I’ve been wanting to comment on this thought-provoking post by Carleen at Woodsy + Wired (a pretty new blog) for a few weeks now and just haven’t had the time. But almost every day, her post has been on my mind.
In Effects of distance learning on public libraries, Carleen writes about her library’s struggles to provide services to students at a satellite campus in her town that has no library:
Although we’re happy to assist them, I always try to ask whether they have considered using their schools databases since they tend to be bigger, better and more geared towards their needs. They usually look at me with a blank stare.
We’ve tried to address this issue in various collection development meetings but I think it’s an area we’re a little afraid to tread on. In the past, we have purchased reference books specifically with university students needs in mind, but are reluctant to take it much further.
I agree that there are limits to what the public library should be providing to these students. The library shouldn’t be purchasing databases or pricey journal subscriptions for students who should have access to this through their academic library. On the other hand, these students should be treated like any other member of the community. If you had an illiteracy problem in the community, you’d probably start a literacy program. If you had a small Spanish-speaking population, you might do some collection development in that area. You provide for the needs of your patrons.
I think about the role public libraries play in distance education quite frequently, because I often do refer our distance learners to their local library. We provide a lot of services to our distance learners. I have created a special portal to library services that lives in WebCT and is linked in every online classroom. I have created many, many tutorials (flash movies, html, etc.) to teach them how to use our resources. I am embedded into some of the more research intensive classes. We have more than 10 times the number of databases that we had 5 years ago. We will mail our books to our students and will frequently purchase books for the collection at the time a student needs it (within reason). We will get them any journal article they want via ILL. The one thing that is lacking is that we do not do traditional ILL with books. With the short loan times and the fact that we have students all over the world, there simply isn’t enough time to receive the book, mail it to the student, allow them to consult it, get it back from them and then mail it back to the lending institution. And while we will purchase books for the collection that students request, there are times when a book is too expensive, out of print and not readily available or just blatantly inappropriate for the collection. At those times, I usually suggest to the student that they utilize the interlibrary loan services of their local library.
I often feel badly about it, as if I’m abandoning them on the doorstep of their public library with little more than a note pinned to their clothes. On the other hand, they are members of the community and thus are entitled to their local library services. And they are likely able to get an ILL more quickly from their local library than if we ordered a book from Amazon, received it here, and then mailed it to them. Of course there have been times when a student has come back to us stating that their library won’t do ILL, but those are fortunately rare cases.
What I always find interesting is the fact that our students have no idea that most public libraries do provide ILL services. They are floored when I tell them that. It doesn’t occur to many of them to even see what their local public library might have to offer them. Public libraries often have excellent microfilm collections with lots of great primary source historical material. We don’t mail our microfilm to students, so if they can find and access back issues of The Chicago Defender or Harper’s at their public library, that is a great thing. The students don’t think of this. When I suggested to one graduating student that he could do research in the future at his local public library (which was the Pima County Library, a huge and excellent system), he said that his wife takes their toddler there, but that it wouldn’t have much to offer him. Then I showed him the list of databases available through the library and he realized that there might be some things he could benefit from.
So consider that when a public library provides a service to a distance learner, they may be creating a lifelong patron.
What I found most frustrating about Carleen’s post was the attitude of the University:
The response I recieved was that they didn’t feel the need to spend the money on another library since they had a computer lab and well, us. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to get it through to them how much their students need better access to university library resources. Not to mention, a university librarian… I get the feeling that they expect distance students going to other branches to travel all the way to the main campus in order to get full library services.
Well, I agree that they probably shouldn’t build a new library. However, they could offer information literacy classes online. They could create tutorials for their distance learners and put them in the students’ online classrooms. They could even collaborate with the public library. Perhaps they could give the librarians access to their databases, so that they could teach the students what was available and how to use it. Maybe they could purchase some print nursing resources and keep them at the library or could at least mail books to the public library. If the public librarians were willing, maybe they could use the computer lab at the satellite campus to teach information literacy classes (which would earn those public librarians a gold star in my book). The University library shouldn’t just leave it at “well the students should come to the main campus.” You go where your students are. You provide services to them at their point of need. Otherwise, what good are you?
