What to Teach Future Digital Reference Librarians: Experiences of IPL Student Volunteers

1. What to TeachFuture Digital Reference Librarians:Experiences of IPL Student Volunteers Maurita Peterson Holland Soo Young Rieh School of Information, University of Michigan http://www.ipl.org

2. The IPL is a venue for … • Education • Trained 1,500 information professionals from twelve U.S. and Canadian universities • Research • Janes, Carter, Mon, Chen, Edwards, Holland and Rieh • Service • Linked to by over 12,000 sites and cited in more than 500 articles and books http://www.ipl.org

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9. Digital Reference Service (DRS) • Previously in the literature • Understanding the nature and role of intermediation in digital environments • The process of building and maintaining DRS • User studies • Usage log analysis http://www.ipl.org

10. Digital Reference Service (DRS) • What about the experiences, behaviors, and preferences of librarians (intermediaries)? • How can we better train future digital reference librarians? http://www.ipl.org

11. Ask a Question in IPL • Same as other DRS • Asynchronous (web-based form) transactions • Lack of reference interviews • Require additional skills and training to reference service • Different from other DRS • Entirely rely on the Internet resources • Volunteer labor • Intermediaries choose the questions that they would like to answer http://www.ipl.org

12. Research Questions • What factors influence student volunteers’ decisions in selecting questions? • What are their search strategies? • How do they select specific information resources? • What are the strategies, search skills, and knowledge of resources that the IPL librarians need? • We teach sources, tools, information needs and professional practice http://www.ipl.org

13. Methodology • Questionnaire including open-ended questions • Participants: 111 students at the School of Information, University of Michigan (41 students in Fall 2002 and 70 students in Fall 2003) • Every time the students answered a reference question, they filled out questionnaire • Participants answered 1581 reference questions in total during the two semesters • Analyze frequency for quantitative data and develop coding schemes for open-ended questions http://www.ipl.org

14. Questionnaire • Why did you choose this question? • Do you need additional information? • Choosing and executing a strategy • Strategy • Implementation • Result (copy of message sent to client) • Time spent • URL suggestions for IPL • Ah-ha: Reflections, observations, lessons learned, suggestions for IPL interface and software http://www.ipl.org

15. Why did you choose this question? http://www.ipl.org

16. Do you need additional information? http://www.ipl.org

17. If “yes,” then what is needed? http://www.ipl.org

18. Question-related strategy http://www.ipl.org

19. Source-related strategy http://www.ipl.org

20. Search-related strategy http://www.ipl.org

21. Ah-ha Reflections – Self • Learns sources • Makes emotional investment • Derives personal satisfaction • Draws on personal experience • Learns to be professional • Learns strategy • Shows curiosity to learn more http://www.ipl.org

22. Ah-ha Reflections – Client • Tries to match writing style and tone • Tries to intuit need • Contemplates level of detail • Considers clients intelligence, ponders their motives, ascribes attributes http://www.ipl.org

23. Ah-ha Reflections – Question/Answer • Learns that what appears easy sometimes isn’t • Must accept that some questions can’t be answered • Sometimes learns to take a new point of view about a question and marvels at the result http://www.ipl.org

24. Ah-ha Reflections – Question/Answer • Considers ethics • Finds print sources are necessary • Thinks about orderly steps as the writing process forces http://www.ipl.org

25. Ah-ha Reflections - Tools • Evaluates, evaluates • Suggests improvements for the IPL • Is pleased with the IPL • Faces technical problems • Locates gaps in web resources • Tests search engine features http://www.ipl.org

26. What We Teach • Whose job is it? How far to go? • One hour rule • Give it up for Jen • Confidence/uncertainty • It’s not all here! • Print is still important • If only… • Tools and sources needs http://www.ipl.org

27. What We Teach • Present your credentials • Evaluating sources • Fractured resources • Deep web, fee-based, confusions of access • Everybody is a client • Helping kids, global citizens http://www.ipl.org

28. What We Teach • Familiarity breeds confidence • More sources learned, more used • Know answer, can’t find source • If you can’t give’em bread, give’em crust • You don’t understand the question, chew on potential answers http://www.ipl.org

29. What Do We Teach? • Policy and Ethics • Resources • Collection credentialing • Strategies • Team work; rely on experts • …and acknowledge personal involvement http://www.ipl.org

30. www.ipl.org Join Us!! http://www.ipl.org

31. Bibliography • Lankes, R.D, et al, eds. (2000) Digital reference service in the new millennium: planning, management, and evaluation. New York: Neal-Schuman. • Smith, L.C. (2002) Education for digital reference services. Proceedingsof the Digital Reference Research Symposium, Aug. 1-3, Cambridge, MA • White, M.D. (2001) Digital reference services: framework for analysis and evaluation. Library & Information Science Research, 23:3, 211-231 http://www.ipl.org