ACRL - Leaving the One-Shot Behind: March 26

Two librarians from very different institutions (Keene State College, NH and Portland State University, OR) discussed their experiences of addressing the problem of teaching information literacy without overextending themselves or their resources. Referencing the research (Orr & Wallin, Badke, etc.) they acknowledged the perennial disconnects among one-shot training and authentic learning, librarian and faculty perceptions and expectations, and student perceptions and needs. Alternatives to the one-shot, they admit, such as embedding individual librarians in specific classes, are time-consuming and ultimately not sustainable.

They discussed alternative models of providing information literacy that have been put into practice at both of their institutions: student-to-student (peer learning & mentoring), library DIY, and train-the-trainer.



Portland (an urban, public research university) leveraged their year-long, freshman inquiry program to develop peer mentors (juniors and seniors) who conduct orientations in which they model good research practices. The librarians created content and learning objects in LibGuides for the mentors to follow - a kind of tool kit. They also held training sessions for student mentors, and advanced design workshops for faculty assigned to teach the freshman inquiry classes - with librarians assigned to keep in touch with both groups. The tool kit was later used as the basis of research tutorials that were embedded into a online Gen Ed course pilot - evidently a happy serendipity with a several million dollar university initiative.

At Keene (a small public liberal arts college), the librarians were frustrated with limits of their instruction in a couple of lower level Gen Ed courses, and the lack of recognition of the library’s attempts to map IL across the curriculum. Following the college’s official focus on integrative learning, and inspired by peer mentoring models, they set up a program to allow students employed by the library, or other college departments to serve as student mentors, and hold one-shot sessions, do reference interviews and work at the information desk.

I have to say, that while the idea of getting away from the tyranny of the one-shot is appealing, I’m not sure that all of these models are transferable to a community college context - particularly the peer mentoring model. However, library DIY and train-the-trainer concepts do seem transferable, and could be a way to involve faculty more effectively. We already have the building blocks for these things, (LibGuides, LMS) it only remains to start a conversation about collaborating on such initiatives.

Exhibits: March 25, 26 & 27

After the opening keynote, we had a chance to view the vendor exhibits. Plenty of swag available, and a wide array of products, services, and publishers. The big players were on hand, of course, and had the most elaborate displays.

I had the chance to speak with representatives from Statista, National Library of Medicine, Lyrasis, ABC-CLIO, The Fed (!), Springer, Mango, and several others. Got my badge scanned at many of the booths. Didn't win the Gale ring-toss, but I did win a reference book. (I know, right?) 

First Day in Portland

After a day-long journey I arrived in Portland, and my first glimpse was this gorgeous view of Mt Hood. The theme of the 2015 ACRL conference is "creating sustainable community," so it is very fitting that it takes place in Portland. I was able to take the light rail directly from the airport to the hotel. After checking in at the conference, the next day,I was able to eat lunch at a "quick service " restaurant that uses local, natural food. I'm  really looking forward to this week's events. :)

Countdown to Portland

By this time tomorrow, I will be en route to Portland for the ACRL conference. Except for a few last-minute details (like packing) everything seems to be in order.

I must say that ACRL, besides choosing the hippest possible city for the conference, also seems to have chosen well in terms of the logistics of getting around. Almost all of the relevant presentations and events will be held at the Oregon Convention Center itself, and Portland is blessed with an excellent public transit system, which runs between the airport and the city, and throughout downtown and environs.

Another thing that I'm enjoying is the online planner, which allows you to search the conference program and save the information about presentations and events you're interested in. This has saved me a lot of time. Next stop, The Rose City.

Re-launch Redux

Resuming regular posting on a blog is something that I approach with ambivalence.  This, of course, is because regular blog posting is something that tends to come  and go in cycles. I mean seriously - who, besides someone with a regular gig blogging for a library or academic publication, actually has time for it. I certainly read Barbara Fister and The Annoyed Librarian regularly, but I wouldn't think of subjecting myself to the earnest musings of  some other random librarian bloggers for love or money. I'm just saying.

That said, I've decided to breath some life back into this moribund venue - at least temporarily - as a convenient vehicle for chronicling my attendance at the 2015 ACRL conference. So, rather than reconstructing a narrative of what I see, hear, and think about the events and presentations at the conference , I'll record them here.

All seems simple enough, eh? Well, we shall see. So, I invite you, gentle readers (meaning those of you in my department, and other friends , colleagues, and co-conspirators) to follow my experience via this quaint early 21st century convention: the personal blog.

ALA gets its privacy game on

A welcome contribution to the NSA spying debate has been ALA's official entry into the fray. In an open letter to ALA members on July 11, current president Barbara Stripling announced the launch of a new website called ALA Liberty dedicated to providing tools libraries can use to educate the public about privacy issues and help people understand their Fourth Amendment rights. 

In her open letter, linked on the ALA site, Stripling noted that ALA was "saddened by recent news that the government has obtained vast amounts of personal information and electronic communications of millions of innocent people." She further invoked ALA's history of activism around the 2001 Patriot Act and added that libraries, as "one of the few trusted American institutions...have the tools, resources and leaders that can teach Americans about their civil liberties and help our communities discuss ways to improve the balance between First Amendment rights and government surveillance activities."

ALA has joined other civil liberties groups such as the ACLU, Center for Constitutional Rights, Electronic Frontier Foundation and many others, in calling on Congress launch a congressional investigative committee, similar to the Church Committee of the 1970s, to investigate  domestic spying. 

Learning Solutions conference

This is the first non academic conference I've attended, and I have to admit, it's been quite an eye opener. Lots of vendors promoting and hawking stuff - in fact the line between vendor and conference attendee seemed a bit blurred. The conference is hosted by the eLearning Guild, which is a kind of professional membership organization for people in the eLearning and corporate training business.

The rhetoric and nomenclature of this community takes some getting used to. Some of it comes right out of the information technology field, but much of it also has the vaporous, confabulated quality of corporate jargon and marketing-speak. And, of course, there is an admixture of education discourse and associated buzzwords.

This not to say that there's nothing for academic librarians and other higher education academics to learn at conferences like these. If nothing else, it provides an instructive window into the hurly-burly of the education-technology commercial sector, which for better or worse is going to affect us all. 

The number of education technology firms selling various applications and platforms is overwhelming. And, given estimates I've seen for the size of the market for corporate training (roughly $130 billion for North America and over $200 billion globally), this should come as no surprise. How many of these firms will be in business five years from now, though, is anyone's guess.

 Clearly, we are witnessing the beginning of some big changes, especially with the ubiquity of mobile devices, and the growth of cloud computing. But there is also the same sort of feeling of constant obsolescence as there was during the dot-com boom of the nineties. There is an almost palpable sense that most of the presenters really have only the vaguest notion of where all this is going - despite their confident, techno-deterministic rhetoric.

Superficially, the general ambiance is not unlike other conferences - there are lots of people rushing about checking phones, laptops and tablets, trying to look busy and important. (Although, I must say, it was much easier on the eyes than the typical library conference.) There were also lots of breakout sessions with cool-sounding names that were anything but. 

The most important conversations I had were with various vendors' representatives in the exhibition hall, who were happy to explain their applications and discuss interoperability questions. It was there, in fact, that I got the best explanation of Tin Can API that I've heard so far. The actual breakout sessions were less than helpful, with the notable exception of the presentation on cloud computing by one of the engineers for Allen Interactions, which was excellent. 


  http://www.learningsolutionsmag.com/lscon/content/2594/learning-solutions-2013---conference-homepage/