Recent berkeleylibrary_berkeleylibrary_llsr items

Machine Actionable Plans: Assessing the potential for machine actionable data management and sharing plans (DMSPs) at UC Berkeley

Mon, 26 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Machine Actionable Plans: Assessing the potential for machine actionable data management and sharing plans (DMSPs) at UC Berkeley

Beyond Data Literacy: Helping Nontraditional Students Get “Ready4Research”

Mon, 26 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Beyond Data Literacy: Helping Nontraditional Students Get “Ready4Research”

Share the wealth: Creative Commons licenses for library learning objects

Mon, 5 Jan 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Share the wealth: Creative Commons licenses for library learning objects

Baptism and Reversion in Canon Law (working paper)

Mon, 22 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

Baptism and Reversion in Canon Law (working paper)

From Cartonera to Cordel: Aesthetics of the Caribbean and Latin American Book Art

Mon, 22 Sep 2025 00:00:00 +0000

The presentation was delivered at the 70th annual conference of the Seminar on the acquisition of Latin American Library Materials on 29th of May 2025 at the NYU in New York.

This exhibition highlights efforts of UC Berkeley Library’s Latin American Studies librarian to create distinguished collections of the Caribbean and Latin American book collections that relay spirit of ingenuity and creativity of Caribbean and Latin American publishers and artists that base their cultural production also on the notion of sustainability and repurposing of materials that could have otherwise been relegated to landfills. Each book in this exhibition represents distinct viewpoints of its creators and publishers. Each book symbolically represents an artwork that would allow visitors to this exhibition re-discover not only the lesser known traditions of upcycling movement in the region but also the folkloric esthetics of the book art.

This exhibition is divided into four distinct...

Africana Collections and Librarianship at the University of California, Berkeley: A History Since 1960

Mon, 6 Jan 2025 00:00:00 +0000

UC Berkeley’s history of collecting Africana materials traces back to the earliest years of its founding, but it was the foundational collections work of Africana Collections Librarian Lee Petrasek and his successor Phyllis Bischof, in the post Word War II era to 2005, that established Berkeley as a major source for Africana collections in the United States. Through details gathered from staff files, library records and personal accounts, this article provides a glimpse into the collecting practices, priorities, and strategies of former and current librarians charged with building and maintaining Africana materials collections at UC Berkeley from 1960 to 2024.

The Languages of Berkeley: An Online Exhibition

Fri, 15 Nov 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The Languages of Berkeley: An Online Exhibition celebrates the magnificent diversity of languages that advance research, teaching, and learning at the University of California, Berkeley. It is the point of embarkation for an exciting sequential exhibit that built on one post per week, showcasing an array of digitized works in the original language chosen by those who work with these languages on a daily basis. Many of these early-published works are now in the public domain and are open to the world to read and share without restriction.

Preparations for the online exhibition began in early 2018 with the final installment published online in October 2020. Using the Library’s instance of WordPress, the library exhibit comprises short essays of nearly all of the 59 modern and ancient languages that are currently taught across 14 departments on campus plus a dozen more languages that contributors wished to include. From September 2019...

Enemies of God and Killers of Christ

Thu, 19 Sep 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Enemies of God and Killers of Christ

Taking the world for a spin: teaching spatial and data visualization with a digital globe

Wed, 21 Aug 2024 00:00:00 +0000

In the summer of 2016, the Earth Sciences & Map Library at the University of California, Berkeley, purchased a Magic Planet digital globe in a collaboration with the departments of Geography and Earth & Planetary Science. This 30” diameter 3D display supplements and expands the library’s instruction and outreach services in GIS, data visualization and modeling. Faculty and graduate students were surveyed regarding their interest in using the globe for teaching and research projects. Based on this feedback, librarians developed a basic training plan for using the globe in the classroom, as well as an assessment tool to rate the effectiveness of instruction with the digital globe. Student and faculty responses at the end of fall semester (2016) were evaluated for suggestions to increase the variety of data sets and animations available to view on the globe. Curriculum and guides for visualizing custom and interactive data sets will be developed and made available based on...

Ana Hatherly Micro-collection @ UC Berkeley

Thu, 11 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

Throughout her long life, Portuguese visual artist/poet/scholar/filmmaker Ana Hatherly (1929-2015) reflected creatively and profoundly across diverse media. While her drawings and paintings have been deposited in museums such as the Gulbenkian Museum and the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Lisbon, UC Berkeley is where she earned her PhD and where her published works have been archived. This precious collection, now mostly housed at The Bancroft Library is not large and does not include her personal papers nor very much manuscript material, but it is the most complete of its kind on this side of the Atlantic. The collection of mostly short-run books published by independent presses serves as a textual archive to one of the most prolific visual poets of the latter 20th century.

This lightning talk raises questions about the evolving importance of micro-collections and necessity for custodial acquisitions during an unprecedented age of austerity resulting...

