outline of asking questions. These questions begin in a sort of general arena and move to more specific characteristics of the information resource being analyzed. For instance, “What is it?”; “What is it for?”; and “What is it about?” in Langridge’s approach. Wilson describes in his approach four methods, which similarly work from generalities to specifics. First (Purposive), “What was the author’s purpose?”; second (Figure-Ground), “Is there a central figure that stands out?”; third (Objective), counting references to determine which vastly outnumber the others; and fourth (Cohesion), “what holds the work together?”. This general to specific question-tree approach was likened by Bates (pg. 14) to the same way library users approach the reference desk. They start with a general opening question and, based on the librarian’s interviewing skills, the interview moves to specifics until the librarian has determined what the user really wants and provides a path to that information. It seems that the database searcher follows this same approach of trying general terms and getting more specific until the search has been narrowed to relevant and desired information.

The impetus for following methodologies such as those presented in the text and article under review here is to overcome the many challenges inherent in communication of information. People from different environments, cultures and background simply think of things differently. Anticipating those differences will aid in overcoming them. The suggestion by Bates to build a user-friendly front-end to attach to the logically developed database makes good sense and since the time of her writing, this suggestion has been implemented by most developers of retrieval systems.

In today’s Web 2.0 environment, retrieval systems are advancing to the stages of incorporating user generated aboutness, or tagging, which will take the process a step further in overcoming some of the challenges identified in the Bates article and the T&J text. According to Rolla (pg. 178), user tagging such as is present in LibraryThing has added richness beyond the library catalog. This is the positive result that Bates, in particular, and the T&J chapter suggest we must pursue in the information organization profession as we overcome inherent challenges of subject analysis.

Conclusion
Many studies have been conducted and much has been written about the subject analysis process (see Notes in T&J, Chapter 9, pp. 328-332) which has added to the discussion before and since the 1998 Bates article. These studies and the literature have helped to formulate new methodologies and to enhance existing approaches to subject analysis. As approaches and methodologies, like those considered in this week’s reading material, continue to develop with an eye on solving the aboutness challenges discussed, the search process will only improve.

References:

Taylor & Joudrey, Chapter 9, Subject analysis (pp. 303-332) and Appendix A. An approach to subject analysis (pp. 419-427)

Bates, M.J. (1998). Indexing and access for digital libraries and the Internet: human, database, and domain factors. Journal of the American Society for Information Science 49(13): 1185-1205.

Rolla, P. J. (2009). Can user-supplied data improve subject access to library collections? Library Resources & Technical Services 53(3): 174-184.

Reference Interview Analysis

This paper will identify and discuss five reference transactions through a variety of modes between a library and information sciences student (me) and multiple information centers providing reference services. The personal interactions will be reported from the student’s point of view and the services rendered will be analyzed in terms of the LIS literature studied in the LIS 504 class at the Graduate School of Library and Information Sciences at the University of Illinois. In some transactions, the specific points recommended in the literature on the reference interview were present and obvious. In others, they were obviously missing. This paper will attempt to make that connection between the transactions and the LIS literature.

The Information Centers and Reference Providers:

Four different centers or reference services were accessed. They include the Crystal Lake Public Library in Crystal Lake, Illinois, (my closest public library relationship), the Arlington Heights Memorial Library in Arlington Heights, Illinois, the University Library at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus, and the online resource “Yahoo! Answers” at http://answers.yahoo.com/.

The transaction at the UIUC University Library was conducted via instant messaging through their AIM connection on the website home page and of course, the Yahoo!Answers transaction was conducted online through their website. All other transactions were face to face.

The Transactions:

Transaction #1 - On September 6, 2009, the on-duty reference desk librarian at Crystal Lake Public Library (CLPL) was asked about dictionaries and their usage. The original question was, “Where are the dictionaries located?” A specific question was asked later of the same librarian about a quotation, the source of which had eluded the student.

Transaction #2 - On September 29, 2009 in regard to geographic sources a different librarian at the CLPL reference desk was asked if she knew what an atoll is and where one might find information about any atolls that belong to the United States.

Transaction #3 - On September 26, 2009, a visit to the Arlington Heights Memorial Library (AHML) was made in an effort to access a larger (than CLPL) reference section of print sources to support a project in the LIS 501 class centered on the development of a digital collection. My introductory question of the reference librarian on duty was, “Do you have any sources that would assist me in a project in one of my LIS classes to develop a digital collection?”

Transaction #4 - On October 14 an instant message transaction was undertaken with the main library at the University of Illinois on the Urbana-Champaign campus. My initial question was, “Can you help me request a book to be picked up this weekend?”

Transaction #5 - The questions submitted were, “What can be done to stop North Korea from further developing nuclear weapons?” and “What is an “Illini” and why is that the mascot of the University of Illinois athletic teams?”

The Analysis:

Transaction #1 - As I approached the reference desk from the corridor directly before the desk, the librarian didn’t see me coming as she was engaged with the computer screen in front of her, which takes her gaze away from the corridor. When I arrived, however, she immediately looked up, smiled and acknowledged me. (I volunteer at this library, so she knew me by name.) When I explained my assignment and asked about dictionaries, she asked if I wanted to look for something specific, or just a tour of the section. At that point, I had no specific questions and asked for the tour.

She guided me to the section and identified all of the various types of dictionaries. She did not show me, and I did not notice, that the section extended past the end of the stacks we were viewing and continued on the next stack behind us. I’m not sure if she was aware of that physical attribute of the section and I think she thought she had shown me the entire collection of dictionaries. However, I came back later and was stumped that there were not more books on quotations. The answer was found online through an unfamiliar source. A classmate was consulted to see if she had found the answer. She identified a source. When I came back to the reference desk a week later, I asked specifically for that source and was told that it was in the collection. That’s when I looked past the end of the first set of shelves and found additional sources on the next section and specifically the very source that held my answer.