So many universities have gone gung-ho into offering online programs. These programs often make a lot of money for the universities. Too often, the university doesn’t put much (or any) of that money into the library. If you have online learners, chances are good that you’re going to need to beef up your library’s online services and collections. But the libraries don’t escape blame here. I have examined the websites of libraries at major universities that offer distance learning programs and have seen nothing for distance learners. If I search their site I will sometimes find a page that tells them how to log into the proxy server, but that’s it. Too many libraries don’t provide online information literacy instruction or even simple HTML tutorials. And even if they do, these services aren’t usually integrated into the online courseware the students use. A student’s course management system (WebCT, eCollege, Moodle, etc.) is essentially their online campus. If the library isn’t in there, how can you possibly expect your students to utilize your collections and services?
I feel very lucky that our library was never an afterthought when Norwich planned for distance learning. The library has been very well funded by the distance learning programs. We have been able to purchase a lot of new stuff for the distance learners and have been able to buy lots of books for students in programs where the online resources have been insufficient (like military history). But even if library services are an afterthought, there are a lot of things libraries can do to at least make their current resources more accessible to their students and easier to find. There is no excuse for a situation where a large chunk of your students are only using the public library for their research.
I _know_ that distance ed programs are very valuable services for some students. Don’t get me wrong.
But I also have experiences with schools that were clearly interested in distance ed because they thought it could somehow save them money, or make them more money, over traditional in person programs.
To me, this seemed obviously wrong-headed, it seemed that a distance ed program done right would probably cost the school MORE money than traditional, especially in these early phases of figuring out how to do it right.
On the other hand, if it’s a game of how many of one’s costs one can externalize to local public libraries or other local institutions…
I did a presentation at an Information Literacy Conference once on the need for partnerships between public and academic libraries.
After a whole whack of comments on the role public libraries could play in the information literacy game, hardly anyone from the heavily Academic Librarian-laden group showed up to my talk. It wasn’t my best presentation, no — but still.
For public librarians to help out in this game, we need partnerships. Plain and simple. We need training support, access to journals (or at least advice on selection and promotion), information about course materials/assignments and so on. Web 2.0 is an opportunity here of course.
Conversely, as a former intern in an academic library, I know the public comes to universities for access to relevant materials. We can provide help on literacy, ESL training, community needs, pop culture and leisure reading interests. We could even put on information literacy sessions for online students provided we know what we have to teach ’em.
Somehow, Town and Gown divisions seem to keep all this from happening. There is a bit of ivory tower in the academic culture that doesn’t translate well into the public sphere. We are also less concerned about plagiarism and intellectual honesty than the academic sphere. (No I do not mean we think people should plagiarize, we are just not likely to be as enthusiastic about proper citation.)
This story is similar to my library’s story. We have an online community college 30 miles from us as well as a local community college. The college is located only 10 minutes from us. Still when we suggest to the students from that college to go to their library, they looked stunned. Then they ask, can you just ILL it? 🙂 They use our computers (and ask that they receive more time because they are students) and expect to have the same highly specialized collections.
Yes there should be collaboration. However, at any mention of joint-use or shared resources, the college will immediately state that they would be giving their resources away. San Jose State is a good example of a joint use, but there is a high level of complaining on the academic side that feel they are giving away the farm to the unwashed masses.
I find this article interesting because I’m a distance learner in SJSU’s graduate program in LIS. Lucky for me, I work at a university, so I have access to a college library. However, I also use the local public libraries for study space and general reference books. As a LIS student, I consider visits to any library a learning experience. I consider it a perfect opportunity to ask a librarian a question to see how they formulate an answer.
