Short book review: Academic Library Services for First-Generation Students

Xan Arch and Isaac Gilman, Academic Services for First-Generation Students. Denver, CO: Libraries Unlimited, 2020.  ISBN: 9781440870170. 

 

Genre: nonfiction, library science

Subgenre: academic libraries, first-generation students, surveys and case studies, higher education

Format: trade paperback

Source: Interlibrary Loan via Hutchins Library, Berea College. Book came from Owensboro (KY) Community and Technical College Library.

 

Doing a short review as I ran out of time in reading it, and I rushed reading to the end. I borrowed this via Interlibrary Loan, and the lending library refused to renew it, so time is up and I have to return it. I borrowed this because in my library and college we have a big interest in first-generation students (as we do in all of our students of course). A lot of our student population are first-generation students, so I was hoping to find a few new things to learn about them and how libraries can help them better. I liked the book, but it was just not as helpful as I thought it would be for our situation. 

Let me make some quick notes for me to remember about the book: 

• Book is arranged into seven chapters. First three chapters, which is almost half the book, is mostly the usual literature review and backgrounder material you usually get in a lot of the library literature. If you have kept up with these topics, then you have a pretty good idea of the basics the authors are presenting. On the other hand, if you need a quick primer on the condition of the literature and some key concepts, then this will do the job. It does refer to a good amount of the "we did good" kind of articles also common in the library literature. The rest of the book looks at the topics of library space, library instruction, outreach and partnerships, and path forward for academic libraries. Book also includes 2 appendices, which are basically survey instruments the authors used in their research. This can prove useful for folks trying to do similar research on their campuses. 
• Each chapter has a list of reference notes at the end.
  
• A big thesis of the book is that libraries, and their institutions, need to get away from seeing first-generation students as needing remediation and/or needing to adapt to whatever systems are in place. Instead, the institutions need to change and adapt for the skills and assets that these students bring. The institutions need to check their privilege and stop favoring the "usual" white middle class "typical" students. 
• The book seems mainly geared to large universities and institutions. To be honest, I did not feel there was much for us in small colleges. 
• As I read the book, given our college's mission and history, I feel that we already do a lot of what the authors are suggesting. While there is always room to improve, I can say overall we are in good shape when compared to some of those larger places out there. 
• Four areas the authors say institutions need to work on/concentrate to make change: 
• Affirming assets/belonging.
• Support services/help seeking.
• Pedagogy/curriculum.
• Approaches to family. 
•  In reading the chapter on student perceptions, where they surveyed high school college admission counselors, I felt as if those counselors had no idea what it is many modern academic libraries do or have been building up and doing. From their responses, some of those folks need to take a trip to some of their local colleges and universities and their libraries nearby. At least for us, a lot of the academic services they say we ought to have we already have. 
• Do keep in mind this book and the activities described were pre-pandemic of COVID-19. I think it will be interesting to see how things adjust as we come back from that pandemic. 
  
  

Overall, this book is a good primer on the topic. If your library or institution needs to do serious work, this book will give you ways to get started on the work. On the other hand, if you are already doing the work, you may not find much here that is new to you. I liked it, and I would recommend it to folks needing to get a crash course on the topic or for administrators who may need a better understanding about how to serve first-generation students and how their campus libraries work. 

3 out of 5 stars. 

 

Article note: On assessing and communicating liaison librarians' work

The authors start by asserting that the academic libraries' narrative has been moving from telling the story of collecting resources to telling the story of libraries connecting to their campus communities, going outside the library. This is not exactly new; this has been going on for a while now, and they show some of that ongoing narrative in their literature review. Anyhow, this article looks at the efforts and roles of liaison librarians at Rutgers University Libraries, New Brunswick. The highlight is their account of the creation of a Liaison Assessment Committee. 

My interest in the article is that, like many academic librarians, I do some liaison work at my library. Here are some things I took away from the article. 

