ACRL Seattle 2009

I had an amazing time at my first ACRL conference! Below are some highlights:

Roundtable: Measuring Libraries Return on Investment (ROI)

Based on a White paper- Phase 1 study at Univ Illinois “For every x dollars spent on the library the university received x dollars in return.” Articulate the value of the library in terms of institutional objectives (measurable effects, replicable, meaningful & compelling)

o Phase 2: ROI in grants to 8 countries, in process now
o Phase 3: How can we put a value on what an academic library is? Extend definition on ROI, now it’s mainly just grants

· How/What else can we assess?

• Cost per use journals
• Higher graduation rate=successful library
• Higher GPA if in contact with the library
• Need to break down into small pieces ex: this particular effort has this return (does not have to be in terms of $$).
• Look at thesis bibliographies to see if use collection- what percentage from our library? Correlate with GPA?
• Time spent: Cost spent to get on own, but also time spent. Show a student at a remote location-calculate miles away from place, etc.
• Balanced scorecard: get goals and benchmarks and measure yourself against there- inputs/outputs
• Have interviews/stories/case studies qualitative data to back up. Perhaps focus groups of alumni about their experiences.
• Track how many times alumni call and complain that they no longer have access to library resources.
• Exit interviews at the college level with library question or two.
• Get a library question on a state level survey?
• Be careful about tying ROI to only collections- also tie to instruction, service, and reference.
• Interviewed presidents and chancellors- what do you value the most about the library? Then quantify and try to demonstrate this.
• Faculty publications in the collection- check acknowledgements to see if thanks library or if used library resources.

____________________________________________________________________________________

Do the Outcomes Justify the Buzz? An Assessment of Lib Guides at Cornell and Princeton

· Survey to see if LibGuides are effective/worth it
· Results:

• Faculty: 100% thought it was valuable for their classes
• 85% perceived improved student assignments
• 67% are interested in creating/co-creating guides with librarians
• Students: 90% would like for more courses
• 90% perceived that it helped with assignments

* The buzz is justified! Next research steps: Are the web 2.0 features being utilized?
_____________________________________________________________________________________

CyberShed Zed: Learning Information Literacy Online (LILO)- University of Hawaii (Cybed Shed Zed)

· www.hawaii.edu/lilo (definitely worth checking out!)

• Great interactive tutorials on their website- includes research journal, videos, links to interactive elements
• Assessment 72 questions in tutorial- made rubrics to assess based on institutional standards and ACRL standards
• Embed and link interactive materials from various sources, instead of re-inventing the wheel (youtube, database vendor tutorials, etc.) Most librarians use screenshots and then have to constantly change and update these when interfaces change. This uses real time searching with instructions on the side so it never needs to change!
• Students automatically have accounts in the tutorial.
• My LILO Journal- students record research projects and can email the journal to the librarian to see if they are on the right track with researching a topic.