In the first week’s encounter, I had returned to the desk and asked where I might find the specific quotation. The librarian immediately started an online search and had to ask a few times for the quote. She asked me to repeat it so many times that I had it memorized for several weeks thereafter. She never did find the answer, but asked me several times before my departure that day if I had because she was now interested in knowing who had said it.

The librarian did not think to recommend some excellent quotations books in the collection, but conducted a cursory search online and then indicated that she could not find an answer for me. The librarian seemed sure that it could be found online (which it was), but when she was unable to do so, didn’t finish the reference interview and became too engrossed in the actual search to be of service to me any longer. She lost focus of the interview by not following through to figure out what I really needed. See Ross, Chapter 3 information.

Transaction #2 - During my sources assignment on geographical sources, I found the print versions of atlases, gazetteers and other sources without assistance and had answered most of the questions. Thinking of this assignment I decided to ask another librarian at the reference desk to assist me on finding information about atolls belonging to the United States. She asked, “What is an atoll?”, which is perfectly understandable – after all; not everyone in the Midwestern United States has heard of an atoll. After explaining to her what it is, she indicated she wasn’t sure where to look for such a source. She was aware of what I had been doing with the atlases and gazetteers and asked if I had reviewed all of them. I hadn’t yet, so I went back to an atlas still on the shelf (I had most of the books of the section on my table) and found that it was an excellent source for the specific subject. I later found the World Fact Book to be quite helpful as well.

I think this librarian felt a little uncomfortable trying to help when she hadn’t known what an atoll is and she held back from assisting any further. Truthfully, I may not have needed her assistance and it was probably appropriate for her to send me back to the sources and refrain from doing it for me. The information in chapter 1 of Ross suggests that not bothering with the interview leads to a failed transaction. That seems applicable here. The librarian did not follow the interview through to a close. However, once again, maybe that’s exactly what I needed in this case – to be sent back to my own search.

Transaction #3 - After entering the AHML (which was somewhat unfamiliar to me), I found signs leading to a reference desk, which was called the “Questions and Answers Desk”. That seemed an apt place to start. Two librarians were seated there, one male and the other female. The female was engaged in a project at her computer and the male was on the phone. As I approached the desk the male librarian was just finishing his transaction on the phone and asked if he could help me.

I asked my question on digital collection development. He thought for a moment and then said, “Okay, just a moment,” and turned to his computer. He typed in a few key words and I assumed by his actions and apparent thinking process that he was checking for call numbers to identify a section where such books might be found. As it turns out, that’s exactly what he was doing. I know he asked me a couple of questions to confirm some things about the assignment, but the specifics now escape me. But suffice it to say, he was narrowing things down in his search for answers to my question.

Once he had a location, he took me to several shelves filled with a large variety of books on digitization, digital library collections, online library services, etc. Some of the collection was specifically related to my needs and much of it was not. He started identifying options and quickly pulled two likely suspects from the shelves. I suddenly had in my hands Cataloging and Organizing Digital Resources and Developing Library and Information Center Collections. He then suggested I look through the section, gave me some instructions and indicated he would be right back.

No other books met my needs. When the librarian returned he asked if anything else had been found, and was told not yet. He had in his hands a copy of The Whole Digital Library Handbook, with a colored slip of paper inserted into its pages, with “Checkout 7 Days Only” printed on it. He explained that this book might be useful, but it was part of their reference office collection and did not normally circulate. He indicated I could take it for a week and review it.

He then offered to assist further if I needed it and as he prepared to excuse himself from me, he encouraged me to stop up at the desk later if there was more he could do for me.

This librarian immediately acknowledged my arrival at the reference desk, listened carefully to my question, confirmed my needs with an encourager, “Oaky, just a moment”, and then took me to the sources and identified several options that matched exactly what I had requested. He verified my satisfaction with these results and offered more assistance if needed in his closing statement with me. In short, he practically delivered a text book response to my request as outlined in Ross, chapter 3.

Transaction #4 - The instant messaging service was new to me and it took some time to figure out how to use it. There were some instructions about downloading the AIM service onto my computer and at first I thought I would have to do that. After starting that process, I noticed it was not required and I started over. My initial request drew a response in about 5 minutes. The whole transaction was running smoothly, until I accidentally pressed a wrong key on the keyboard and then had to connect all over again. Thus, the simple question about how to request a book from the library online took almost 30 minutes to complete.

A more complex question may have taken longer, and then again, a more complex question may have been more difficult to figure out on one’s own. All in all, IM was a good experience, as I did get the answer and accomplished a remote book request, which I had wanted to do for some time, but never quite figured it out on my own, as I had lost my patience in previous attempts.

However, my experience supports the claims made by Sam Stormont that technical reference must become simpler and more convenient in order for it to become more widely used.

Transaction #5 – Two questions were asked on the Yahoo! Answers site on October 10, 2009. I did not consider this a normal “reference” transaction, since there was no collection attached to it, and was unsure of formulating appropriate questions. Although, I did review the site and read many of the thousands of questions that were already solved and found that they were focused on various cities, people and things. Nonetheless, my feelings were to ask broad questions and see what came of it.

The answers started arriving within minutes and by the second day there were about a dozen responses to my question on North Korea and just three responses to my Illini question. It was interesting that most answers were strongly held opinions and given in that manner, at least on North Korea. Also, the answers slowed down and stopped just as abruptly as they had started, even though the question remained open for four days. It appeared to me that once a perceived “best” answer was given, other potential respondents stopped.

On the Illini question, for instance, the third posting included a link to Wikipedia’s entry on Chief Illiniwek, which must have seemed sufficient because there were no more answers delivered.

It became apparent that this service could be useful in the right setting and for the right information seeking need. It was prompt in delivering answers, from which the questioner may select a “best” answer. Anonymity is maintained, if desired, and no harm is done in the asking. If the question is not asked perfectly to elicit desired responses, it may be rephrased and resubmitted for a fresh round of answers. It is really quite simple, and more useful than I at first thought it could be.

