UC San Diego Library

This poster explores how librarians can evaluate students’ perceptions of their ability to apply skills about how to evaluate and use primary sources taught via an online tutorial for a large-scale (250+ students each quarter) writing program course that does not provide access to student work products. We reviewed data from a writing program course taught in two quarters with a combined enrollment of 574 students. Students completed an online tutorial where they learned skills required to analyze primary sources and an evaluation to determine their perception of the effectiveness of the tutorial format to teach these skills. Our data show students preferred the online tutorial format and 75% feel very confident or confident about their ability to analyze a primary source after completing the tutorial. This is significant because only 50% were able to demonstrate their abilities in completing the tutorial activities. While we are pleased students have confidence to proceed with analyzing a primary source on their own, we don’t want them to overestimate their abilities. The analysis of student responses to questions where they applied their learning revealed key areas in which we can focus on improving our instruction. We plan to work with faculty and our librarian colleagues to make revisions to the tutorial content to close this gap. This project revealed the value of having an evaluation of student perception of their ability to complete tasks in addition to an assessment of student work. It provides additional information to librarians about content areas where students are feeling more or less confident compared to their demonstrated abilities. 

Presented at the Western Association of Map Librarians (WAML) Annual Conference, Albuquerque, NM, Sept. 25-27, 2024

At UC San Diego, our Library’s Data & GIS Lab employs between four and six student workers. These students not only serve as the front line to patrons who drop by the lab with geospatial or data analysis questions, they also have them work on Library related projects. We will discuss how we’ve taken Agile principles and applied them to help us manage our Lab and the projects our students work on. While Agile methodologies and principles emerged as a response to challenges and limitations observed in traditional software development and project management practices, we are applying them as a flexible and adaptive approach to managing projects and delivering value to our end users. We leverage weekly standups, a Trello kanban, and allocate time to reflect and make changes to how we operate and can continue to improve as a Lab. Taking these approaches have helped us better manage our patrons' needs as well as our projects.

PURPOSE & GOALS: At UC San Diego Library, we are committed to continuously improving equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) in our services and team. We aim to inspire all employees to actively advance EDI through a multi-faceted training initiative. This program includes comprehensive training for all staff, with additional leadership development for managers and supervisors. After the training, we evaluated how staff applied what they learned in their roles and in delivering Library services. This feedback is essential for shaping future EDI strategies and ensuring every employee can meaningfully contribute. Rather than focusing solely on learning recall or satisfaction, we prioritized understanding how employees applied the training in real-world settings. This evaluation guides the Library’s strategic planning, fostering continuous improvement by integrating training, evaluation, and employee-driven enhancements.

DESIGN & METHODOLOGY: We used the CDC’s “Recommended Training Effectiveness Questions for Postcourse Evaluations” to assess how employees applied their EDI training. This evidence-based survey instrument, rooted in adult learning research, examines key areas like knowledge gained, relevance, intent to apply learning, implementation, and the barriers and facilitators encountered. To ensure the evaluation was effective, we developed a logic model that connects survey feedback directly to the Library’s strategic planning for EDI initiatives. This model helps us focus on key areas and ensures the results lead to strategic actions that guide operational improvements.

FINDINGS: We are currently evaluating several training programs, and this presentation focuses on the completed evaluation of the “EDI in Action” program. The survey captured diverse perspectives and encouraged employees to reflect on their contributions to EDI initiatives. Thematic analysis of open feedback identified key areas for growth, including bias mitigation, communication, advocacy, collaboration, and professional development. These findings also confirmed that our logic model is an effective tool for refining the Library’s EDI strategy. We expect to complete the full evaluation by Fall 2024, providing a more comprehensive understanding.

ACTION & IMPACT: With the “EDI in Action” program evaluation completed, we continue evaluating the remaining EDI training programs. Once finished, these evaluations will confirm effective learning strategies, highlight professional development needs, showcase achievements, uncover future learning opportunities, and reveal any disparities in EDI support across the staff. These insights will help the Library to offer targeted support and refine its overall EDI strategy.

PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS & VALUE: Our approach to EDI development followed a series of focused phases: comprehensive training, evaluation of real-world applications, and strategic planning based on feedback. By linking survey findings directly to strategic actions through a logic model, we aim for these efforts to drive meaningful EDI improvements. The CDC’s training effectiveness tool has been essential in assessing how employees apply their learning, providing practical insights that can shape the Library’s strategic planning and support effective decision-making. Ultimately, evaluating the real-world application of EDI training offers valuable feedback for libraries looking to strengthen their inclusive practices and improve operations.

