The Summer Research Forum will be July 26th and July 27th.
You can register here.
AGENDA
July 26, 10:00 am – 1:30 pm
10:00 “ACRL-LA Annual Business Meeting”
Elizabeth Batte, current ACRL-LA President, will discuss highlights of the past year and a brief look into what lays ahead for the organization.
10:30 Keynote: Q&A with Kaetrena Davis Kendrick on Low-Morale Experiences
Kaetrena Davis Kendrick is a researcher, leader, consultant, and coach. While known for her work on ethics, equity, diversity and inclusion, and communities of practice in libraries, Kendrick’s research on low-morale experiences in library workplaces is recognized as groundbreaking and validating for library employees at all levels. In her daily and long-term work, Kendrick has transformed library programs, services, and culture via creativity, leadership, and advocacy. She is committed to centering well-being, creativity, and empathy in the workplace and promoting career clarity and rejuvenation to workers. In 2019, Kendrick was named the Association of College and Research Libraries’ Academic/Research Librarian of the Year.
10 min break
11:30 “Louisiana Academic Library Workers and Workplace Bullying”
Presented by Andrea Hebert (Louisiana State University, Human Sciences & Education Librarian), Justin Savage (Montclair State University, Research and Reference Librarian), and Catherine Baird (Montclair State University, Online and Outreach Librarian).
Workplace bullying is a problem in many work environments and can take different forms, including spreading gossip, criticism of work, unreasonable workloads, and being excluded. This study explores workplace bullying among Louisiana academic library workers using the Negative Acts Questionnaire--Revised (NAQ-R) instrument (Einarsen, Hoel & Notelaers, 2009). To explore relationships between various factors and the prevalence of bullying (e.g., faculty status, tenure status, gender, race), demographic questions were added to the questionnaire. The study population was determined by the list of Louisiana institutions accredited by SACSCOC, and the researchers used a direct plea to participants rather than listservs with the goal of obtaining a more accurate picture of this issue in Louisiana. This research has become increasingly relevant due in no small part to the impact of the pandemic on the academic library workplace and workers. This presentation will highlight the study’s goals, methodology, and a preliminary analysis of the results as well as discuss future goals in this area of research.
11:45 “Sharing, Preserving, and Reusing Data with the SAA Dataverse”
Presented by Jane Fiegel (Tulane University, Metadata Librarian), Erin Stoddart (Michigan State University, Head of University Archives & Historical Collections), Emily Lapworth (University of Nevada Las Vegas, Digital Special Collections Librarian), and Maggie Hughes (The Huntington Library, Archival Processing Manager).
The Society of American Archivists’ Committee on Research, Data, and Assessment (CORDA) recently launched the SAA Dataverse, a new open-source data repository. Aimed at fostering knowledge, insights, and a deeper understanding of archival organizations, the status of archivists, and the impact of archives and archival work on the broader society, the SAA Dataverse welcomes a broad range of submissions. This presentation will explore the creation of the SAA Dataverse, guiding principles, its policies and procedures, and how archivists can contribute their research data.
12:00 “Traiteurs: Faith Healers, Folk Medicine, and Medical Traditions”
Presented by Christopher Bienvenu (University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Library Specialist II, and MLIS student).
A look at various user-centered approaches within information environments as it pertains to colloquial jargon, specifically the use of the words traiteur to describe Cajun faith healers/folk doctors and buaji to describe faith healers of several different faiths in India. Focus groups, multiple constituencies and their differing needs, types of information resource, and how this affects libraries and archives specifically in South Louisiana will all be discussed. Also considered will be information-seeking behaviors of two diverse constituencies. This paper will look at a way to circumvent the Library of Congress (LOC) subject headings to allow patrons of libraries and archives to find the information they are searching for in a quick, succinct manor. The usability of the system and the ability of the user to quickly find the information is what is most important in this case. It is looking to add a LOC subject heading and will also explore how to make sure patrons are able to find the catalog entries so they can spend more time researching the topic by utilizing a different line on the MARC record and creating a lib guide. This will further help establish the University of Louisiana at Lafayette as the Université des Acadiens.