Conclusions:

In transaction #3, almost all prescribed attributes of the reference interview were demonstrated by the librarian. In transactions #1 and #2, the librarians were pleasant, inviting of the questions, but slightly less than supportive of the process. In each case, they did not pinpoint exactly what was needed and why. Thus, they did not guide me to an answer and didn’t close the interview positively. They knew me personally before my arrival at their desk, and my questions were not complex. Both conditions may have factored into their responses. But, in both cases, the reference interviews were somewhat lacking, in comparison to the recommended methods in the LIS Literature, and as a result, the outcomes fell somewhat short of desirable.

The IM transaction, #4, with the University Library went well from the perspective of the librarian’s interviewing skills. Through IM questions and responses, the librarian confirmed what I needed, where I was in the process already and then guided me to the next step and then the next, until I had accomplished the purpose of my service request. The interview was closed with confirmation that I was satisfied and had no other needs, and was finally ended with an invitation to come back to the librarian if I needed anything in the future. Only the mechanics of the transaction caused some dissatisfaction.

Transaction #5 surprised me in its promptness and efficiency and is encouraging to see that such a simple approach can deliver good and mostly satisfactory answers to a multitude of questions. Authoritative answers were not expected and many of the answers I reviewed to other questions on this site were ridiculous, opinionated and lacked any authority whatsoever.

As is pointed out in the literature, attributes of the information seeker weigh heavily on the outcome of the interview. The better questions are articulated, the better chance of getting a satisfactory answer. However, much of the success of the interview rests on the librarian’s ability to draw this information from the seeker through an effective interview.

References:

Ross, Catherine Sheldrick; Nilsen, Kristi; and Radford, Marie L. Conducting the Reference Interview, Second Edition. 2009. Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc.

Stormont, Sam. “Looking to Connect: Technical Challenges that Impede the Growth of Virtual Reference.” Reference & User Services Quarterly 47:2 (Winter 2007): 114-9

Interacting With Retrieval Systems

A common theme in the primary readings on Evaluation of Retrieval Systems centered on the weaknesses of search engines in general and full-text searching specifically. The supplemental readings followed the same theme. I found some humor in Matthew Koll’s report on Information Retrieval and some insightful suggestions from Daniel Tunkelang in his Reconsidering Relevance and Embracing Interaction. The retrieval systems of the not-too-distant future will undoubtedly require more interaction from information seekers, but will likewise be more powerful and deliver more relevant results in return.

The Evaluation of Retrieval Systems literature makes well the point that information seekers go about the search process with different interests and bring different experiences and knowledge to their search attempts. Koll suggests that too many searches fail because searchers are looking in the wrong place and that casual searchers don’t have time for a lot of interaction and may not even be able to provide all of the information the system requires for a successful search. With some levity, Koll suggests that in future information conferences (like the one he reports on) the classes should be made available by full-text search to see if attendees find the session they truly want. In spite of the noted progress, the basic challenge of retrieval systems providing successful search results continues to be a difficult problem.

Contrasting Koll’s opinion that casual searchers will not take the time to be more interactive, Tunkelang predicts that perhaps the truly ranked search era is coming to a close and we will soon be interacting much more with search engines. He cites the relaunch of Microsoft’s “Bing” web search engine as evidence. Bing offers users an interactive exchange permitting quicker refinement of the search results in categories of applicable data related to the original search terms. Google has likewise made steps in this direction on their advanced and experimental interfaces.

Further evidence for the close of an era is given by Tunkelang by discussion of his company’s (Endeca’s) long ago development of faceted search technology, which is now used by, or simulated in the proprietary systems of web retailers (such as Amazon and eBay). This approach adds to the conventional text search the ability to refine queries in such a way that users can navigate the content in more than one way at once. On shopping sites, for example, product searches are refined by such facets as brands, price or product type.

Tunkelang progresses through a discussion of Human-Computer Information Retrieval (HCIR), a system approach (which includes faceted searching) that calls for computing tools that augment the search process with human interaction to take advantage of human intelligence and attention. The objective of this approach is to give information seekers the chance to clarify or elaborate on their intended search. Ultimately, searches will be more focused and more easily refined, leading to more relevant results. The focus comes from the system asking or prompting the user, so that the information seeker need not yet “know what they don’t know”, as Koll might say it. They just have to be able to answer the questions or prompts from the system.

The concluding statement of this article is that users seem ready for a new interface that utilizes the intelligence and attention of the seeker to guide and refine the in-progress search leading to more successful outcomes.

Retrieval systems will certainly become better as developers invest in new interfaces and technologies. The question remains, will information seekers embrace the responsibility to take control of the search process and become more engaged in their casual searches.

Koll, Matthew. (2000) Annual Meeting Coverage - Track 3: Information Retrieval. Bulletin of The American Society for Information Science and Technology. 26:(2).
http://www.asis.org/Bulletin/Jan-00/track_3.html

Tunkelang, Daniel. (2009) Reconsidering Relevance and Embracing Interaction. Bullletin of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. 36:(1). 20-23http://www.asis.org/Bulletin/Oct-09/OctNov09_Tunkelang.pdf

To Cognate or To Socialize?

In this response, my purpose is to identify a particular feature of Elmborg’s argument for a constructivist approach to reference desk services, which is significant in the acceptability of his argument. Without this feature, his argument could lose credibility and merit with some educators.

Elmborg’s argument that the reference desk can be a powerful teaching station is based on the learning theory called constructivism, which posits that people generate knowledge from their experiences. Further, this theory states that the learner learns best when in charge of the learning activities. Elmborg quotes from five scholars who studied and reported on the librarian in the reference services process during the 1990’s. All five authors emphasized the shift of academia to the “student-centered pedagogies”, known as constructivist pedagogies.

In the era of these studies and analyses the constructivist learning theory was quite popular and a movement existed throughout the United States to adopt the constructivist principles in public school curriculum and teaching methods. At that time, my children were in elementary and middle school and the community where we lived became embroiled in significant political debate over this movement. In fact, the school board president and another member of the board were voted out of office to counteract this movement. Because of that emotional experience, I became increasingly interested in Elmborg’s arguments.