Presented at the Library Assessment Conference, November 6–9, 2024, Portland, Oregon, USA

Libraries strive to increase diversity in the workforce and foster equity and inclusion through the resources and services we provide. Recognizing the inequities and biases that exist within the scholarly publishing ecosystem, the authors created a publicly accessible online resource on the University of California Office of Scholarly Communication website to guide stakeholders to actions they could take to create more equitable scholarly communication environments. The resulting site offers distinct sections for peer reviewers, editorial boards, authors, scholarly publishers, and libraries, each summarizing research into the equity challenges for that group and suggesting actionable steps for addressing these challenges. We hope that, by interacting with this resource, scholarly communication stakeholders will gain a better understanding of the landscape and know how to take action. This poster will present our model for raising awareness of the inequities in the scholarly publishing ecosystem and encouraging participants to take concrete steps to reduce barriers and inequities in scholarly publishing. We will describe how we first identified the need for such a resource, engaged stakeholders in a review of the initial draft, modified that draft in response to feedback, and are currently implementing our recommendations in our library-based publishing setting. We will explore some of the challenges we face in ensuring that the resource remains up-to-date and relevant over time. Suggestions will also be provided for linking to this resource on library and publisher web pages and for contacting the group with suggestions and feedback.

Presented at the American Library Association 2024 Conference.

The presentation discussed the current and potential issues we faced with electronic resources, especially Chinese e-resources like ebooks from Apabi, which filed bankruptcy (and we've bought a lot of books there!), and databases from CNKI, which are suspended until further notice due to government audits. Brings up a lot of questions on how to handle these situations from perpetual access rights in licensing terms to safeguard plans for preservation and activating perpetual access.

Structural changes in library leadership and services impact how librarians experience their work. When faced with externally imposed change, our public services team did more than adapt and navigate. We partnered management with organizational development to build a more inclusive team through shared visioning. Recognizing that everyone’s experience of change is unique, we employed a variety of tools and techniques to discover factors underlying motivation and resistance. We will share how we built our leadership skills to move a large team through change while respecting the identities, professional values, and experiences of each individual in the team.

As affordability continues to be a growing concern in higher education, more institutions are building programs to not only bring down course materials costs for undergraduate students, but to align affordability with student success and retention. In this presentation, two institutions will share their program development around open and affordable course materials. One institution is just at the beginning of developing their program and has created a robust program for gathering data on student and course instructor needs and desires on their campus. The other institution has a much more well-established initiative with a focus on both OER and open educational practices, leveraging the impact of the program to advance the goals of access, equity, and student success. In both cases, campus partnerships ranging from undergraduate students to high-level administrators are a critical component to success. We will reflect on lessons learned for beginning and expanding programs, and the variety of pathways that can be pursued in expanding the reach of OER.

Link to YouTube recording  https://youtu.be/fcCmeepklSA and conference page https://www.cni.org/topics/economic-models/open-educational-resource-program-development-a-view-from-two-institutions  

Scholars, publishers, and library experts discuss the current OA landscape in Europe and North America and the implications of new developments for the theater education field.

The notes for the presentation slides are included in the supplemental files.

A flourishing partnership between undergraduate CALPIRG representatives and the campus scholarly communications librarian was able to withstand obstacles the pandemic piled on and increase faculty and student engagement with OER advocacy. This presentation will give background to our individual efforts, alignment during the pandemic, amendments made, and where we hope to go from here. We’ll discuss how we took advantage of an all virtual environment, adjusted outreach methods, collaborated on statewide education efforts, and aligned individual initiatives. Despite the hardships, we saw opportunities to engage faculty, not only on our campus but as far as the internet would take us as we moved our advocacy efforts online along with classrooms and instruction. We saw opportunity as the UC installed a new president who is vocal about affordable education and diversity.

We have held multiple virtual sessions inviting other student advocacy groups, faculty from local community colleges and several UC campuses to discuss experiences, publishing, and initiatives focused on open educational resources. The campus CALPIRG student representative will discuss their initiatives, a UC Open Textbook Grant Program through the UC Regents that would incentivize faculty to use open textbooks. She will disclose the results of the CALPIRG faculty survey and screen the student testimonial video. The librarian will discuss; guiding, collaborating, and learning from the students; faculty publishing challenges; and the campus-wide team accepted to the AAC&U Institute on Open Educational Resources that will design a pilot OER Incentive Program.