• Some things have not really changed. The authors cite Laurence Miller, who was writing in the 1970s or so that when it came to liaison relationships "those relationships required more than occasional contact and speculated that they would likely result in routine work receiving priority over more creative but less tangible activity" (286). Here we are in 2021, and more often than not when it comes to liaison work it is basically something you do if and when you can get to it because you have to prioritize the routine work that keeps the library functioning. We often start out with great intentions, but as soon as the daily priorities take over, the intentions do not go very far. After all, given how busy we often are, the higher ups never have a good answer to the question of "if you want us to do this, what are you willing to drop?"
  
• Along with that are the ever popular budgetary concerns: "As budgets tighten, liaisons have assumed more roles that require new skills and more specialized expertise. No longer can liaisons become proficient themselves in each new capacity; rather, they must partner with other specialized colleagues and, at the same time, communicate their own expert capabilities more efficiently" (290).  
• However, more often than not, money is not as much of an issue as time is, especially since no higher up wants to drop stuff being done to add or exchange for additional more focused liaison work. Collection development per se lessens as libraries become more reliant on things like patron driven acquisitions, standing order plans, and buying resources by the bundle. This makes the acquisitions process less humane (but that is another question for another time).
  
• Later on, a bit more of the same in 2009, this time the authors cite Karla Hahn writing for Research Library Issues: "While research libraries may agree on the importance of the position, how to reconfigure liaison work has become a topic of broad concern. Identifying emerging roles and determining how to develop corresponding liaison capabilities are common challenges" (288). 
• We do need to keep in mind that this article was written pre-pandemic. I have not seen much on liaison work in light of the pandemic, but I have seen more on things like services to students, which is fine by me, they should be our main focus in my humble opinion. But still, if things were difficult to keep up liaison work, the pandemic has not done any favors for us. 
• Keep in mind also that Rutgers is a very large campus, and their librarians have a lot of specialties. That level of specialization is not an option in a small campus like mine. Liaison work here can be specialized subject or functional. We do both here to varying degrees. 
• Recommendation from the article: "redefining job descriptions for new recruits to reflect a variety of functional specialties to engage more actively on campus on issues related to data, copyright, Web and digital services, the undergraduate experience, and instructional design" (292).
• We did that here, for example, when a position was created and filled for a Digital Initiatives Librarian. 
• Recommendation from the article: "It was also recommended that the liaison librarians create an internal, online portal that includes policy documents, tools to aid in the delivery and assessment of instruction, outreach strategies, and information about how to articulate and communicate liaison activities efficiently" (297). 
• Another idea from the article: "In addition to centralized, virtual reference services, the librarians offer local, pop-up reference assistance at the Cook Campus Stephen and Lucy Chang Science Library" (298). The idea of doing pop-up reference in locations outside of the library is something I have considered in and out since before the pandemic. I think it would be nice to offer it, but for me, the question is besides me, who else would be willing to put the time for it? I do not anticipate others jumping at the idea. But still, maybe once the pandemic slows down enough to allow some degree of movement. 
• An example from their art librarian: ". . . the art librarian began in 2014 to hold weekly office hours in the lobbies of those distant units to meet with potential users. Arranged to suit student schedules, the art librarian brings a sign, laptop, brochures, candy, and sometimes library materials or a button maker" (299). In addition to the benefit to students, this additional visibility meant more engagement with the art faculty for the librarian. For me, something like this remains a nice idea, but then I get reminded of time factors and the question of whether the administration would support it or not (and support it more than just saying, sure go for it but you still have all the other stuff you have to do). 
• Still, there are benefits according to the authors that can make this worth it: "This successful initiative demonstrates that spending as little as two hours a week in a place where users learn and convene reaps big benefits for the library and its users, building stronger relationships with a liaison librarian and fostering a solid foundation for engaging with departments" (299). If nothing else, two extra hours does not sound that heavy in terms of load. I am not too likely to carry a button maker; we have one here, but it is an older extremely bulky model you can barely move. Such an initiative does have potential to help increase library support for students in addition to research consultations, virtual reference, and visits to the reference desk.  
• From the article, some ways to get more engagement include: 
• "work more proactively with their community, not just provide services to it" 
• "assess skills needed to achieve their goals" (this implies goals are being set and there is some commitment to do the professional development to develop skills plus administrative support)
• "tell their story more effectively to both library and campus colleagues" (building and maintaining communications is a key point of the article)
• Article includes checklists to help assess liaison efforts and for planning. 
  