When I lived in the San Fernando Valley, CA, I could get most materials by ILL in the Los Angeles Public Library system. But, since I’ve moved to Ventura County, I’ll have to admit I’m not so familiar with services provided by the local libraries since there are some libraries belonging to certain cities and others belonging to the county system. The quality of the public library varies greatly.
Hey Ryan, I totally agree that there often should be more collaboration between academic libraries and public. Especially in the above case, where partnership would be such a perfect fit and would be beneficial to everyone. At Norwich, our distance learners are scattered all over the world, so there isn’t much we can do with other libraries. If they were concentrated in a few geographic areas, I’d work with the libraries in those areas to develop some sort of mutually beneficial arrangements.
I think in certain areas it’s about how connected the University is with the community. We actually run the OPAC, Websites and other technologies for the public library in Northfield, VT. The (now) former Director of the public library worked two nights per week at our library until she retired. We don’t do a lot of purchasing of popular books, because we know the students can easily walk to the public library and take them out there. The University is VERY connected to the community and both the public and academic library benefit from that connection.
I’m always dismayed also when public and K-12 libraries in a community don’t come together to provide coordinated services to young people. When two institutions have similar goals and populations, it’s crazy to not collaborate or at least communicate to some extent. The public library I used to work with had nothing to do with the school system, and not surprisingly, we also had very few people over the age of 10 and under the age of 30 in our library.
Very nice article, Meredith. And in a perfect world, there would indeed be collaboration between academic and public libraries. But one very glaring inconsistency in distance education is the difference between university DE programs (e.g. Drexel University, the University of Maryland, etc.) and “vo-tech” type of degree programs such as those offered by Strayer University, Ashford University, and their ilk.
I work in a public library. The county in which I work has a community college, a state university, Strayer University, and any number of students enrolled in DE programs. Frequently, students from ALL of these programs come to the public library to do research. We have a wonderful collection of medical/nursing textbooks and basic coverage topics, e.g. physics, essay writing, etc. In addition, we also have a very nice selection of databases such as InfoTrac. Still, none of that makes up for the fact that students come to us before even thinking of checking with their school libraries.
When I show them what we have and then explain that their academic library is the best resource for their needs, I get blank stares. I get outright lies (“Oh, I already looked there. They don’t have anything.”) I get Master’s degree and PhD candidates telling me–to my face, in complete seriousness–that they “just didn’t feel like driving that far” to their campus to do research. In my opinion, if you want an education badly enough, you’ll do whatever it legally takes to get one…and that includes driving for an hour. (For the record, I spent two years commuting an hour and a half via train to get to my urban library program, so my sympathy meter is low.) I even had an encounter several months ago with a sociology student who huffily demanded why our public library didn’t carry the “Journal of Gerontology.” (Umm, because your local university already does!)
Why are all these people so clueless about libraries and doing research? Is it a failure of the American education system? Do certain DE programs encourage student apathy by claiming that one can earn a degree while sitting around in one’s pajamas? Does it never occur to these students that maybe all is not golden if their school teaches subjects that it has no resources to support?
In the case of Strayer University (I’m not trying to pick on them alone; they’re simply the degree-granting institution I’m most familiar with), I believe their corporate office stocks the Library Resource Centers at each campus with the same resources. This may affect what their students have access to. I’ve also heard scuttlebutt that Strayer tells its students to go to their local public libraries for help. I have no problem with that, as long as the institution informs the local public libraries near their campuses of this minor detail and actively seeks out partnership. Otherwise, I’ll do what I’ve been doing for the past year: help as much as I can, and then suggest the student go to their school library. If that causes frustration, so be it.
Even as an undergraduate student, well before my librarian career, I intuitively knew that the college library was the best place to start with doing research for a collegiate assignments. Why does that simple truth seem to be beyond comprehension for so many students these days? Perhaps the problem is that information is so easily accessible via the web. Heck, if you can’t figure out your homework assignment, forget about contacting your teacher for further insight. You can just dump the question into a chat box and send it off to the virtual reference librarian to do for you. And Heaven forbid if they dare to steer you in the direction of resources for you to use in order to figure it out on your own! That’s commonly what happens during my shift as a virtual reference librarian. I suppose that if students take that easy route in high school, it shouldn’t be too surprising that they’re equally as clueless–and just as lazy–by the time they get to college.
