Topic: Research practices
Blog Post
January 23, 2017
Multi-Stakeholder Perspectives on Understanding and Supporting Research Habits
How do various stakeholders in higher education believe that research habits can be best developed and supported? And how important is the role of the library in developing these skills? Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to share findings on these perspectives from Ithaka S+R surveys of students, faculty members, and library directors. In this webinar hosted by NFAIS, I was joined by Lisa Hinchliffe, Professor/Coordinator for Information Literacy Services and Instruction in the University Library at the…
Blog Post
January 4, 2017
The Future of the Print Record
Recommendations from the MLA’s Working Group
The Modern Language Association’s Working Group on the Future of the Print Record released its report last month and I urge the library community to consider it carefully and respond. As a member of the working group, I have been impressed with the collaboration of scholars and librarians in dealing with an issue that is both important and complex. Librarians have witnessed a dramatic change in students’ and researchers’ use of print materials housed in their collections. The convenience…
Blog Post
December 12, 2016
Libraries Becoming Invisible to Junior Scholars?
Last week, Times Higher Education shared provocative findings from a recent report that suggested that libraries have “little to offer” the next generation of academics. According to the key findings of the report, funded by the Publishing Research Consortium, libraries appear to have “lost all visibility” with early career researchers, in part because many “have not visited the library for years.” These conclusions were based on interviews with 116 junior academics in science and social science fields from seven…
Blog Post
December 5, 2016
Now Available: Dataset for UK Survey of Academics 2015 at ICPSR
Earlier this year we partnered with Jisc and Research Libraries UK (RLUK) for the second cycle of the UK Survey of Academics to understand the research and teaching attitudes and practices of academics in the UK higher education sector. Key findings from this snapshot of national findings included: A substantial increase in the of respondents that preserves their research data in a repository and a corresponding decrease in the share that preserves data themselves An increase in the share…
Blog Post
November 16, 2016
Breaking the Luxury Barrier
On Fostering Exploratory Qualitative Research in Libraries
How should qualitative research be incorporated into a library’s research agenda? In the latest issue of Weave: Journal of Library Experience “provocateur anthropologists” Donna Lanclos and Andrew Asher reflect on the state of ethnographic research in libraries, which they characterize as more “ethnographish” than ethnographic. Some of the trappings of ethnographish library research include that the projects are: smaller scale, rely on “pre-packaged” methods, and aim towards solving institution-specific problems. In contrast, drawing on their experiences as…
Blog Post
November 14, 2016
Now Available: Dataset for US Faculty Survey 2015 at ICPSR
Earlier this year we published findings from the US Faculty Survey 2015. We have been running this survey on a triennial basis since 2000 to examine the attitudes and behaviors of scholars at four-year colleges and universities across the United States. The survey provides the higher education community with a regularly updated snapshot of its faculty members at a moment in time, as well as trend analysis of changes. Key findings from this latest snapshot of national findings include:…
Blog Post
November 3, 2016
Building Effective, Sustainable, Practical Assessment
Notes from the Library Assessment Conference
At the 2016 Library Assessment Conference, we had the opportunity to attend sessions on how to demonstrate the value of libraries, methods for data collection, analysis, and visualization, designing library spaces, and organizational issues facing the community. The conference, which attracted over 640 attendees, focused on building effective, sustainable, practical assessment. A number of themes that ran across the conference resonate with our ongoing work at Ithaka S+R. Data visualization There was an overwhelming amount of interest from both…
Blog Post
October 18, 2016
Collaborating to Support Undergraduate Student Needs
The Local Survey at UC Santa Cruz
To better understand and support undergraduate student needs, the University Library at the University of California, Santa Cruz contacted Ithaka S+R to run the Undergraduate Student Survey on its campus. Under the leadership of Greg Careaga, Head of Assessment and Planning at the University Library, UCSC ran the survey in spring 2015, and also assisted Ithaka S+R in testing and piloting a new set of questions specifically designed to help academic libraries understand undergraduate perceptions and usage of library…
Blog Post
October 4, 2016
Examining Research and Teaching Practices of Canadian Faculty Members
Since 2014, eleven of the twenty-nine Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) member institutions have participated in running the Ithaka S+R Local Faculty Survey on their campuses, providing a rich dataset of over 4,000 responses across the universities. This morning, we published findings on the research and teaching practices of these faculty members. We have been examining the attitudes and behaviors of academics in the US and the UK every three years since 2000 and 2012 respectively,…
Research Report
October 4, 2016
Canadian Association of Research Libraries Faculty Survey
Executive Summary of Findings
Since 2014, eleven member institutions from the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) have administered the Ithaka S+R Local Faculty Survey on their campuses.[1] The survey instrument covers many scholarly research and teaching-related topics, in part overlapping with the 2015 Ithaka S+R U.S. Faculty Survey and other previous iterations of the Ithaka S+R U.S. Faculty Survey.[2] Each of these Local Faculty Surveys included a core set of questions on preferences and practices related to discovery, digital…
Blog Post
September 27, 2016