 

 

Citation for the article: Kranich, Nancy, et.al., "Moving from Collecting to Connecting: Articulating, Assessing, and Communicating the Work of Liaison Librarians." portal: Libraries and the Academy 20.2 (April 2020): 285-304.

Article Note: On a scaffolded research assignment in a first year course

Citation for the article: Jennifer Saulnier, Corey M. Johnson, and Kathleen Whalen, "Scaffolded Research Assignment Analysis for a Required First Year Course." The Journal of Academic Librarianship 47 (2021): 1-6.

This study took place at Washington State University, a public research campus with about 30,000 students over multiple campuses. The article looks at the effects of library research scaffolded assignments on student learning of information literacy skills. This is in the context of a required class, "Roots of Contemporary Issues" (History 105/305), for all undergraduates.

Some takeaways for me from the article: 

• Some of the things students are required to find as part of research in the assignments: 
• a contemporary newspaper article
• a specialized encyclopedia entry, or a relevant Wikipedia article. (This caught my eye. On my campus many if not most of the faculty are vehemently opposed to students using Wikipedia in any way). 
• primary sources, which can be documentary like a historical newspaper or non-documentary like a speech, a letter, an interview, etc. 
• creating an annotated bibliography
• "Through the progression of the LRAs [library research assignment], students are taught how to move from general topic ideas to a refined thesis statement, in addition to having multiple opportunities to integrate ideas from their sources and practice Chicago Style citation" (1).
•  The literature "found that many forms of information literacy assessment measure student attitudes or confidence in their research skills, but do not explore whether or not student skills have actually increased or if students have met learning outcomes, which is especially important because there is often a gap between ability and actual skill levels" (2). 
• Benefits of smaller assignments: "Breaking down a larger project into smaller sections alleviates the library research anxiety felt by many students; connects information literacy instruction to specific course outcomes; and grants librarians the 'opportunity to develop shared responsibility with the faculty'" (2). 
• Turns out, at least according to this article, that students do not change topics midstream during writing a research assignment as often as faculty think they do. Students may talk about doing it, but often do not do it. "The discrepancy with instructor survey results here could stem from the idea that instructors spend more time with students who are altering topics so therefore have an inflated sense of the total number in this circumstance" (4). 
• Getting students to refine topics was a bit more challenging. 
• "It is not a positive result that almost one in four students got through the whole process (multiple LRAs and a final paper) with little to no topic refinement" (4). 
• "Instructors are divided on the value of detail accuracy in citation, some think this is an important skill to hone, others believe presenting a basic level of traceability is sufficient" (5). This is why you get students often lost about doing citations. Instructors are rarely consistent about what they want ranging from seriously anal retentive (miss a comma here or there and serious points come off) to "do what you want as long as it is consistent." Despite this instructors tend to make a fuss about any small form of plagiarism, which may often be accidental or due to less than appropriate citing. This last part I will note is observation on my part. 
• Again, instructor inconsistency can be an issue: "In addition, instructors vary on acceptance of book chapters as basic equivalents to scholarly journal articles, and some accept newspaper articles as primary sources, while others want primary sources created by key historical figures central to students' topics" (5). So very often instructors in some cases make things more difficult for students. For example, the instructor who only wants those primary sources from key historical figures, well, if the material does not exist or is not accessible to the student, what then? Not always easy explaining that to some faculty members entrenched in their ways. 
• "A strength of this work is the value of having librarians and instructors work together on programmatic assessment" (5).

 

 

Article Note: On libraries serving transfer students

Citation for the article: Vinyard, Marc, "The Kids Are All Right: How Libraries Can Best Serve Transfer Students." portal: Libraries and the Academy, 20.2 (April 2020): 339-360.

 

As the article states in the title, "the kids are all right." While there is room for improvement for academic libraries to serve transfer students, the situation for these students is not as bad as previous library literature suggests. This quote from a student sums up the situation well: 

 

"There's not so much where you have to explain everything to transfer students. Because, like I said, we've had most of the information before, it's just figuring out how it's done here, and just getting a new mind-set essentially" (339). 