On pg. 457 of his article, he makes a distinction of moving from cognitive constructivism to social constructivism. The ‘cognitive’ requires an emphasis on the mental models of the learner and the teacher having some understanding of those models, whereas the ‘social’ “emphasizes the social nature of knowledge formation”. His reasoning for this adoption of the ‘social’ is that “very few librarians are comfortable in making the sophisticated diagnoses required in a cognitive interview.”

Monday night, September 28, 2009, I listened to a radio program in the Chicago area called Extension 720, on WGN 720, wherein two renowned experts in the field of education were in a discussion with the program’s host about education in inner-city schools and in particular they espoused the adoption of more charter schools. A caller to the program (himself an educator) took issue with one of the guest panelists, Herb Walberg, who had somewhat denounced constructionism (a form of constructivism theory). Mr. Walberg, however, defended his position by citing studies that had proven some errors in constructivism. For one thing, the theory is weak when applied with a population of novice learners. The panelist accepted the value of constructivism for experienced or high IQ learners, but suggested it is not appropriate for general populations. The Wikipedia article on constructivism also identifies some opposition to the theory.

It occurred to me as I read Elmborg’s article, that his argument gains strength when he emphasized the social constructivism , which sets the learner in a social environment, rather than remaining alone. A novice learner in a cognitive constructivist environment must be highly capable and motivated in order to effectively learn. The social constructivism approach not only frees the reference librarian from making the difficult diagnoses spoken of, but also allows for another party to be involved with the learner. In fact, this other party is to be engaged with the learner from a position of one with special knowledge who can guide the learning process. This model fits well for a novice learner and is much more apt to be effective at the reference desk.

Elmborg, James K. “Teaching at the Desk: Toward a reference pedagogy.” Portal: libraries and the academy 2 (2002): 455-464.

Constructionism on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructionist_learning, 30 Sep 2009

Constructivism on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructivism_%28learning_theory%29, 30 Sep 2009

Extension 720 Broadcast of 28 September 2009
http://www.wgnradio.com/shows/ext720/wgnam-x720-uncut090928a,0,6044235.mp3file

Digital Collections Assessment

A Collection Featuring Created Surrogates from Existing Holdings

The Darlington Digital Library was created from the first major collection of materials donated to the University of Pittsburgh. This donation included books, manuscripts, atlases, images and maps that had been assembled by William M. Darlington, an attorney and native son of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, born in 1815. His family and estate made the donation in 1918, some 29 years after his death. The online collection is made up of surrogate digital images created by the university from its physical holdings in a special collection called the Darlington Memorial Library, and is presented on the website http://digital.library.pitt.edu/d/darlington/.

Of particular note, the collection includes two major works of John James Audubon: a complete set of Birds of America and a companion work, Ornithological Biography. Both books are a prized part of the assembled materials of Mr. Darlington. Audubon created these two important works simultaneously, and they were acquired by Darlington in the mid 1800’s. The collection website states that “The University of Pittsburgh is fortunate to own one of the rare, complete sets of John James Audubon’s Birds of America. It is considered to be the single most valuable set of volumes in the collections of the University Library System. Indeed, only 120 complete sets are known to exist.”

Because of the singular nature of these books, a special Audubon Website was created, http://digital.library.pitt.edu/a/audubon/, to dipslay them. The quality of the artwork and of the scientific data contained in this site is impressive. I am not an ornithologist, nor have I had any real interest in the study of birds. However, exploring this site was captivating. The available viewing tools allow the user to enlarge the images to a significant degree and the detail of these prints is astounding. Further, the variety and breadth of Audubon’s work is obvious and easily detected immediately, even for one as unschooled and inexperienced as I am in this field of study.

The main body of the Darlington Digital Library reveals Mr. Darlington’s interest in the colonial history of the United States, particularly the development of Pennsylvania and Ohio. The materials are eclectic in nature and cover areas of interest from civil war soldier escapades, 18th and 19th century methods of advertising and publishing announcements, and correspondence between British noblemen and American colonists. The maps provide an historical view of the development of the United States, as populations moved westward. The scope of the collection is large and varied.

The material is organized into category headings and is searched by these headings: Atlases, Books, Broadsides, Images, Manuscripts and Maps. Users will also find a detailed description of the digitization process executed by the library staff, and a helpful background explanation on how the collection came to be. The site also provides links to published overviews of the collection and the Darlington family, which places the materials in an historical context and helps to explain its eclectic nature.

The 1,680 books in the collection can be searched by author, title and subject. Bibliographic, Boolean and proximity searches are also available, and a general search box on the books page offers a general word search. All search attempts provided quick results, whether broad or targeted in scope. In addition to the books, there are only 5 atlases, 51 broadsides, but 1,825 images and 853 maps in the digital collection. Digitization of the manuscripts is still underway, and none are available digitally at this time. Each of these categories offers similar search features and organization structure, where applicable, as the books category.

A researcher desiring information on a specific period or episode of US history can easily
determine if it exists in this collection, and, if extant, locate it in the collection. Certainly, it is not a comprehensive collection on any one subject, but the organization of the materials makes each item easy to find. An ornithologist will definitely enjoy a review of the special Audubon Website appendage to the collection.

A Collection Featuring Third-party Domain Sources

From the Internet Public library main page, various collections are available for selection. The “Special Collections” section includes an interesting and informative collection about US Presidents, called POTUS, accessed through the URL: http://www.ipl.org/div/potus/.

On the POTUS site main page the forty-four presidents are listed and linked to articles containing information on the IPL site under the following standardized category headings: Presidential Election Results, Cabinet Members, Notable Events, and Internet Biographies, Historical Documents, Media Resources, Other Internet Resources and points of Interest. Clicking on a president’s name will display that president’s page with detailed information under those headings.