Designing Libraries to Support Community College Students
Among the growing number of ethnographic studies of college students, only a tiny number look at students on community college campuses, and even fewer look specifically at how these students do their academic work and use the library. But community college students constitute an enormous and important group. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, about 7.2 million of the 20.5 million undergraduates in the US are enrolled in community colleges. And it is important to understand their…
Research Report
September 27, 2016
Reflections on Ethnographic Studies in a Community College Library System
Montgomery College, the community college of Montgomery County, Maryland, has made an enormous contribution to the study of libraries in community colleges with a series of reports about ethnographic studies on all three of its campuses.[1] Tanner Wray, Director of College Libraries and Information Services, led the studies, which gathered information from students and faculty members on how students do their academic work and how library resources, spaces, and services support this work. The Montgomery College project was…
Blog Post
September 20, 2016
Making Space in the Library for New Pedagogies
Academic librarians, seeing changes in teaching and learning at their institutions, seek to understand these changes and ensure that their spaces, services, and resources respond accordingly. They ask what is different about the work habits and library needs of students in “flipped” and other kinds of active learning classes. By gathering information on new teaching and learning patterns and practices, they will be better equipped to highlight relevant services, develop new ones that address emerging needs, and provide spaces within…
Research Report
September 20, 2016
Reconfiguring Auburn University’s Main Library for Engaged Active Student Learning
Introduction The effects of technological innovation have been rapid, significant, and well documented, and libraries have responded to changes in the way people read, communicate, and do research by providing digital content and renovating buildings so that they support new, technology-enhanced ways of work. But what about teaching and learning? More and more colleges and universities provide “hybrid” courses, “flipped” classrooms, and “active learning.” Instructors put lecture material online and engage students in group exploration and problem solving during class…
Blog Post
September 1, 2016
Developing and Improving Scholarly Communication Services
The Local Faculty Survey at the University of South Florida, Tampa
During a time when the University of South Florida Libraries were exploring new service offerings, the Libraries turned to the Ithaka S+R Local Faculty Survey to better understand the research and teaching needs of its faculty members. Matt Torrence, Associate Librarian and Principal Investigator, reports that “responses to the local survey have helped the Libraries make evidence-based decisions regarding the collections, programs, and services we provide to faculty members, as well as assist in benchmarking faculty perceptions and experiences against…
Blog Post
August 11, 2016
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Faith-Oriented Institutions
Fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion is an issue of ever-growing importance in libraries and archives but to what extent can these principles be universally applied? At Ithaka S+R we recently fielded a study on representation in the New York cultural sector and are now working on a study on representation within the academic library community. I have also experienced the palpable interest in these issues in the library and archives sphere first hand through two conferences I recently…
Blog Post
July 14, 2016
International Advances in Digital Scholarship
Notes from the Jisc and CNI Conference 2016
Last week I had the opportunity to attend the Jisc/CNI conference in Oxford, England, and share findings from our recent studies of academics in the US and in the UK. The conference focused on current issues and innovations in digital scholarship and allowed for international exchange on leading practices and policies. A number of themes emerged within and across the various sessions I attended. Open data Many speakers and attendees discussed the “openness” of research data, including discussion of…
Blog Post
July 14, 2016
Libraries’ Role in Global Education
Nearly any conversation about higher education includes the need for global engagement. Some universities have addressed this by building international campuses; others have recruited heavily to bring international students to their American campuses. All have focused on adding global perspectives to the curriculum. How are university libraries assisting in these globalization efforts? Anne Kenney and Xin Li of Cornell University Libraries in their issue brief “Rethinking Research Libraries in the Era of Global Universities” look at the kinds of services…
Issue Brief
July 14, 2016
Rethinking Research Libraries in the Era of Global Universities
As our world becomes increasingly interconnected politically, economically, culturally, and socially, higher education has followed suit. The 2011 survey by the American Council of Education’s Center for Internationalization and Global Engagement found a perceived acceleration of internationalization across campuses, from doctoral to associate degree institutions.[1] The definition of what that means for each institution varies. Graham Elkin, Faiyaz Devjee, and John Farnsworth developed a 13-scale model to assist universities in evaluating where they are presently and where they…
Blog Post
July 13, 2016
The Protolib Project at the University of Cambridge, Part 2
In my last blog post I wrote about the final report on the Protolib Project, which the Cambridge University Library released in April.[1] The Protolib Project, part of the Futurelib initiative at the University of Cambridge, was led by Sue Mehrer, Deputy Librarian, and included extensive participation by librarians and library staff as well as Modern Human, a design consultancy in Cambridge, England. David Marshall, Jenny Willatt, Paul-Jervis Heath, Chloe Heath, and Pete Hotchkin took the…