FAIRsharing.org

Thu, 11 Jan 2024 00:00:00 +0000

The benefits of data sharing have been powerfully demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic: shared data made possible the rapid development of public health policies, treatment guidelines, therapies, and vaccines. And with the issuance of the NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy and the OSTP memo on public access to research, funders are mandating that research data should be well-described and, whenever possible, readily discoverable to enable re-use.

FAIRsharing.org is a curated, searchable registry of metadata standards; databases and repositories; and funder and journal policies that are relevant to specific domains or types of data.

Seismica: Open science and community building in a new diamond open access journal

Thu, 14 Dec 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Seismica, a new Diamond Open Access journal in Seismology and Earthquake Science, launched in July 2022. One year into production, we have received 90 submissions, published 25 articles and have over 50 works in the pipeline. Seismica is an independent journal, designed and built by a global community of researchers with the aim of making scientific research freely available, with no publication or subscription fees.

Beyond traditional research articles, Seismica publishes an innovative set of peer-reviewed reports including fast reports, null results/failed experiments, software reports, and instrument deployment/field campaign reports. Seismica accepts papers within the very broad scope of fault slip and earthquake source phenomena, earthquake records, imaging the Earth, theoretical and computational seismology, beyond Earth-tectonic applications, techniques and instrumentation, earthquake engineering and engineering seismology, and earthquake education, community engagement,...

Seismica: Open science and community building in a new diamond open access journal

Tue, 26 Sep 2023 00:00:00 +0000

Seismica, a pioneering diamond open access journal in Seismology and Earthquake Science, launched in July 2022. Seismica is an independent journal supported by McGill University, designed and built by a global community of researchers with the aim of making scientific research freely available. Our international team of over 40 people includes disciplinary experts as well as specialists in open science and data; equity, diversity and inclusion; outreach and communication; and digital media and branding. Volunteers cover traditional editorial roles as well as the journal’s full-time management and operation (including technical support, copy editing, branding and communications).

Now in its second year of publication, Seismica has evolved as both a journal and a community dedicated to transparency in science, and supporting not only open access articles, but also a fully open publication process. Beyond traditional research articles, Seismica publishes an innovative...

Research Organization Registry

Thu, 13 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0000

The Research Organization Registry (ROR), a recent initiative by California Digital Library (CDL), Crossref, and DataCite, attempts to address the issue of institutional disambiguation through the development of a non-commercial, open, and interoperable system of unique persistent identifiers for research organizations.

Research Resource Identification (RRID)

Wed, 1 Jun 2022 00:00:00 +0000

One barrier to reproducibility is the lack of specificity in the materials and tools used in research. The Research Resource Identification (RRID) Initiative is a community-based solution addressing the issue of experimental resource identification, primarily in the biomedical and life sciences. Citing the RRID for research materials and tools in scientific publications eliminates ambiguity and enhances reproducibility.

Research Data Management Needs Assessment: Survey Results

Wed, 25 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

The National Network of Libraries of Medicine’s Pacific Northwest Region (PNR) conducted a needs assessment in April/May 2017, focusing on respondents’ responses to questions about which types of assistance and programs related to data would be the most useful. The survey focused specifically on respondents in settings offering research data services. They mentioned collaboration as a highly-regarded method for keeping up with the data librarianship field, so it may be that the PNR’s support for collaborative efforts, whether through funding or another mechanism, may make an important contribution. These respondents also noted that besides subject-specific liaison work, they were very likely to work with their university’s sponsored research and/or IRB offices. If the PNR can offer suggestions for developing and sustaining these relationships, that may also be helpful.

Introduction

Wed, 4 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Academic library workers often make use of systemic, bureaucratic, political, collegial, and symbolic dimensions of organizational behavior to achieve their diversity, equity, and inclusion goals, but many are also doing the crucial work of pushing back at the structures surrounding them in ways small and large. Implementing Excellence in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion captures emerging practices that academic libraries and librarians can use to create more equitable and representative institutions. 19 chapters are divided into 6 sections:

Recruitment, Retention and PromotionProfessional DevelopmentLeveraging Collegial NetworksReinforcing the MessageOrganizational ChangeAssessment

Chapters cover topics including active diversity recruitment strategies; inclusive hiring; gendered ageism; librarians with disabilities; diversity and inclusion with student workers; residencies and retention; creating and implementing a diversity strategic plan;...

Preface

Mon, 2 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Recruitment, Retention and PromotionProfessional DevelopmentLeveraging Collegial NetworksReinforcing the MessageOrganizational ChangeAssessment

Afterword

Mon, 2 May 2022 00:00:00 +0000

Recruitment, Retention and PromotionProfessional DevelopmentLeveraging Collegial NetworksReinforcing the MessageOrganizational ChangeAssessment

Data Engagement for the Data-Hesitant Librarian (Presentation at ICPSR Data Fair)

Wed, 8 Dec 2021 00:00:00 +0000

In our data-driven world, what are the best ways to engage librarians who are hesitant to work with data-related content and questions? Can we? Must we? Should we? Critical data literacy will be the starting place for the presentation, followed by suggestions for how to engage “non-data” librarians with data training and activities in the library setting. We’ll discuss the issue of how feasible it is to expect universal data-savvy, and how to empower librarians to choose their own approaches to the issue, both in the workplace and in their career planning. Finally, we’ll discuss training approaches and availability specifically, and attendees will leave with ideas for a plan of action for future data training in their libraries.