Within those category sections, links are available to third-party sites that give extensive and detailed information about the president selected. These third-party sites are not standard on each president’s page, but are similar in nature. The Media Resources category doesn’t provide any links for presidents prior to Grover Cleveland, since recording technology was only just being developed in the 1880's.

The user can easily find much detailed information about each president. The format is simple to understand and it takes only a few seconds to a minute for the user to identify the structure of the information. From that understanding a search strategy can be formulated and executed leading to a significant volume of web information. A searcher will have to verify authority of the third-party sites, which can be done through corroboration of the multiple sources of information. Cross-checking with encyclopedias and other reference sources, some of which are linked to this site, may be necessary to achieve full confidence in the veracity of the information, if the need exists. For less than in-depth research, significant information about a president is available through this collection.

The collection is remarkably current. Complete video of President Barack Obama’s speech to the United Nations General assembly given today, September 24, 2009, is already accessible from this site by cyberlink.

Reading Response #2

Collection Developers – Past, Present and . . . Future?

Buckland’s, Lee’s and Sandler’s articles particularly caught my interest. A feeling of relief warmed my soul as I read the passionate predictions by the first two authors that the role of the collection developer will be enhanced, rather than eliminated by the increasing presence and sheer magnitude of the digital collection. When I reached Sandler’s contention in the reading that ‘it is potentially a world of disintermediation for libraries of all types’ (pg. 241), the warmth turned icy and the future became bleak. Thankfully, even Sandler eventually finds a use for collection developers, if not by name at least by task, in the area of special collections. So, is there a future for collection developers?

Each of the authors described in one way or another not only their contention that there is a future for this role, but also why they believe there is a future. Lee expressed it (pg. 1110) by quoting Taylor, saying that selectivity is ‘the value added when choices are made’ by developers on the merits of the information and its appropriateness for the community served. Sandler pins the survival of the local library collection on relevancy and continual recognition of trends and making the necessary changes. These, are changes, or choices, that must be made by human decision makers, or by another name, collection developers.

Buckland, I think states the case best, when he describes the classical book selection theory. Quoting a number of scholars on the subject, he portrays a sound business model based on meeting demand and delivering value. Because meeting demand can be a quantitative process, it will likely not be a distinguishing feature in the future, since computers will (may already have) take over that analysis and decision process. On the other hand, making the right choices on materials will be subjective tasks that require human cognitive capabilities. The better it is done, the more value to be found in the resulting collection, which is a distinction of note. Buckland quotes Lionel McColvin, an early contributor of the selection theory, to make the point that having the right materials in the collection is the most important aspect of the developer’s job. Buckland makes a strong case that an information professional will be needed to do that for the foreseeable future.

Creating value is obviously a key to survival. Providing services that are valued by patrons, beyond mere perceptions, will ensure a place for information workers of all kinds, including the collection developer. In fact, value creation is the underpinning of all employments in a capitalistic and democratic society. It is a law of economics that when a product or service no longer brings value to a consumer, that product or service will cease to exist. This is as true for collection developers as it is for carmakers.

Interestingly, in as much as these concepts parallel business so closely, comparisons are easily made between libraries and retailers. The tried and true retailing rule of delivering the right product at the right place at the right price is basically what collection development is all about. Buckland makes the case that the development decisions have brought value in the past and continue in the present to do so by giving access to the right materials that patrons are seeking. He claims that there is no reason for that value process to end in the future. In fact, he thinks the value of these decisions will be enhanced in the digital collection environment. The selection of sources into a collection will even more effectively guide the user to the desired information, in spite of the overwhelming amount of available data. Now that is value! And, value means there is a future!

Buckland, M. (1995). What will collection developers do? Information Technology and Libraries 14(3): 155-159.

Lee, H.-L. (2000). What is a collection? Journal of the American Society for Information Science 51(12): 1106-1113.
Sandler, M. (2006). Collection development in the [age] day of Google. Library Resources and Technical Services 50(4): 239-243.

Information Seeking Behavior of Graduate Students

Journal article reviewed in this paper:

Hyldegard, Jette (2008). Beyond the search process – Exploring group members’ information behavior in context. Information Processing and Management 45 (2009) 142-158. http://dx.doi.org.proxy2.library.uiuc.edu/10.1016/j.ipm.2008.05.007

Introduction

This paper reports the findings of a case study, which considered Kuhltau’s information seeking process, the (ISP)-Model, in a group based in an academic setting. According to Hyldegard, implicit in many other information process studies is the assumption that the information seeker is an individual. His team set out in this study to look into the impact of contextual and situational factors of a group on the information seeking behavior of group members. The stated purpose of the study was to explore if group members would behave differently from the individual modeled in the ISP-model and why.

Methods

The study was conducted at the Royal School of Library and Information Science in Copenhagen, Denmark in 2007. Three groups of students were observed, two groups consisted of three students each and the third included four students. The class, including these students, was assigned a group project. Study participants were interviewed by researchers at three stages of the project -- beginning, middle and conclusion. Additionally, students were required to maintain regular diaries of all activities throughout the assignment. Student feelings, thoughts and actions were recorded and described in the diaries and interviews.

The research team measured the influence of activities in terms of three aspects: feelings (affective), thoughts (cognitive) and actions (physical) on individual group members during completion of various tasks required by the assignment. The researchers paired the six stages of the ISP-model with the associated expected feelings as follows: Initiation - uncertainty, Selection - optimism, Exploration - confusion/frustration/doubt, Formulation - clarity, Collection - sense of direction/confidence, and Presentation - satisfaction or disappointment. The interviews and diaries were used to measure if and to what extent each of these feelings were present at each stage of the project.

The impact of the work process dimension (focus formulation) and the group process dimension (working with others) on the information seeking process dimension of individual students were measured. This enabled the researchers to view the information seeking process within the context of the group assignment.