12:15 Q&A + Break
12:30 Roundtable: “AOER at One Louisiana Institution: Highlights from a Doctoral Dissertation”
Presented by Megan Lowe (Northwestern State University, Director of University Libraries).
In Spring 2022, I successfully defended my doctoral dissertation, "Faculty Perceptions of Affordable and Open Education Resources." This presentation will highlight the findings of that study and its implications for AOER in Louisiana.
July 27, 10:00 am – 12:30 pm
CANCELED 10:00 “The Information Barrier of Controlled Vocabulary on LGBTQ+ Information Needs in Libraries”
Presented by Kendall Caple (Louisiana State University, Resource Sharing Specialist – ILL and MLIS student) and Lili Bedoya (Louisiana State University, Circulation Graduate Assistant and MLIS student).
With each passing year, social attitudes about Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, etc. (LGBTQ+) individuals have evolved to become more understanding of the idea that the community is not a homogenous group, but rather it is a community of various identities across a diverse map of sexual orientations and genders. According to GLAAD’s (2021), “Accelerating Acceptance” report, the rates of people identifying as LGBTQ+ are greater than ever before, with one out of six Generation Z adults distinguishing themselves as a part of the group (GLAAD: Accelerating Acceptance, 2021). However, despite the increased awareness of the multifaceted nature of the LGBTQ+’s expanding community, the information needs of such identified individuals continue to be oppressed by information barriers like prevailing cultures of heteronormativity.
Briefly defined, information barriers are disruptions to the information-seeking process that can encompass language, social stigmas, and cultural taboos (Stewart and Kendrick, 2019). Sexual orientation and gender specification are integral aspects of an individual’s identity; therefore, the LGBTQ+ community must have a safe space to explore their information needs. However, despite libraries being an essential resource for the LGBTQ+ community’s exploration of topics like sexuality, health, and history, effective searching in an information institution is reliant on its organizational system, which is formed by its chosen vocabulary. When vocabularies do not reflect modern and relevant subject terms, the information is ineffective for the user, because the lexicon affects how further information is sought, understood, and evaluated (GLAAD: Accelerating Acceptance, 2021).
At libraries specifically, institutionalized cataloging that relies heavily on systems of controlled vocabularies can act as an information barrier to the LGBTQ+ information-seeking process. However, because little has been done to subvert the categories assumed by these systems regarding the marginalized community of the LGBTQ+, the purpose of this study is to explore how library classification systems, specifically those of controlled vocabularies, act as an information barrier due to their rejection of evolved and current subject term knowledge.
10:15 “If We Build It, They Will Come: How we are Rebuilding an Instruction Program”
Presented by Abigail DeSoto McCoy (Louisiana State University Shreveport, Director of Research and Instruction Services).
This session will discuss how LSUS’S Research and Instruction Services Department is planning to rebuild our instruction program to better enable students to develop habits and skills that will be used across their curriculum and after college. This presentation will focus on the tasks we were given to revise our instruction program and how we have been researching best practices in instruction design, student centered teaching, and assessment to maximize student impact.
10:30 “Mapping Post WWII New Orleans Commercial Areas: using the LDL as DATA”
Presented by Kure Croker (Loyola University New Orleans, Special Collections Registrar & Archivist).
I will present a digital map and the process by which it was created, discuss how digital interpretation of archival collections can be used as a tool to of inquiry into the landscape of public space. Utilizing LDL images and metadata from the Franck - Bertacci Photographers Collection, I will present a digital map built with Google MyMaps. The map highlights the use of image collections and associated metadata to illustrate the changing urban environment of commercial areas in New Orleans over time.