Supporting Big Data Research at the University of California, Berkeley: An Ithaka S+R Local Report

Thu, 14 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Based on interviews with big data researchers at UC Berkeley as part of an Ithaka S+R project, this local report provides insights on researcher practices and challenges in six thematic areas: data collection & processing; analysis: methods, tools, infrastructure; research outputs; collaboration; training; and balancing domain vs data science expertise. The report makes several recommendations based on these findings. A summary post with the recommendations is available at https://update.lib.berkeley.edu/2021/10/04/big-data-as-a-way-of-life/.

Cultivating Public Service Competencies in Student Employees: A Case Study

Wed, 29 Sep 2021 00:00:00 +0000

How can we best train student employees for public service roles? At UC Berkeley, as in many academic libraries, a student employee is the first person that a user will see when entering the library; they are the “face of the library.” A positive interaction will set a positive tone for the user’s library experience, while a negative interaction may discourage the user from ever visiting the library again. As such, it is critical to prepare student staff with the competencies to engage positively with library users and feel confident in their roles. This paper shares a case study of a public services training piloted for Access Services student employees at UC Berkeley.

Ready 4 Research: A Pilot Workshop

Sat, 7 Aug 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Ready 4 Research is a 3-hour workshop to support students in learning about and getting ready to participate in research as research assistants and researchers themselves. It is aimed at UC Berkeley social sciences students, at the sophomore level and above, but there is content that can be used by students in other majors, other universities, and other educational levels.

Library Staff Morale in the Academic Hierarchy

Wed, 21 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Academic librarians have increasingly gone public with their experiences of low morale and burnout, yet less attention has been paid to the workplace experiencesof library staff. As Kaetrena Davis Kendrick notes in her work on the persistent harm of low morale among librarians, “the cost of silence can be high.” Our research team includes library staff, former library staff, a recent MLS grad and MLIS student, and librarians. Through 34 structured interviews with academic library staff nationwide, we seek to demonstrate how organizational culture, library hierarchies, and management style affect staff morale. In this webinar, we present our findings establishing that efforts to address equity in compensation, provide professional growth opportunities, and create more collegial work environments can all improve staff morale. Finally, wesuggest how you can make changes in your own libraries to assess and improve morale across staff hierarchies.

#LibraryStaffLife: Improving Staff Morale in Academic Libraries

Fri, 16 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Academic librarians have increasingly gone public with their experiences of low morale and burnout, yet less attention has been paid to the workplace experiences of library staff. As Kaetrena Davis Kendrick notes in her work on the persistent harm of low morale in library settings, “the cost of silence can be high.” Our research team includes library staff, former library staff, a recent MLS grad, and librarians. Through 35 structured interviews with academic library staff nationwide, we seek to uncover how organizational culture, library hierarchies, and management style affect staff morale. In this poster, we present our findings establishing that efforts to address equity in compensation, provide professional growth opportunities, and create more collegial work environments can all improve staff morale. Finally, we suggest how you can make changes in your own libraries to assess and improve morale across staff hierarchies.

On Scholarly Book Awards in Anthropology

Fri, 16 Apr 2021 00:00:00 +0000

A brief article that explores how and why academic book awards are proliferating, and how anthropology book awards may be used in academic library collecting.

Planning an Entry Sequence with Service Design

Wed, 13 Jan 2021 00:00:00 +0000

Celebrate the possible with service design! The design of academic libraries is often rooted in the history of the institution. But how might these processes be improved to meet the needs of today’s users? Join us as we discuss our year long journey learning about service design and applying service design tools at UC Berkeley. We will share how we examined the entry sequence from the perspective of various user groups to meet user needs. Ideally service design incorporates user observations and feedback, but we will show you how service design tools and principles can be used even while a library is closed during a pandemic. After this session, you will be ready to embark on your own service design journey.

International and Areas Studies (IAS) Faculty: Are They Different?

Mon, 14 Dec 2020 00:00:00 +0000

International and Areas Studies (IAS) Faculty: Are They Different?

Planning an Entry Sequence with Service Design: A Case Study

Mon, 2 Nov 2020 00:00:00 +0000

How might we plan user-friendly entrances for the library? For this project, we learned about and applied service design tools to an entry experience at an academic library. Service design means working to understand users and applying this understanding to the creation or refinement of services. After learning about service design, we created six user profiles and walked them through different entry scenarios to examine each step. Then we created easy-to-understand graphics to provide library leadership with planning materials.

Training Student Employees in Public Service

Mon, 5 Oct 2020 00:00:00 +0000

How can we teach student employees to interact positively with patrons? At UC Berkeley, Access Services supervisors worked with Reference and Instruction librarians to create a training to better equip student employees to interact with the public and learn basic reference tools. The “Public Services and Effective Referrals Training" teaches student employees how to 1) Apply public service guidelines, 2) Deploy de-escalation techniques, 3) Make effective referrals, 4) Navigate key search tools, and 5) Identify methods for seeking research assistance. The program has been running since 2016, and we have trained over 200 student employees. We believe that all student employees should receive training on these basic tools to excel at their jobs and their studies.