Hey Karen — I feel your pain. But there has long been a call for public librarians to get involved in information literacy at the pre-college level, so alot of fingers are pointed at the public libraries as well.
There seriously does need to be some sort of collaboration here, though. That’s a given.
Hi Meredith,
As the Electronic Resources Librarian at the Pima County Public Library, I just HAD to say “thanks” for your nice words about our library… especially the databases page!
Not only do many students not realize that libraries provide ILL, but I think the general public does not realize this. It is sad, because many people are missing out on this wonderful resource…
Meredith, thank you for commenting about my post and providing so much insight. 🙂 You are so right about the fact that these students are still part of our community and therefor should be treated as such and a collection/services built for them. I think what we’re wrestling with is the lack of collaboration from the school. We would really like to help them, but we’re a little blind right now. However, this is probably not entirely their fault. I don’t think we’ve managed to reach the right people yet. This whole thing kind of blindsided us. We have made some measly attempts, for example, I tried to make a wiki about a year ago for these students, something that would link them to the resources that we had, the web had and that their own library had. My supervisor and I were kind of working together on it and the idea was to put the wiki somewhere on our homepage where they could come across it easy. At the time, many of the students were coming in for information on the same projects. I was trying to get as much information from the students as I could so I could develop the wiki, and in one instance I even emailed one of their teachers but didn’t get a response. I eventually gave up. We talked about this situation in the last staff meeting and I think there may be some plans in the works to try and get some collaboration going. It would have really been nice if the school had tried to form a better partnership with us before the branch had opened up here, putting us in contact with teachers, helping us connect with them so we would have a better idea of what assignments to expect and whether we need to purchase anything for the collection to help them. I’m really hoping that we’ll be able to move towards something like this in the near future.
The crucial issue which we’re not addressing here is the fact that for-profit educational institutions are charging students money for an education, and then sticking public libraries with the responsibility for providing educational resources. Does anyone else have a problem with a for-profit organization that collects money from its clients and then relies on the public service sector to provide the services promised? What a great business model: you get away with sticking it to the students (who may not know any better) and you make a tidy profit, while the public library has to stretch its already meager budget to cover subject areas that your school should rightly handle! Is it right for a DE program to charge students big bucks and then encourage them to go to a public library? Sure, students are a part of a community…but it’s unreasonable to provide services to them on par with those their school is supposed to provide. A DE program should have excellent electronic resources for its students, if nothing else. Academic people, I’d really appreciate getting your perspectives on this. We keep talking about the importance of making partnerships. But what happens when the educational institution has no interest in assuming responsibility?
I can’t imagine who would not have a problem with an institution that does not support the students with library resources and relies on the public library to do it. It’s an awful situation, but there honestly isn’t much the public library can do beyond communicating with the school and encouraging the students to do the same. There may be situations where the library is providing resources, but the students don’t want to make the effort to use them or don’t know about them. Marketing can be difficult in online programs if there isn’t a close relationship between the program and the library. Sometimes it’s unclear which is the case; is the library not providing anything or do the students just find it easier/more convenient to use their PL.
I question how programs can get accredited if they are not providing proper library resources online and are not offering instruction of some kind online. I know here in New England, NEASC requires that information literacy be taught and assessed and that certain standards be met in terms of having sufficient library resources to support the curricula. We work very hard to meet and exceed those standards and I wonder how these programs that offer little or nothing in the way of library resources manage to get accredited or stay accredited.
While there are some distance learning programs that are reprehensible in their lack of support of library services, I do think there are a lot of schools that do provide excellent support for their distance learners.
