what to teach future digital reference librarians: experiences of ipl student volunteers

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What to TeachFuture Digital Reference Librarians:

Experiences of IPL Student Volunteers

Maurita Peterson Holland

Soo Young Rieh

School of Information, University of Michigan


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


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


What about the experiences, behaviors, and preferences of librarians (intermediaries)?

How can we better train future digital reference librarians?

Digital Reference Service (DRS)


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


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


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


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


Why did you choose this question?

Topic (n=1283)

62% (792)

31% (396)

7% (95)

Curious Familiar Other

Ability (n=1197)

3% (41)19% (225)

78% (931)

Think I know how to do this oneWant to try something out of my scopeOther


Do you need additional information?

(n=1425)

47% (675)

53% (750)

No Yes


If “yes,” then what is needed?

(n=333)

20% (67)

9% (29)

10% (32)

13% (45)20% (66)

28% (94)

Professional knowledge ofsources on the topic

Client's context

Client's use

Client's previous work

Client's reading level

Other


(n=1702)

2% (37)6% (95)

8% (144)

20% (346)

63% (1080)

Search terms are obvious

Familiar with topic

Hard to grasp; fishing

Subject match withindictionary or thesaurus

Other

Question-related strategy


Source-related strategy

(n=998)

5% (49)

39% (388)

56% (561)

Content should fit

Certainty of URL

Other


Search-related strategy

(n=2129)

1%(23)

7% (151)

9% (182)

10% (206)

16% (346)

32% (690)

25% (531)Likelihood of success

Ease of access/ directness

Range of sources

Subject match

Query flexibility

Speed

Other


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


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


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


Ah-ha Reflections – Question/Answer Considers ethics Finds print sources are necessary Thinks about orderly steps as the

writing process forces


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


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


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


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


What Do We Teach? Policy and Ethics Resources Collection credentialing Strategies Team work; rely on experts …and acknowledge personal

involvement


www.ipl.org

Join Us!!


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. Proceedings of 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

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