Educating the Central Asian Librarian: Considering the International MLIS in Kazakhstan

Tue, 25 Aug 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Why do Central Asian librarians enter the profession, and how do they decide which educational strategies to pursue in developing their careers? Using 13 conversations and 10 qualitative interviews with Kazakh and Kyrgyz librarians, this chapter finds that librarians enter the profession due to personal interest, by happenstance, or for university funding and continue when they perceive an opportunity for career growth as well as salary mobility. Central Asian librarians evaluate their educational options, including local bachelor's degrees; distance education from Russia; MLIS programs in Asia, Europe, or America; and short-term online training, while balancing family responsibilities and career prospects in and outside of librarianship. Prospects for creating a local MLIS or other improved professional training programs are discussed.

Reading Between the Lines: Using Citations to Understand Anthropologists’ Reading Patterns

Mon, 10 Feb 2020 00:00:00 +0000

Academic libraries want to collect the materials most useful to researchers, yet how can libraries know how successful they are? While Berkeley’s George and Mary Foster Anthropology Library collects data on which books circulate, it is difficult to evaluate how materials are actually being used to further the discipline of anthropology. In this article, we examine sources cited by our a) faculty members, b) dissertation writers, and c) honors thesis students to better understand how anthropologists read when conducting research. This paper compares materials used across subfields and research levels to highlight patterns in citations within this discipline, leading to new insights that will improve collection development among anthropology librarians.

Democratizing the Union at UC Berkeley: Lecturers and Librarians in Solidarity

Tue, 4 Feb 2020 00:00:00 +0000

This article explores how librarians and lecturers at the University of California, Berkeley, worked together to make their union more participatory in a context of increasing corporatization in public higher education. Written as a case study, we examine this ongoing revitalization process initiated by lecturers in the summer of 2016 and how it transformed librarian activism and bargaining strategy. For context, we also examine the history and unique nature of the University Council–American Federation of Teachers, the union representing both librarians and lecturers. We discuss why librarians had become ambivalent about their union and how an active group of librarians changed the culture in the organization and worked to bring members' voices into the 2018/2019 librarian contract negotiations. Engaging membership and encouraging participation required a group of committed organizers, with the support of paid union staff, to actively seek feedback from members, to communicate...

The Impact of Web-Scale Discovery on the Use of Electronic Resources

Tue, 4 Feb 2020 00:00:00 +0000

In 2015, the University of California, Berkeley, launched EBSCO Discovery Service (EDS), a web-scale discovery tool, with a goal of improving visibility and usage of collections. This study applies linear regression analysis to usage data for ebooks, ejournals, and abstracts and indexing (A&I) databases before and after implementation of EDS in order to identify correlations between the discovery layer and usage of library electronic resources across platforms. Our findings diverge from conclusions drawn in the previous literature that indicate that resource use generally increases after a discovery tool is implemented. We examine data from a longer period of time than the previous literature had, looking for statistically significant changes in resource use. The discovery layer at UC Berkeley did not lead to equal increases across platforms, but rather to a complex array of increases and decreases in use according to a variety of factors.

Open Science and Data Management: Introducing Graduate Students to Research Workflows in a Local Context

Fri, 10 Jan 2020 00:00:00 +0000

The Engineering & Physical Sciences Division of the UC Berkeley Library partners with researchers to support the entire research life cycle. Since 2016, the division’s Science Data Librarian has offered Research Data Management training that covers data management, storage, documentation, and sharing. Based on this established work, division librarians piloted a series of open science workshops in 2019. The Earth & Planetary Sciences (EPS) Department was chosen as the target department for this work. Librarians began by replacing their traditional orientation session, focused on library procedures and resources, with an approach that highlighted local support for open research workflows.

Listening to Unaffiliated Users of the Academic Library

Thu, 19 Dec 2019 00:00:00 +0000

We know that unaffiliated users access books, reference services, and databases at our libraries, but how do they experience this access? The library science literature reveals a range of ethical concerns around how we serve unaffiliated users, meaning those who are not current students, faculty, or staff. Yet this literature is often based on librarian perspectives rather than on conversations with the unaffiliated users themselves. In this pilot study we interviewed 10 unaffiliated users to better understand their perceptions of a large academic library and how the library fits into their daily habits. Emerging patterns include a respect for the depth of academic collections, an appreciation of how physical spaces shape their campus experience, and a persistent sense of nonbelonging as people who are not students at our university—even if they are affiliated to another institution. In conclusion, we suggest ways that librarians can invite unaffiliated users onto campus as guests...

