Presentations

Saturday, November 10th, 2007

University of Arizona campus, Modern Languages Building, 3rd floor

 

Breakout Session 1 ~ 9:00-9:50 a.m.

Room 301:
Games, Gaming, and Gamers: Why You Want Them in Your Libraries (PPT)
~presented by Liz Danforth

Words you know: Candyland. Monopoly. Trivial Pursuit. Pokemon.
Words you might know: Wii. World of Warcraft. Second Life. Dance Dance Revolution.
Words you may not know you need to know: Halo. Guitar Hero. Club Penguin. Runescape.

What do these things have in common? Games: they are all games and about gaming. And you need to get them on your radar as you move into the library profession. But gamers? In the library? We are heavily about education and entertainment, and games are both. Public libraries especially are increasingly about being a community commons.

"But," you say, "I'm going to work in a business library, a medical library, a special collection. I don't want or need this trivial fluff."

Actually, you might. Maybe you can't see a place for World of Warcraft... but games in general? Yes. The military has invested heavily in online gaming as a recruitment tool. Businesses are regularly using games to recruit and train personnel; it's far more motivating than a powerpoint and the information is internalized faster. Research from IBM shows that leadership skills practiced in online games teaches and rewards success and innovation. Games are being used to help young and old understand the medical procedures they're facing, and to teach them visualization techniques and attitudes that help them battle cancers. Retirement homes are using the Wii for the chair-bound, for socialization and for exercise appropriate to their constrained activity levels. So familiarizing yourself with the world of games, gaming, and gamers should be on even your more rarified agendas.

Room 302:
Imagine a Future; Scenario Planning for Libraries
~presented by Dale Savage

Long range planning among libraries often encompasses no more than a 5-7 year timeline and deals with issues that are fairly straightforward projections of today's working climate. A different type of long range planning, Scenario Planning, has been used successfully by the military, governments, and corporations such as Royal Dutch Shell to anticipate and prepare for trends on much longer scales. Scenario Planning attempts to project Social, Technological, Economic, Environment, and Political (STEEP) trends far into the future as a means of creating the types of conversations that may prepare us for the unexpected. This paper will report on a one day scenario planning workshop held in the Urban Libraries Council offices in Chicago on July 25, 2007. It will further describe one possible technological scenario projecting today's trends in digitization, ever-increasing processing power, miniaturization, battery technology, robotics, trans-humanism, etc. may affect the library world by the year 2025 or 2035.

Room 306:
Information-seeking behavior of avatars in virtual worlds:  A pilot study in Second Life
~ presented by Nancy Bronte Matheny 

The disquieting revolution occurring in the multi-user virtual environment (MUVE) Second Life, an animated, 3-dimensional, social networking world mimicking the real world in all its vice and virtue, has promoted to the forefront an information-seeker unfamiliar to traditional library and information science pedagogy -- the avatar. Due to the limited organizational structure of Second Life and its dispersed collection of formal sources and channels of information, however, avatars in Second Life are compelled to rely on alternative means, in their endeavor to find, create, and use information. Minimal organization to Second Life appears to have forced the user to become proficient in browsing to navigate the virtual world. Therefore, the paper seeks to answer research questions:  a)  What role does browsing play in the avatar's search for information, and b)  does the traditional behavioral model of online browsing explain the behavior of the Second Life avatar?

Breakout Session 2 ~ 10:00-10:25 a.m.

Room 301:
Recruitment of Minorities to Librarianship (PPT)
~Presented by Doris Dejwakh

How do librarians encourage diverse peoples to come in and use library services? Do we have a significant number of librarians in all areas of the field representing as many as possible of the minorities present in today's society? Do our collections and digital holdings materials reflect this diversity: ethnic, racial, linguistic, the disabled, and so forth? This presentation will describe some of the strategies that are already in place, and others that are proposed, to encourage more minorities to enter the LIS field.  A goal is to encourage others to think about what they can do, particularly on a local grassroots level, to this end.

Room 302:
Access to Information in the Czech Republic: Before and After the Velvet Revolution
~Presented by Rebecca Blakiston

For half a century, the communist government in Czechoslovakia restricted the role of libraries by controlling their content and access to their collections. This presentation will discuss the role of the library in a communist state, the culture of underground literature, and the transformation of Czech libraries since the Velvet Revolution of 1989.  It will address the triumphs and challenges of the Czech library today, and what we can expect to be the future role of libraries in this region.

Room 306:
Visual Searching (PPT) and Web searching (PPT)
~Presented by Jill Tinsley

Presentation on visual searching for databases:  what it is, how to do it, and the science behind visual searching. Discussion of learning styles relating to visual searching and educational application of visual search methods.  Demonstration of the Grokker visual search feature on EbscoHost and Groxis web searching, along with many new and popular technologies available on the Web for visual searching.

 

Breakout Session 3 ~ 10:35-11:00 a.m.

