Assessment is increasingly important to higher education. Tight budgets and scarce resources demand accountability from the entire academy, including the library. Librarians must be prepared to document the impact of the programs they create, the collections they develop, and the services they offer. Liaison librarians in academic libraries focus on engagement with academic units and outreach to students, faculty, and the community of scholars. In a series of scholarly essays, Assessing Liaison Librarians: Documenting Impact for Positive Change examines how academic libraries assess liaison activities and offers recommendations for documenting the impact of programs and services. Individual chapters address liaison activities relating to collection development; library instruction; research services; engagement and outreach; online, blended and other learning environments, including MOOCs; scholarly communications and information technology; the importance of assessment in the 21st century research library; and professional development of liaisons librarians.
"Liaison librarianship is a well-established system for framing the work and organizational structures of an academic library to effectively meet the needs of faculty and students. But despite its rich history, the precise meaning of liaison librarianship remains somewhat fluid--the size and nature of an academic institution, the library's financial and human resources, and the diversity and size of local programs are only some of the variables that librarians must take into consideration when evaluating a specific liaison model for their library, how to implement it, and how its success will be assessed. Approaches to Liaison Librarianship showcases a number of different implementations of the liaison model, across a range of institutions, and describes in detail many of the tailored programs and services that liaison librarians are so well-positioned to provide" -- Publisher's description.
As liaison librarianship has evolved from a collections-centric to an engagement-centric model, liaisons have had to grapple with new and evolving competencies and skills that are focused on how to engage with diverse constituencies and stakeholders. But what does that mean practically? Liaison Engagement Success: A Practical Guide for Librarians will answer that question for academic liaison librarians, whether they are new to the profession or new to the liaison role. It offer specific proven strategies for engaging with user communities. Every community is different, and a liaison who takes up the tasks of engagement will need to be committed to building relationships, being flexible, and listening well, in order to understand the community’s needs and meet them. This book offers specific strategies for : Getting to know a user community Finding effective strategies for proactive outreach Collaborating with others for effective engagement Evaluating and assessing the engagement that is happening The book features practical tips and case studies for engagement with different disciplines in the humanities, social sciences, STEM, arts, professional disciplines, and with non-academic units.
Approaches to Liaison Librarianship showcases a number of different implementations of the liaison model, across a range of institutions, and describes in detail many of the tailored programs and services that liaison librarians are so well-positioned to provide.
A core resource for any LIS student or academic librarian serving as a liaison, this handbook lays out the comprehensive fundamentals of the discipline, helping librarians build the confidence and cooperation of the university faculty in relation to the library.
Aimed at practitioners and students of librarianship, this book is about interesting and unusual practical projects currently being run by academic liaison librarians. It shows how liaison librarians can extend their roles beyond the established one of information literacy teaching and showcases areas in which they can engage in collaborative ventures with academic and administrative staff. Designed to excite and inspire, New Directions for Academic Liaison Librarians demonstrates the potential of the liaison role and emphasises the need for flexibility, imagination and initiative in those who hold these posts. Unique in concentrating on the role of the new community of academic liaison librarians Recognises the wider possibilities for development open to this different new breed of information specialist Written by a practitioner in the field
New Roles for Research Librarians: Meeting the Expectations for Research Support presents strategies librarians can use to adapt to the new conditions and growing expectations that are emerging from students and researchers. Even if they have never completed a PhD, or even been engaged in independent research themselves, this book will provide a new roadmap on how to deal with the new work environment. The book provides different approaches that include the library in the research process, an area that is often neglected by researchers during their planning and strategic work on research projects. Users will find content that offers tactics on how to create a new dialogue between the librarian and the postgraduate student, along with comprehensive discussions on different starting points, and how communication and collaboration can help reach the best of both worlds. Explores the new roles available for research librarians and how they can be integral parts of research Provides a new roadmap on how to deal with the new work environment that now exists between librarians and researchers Discusses the development and systemizing of research support services and strategies Offers insights into the collaboration between the librarian and PhD-candidates
Liaison roles are generally commonplace in medical and health sciences libraries as librarians strive to develop and enhance relationships and collaborations with clinicians and faculty. While the liaison of the past acted primarily as the main contact between respective departments and the library providing a facilitative function (e.g. arranging for instruction sessions, inviting feedback on the collection, providing updates on new programs and services, etc.), today’s liaison activities are more proactive and robust. The Engaged Health Sciences Library Liaison features ten program descriptions that illustrate how the reach and scope of librarians in the medical/healthcare arena has changed dramatically since the inception of liaison services. The program outcomes described: illustrate a direct impact on curriculum development, address new information types with new access and preservation technologies, expand stakeholder groups, create research and teaching collaborations, and enhance functional roles. This authoritative book copublished by the Medical Library Association demonstrates thatcollaboration and communication, the basic tenets of a liaison program, breed innovative programs and services that are relevant, current, and valuable.
This inspiring book will enable academic librarians to develop excellent research and instructional services and create a library culture that encompasses exploration, learning and collaboration. Higher education and academic libraries are in a period of rapid evolution. Technology, pedagogical shifts, and programmatic changes in education mean that libraries must continually evaluate and adjust their services to meet new needs. Research and learning across institutions is becoming more team-based, crossing disciplines and dependent on increasingly sophisticated and varied data. To provide valuable services in this shifting, diverse environment, libraries must think about new ways to support research on their campuses, including collaborating across library and departmental boundaries. This book is intended to enrich and expand your vision of research support in academic libraries by: Inspiring you to think creatively about new services. Sparking ideas of potential collaborations within and outside the library, increasing awareness of functional areas that are potential key partners. Providing specific examples of new services, as well as the decision-making and implementation process. Encouraging you to take a broad view of research support rather than thinking of research and instruction services, metadata creation and data services etc as separate initiatives. Dynamic Research Support in Academic Libraries provides illustrative examples of emerging models of research support and is contributed to by library practitioners from across the world. The book is divided into three sections: Part I: Training and Infrastructure, which describes the role of staff development and library spaces in research support Part II: Data Services and Data Literacy, which sets out why the rise of research data services in universities is critical to supporting the current provision of student skills that will help develop them as data-literate citizens. Part III: Research as a Conversation, which discusses academic library initiatives to support the dissemination, discovery and critical analysis of research. This is an essential guide for librarians and information professionals involved in supporting research and scholarly communication, as well as library administrators and students studying library and information science.
The book raises a broad scope of themes including the intellectual, psychological, cultural, definitional and structural issues that academic instruction librarians face in higher education environments. The chapters in this book represent the voices of eight instruction librarians, including two Immersion faculty members. Other perspectives come from a library dean, a library school faculty member, a library coordinator of school library media certification programs, and a director emerita from a School of Education.