From curation to creation: Transforming paper map collections into research-ready GIS datasets

Mon, 23 Sep 2019 00:00:00 +0000

How can librarians engage with the concept of collections in new ways? One answer to this question may be expanding the definition of collection management to include active creation and remixing of our collections. Taking on the role of data creator changes the narrative of what libraries do, enables librarians to model metadata creation standards and licensing best practices, and transforms existing analog collections into research-ready data collections. As a GIS and map librarian interested in these issues, I developed a project to scan physical maps from library collections and transform them into a GIS database covering 20th century Mongolia. The project resulted in a useful set of data for researchers, best practices that can be used in other similar projects, and an expanded concept of what it means to curate a geospatial collection.

Readers and Authors of Educational Research: A Study of Research Output on K-12 Education Policy

Tue, 25 Jun 2019 00:00:00 +0000

The purpose of this study was to characterize a representative body of research to demonstrate the advantage of disseminating educational research in ways that reach the broadest audience. Using the Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) database, I compiled a set of research findings on a number of broad educational themes. Focusing on journal articles and reports, I examined the public availability of the publications, publication quality as determined by peer review, and authorship. In all, 65% of the journal articles were behind a paywall, and 35% were available either as PDFs or freely available on the publisher website; 61% of the peer-reviewed literature was locked behind a paywall. This study also examined a subset of reports—research studies not published in journals but issued by organizations, think tanks, or policy institutes; 27% of the reports were authored by institutions identified with a neoliberal or free-market ideology

CIFNAL: A Decade of Collaboration (2006-2016)

Fri, 21 Jun 2019 00:00:00 +0000

CIFNAL, the Collaborative Initiative for French Language Collections, promotes and facilitates the cooperative exchange of ideas and resources between Francophone and North American research libraries. Founded in 2006 with just a few institutions, CIFNAL is the youngest of the expertise groups within the Global Resource Network administered through the Center for Research Libraries (CRL). With a shoestring budget and essentially a volunteer work force, CIFNAL has succeeded where individual libraries or other regional consortia have faltered because of two constants: dedicated librarians and unwavering centralized support of CRL. This presentation provides a short history of the group’s activities over the past decade, highlighting its contributions to digital scholarship, building regional and international alliances, and cultivating relations with information professionals from and outside of the United States. A careful assessment of CIFNAL’s projects, working groups, and publications...

Accuracy of Identity Information and Name Authority Records

Wed, 29 May 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Accuracy of Identity Information and Name Authority Records

Supporting Research Workflows with Online Collaborative LaTeX Writing Tools

Thu, 25 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Science librarians at a major research university have developed a series of LaTeX workshops utilizing online collaborative tools. These sessions allowed us to increase turnout at instruction sessions while also shifting support to patrons across their research lifecycle. By utilizing online collaborative tools to teach the document preparation system, attendees are able to launch their workflow as scholars in their field. This poster will show that the success of this shift in service enables holistic support of the research lifecycle. Learn about the development of these workshops and useful outreach lessons that emerged.

Mortuary Practices in Late Antique Corinth

Wed, 2 Jan 2019 00:00:00 +0000

Mortuary Practices in Late Antique Corinth

Why Promote Foreign Travel Acquisition Trips?

Mon, 17 Dec 2018 00:00:00 +0000

A poster promoting book acquisition trips not only for buying books, but also for other collaboration activities.

Visual Literacy for Libraries: A Practical, Standards-Based Guide

Mon, 19 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

The importance of images and visual media in today's culture is changing what it means to be literate in the 21st century. Digital technologies have made it possible for almost anyone to create and share visual media. Yet the pervasiveness of images and visual media does not necessarily mean that individuals are able to critically view, use, and produce visual content. The ACRL Visual Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education were developed to address these distinct characteristics of images and visual media. Based on those standards, this book provides librarians and instructors with the tools, strategies, and confidence to apply visual literacy in a library context. Readers will not only learn about ways to develop students' visual literacy, but also how to use visual materials to make their instruction more engaging. Ideal for the busy librarian who needs ideas, activities, and teaching strategies that are ready to implement, this book: shows how to challenge students...

Where Are They Now? Winners of a Library Prize for Undergraduate Research: A Survey at the University of California, Berkeley

Fri, 16 Nov 2018 00:00:00 +0000

We conducted a survey of the winners of University of California (UC) Berkeley’s Library Prize for Undergraduate Research (2003-2016) to learn about the long-term impact of undergraduate research projects on students, find out what winners gained from the experience, and compare their careers post-graduation with other students. Seventy-four winners responded and reported increased academic engagement during their undergraduate experience, and demonstrated greater than average academic achievement post-graduation. The winners became more confident of their research skills and their aptitude for post-graduate work as a result of winning. More than 3 times as many prize winners went on to graduate school as the typical UC graduate. We also examined usage statistics of winning papers that had been posted to UC’s open access publishing platform and observed that papers continue to be accessed by the general public years after students graduate.

Big Data for Big Questions: Assessing the Impact of Non-English Language Sources on Doctoral Research at Berkeley

Wed, 8 Aug 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Even the largest research library can no longer build comprehensive collections from all countries and in all languages. The pressure to justify acquisitions can be great on non-English language materials, which are often low-use in North American universities. Determining the research need for these materials, and assessing how well it is being met, is challenging. This paper analyzes impact by examining the language of cited references in doctoral dissertations at Berkeley, 2008-2015.