More often than not the idea is that libraries need to teach students how to do things locally rather than give full on information literacy instruction. The transfer students likely did get that instruction previously. Having said that, that experience at times can also make those students a bit more confident than they probably should be when it comes to their skills; in other words, they can get a little cocky. The author concluded that these students usually have a good understanding of how to do research and are confident in their research skills. They just need to learn institution-specific skills when they arrive in a new campus. I will say this does match with my experience over time when working with transfer students. They know more than librarians may give them credit for. 

The study took place at Pepperdine University, which is a Christian liberal arts university with 3,400 enrolled students at the time of the article. It almost twice the size of the college where I work, but it would still be comparable to us. Their First-Year Seminar and English 101 classes would be somewhat comparable to our General Studies GSTR 110 and 210 which serve an FYE seminar-type function here. 

The article states that two researchers conducted "in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 12 transfer students at Pepperdine during Spring 2018" (343). These students had to be undergraduates "who had completed at least one research assignment at Pepperdine that required resources outside their course readings" (343). That sample size seems a bit small to me but the author claims that the applied thematic analysis technique used means they could have gone as low as six students and gotten meaningful information. I leave it up to readers to judge. By the way, the interview participants did receive incentives to participate. "Participants in the study received $20 Amazon gift cards and $5 Starbucks vouchers as incentives" (344). Must be nice since here it is next to impossible to provide any incentive when we want to survey students on anything. I know; I've asked.The usual answer is either lack of funds (i.e. the administrators do not want to give us funds for the incentives even as other campus units give out all sorts of incentives) or some other excuse about "if we give them some kind of monetary incentive it can interfere with their aid or other" (which see previous statement), but I digress. The participants were nine females and three males. 

The article includes an appendix that features the interview instrument. I am thinking we could adapt some of the questions for our use here down the road.

Some takeaways for me from the article: 

• I like the idea of setting up a personal librarian program for transfer students, and students in general, but this may not always be successful. For example, the author mentions a program at University of Carolina at Chapel Hill where such effort was made to assign 40 librarians to 800 students. "Despite e-mail communication and welcome letters to incoming students, only 3.9 percent of transfer students utilized the program, falling short of its initial goal of 5 percent participation" (341). As we can see some things never change, in this case the known fact that students often neglect to even read their campus e-mail. By the way, 40 librarians seems to me a lot, but we need to realize UNC-Chapel Hill is a big campus. 
• The study aimed to answer the following two questions: 
• "How do transfer students look for information?"
• "From the transfer students' perspectives, how can the library best assist them?" (343).
•  On how the students approach research: 
• "While discussing the sources used for assignments, student preferences were evenly split between starting with open Web searches and with library databases" (346). 
• "One student warned, however, that peer-reviewed sources might not cover recent topics. . . " (346). This caught my eye because this is a reality I often need to convey to regular undergraduates when they pick the latest fad topic or straight out of the news event and they come asking for "peer reviewed sources" because their teacher said they need such sources. This can lead me to some interesting conversations with a student. A transfer student may be more likely to have learned this lesson. 
• "Additional methods [of finding sources] included approaches to organizing sources, determining if multiple sources had recurring themes, brainstorming effective keywords, and writing the conclusion of a paper before searching for sources" (347). I was doing OK with these until that last one, which can be problematic. At times, students who write out the conclusion before doing research are the ones we get in a panic a day or two before the paper is due because they need "just one more source, two tops" that fits whatever conclusion they fixated on when they started rather than doing actual research and taking the question where the research went. 
• On the role of librarians: 
• Sadly, "transfer students would much more likely ask professors rather than librarians for assistance" (349). We need to work on that. Sure, ask your professors for help related to the class, but ask your librarian for research assistance. The author also found that out of the twelve students interviewed, only one "favored librarians" (350). That is not exactly encouraging. In my college, we are lucky that we tend to get good feedback from students for our research consultations. Librarians do need to put in the work and effort.
  