Findings

The study showed that the group setting did impact individuals in cognitive and affective ways that influence information seeking behaviors differently than predicted by the ISP-model. In fact, the influences were noticed in all three project dimensions observed in the study. A particularly interesting feature of working in a group is introduced when members have to depend on others to fulfill segments of the information seeking process. This feature influenced feelings of satisfaction or dissatisfaction and confidence or uncertainty, depending on the actions of others.

Additional conclusions showed the general stages of information seeking, the cognitive pattern associated with focus formulation and the tendency towards an increase in writing while searching decreased as the project progressed were similar between group members and the individual in Kuhltau’s ISP-model. The research also concluded that group based problem solving seems to be a dynamic process that shifts between a group perspective and an individual perspective. Lastly, this activity is further influenced by contextual and social factors beyond the mere information seeking process.

Hyldegard posits that the ISP-model does not fully comply with group members’ problem solving process and the involved information seeking behavior. He suggests further, based on these findings, that academic problem solving seems to be even more complex when it is performed in a group based setting.

Design Implications

The study itself identifies several important limitations. My additional observations are that this study observed activities of very small groups. A study design covering larger groups could amplify these findings or even uncover new information about information seeking behaviors, but studying larger groups might also add complexities beyond its effectiveness.
Knowing that the study is being conducted potentially influences behavior. It doesn’t appear that any steps were taken to establish a “control” group. That may not even be possible, since the study of human subjects requires some prior notification, but the issue is an important consideration.

Reading Response #1

Inquiring Minds Want to Know – But Why?

Due to my own seemingly insatiable need for information, evidenced by 10 magazine and 3 newspaper subscriptions, of which almost each issue is read start to finish, in addition to reading two non-fiction books every other week or so, the chapters from the Case text on information behavior struck my interest. I have often wondered why some of us are “wired” to be so interested in information. Beyond knowing facts or data, the drive is sometimes deeper and taken to the level of wanting to understand the reasons for things; why are things the way they are, or why are people the way they are.

In chapter 4 of “Information Needs and Information Seeking”, Case notes that information researchers analyzing the issue of human information needs generally cite one of four main authors: Robert Taylor, Nicholas Belkin, Carol Kuhlthau, and Brenda Davis. While the theories of all four authors appeal to me, it seems that their approaches play themselves out in different ways at different times in my own experience. This may also impact how the need is satisfied (when the search is over), the sources and number of sources to be searched, and how the information is then used and incorporated into a body of knowledge.

For example, when facing a simple information need that by all appearances may have a specific and straight forward answer, Belkin’s suggestion of the “ASK Model” may most closely match the motivating force for seeking information. In other words, when the information gap becomes recognized and needs to be answered, the information seeking strategy is also straight forward: get the answer to a specific unknown, and move on. However, when trying to understand the reasons behind any large history-making action or monumental occurrence, Dervin’s approach suggests a different strategy. A more “in-depth” activity is required in order to try and make sense of something. Such a motivation may require more extensive search activity and effort to get underneath the surface of the event. The strategy may lead to context development, analyzing the personalities of the involved people, identifying any extenuating environmental issues, and so forth. All of that background development to me is what Dervin means by making sense of it. It leads to answering the question, “why was it that way”, as opposed to just “how is it”, or “what is it”. Making sense seems to call for a deeper search.

Further, the way that these different models of information seeking motivations play out may very well be related to the concept of satisficing expressed in the Bawden and Robinson reading. For instance, if the motive for information seeking comes from a deeply-seated visceral position, perhaps it is strong enough to cause an in-depth search to really understand and make sense of things. On the other hand, lacking a sense of uncertainty and just wanting to satisfy some curiosity about an information gap may mean that the information seeker is more easily satisfied to just get the first answer from a source and not be overly concerned with authority, scope and treatment of the information by the source.

This may simply be one way of considering Case’s “Spectrum of Motivation”. While there is not necessarily significant difference along the spectrum, or between the models, there is diversity in approach that may encompass more than just the motivation itself. It may also influence the search strategy, commitment to the search and final results or accepted end-point of the seeking exercise.

References
Case, D. O. (2007). Looking for Information: A Survey of Research on Information Seeking, Needs, and Behavior. 2d ed. Amsterdam: Elsevier. Chapter 4. Information needs and information seeking (pp. 68-83) Bawden, D.; Robinson, L. (2009). The dark side of information: Overload, anxiety and other paradoxes and pathologies. Journal of Information Science 35(2): 180-191.

I wish to thank the academy . . .

Seven groups were asked to prepare information on seven topics and present it in seven minutes or less. We had five days to do it. The key is that those five days also included one or two lectures per day, three discussion group sessions requiring follow up reporting and two papers to be written as well, including the brutal tracking paper assignment. So, time was a bit limited.

The presentations will be linked here, for your viewing pleasure (Only one for now). This was easily the best night of theweek, and the entertainment factor was huge. What is attached does not include the acting in skits and demonstrations done in the classrom, so you will have to use your imagination. It was way cool in context. It loses something now.

Net Neutrality: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hW37phe7M4o

Library as Third Place/Community Space:

Is the Digital Divide still relevant?:

Creative Commons:

Privacy:

WTO/GATTS: http://people.lis.illinois.edu/~bloch2/GATTS_Group_Project

Social Spaces/Social Networks: http://people.lis.illinois.edu/~temple3/networking_resources.html

Day Eight

I awoke at 4:22 am with yesterday's group discussion failure still tormenting me. As I lay there, without any memory of the readings, I decided to get up and force myself to review each one and try to determine what we should have taken away from the discussion group exercise.

The six hours of sleep must have helped, because it worked. The essence of the three authors points of view came back to me and then suddenly it made sense why we read these three articles about scholarly publishing. The process is broken, according to them. It requires some fixing and these three authors each have a unique take on what can be done to improve the process of scholarly research and publishing. Well, that made my day (that I overcame being brain dead, I guess) and I got over the "torment" and went back to work. I also learned a lesson about preparation for group discussions.