Privileged Exclusion in Post-Soviet Kazakhstan: Ethnic Return Migration, Citizenship, and the Politics of (Not) Belonging

Fri, 13 Jul 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This essay explores issues of citizenship and belonging associated with post-Soviet Kazakhstan’s repatriation program. Beginning in 1991, Kazakhstan financed the resettlement of over 944,000 diasporic Kazakhs from nearly a dozen countries, including Mongolia, and encouraged repatriates to become naturalized citizens. Using the concept of privileged exclusion, we argue that repatriated Kazakhs from Mongolia simultaneously belong due to their knowledge of Kazakh language and traditions, yet do not belong due to their lack of linguistic fluency in Russian, the absence of a shared Soviet experience, and limited comfort with the ‘cosmopolitan’ lifestyle that characterizes the new elite in this post-Soviet context.

Being there at a distance: connecting the academic library to students who study abroad

Fri, 13 Jul 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Being there at a distance: connecting the academic library to students who study abroad

Accés Obert: Modeling Open Access in Catalonia

Tue, 15 May 2018 00:00:00 +0000

For the past decade, Spain has been a European leader in the transformation to open access publishing. About 70 percent of Spanish journals publish freely online — far higher than world averages. Conversations with two of Spain's foremost scholarly communication experts describe the conditions that have been conducive to academic openness in the region of Catalonia in particular. Among those conditions are stable public funding, an effective consortial library infrastructure, and supportive intellectual environments.

GIS Historical Map Project and Metadata

Mon, 30 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Metadata is important in making digital humanity research more discoverable and accessible. For geospatial resources, there are different metadata standards available, but no one standard can cover all materials. Some specialized projects may need experienced technical service librarians’ help for creating effective metadata.

This research aims to examine the functional requirements of metadata services for digital humanities research by analyzing a GIS project involving East Asian historical maps. Historical maps are unique in that they may not fit into current geospatial metadata standards well and this is where technical services librarians can utilize their knowledge and experience of historical resources. By exploring some metadata solutions, we intend to demonstrate the role of controlled vocabulary as a means to improving the access to and usability of spatial data. We suggest that digital humanities researchers create metadata for their GIS projects collaboratively...

Searching for Recent Anthropology and Archaeology Publications

Thu, 26 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This article examines where recent books, chapters, articles, and reviews by prominent anthropologists can be found by comparing search results across open access and scholarly databases. Scopus, Web of Science, the International Bibliography of Social Sciences, and Google Scholar all emerge as major resources for finding publications in anthropology and archaeology.

Search Chinese Government Resources for Geographic Names

Tue, 24 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This is a poster presented on March 21, 2018 in Washington, D.C at the Annual Meeting of the Council on East Asian Libraries (a Committee of the Association for Asian Studies). Chinese government department websites were introduced for verification and identification of the current Chinese place names.

Following the Yik Yak: Using Social Media Observations to Understand Student Needs on College Campuses

Tue, 10 Apr 2018 00:00:00 +0000

What can social media tell us about our patrons? We look at Yik Yak through the lens of library ethnography, suggesting that anonymous social media can reveal not only complaints and commentary about library services and spaces, but also uncover students’ emotional and social experience with research and study space. Looking at social media posts on Yik Yak, we uncover common threads of social dynamics, expectations of quiet space, and frustration with studying, all of which increase our understanding of student experiences in US and international libraries.

Supporting the expatriate social scientist: Faculty research and information access in post-Soviet Kazakhstan

Tue, 6 Mar 2018 00:00:00 +0000

Librarians in America and Europe find that social scientists rely heavily on journal articles, specialized data, and feedback from colleagues in directing their research. This project uses 21 ethnographic interviews with librarians, students, and faculty at “Atameken University” in post-Soviet Kazakhstan to explore how social scientists adjust such research habits to a context of distant information sources and limited access. By developing technological adaptations to the local context, expatriate scholars can surmount most barriers to access—and yet librarians are then less able to effectively support research. Increased access to information and skilled librarians remains essential for Eurasian universities seeking to support world-class research in the developing world.

Thinking through Visualizations: Critical Data Literacy Using Remittances

Wed, 17 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

[Chapter excerpt] "We aim to situate and critically interrogate the increasingly privileged role of data within library and information literacy outreach on college and university campuses. Following a brief discussion of data in a college context, we provide a lesson plan that adapts critical information literacy and critical data librarianship to draw entirely on open data... we ask librarian and students together to consider a series of interrelated questions and activities. This lesson plan is focused on the topic of remittances to the Philippines, but it could be adapted to any topic for which World Bank data is available..."

[for the two-volume series] Critical pedagogy incorporates inclusive and reflective teaching for aims of social justice; it provides mechanisms for students to evaluate their social, political, and economic standing, and to question societal norms and how these norms perpetuate societal injustices. Teaching librarians have long incorporated...