• "Prior interactions with librarians can potentially influence the help-seeking behavior of transfer students at their new institutions" (349). This is where making a good impression as a librarian and professional will encourage students to seek us for assistance. I have heard enough stories of how librarians in prior institutions were not helpful to students. Honestly makes me wonder why some people become librarians if they are not helping their patrons or consider them a bother.  
• However, the author cites research that found "that transfer students who received library instruction would be more likely to ask subject librarians for research assistance" (353). I will add that here we have found that marketing librarian research consults during library instruction has helped to get students to seek library help later. Yet during COVID, without formal library instruction, this marketing has been more limited. 
• "Because institution-specific information is so important to helping transfer students succeed, libraries need to make them aware of library services. Nearly all the students interviewed thought the library should participate in the transfer student orientation sessions" (353). 
• To sum up: "Specifically, we need to implement outreach efforts that help students gain the following competencies: (1) familiarity with their subject liaison librarians, (2) knowledge of the subject-specific databases, and (3) ability to navigate the library's physical layout and services with emphasis on the library's print collections" (354). The knowledge of subject-specific databases is important, and it is something we do try to emphasize here as much as we can. The common "just use a discovery engine" or similar just does not really cut it to do focused research on a specific topic, but that is another topic for another day. 

Some items from the article's bibliography I may want to read later: 

•  John C. Phillips and Thomas A. Atwood, “Transferring Skills, Transferring Students: A Call
  to Academic Libraries,” College & Undergraduate Libraries 17, 4 (2010): 331–48.
• Lindsay M. Roberts, Megan E. Welsh, and Brittany Dudek, “Instruction and Outreach for
  Transfer Students: A Colorado Case Study,” College & Research Libraries 80, 1 (2019): 94–122.
• Helene Lafrance and Shannon B. Kealey, “A Boutique Personal Librarian Program for
  Transfer Students,” Reference Services Review 45, 2 (2017): 337.
• Sylvia G. Tag, “A Library Instruction Survey for Transfer Students: Implications for Library
  Services,” Journal of Academic Librarianship 30, 2 (2004): 102–8. 
• Chelsea Heinbach, Brittany Paloma Fiedler, Rosan Mitola, and Emily Pattni, “Dismantling
  Deficit Thinking: A Strengths-Based Inquiry into the Experiences of Transfer Students in
  and out of Academic Libraries,” In the Library with the Lead Pipe, February 6, 2019, http://
  www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2019/dismantling-deficit-thinking/.
  

 

 

Article Note: On social media as platform for academic library marketing

Citation for the article: Wesley Wing Hong Cheng, et.al., "Social Media as a Platform in Academic Library Marketing: a Comparative Study." Journal of Academic Librarianship 46 (2020): 1-8.

This article looks at use of social media for marketing academic libraries. Libraries often hope to use social media as a tool to better engage their patrons. Given the popularity and ubiquitousness of social media, there is a need for library professionals to learn new skills and best practices in this area. The authors write that "librarians should know how to use these tools effectively by understanding behavior, culture, and etiquette of different users" (2). The librarians and library staff also need to examine how their patrons use and engage with social media. This article looks at an evaluation study done at University of Hong Kong Libraries on how effective or not use of social media was to market the academic library. The study focuses mainly on the library's Facebook page. Information was gathered via a quantitative survey created and distributed via a Google Form at the HKU campus. A total of 101 responses from faculty and students were collected.

Some takeaways from the article for me: 

• A definition of marketing: "Johnson (2014) defines the term marketing from a library context, which is to determine the wants and needs of the user communities, to develop the products and services to respond, as well as to encourage users and potential users to take advantage of those products and services" (qtd. in 1). 
• On perception of the Facebook page they found that "although respondents generally agreed that the use of library Facebook could be beneficial, some issues such as a lack of attractiveness, shortage of technical staff, and too much spamming might hinder them from participating in the HKUL's Facebook page actively" (5). 
• Suggestions from the article: 
• Use casual language and friendly tools so you can create a positive social media environment for users. 
• Introduce training sessions on library marketing with topics such as effective communication and use of social media tools. 
• Adjust posting frequency after investigating when users are most active. Do keep posting frequently. 
• Criteria you can use to evaluate how your social media is performing include numbers of likes, shares, and comments on posts. These are measurable and can be used to set benchmarks.