Our lecture (picture) of the day set the foundation for copyright and intellectual freedom discussions. If I had known I would be blogging, I would have brought a camera, but I'll just have to settle on an over abundance of text in this blog. That's more me anyway.

For group discussion this afternoon the three of us in my small group went down to ground level in GSLIS and found some cushy chairs and a sofa in the Children's Book Center. Besides the extra comfort, I enjoyed my discussion partners and their insights. Doug, Carla and I discussed the readings about the ways librarians are sometimes put in the position of dealing with social issues, when patrons are homeless or mentally ill . The articles were great and several ideas came out of our discussion that could develop into concrete ideas on solving some of the challenges facing libraries in dealing with these communities.

In particular, I will remember the idea to involve the community itself in addressing the issues. Thanks Doug and Carla for an enjoyable and insightful conversation, which I intend to put to use someday.

Day Seven

That was nice! A fifteen hour semester break can do a body (and a mind) good. So, could a couple more hours of sleep, but that just isn't in the cards this week. Much of the break time was used to catch up on the group presentation for Thursday night.

The best news of the day is, the wretched tracking paper assignment is over!

Sitting "brain dead" through a lecture and a group discussion left me feeling mad at myself for not preparing better for each. The discussion was pitiful. Five people staring at each other wondering what we read only a few weeks ago in 3 important readings about scholarly publishing. I kept hoping someone would save us, but alas, not one of us could think of anything interesting, or even descriptive of the readings we were supposed to be discussing.

After starting my group process paper late tonight, just to get a brief outline going, I'm exhausted and going to bed early, before 10! And, that's about all I can say for Day Seven.

Day Six

Six already! Time is flying by, which, of course, is helped by the fact that there hasn't been more than 5 spare minutes in those six days! We're using all hours of the day. Forum posts start at 5:30 in the morning and usually don't end until well past midnight.

The biggest events of day six are the Tracking Paper is due at 11:55 pm., after which the 15 hour Semester Break begins. Having submitted my paper with a measly hour to spare, I reflect on the rest of the day.

The lecture this morning covered scholarly publishing and communication issues. This is an area that I have not experienced much in my life. It is about to become much more significant to me than it has been. Like everything else in our lives, scholarly works are impacted by technological and economic changes and advances that apply pressure on the way things have always been done and leave traditionalists questioning the value of the new way.

We need traditionalists to question. They are our safeguard to make certain we don't throw out the good and valuable principles that have developed through experience over a long period of time. We also need innovators, who envision how it could be better. Working together, traditionalists and innovators bring improvements that make lives better and fuller. Technological advances usually save time and money, which enhances productivity and at the same time, convenience.

There is more to be said on this, but I will save it for one of my assigned papers yet to be writtten after the break. Today, I managed to get a photo of the back of the class during the lecture.

Day Five

The spotlight is on!

The lectures today centered on "Major professional challenges: the case of intellectual freedom and censorship" and "The Current Information Environment", which covered the social and economic forces that shape the environment.

We discovered first hand that very complex issues surrounding intellectual freedom and censorship will confront us in our work. One example was a little episode in which we reviewed three situations and had to determine if we would allow certain books into a collection or if a controversial panel discussion at an ALA conference should proceed.

The first case involved adding a book to a Public Library Children's collection, titled "Its Perfectly Normal". The book teaches children or young adults about sexuality and reproduction. It uses illustrations of naked bodies and includes descriptions and labels for parts, which illustrations were displayed for us to get a sense of the content.

We were asked, by show of hands, who would without hesitation add it to the collection; who would, with some qualms, add it to the collection; and who would not add it to the collection. I had the privilege of voting singularly in the last category, to the apparent shock of my classmates. But, I am not unfamiliar with being the only one of my opinion in such groups on social issues like this one.

I had several conversations throughout the day and have modified my position a bit, based on the concepts we learned in lecture and discussed in groups. I acknowledge the value of the book genre, that was presented today, in assisting parents in teaching children about the concepts. I also acknowledge my obligations as a librarian to not censor collections based on personal biases. While I now take the position that I would add the book to a collection for any age group, I retain the caveat that I want to honor a parent's rights to make the determination on children's access to the book. My suggested solution would be to retain the book in a parenting section, from which parents could borrow the book, but minors could not access it without parental consent.

The other issues will have to be discussed at a later date, because my time is short tonight. Too many papers and assignments to deal with at the moment.

The TA's assisting with the instruction and discussion groups are quite helpful and I've finally acquired a picture of them from a classmate's blog, which I include tonight.

Day Four

Today was cool, and I don't just mean the weather (which is lovely, by the way)!

We started the day learning to design web pages. It was a 1 hour session that, by the time all the housekeeping stuff was announced, ended up to be only 48 minutes for the designing lesson. I had never designed a web page before and was eager to learn how.

After downloading the software, we created two pages, which I haven't finished or uploaded to the internet yet, but I plan to use them in support of this blog before all is said and done.

Most of the day was spent in my spacious quarters researching for a tracking paper assignment which is due on Tuesday night. I have chosen the topic of Education Trends in Library and Information Science. The format of the assignment is to prepare a report to a fictitious boss bringing her up-to-date and outlining how she can keep current on this issue. I have been pleasantly surprised by how easy it is to find a wealth of information on the topic. Consolidating it down to the most relevant will take more time and then reporting it concisely will be another challenge.





Since so much of my day was in the dorm room, I thought you should see it, but I didn't bring a camera, so the angle from the laptop computer's camera will have to do. Everything the college student needs for warmth and comfort is right here in about 80 square feet, not counting the bathroom, which is behind closed doors at the moment, or closet.

We had our fourth lecture meeting this morning and discussed the current information environment. This led into some lengthy discussions about librarianship and information services as a profession. A key point of the discussion was that it is an absurd question to even ask if librarians or information workers are professionals. One, because of course they are, and two, why should we waste time and enrgy considering such a rediculous question.