Beyond the one-shot: Intensive workshops as a platform for engaging the library in digital humanities

Fri, 12 Jan 2018 00:00:00 +0000

This article explores how librarian participation as instructors in week-long intensive classes—a common workshop format in digital humanities (DH)—can advance a variety of library objectives, while also uniquely supporting the DH community. Intensive workshops fall between the one-shot session and credit course formats more commonly found in library instruction. Drawing on case studies from Geographic Information Systems (GIS) instruction at DH institutes at the University of California Berkeley and Purdue University, the authors explore the origins of librarian involvement, course topics, pedagogy, and library services. Based on their instruction experiences in the DH summer institutes and student surveys, the authors argue that intensive instruction workshops provide a good potential platform for library involvement in DH.

Assess, Annotate, Export: Quick Recipes for Archiving Your Personal Digital Life

Mon, 6 Nov 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Book information: "Scholars and scrapbookers alike need your help with saving their most important digital content. But how do you translate your professional knowledge as a librarian or archivist into practical skills that novices can apply to their own projects? The Complete Guide to Personal Archiving will show you the way, helping you break down archival concepts and best practices into teachable solutions for your patrons’ projects. Whether it’s a researcher needing to cull their most important email correspondence, or an empty-nester transferring home movies and photographs to more easily shared and mixed digital formats, this book will show you how to offer assistance, providing explanations of common terms in plain language; quick, non-technical solutions . . . guidance on how to archive Facebook posts and other social media . . . and additional resources for digging deep into personal digital archiving."

Trends in Open Educational Resources in the Earth Sciences: Emerging Roles for the Academic Library

Fri, 27 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Students have cited the cost of textbooks and other class materials as a barrier to majoring in certain subjects, often in the sciences where costs are most prohibitive. In an effort to curb the high cost of textbooks on students, many universities are investigating the promotion and adoption of Open Educational Resources (OERs). These are free or low-cost materials such as textbooks or other resources that can be used as class material. This poster will examine the state of OERs in the Earth Sciences and give suggestions for adoption of OERs. Many institutions have concerns about the quality of materials for educational purposes and also encounter a lack of support for widespread adoption of many open resource materials. However, we will highlight a number of sources for high quality materials, many of which have already been adopted for use. There are also ways to use less expensive resources in your class without sacrificing quality, such as using popular geology books that...

Behavioral Expectations for the Mommy Librarian: The Successful Reference Transaction as Emotional Labor

Tue, 24 Oct 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Behavioral Expectations for the Mommy Librarian: The Successful Reference Transaction as Emotional Labor

No Legacy || Literatura Electrónica [academic poster for a library exhibition]

Thu, 20 Jul 2017 00:00:00 +0000

The library exhibition No Legacy || Literatura Electrónica at the University of California, Berkeley (March-September 2016) showcases eighteen works of electronic literature in Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, and English, along with rare print works from Latin America, Spain, and Portugal. To address the unique challenges of exhibiting vintage interactive digital works on this scale in the century-old Doe Library, we collaborated with a team including members from ten campus units, with broad national and international support. In this poster we will illustrate how we forged new communities across the digital humanities to install an exhibit that bridges print and digital literary histories.

The University Library selected and prepared print works for the exhibit, coordinated the digital user experience, upgraded facilities, provided IT support, and co-designed the exhibit with faculty curators from UC Berkeley and the University...

Inclusive, Participatory, and Research-Driven Approaches to Strategic Planning in Academic Libraries

Fri, 17 Mar 2017 00:00:00 +0000

Which strategic planning approaches can motivate academic library staff to adopt new organizational structures and adapt to emerging library paradigms? Over the past 10 years, the library at a major research university has undertaken three separate strategic planning initiatives employing significantly different approaches. Each approach has shaped the library and its relationship to the campus community in positive ways. This poster will show that academic libraries have several options for engaging in strategic planning including inclusive, participatory, and research-driven options that can suit different institutional time and resource constraints.

In our first strategic planning initiative, we conducted a lengthy and highly inclusive process to educate library staff about emerging issues and inspire them to generate creative ideas from which library administration prioritized and implemented strategic directions. Our next planning initiative facilitated an expeditious...

Pop-up exhibits as an outreach tool: Connecting academic and public audiences with library resources

Sun, 11 Dec 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Subject specialty libraries like the Earth Sciences and Map Library at UC Berkeley thrive on active user communities, but promoting awareness of resources and services can be slow and time-consuming. In Fall 2014, two new librarians there introduced a series of monthly pop-up exhibits called “Maps and More” in order to help build that community. Now in their third year, the show-and-tell sessions are designed to lure visitors into the library and spark new connections among students, researchers and librarians, and renewed engagement with library collections. The librarians surveyed participants in spring 2015 and fall 2016 to assess the impact of “Maps and More” in terms of visitors’ perception of the events and awareness of library services and materials. One significant finding from the spring 2015 survey is that a quarter of respondents had never been to the Earth Sciences and Map Library before the session. The exhibits draw in participants from a range of departments, including...