Room 301:
Wellness Education: Bridging the Consumer Health Information Gap
~presented by Paula Maez, Cecilia Tovar, Adriana Rendon

WE Search is a collaboration between Knowledge River Scholars from the School of Information Resources and Library Science at the University of Arizona and Sunnyside High School in Tucson, Arizona.  The WE (Wellness Education) Search is a program that focuses on health information resource development and education for teens and their surrounding communities.  Knowledge River Scholars and their selected Sunnyside High School students develop and provide health information services to teachers, students, and South Tucson. These services include presentations as well as creating awareness of consumer health resources through outreach programs, school events, and community events.  The Knowledge River Scholars serve as mentors, provide information resource skill development, and career development to the students in the WE Search program.  The students (mentees) are actively involved in the planning and implementation of programs, events, and presentations. This presentation for the Graduate Student Symposium will be an overview of the WE Search project, its achievements thus far, upcoming program items,  as well as the  plans for sustaining its final outcomes.

Room 302:
The Library as Sacred Place: Applying the Psychology of Religion to the Academic Library as a Sanctified Space and Implications for Measurement and Evaluation (PPT)
~ presented by Heather Lea Jackson  

Trends in measurement and evaluation of academic libraries frequently focus on modifying corporate assessment models. While elements of corporate models might be applied in library settings, particularly those related to evaluation of "customer service," the extant literature is rife with criticisms of such methodology (Pritchard, 1995; Dugan & Hernon, 2002).  However, these criticisms are rarely accompanied by concrete solutions or means for improvement.  This paper provides a novel approach by drawing on psychological assessments of the efficacy and usefulness of tangible aspects of religion and spirituality.  These methodologies are particularly relevant to the recent value assigned to the "library as place." While generally agreed to be an important aspect of the library, the notion of library as place is frustratingly abstract and seems to defy quantification or evaluation.  This paper proposes evaluating the library as a tangible representative of the broader abstract mission and goals of the university as a whole, analogous to how a church building is a tangible representative of the spiritual goals of the church. Pargament (1999, 2000, 2005) and Emmons (1986, 1999) have developed psychometric measures evaluating how people attach worth to places and objects they deem sacred.  This paper proposes that these measures can be modified to measure the worth of libraries as place. By assuming an analogous pair (church is to "God" as academic library is to "knowledge"), we may approach the problem of evaluating efficacy in ways that more accurately reflect the role of the academic library as an interface between patrons and knowledge.

Room 306:
Learner-Centered vs. Teacher-Centered Instruction (2 PPTs)
~presented by Susie Dunbar (PPT) introduction

A comical performance which views the ends of the instruction spectrum, both of which are very exaggerated, in order to make the differences clear.  In the current marketplace in which colleges and universities find themselves, it has become increasingly important for course offerings and instruction to be more responsive to individual student needs, concerns, and abilities.  Thus, learner-centered instruction is called for across the board.  However, there is concern that this type of instruction is "watered down" and/or leads to grade inflation.  This presentation attempts to address those issues.

Breakout Session 4 ~ 11:10 am -12:00 p.m.

Room 301:
Nourishing Indigenous Knowledge and Traditions in the Information Realm
~presented by Janice Gould, Ally Krebs, Jolene Manus, Barbara Teso

Mvskoke poet, Joy Harjo, writes, "The world begins at a kitchen table.  No matter what, we must eat to live." Using the idea of the kitchen table as a metaphorical guide, our panel considers the worlds of library, archive, and museum professionals and scholars, and how we, as Native American students, gain entry to these domains.   Around this kitchen table, we discuss the importance and feasibility of integrating Native values of kindness, generosity and sharing into our graduate schooling in the Information realm.  We suggest curriculum changes and program supports that might help provide more sustenance and nurture to Native students so that those who wish can maintain traditional values even as we encounter new rules and moral attitudes.  We examine ways tribal libraries, archives, and museums are guided by tribal beliefs, and consider how indigenous beliefs might be adapted to help Native students sort out their issues and concerns while in graduate school.  Ultimately, how do we bring our strengths and visions to this table, so that we may all live in culturally fluent and respectful ways?

Room 302:
Public Libraries and Natural Disaster:  The New Orleans Public Library and Hurricane Katrina
~Presented by Jeff Prock

Jeff Prock is doctoral candidate at SIRLS currently working on his dissertation which is entitled "Natural Disasters and Public Libraries:  A Case Study of Planning, Preparedness, and Recovery." The presentation will be an excerpt from his dissertation, in which he discusses his research and experiences associated with the New Orleans Public Library and its experience with Hurricane Katrina. New Orleans Public Library is one of the only public libraries in the US that houses the city archive. There is geographic and geologic risks associated with the location of the city of New Orleans.  As the population in risky coastal areas continues to grow, we can expect public library natural disasters to increase, making this topic very relevant to the topic of libraries in the new millennium. This presentation will feature some questions that this research raises, some general observations about the phenomena and the literature associated with the problem, and also offer some suggestions on what public libraries can do to protect themselves.

ILC:
Addressing Learning Styles in the Library
~presented by Yvonne Mery

This interactive presentation will introduce participants to educational theories in the areas of multiple intelligences and learning styles and how they can be applied in the area of bibliographic instruction. Participants will be presented with practical activities and scenarios which they can easily apply to their own teaching.  They will also be given an opportunity to examine their own leaning styles via an on-line assessment.  Finally, participants will have the opportunity to discuss how learning styles may be applied at the reference desk.

 

 

Keynote Speaker~ 1:30-3:00 p.m.

 

To see other presentations from events sponsored by or attended by LSO and SIRLS students, please see LSO's Professional Development page.