Last week many of us headed down to Baltimore (along with 3400 other librarians) to attend the ACRL (Association of College and Research Libraries) biennial conference. By all reports, it was great learning experience, plus it’s always fun to catch up with colleagues from here and other institutions. Since there was so much going on, I asked my Temple colleagues to share their highlights.
We were all inspired by the keynotes – an exceptionally diverse and stimulating set of speakers included data visualization “rock star” David McCandless (Information is Beautiful), writer and feminist Roxane Gay on the meaning of diversity, and our amazing Librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden.
Steven Bell reports that he was asked about Temple’s new library about 100 times. He attributes this to his participation in the panel discussion Ready or Not? Pressing Trends, Challenges, and Tech for Libraries – about the NMC Horizon Report 2017 Library Edition.
Fred Rowland found Andrea Brooks’ Shifting the Discourse: Information Literacy as an Opportunity to Address Intellectual Virtues of interest, the concept that intellectual virtues like open-mindedness, self-awareness, respectfulness, curiosity, and flexibility are embedded in the ACRL Framework. Citing Jason Baehr, Brooks argued that instruction librarians should invest more energy in instilling these intellectual virtues in the students they are addressing. Also provocative for Fred was Addicted to the Brand?: Brand Loyalty Theory as a Means of Understanding Academics’ Scholarly Communication Practices Cara Bradley applies the perspective of branding theory from marketing to understand the role “brand” plays when scholars and scientists choose to submit their work. Open access journals might compete for effectively if attention was paid to this kind of branding.
The panel Rebecca Lloyd found particularly interesting was Reference: The New Dirty Word. She reports, “The topics addressed were very similar to the discussions we’ve had here about shifting librarian roles, student worker training, librarian visibility, etc. Even though it wasn’t new territory, it was reassuring to hear that other libraries are also struggling with these questions and finding that no matter which approach they choose, there are trade-offs and aspects of the service model that need further improvements. The main take-away was that there is no “right or wrong” on the future of the reference desk. It’s individual to each institution and there are variety of viable paths forward.”
A presentation that stood out for Natalie Tagge was Nicole Cooke’s invited talk, “How would you like to be remembered? Expanding your pedagogy and professional practice”. The presentation described Univ of Illinois’ School of Information Sciences classes dedicated to issues of diversity, social justice, and race, gender and sexually, attempting to infuse these concepts throughout the curriculum.
A useful session for Erin Finnerty was, ‘Everything you wanted to know about predatory publishing but were afraid to ask.’ providing a comprehensive snapshot of the current state of predatory publishing, as it relates to the role of librarians and researchers. Erin reports that “the Q&A session was particularly fruitful, and she gave useful recommendations for educating the different members of our user community – undergrads, pre-PhD students, faculty, etc.”
I asked my colleagues what they thought they might try here at home. Natalie says this: “I may consider experimenting with making course guides organized by research process instead of organized by type of source. I saw a poster (Pathfinder or Pedagogical: Transforming Course Guides for Student Success) about a research study indicating that students retained more from guides organized around the research process. I think this could actually work well for any instruction sessions focused on evidence based practice.”
Noting how many academic libraries are involving students for peer support, Steven would like to continue our own conversations about how work and train students in making such a program a success here.
Assessment continues to be of interest. Several of us attended Metrics Selection across the Research Life Cycle, featuring Chris Belter, the Bibliometrics Informationist at the National Institutes of Health Library. She pointed out (perhaps this is obvious) that metrics need to be question centered, and that having “lots and lots” of metrics, though each imperfect, allows us to triangulate to establish a better view of reality. Erin notes that NIH has an “incredibly informative LibGuide that outlines their major data aggregation and visualization tools, and provides article recommendations and examples of their work.“ Take a look at: http://nihlibrary.campusguides.com/bibliometrics
Annie Johnson’s take on the conference: “The best part of ACRL was meeting people from other libraries who are working on similar initiatives and projects.” Rebecca also enjoyed networking: ” I am still quite new to being a ‘history librarian,’ and it is very helpful to chat with librarians at other institutions who are dealing with similar responsibilities and challenges.”
Congratulations to Annie on her poster presentation, as well to Steven Bell (a panelist and a poster-presenter). And thanks to everyone who shared their ACRL stories.
Finally, the food highlights: Jack & Zach’s lunch counter veggie burger, falafel, beets and an ancient grains salad from Cava Mezze, broiled rockfish, and for me, a sausage, peppers & provolone sandwich to take out and eat on a park bench, once it hit the 70s.
Note: The ACRL conference proceedings are freely available online at: http://www.ala.org/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/conferences/confsandpreconfs/2017/ACRL2017_A.pdf All 778 pages.