Whatever other professionals think of us is really immaterial to our mission. This same question confronts all other well-educated or trained workers. The so called "credentialed" proessionals in Law and Medicine will always maintain an air of superiority (in general, not necessarily individually). There is nothing we can do about that. In my view the best answer to this issue is to act professionally, do the very best for patrons and they will recognize professional service and expert solutions. What more could one desire than to have happy patrons?

By acting the part, the recognition will come, through diligent self-monitoring of the professionals who work side by side and holding ourselves, personally, to a higher standard. In this way, the whole profession is naturally lifted up in respect and recognition, one librarian at a time.

Day Three

I've finally caught up with writing these posts on the day they are named. The day's activities are more fresh in my mind.

Our second and third meetings, or lectures, were held today. An interesting question arose in our evening session which really got me thinking. Dr. Estabrook asked, "Do you think the purpose of libraries and museums is to encourage people to be critical (willing to evaluate and judge: not accept things automatically as they are) of the world as they find and experience it?" We discussed this in small groups, and then with the entire class.

While opinions were somewhat divergent, I got the sense that a majority felt, rather strongly in some cases, that encouraging critical thinking was not the purpose of a library or museum. At first, I was in this camp. Many of us expressed our view in this way: the library's purpose should be to afford the opportunity for patrons to gain the information they seek and if that encourages them to activism or critical thinking at least, then so be it. But if it doesn't, that is okay, too, and the library has still accomplished its purpose of providing the information.

I did say "at first", because the more time I spent noodling this thought, I turned my thinking more on the side that suggests the library's very purpose and existence ought to be based on encouraging citizens of the community to think as citizens, evaluating between positions, good and bad, and judging between what is right and wrong.

The thought that sparked my change of position was this: What is the purpose of a school? Obviously, to me anyway, a school's purpose is to encourage students (citizens), to learn to discern between good choices and poor choices, or even between right and wrong. Why else would we have a school if it were not to teach people how to think and evaluate options? Or, in direct response to the question, to teach them to think critically.

In my mind, a library is ensconced in the realm of education and the same can be said of museums, for that matter. We go there to gain information or knowledge. That is education, self-education if you will, but education none-the-less. And, the core aim of gaining an education must be to learn to think critically.

There is no doubt that some patrons may exit from their experience without having been encouraged to think critically. But, let that not be the fault of the library, but the indifference or slothfulness of the patron.

A good day of thoughtful discussion throughout all sessions and activities.

Day Two

Talk about a religious experience. A librarian's dream might be visiting the Main library at the University. How about a library holding 11 million items?

Or, the fifth largest research library in North America?

Our tour of the "stacks" was impressive - five levels of old (and some new) library stacks, but more powerful was the shear majesty of the entry lobby and stairway off the quad and the central reading room. This is the feeling I've always had in large libraries like this one. Perhaps that is what has drawn me to this course of study and new profession.

The tour began in the undergraduate library, which is built below ground. This picture is taken from the quad (or the roof), above the atrium of the UG Library. The building space is adjacent to the Morrow Plots, which are agricultural experimentation gardens and fields which require unobstructed sunlight. So, the library goes down three levels, with a below ground connecting tunnel to the main library.

Our tech training continued, but most importantlty, we held our first meeting. Dr. Leigh Estabrook guided us through significant history of the field of librarianship and information science and established the setting for today's environment.

The discussion with TA's following the lecture caused quite a stir as we finally received the punch to the gut identifying the workload for the week. I left feeling woefully inadequate to accomplish all that was outlined. In fact, I'm having a hard time sleeping tonight and will have to "refresh" my page in the morning. One thing on my mind was the need to build this blog, and now that I've done that (next morning), the pressure is starting to subside - but only slightly because we've just begun the real course work and learning activities. It won't be getting any easier from here.

Day One

Our first day was filled with clinics, sessions, discussions, meetings and, of course, introductions. We are the first summer cohort of 70 students, with another cohort (70+ more) arriving next Thursday, entering the "bootcamp" experience of the LEEP on-line format. This being the fourteenth year of the LEEP program, we are referred to as 14.1

With a considerable number of English Majors in the room, I feel inferior to their prowess in writing and assume they are more well read than I. Perhaps my only hope in catching up in that respect, is that I have a few years on them! The introductions of classmates lead me to believe there is much to learn from them, perhaps as much as from the course instruction. Looking forward to it!

The amount of technology training, computer orientation and set-up required is not surprising, considering it is a distance learning program. But, the day seemed to be especially full of dealing with computing issues.

If we can keep all these laptops going, about 70 in the room at once, we'll make it through. I can't imagine what my undergraduate work would have been like with a computer. My experience was lined paper and pencils. Now, it is all contained in this little device that is no bigger than some of the textbooks I lugged around years ago.

The Dorms, of course, are another major topic of discussion. Too many memories of undergraduate living come flooding back. Concrete walls, sharing bathrooms, narrow beds and bedrooms, small desks with no reading table by the bed, all seem to bring a negative memory. Yet, it is not so bad. The pace of this course desn't allow for much other than the studying, researching, reading and writing. So the dorm situation is tolerable.

To the right, is Sherman Hall, a graduate student residence hall just across the street from the GSLIS building, where most of us are staying. So, the "to and from" classes is about 2 minutes, room to room. Wouldn't we "Chicagoans" like that commute every day!

Good night.

Blogging

Blogging is not something I expected to ever be doing in my lifetime. It just isn't me. Opening up private thoughts goes against everything in my being. I would rather hear scratches on the chalkboard (we used to have those in schools and churches, but now . . .) than reveal my inner self.

However, as I launch a new phase in my life, I suppose it makes perfect sense to change my thinking in this regard, too, since I am changing almost everything else in my personna.

More importantly, this choice I've made to return to Graduate School after all these years has put me in a class that will eventually require me to write more than ever before and specifically to write about this class experience and how it impacts me. So, I will attempt to keep a running "BLOG" to document that as we go. It is my first attempt at such an enterprise and I will be learning about blogging amidst the rest of all this new stuff. See you in the Posts.