10:45 Q&A + Break
11:00 “Examining open source software in the context of ACRL chapter websites”
Presented by Lucy Rosenbloom (Loyola University New Orleans, Systems Librarian) and Laurie Gaillard (Southern University at New Orleans, Coordinator of Technical Services).
The ACRL-LA Website Administrators, Lucy Rosenbloom and Laurie Gaillard, are in the midst of a year-long project to create a new website for the chapter using the Drupal Content Management System (CMS). An initial review of the technology used for the websites of the other 44 ACRL chapters found that there are generally two approaches: a proprietary software that focuses on tracking memberships or an open source CMS. This presentation will reflect on research conducted over summer 2022 comparing these two approaches to answer the question, is the more robust open source solution worth the higher level of skills required? Through a survey of chapter website administrators, both approaches will be weighed in terms of benefit for the chapter members and professional development for the website administrators.
11:15 “Should Academic Libraries Digitize Vertical Files”
Presented by Lindsey Lutgring (University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Library Specialist II, and MLIS student) and Christopher Bienvenu (University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Library Specialist II, and MLIS student).
The reason we chose this topic is that many academic libraries must ask themselves, “is it worth it to digitize our vertical file collection?” Different people have different views when it comes to prioritizing an organization’s digital files. Some people feel that such material does not have much importance and that it is a waste of time, resources, and labor dedicated to such a trivial collection. Yet others feel that having a vertical file collection helps the organization because it gives patrons alternative resources to materials which they may be searching. Digitizing a vertical file collection can be a very long process. It entails taking information such as magazine articles, newspaper clippings, broachers, and other small copies of various information that the organization has been compiling for years and sometimes even decades and upload the information to the organization’s database and or website.
If the organization does decide to digitize their vertical file collection, there should be proper steps taken to see how to go about undertaking such a massive project. Considerations should be, how much time is it going to take to complete this project? What amount of time each day will employees work on this project? How many staff members is it going to take (remembering that each staff member doing this project is a staff member that is taken away from doing something else)? We will expound on these topics and discuss the pros and cons of digitization, as well as what the University of Louisiana at Lafayette is doing to digitize their vertical file collection.
11:30 Q&A + Break
11:45 “Library Anxiety and Beyond: Using Surveys to Move from Assumption to Understanding”
Presented by Kaci Wilson (Louisiana State University Shreveport, STEM Librarian) and Jessica Hawkes (Louisiana State University Shreveport, First Year Experience and Undergraduate Success Librarian).
Librarians often make assumptions based on prior experience to guide their interactions with students, but without evidence, it can be difficult to assess the accuracy of our assumptions. Surveys present an efficient, cost-effective means to challenge these assumptions by gathering data directly from a population of interest. This presentation will discuss the use of two surveys at Noel Memorial Library to improve our understanding of the student population at LSUS: a library anxiety study conducted in the spring of 2022 and an upcoming survey of the skills and attitudes of incoming freshmen planned for the fall of 2022. We will explore the planning and execution of these surveys, advantages and limitations of survey methods, and next steps.
12:00 “A Tale of Two Pilots: Exploring Community-Based IR Alternatives”
Presented by Jeanne Pavy (University of New Orleans, Collection Development & Scholarly Communication Librarian).
I would like to share my experiences and insights from participating simultaneously in two pilot programs focused on developing community-supported and open institutional repository concepts: Hyku for Consortia and Next Generation Library Publishing's Web Development Platform. These projects seek to build community-owned infrastructure to reframe the landscape of scholarly publishing and enable more libraries to participate as publishers and knowledge disseminators. I will share some specific observations from my experiences in these pilot projects and also offer some thoughts about the broader implications of library investment and participation in open infrastructure.
12:15 Q&A + Research Forum Closing
Thank you for attending from ACRL-LA President, Elizabeth Batte, and the Planning Committee, Abigail DeSoto McCoy, Janelle Zetty, and Phebe Poydras.
Special thanks to the University of Louisiana Lafayette for hosting us via their zoom.