Thanks to Meredith, I managed to come in contact with the distance learning librarian at the university in question and as it turns out, they do have a very good distance learning program in place right now. We just weren’t aware of it and had obviously not been talking to the right people. She teaches a freshman orientation class and comes down to our local branch 3-4 times during the semester to teach classes. I spoke to her on the phone yesterday. She was very helpful and even offered to come down to our library to do a short presentation for our staff about their services. This will also give us a chance to talk with her directly about some of the specific questions we have had from students.
Although we can only speculate, we figure the students who are coming into our library, unaware of what their own library has to offer, are simply falling through the cracks and have likely not taken her class yet, etc. This school caters a lot to adult learners aswell as straight out of highschool students. It dawned on me while talking to her that many of the students who come in tend to fall into the adult learner/parent taking night school group. Maybe they come into the library simply because this is all they’ve ever known, or maybe they just feel a little intimidated by the thought of going to a university library. I really don’t know, again, these are just some thoughts I had. But the point is that although our public library shouldn’t be overlapping our services with theirs and certainly not providing services that they should be doing themselves, we still need to work with them in order to make sure their students are finding the help they need because in the end, their students are still part of our community.
This could mean many different things. Here’s a few off the top of my head. It could mean investing in a particular reference book that is repeatedly asked for. It could mean putting a link on your public library’s homepage that says something like “Are you university student looking for resources? Click here to find the distance learning librarian at your university”, then have a link list to information pages for various universities that you know are near by. It means doing appropriate reference interviews with the students, finding what you can at your library then gently guiding them to their university library in case what you have is insufficient. More than anything it means communicating with the universities and keeping your staff informed. This is something I blame myself for not doing and should have been done a long time ago.
I know it’s easy to get frustrated but I think it’s important to steer clear from the “why don’t they intuitively know that they should be going to their university library”. I’ve been secretly saying this in my head for a long time now and I think it’s probably what kept me from contacting the school for so long. I think I was just hoping that eventually they would get it (maybe next school year?) but that isn’t happening. In fact, in the five years that I’ve been sitting at this reference desk, I’m getting more and more university students coming in here. I had two just this morning. I also have a bunch coming in needing us to proctor their tests for an online class which has promted us to develop a proctoring policy (finally). So, I guess what I’m saying is that I think we’ll be seeing more and more university students in public libraries. If you are a public librarian experiencing a similar situation, I would really recommend calling the librarians/distance librarians at these universities and simply telling them that hey, we have some of your students coming in here, what can we tell them, how can we help them better.
Meredith, Carleen, Ryan, et al., thanks for the comments. They’ve provided food for thought. The best solution for my frustrations is to do what I’ve just done: apply for a web content specialist position and get away from Adult Ref. Perhaps–if I’m the person chosen for this back end position–I can make some positive changes to my library system’s web site. I used to believe I really liked people…then I went into public service! 😉
Okay, I think it’s time for a confession: I am the distance learning librarian at the institution that Carleen mentioned in her post. It’s a testament to her talent for anonymity (and my obliviousness?) that I read the original post, got a phone call from her (described above in Carleen’s comment), and still didn’t connect the dots until my boss circulated a copy of this post to all staff in the wake of my unrelated (I thought!) conversation with Carleen. It was a good object lesson (which I think I’m going to talk about more in my blog).
I thought I was doing well with our distance learning program because I come out several times a semester, present to all orientation and most freshman comp classes (in addition to special requests from the upper division instructors). I provide canned presentations to our online instructors, and am even trying to launch an embedded librarian program. But I’d totally forgotten about the public libraries–both of our distance campuses are less than a mile from their local public libraries. Carleen and I are working on training reference staff and creating some sort of joint outreach, and I’m going to be contacting our other campus’s public library to do the same.
I just want to make it clear that we do care about our remote campuses, and I’m very interested in making what we do better. This could happen at any university’s remote campus. So…when’s the last time you talked to your local public librarians?