Evaluating the Impact of Open Access at Berkeley: Results from the 2015 Survey of Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII) Funding Recipients

Thu, 8 Sep 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The Berkeley Research Impact Initiative (BRII) was one of the first campus-based open access (OA) funds to be established in North America and one of the most active, distributing more than $244,000 to support University of California (UC) Berkeley authors. In April 2015, we conducted a qualitative study of 138 individuals who had received BRII funding to survey their opinions about the benefits and funding of open access. Most respondents believe their articles had a greater impact as open access, expect to tap multiple sources to fund open access fees, and support the UC Open Access Policy and its goal of making research public and accessible. Results of the survey and a discussion of their impact on the BRII program follow.

Preserving Legal History in State Trial Court Records: Institutional Opportunities and the Stanford Law School Library Collection

Mon, 29 Aug 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Preserving Legal History in State Trial Court Records: Institutional Opportunities and the Stanford Law School Library Collection

Interviews, focus groups, and social media: lessons from collaborative library ethnographies in America and Kazakhstan

Thu, 18 Aug 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Ethnography is a way of understanding not just what people say, but what they do within their larger environment. In libraries, ethnography is used to understand how patrons interact with each other and with our information resources. Ethnographic methods includes tools such as observation, interviews, photo diaries, mapping, and in-person focus groups—and the digital age has expanded our toolkit to study users using things like digital surveys and observations. This paper presents reflections on ethnographic and user experience projects at the National Academic Library and Nazarbayev University in Kazakhstan, and at Colby College and UC Berkeley in America, highlighting the methods used and the ways in which collaboration strengthened the outcome. A final section notes both challenges and opportunities for truly effective collaborative work—and how important collaborative study of social science research is for developing libraries that fully meet these users’ needs.

Rekindling a Librarian Diversity Committee: UC Berkeley’s Experience

Fri, 5 Aug 2016 00:00:00 +0000

The Librarians Association of the University of California, Berkeley Committee on Diversity (CoD) has existed for at least 20 years; recent years saw a waning in its activities. A task force convened in 2014 to revise the CoD’s charge, hoping to revitalize the group, and effect change in the diversity of professional librarians. The CoD has since sponsored several events, and reinstated a librarian/staff mentoring program. While the CoD’s re-invigoration has received praise, work remains. UCB librarian diversity (particularly in terms of numbers from underrepresented minorities) remains low. Perhaps the CoD’s work toward culture change and a more supportive climate may be conducive to a future demographic shift.

Technical Data Skills for Reproducible Research

Sat, 2 Jul 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Technical Data Skills for Reproducible Research

"I Fell into Librarianship": Experiences of Post-Soviet Librarians at the National Academic Library in Astana, Kazakhstan

Wed, 1 Jun 2016 00:00:00 +0000

This paper explores the attitudes of librarians in post-Soviet Kazakhstan regarding their roles at the new National Academic Library of the Republic of Kazakhstan (NAL). Using ethnographic observation, interviews, and surveys of library staff (n=24), we find that Kazakhstani librarians either sensed a ‘calling’ to librarianship or ‘fell into’ library careers given life circumstances, and value their library for its contribution to cultural preservation and digital access on a national scale. This pilot project presents NAL to an international community, sharing the voices of Russian- and Kazakh-speaking librarians to highlight the role of libraries in the development of the post-Soviet nation.

Convergence and Divergence Among Digital Libraries and the Publishing Industry

Fri, 13 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Convergence and Divergence Among Digital Libraries and the Publishing Industry

Digital Publishing from the Library: A New Core Competency

Fri, 13 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Digital Publishing from the Library: A New Core Competency

Flipped Instruction for Information Literacy: Five Instructional Cases of Academic Librarians

Fri, 6 May 2016 00:00:00 +0000

University of California, Berkeley librarians have incorporated the flipped instruction model into information literacy training by focusing on two primary elements: assigning pre-class assignments and increasing active learning techniques. We explore these two elements across five diverse instructional cases, which include one-shot and semester-long classes that were conducted through online or in-person delivery for both graduate and undergraduate students across a range of subject areas (sciences, social sciences, and humanities). We examine the enabling factors and the perceived outcomes of this instructional paradigm. Because students came to class with enhanced library understanding and experience from the pre-class assignment, they were better prepared to engage with the material and articulate additional learning needs. We note students' increased engagement during class and more time available for higher-order learning exercises and discussions. As a result, flipped instruction...

Altmetrics: measuring your scholarly impact with tweets, posts, citations, and teaching scores

Wed, 27 Apr 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Altmetrics: measuring your scholarly impact with tweets, posts, citations, and teaching scores

Up and Away: Open Access in Portugal

Tue, 12 Apr 2016 00:00:00 +0000

Portugal stands out among nations that have embraced open access to scholarly communication because of its early adoption of institutional policies, creation of a network of repositories, and effective system of governance. And,nonprofit international publishing initiatives play an important role in opening up entire runs of Portuguese academic journals. This article provides an overview of the open access movement in Portugal.

Reaching ELL Students in International School Libraries