Sakaibrary Project Update: Subject Research Guides December 6, 2007

Background Collaborative project of Indiana University Libraries and the University of Michigan Library Funded by Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Project partners Northwestern, UC-Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Yale, Stanford

Sakaibrary Project Goals Build tools to provide seamless integration of content from licensed library databases within Sakai for instructors Leverage existing library technology infrastructure Prototype functionality for librarians to present content in Sakai and students to discover licensed content within Sakai Engage librarians, students, and faculty in the design and testing Mellon-funded grant project

Project Focus Citations helper - new features in 2.5 Working prototype of Subject Research Guides (SRG) by June

Milestones Usage scenarios – March 2006 First phase implementation – October 2006 Citation list as Sakai resource Searching library resources through OSID connector to metasearch tools OpenURL linking Usability testing – November 2006 Reworked designs - Dec thru Feb 2007 Quality Assurance - March thru April 2007 Released citations helper in Sakai 2.4 - May 2007 Mention what Sakai is - backend for CTools. List the partners: Northwestern, Berkeley, Johns Hopkins, Yale, Stanford - March meeting.

Example: Usage Scenario Summary: Dr. Smith teaches an introductory course in the History department. For the course research paper, he wants to point his students to scholarly resources available via the library, rather than have them use Google. Dr. Smith also wants his students to have easy access to reference librarians for research help, as well as understand the basics of plagiarism.

The Research Process and Student Learning Librarians regularly teach sessions on information research within a course Faculty to develop course assignments which require it Librarians provide reference services and support for the process 7

The Subject Research Guide Research guides lead a new researcher to the best sources and research tools for a discipline or topic Teach the process of information discovery and selection Vary greatly in level of depth and specificity 8

The Subject Research Guide Offer resources and services to for continued exploration or support Offer asynchronous instruction to users at their convenience Typically delivered through library web sites 9

Course-specific Research Guides Faculty requested Developed as part of a Web CMS Pre-Sakai integration Post-Sakai integration Sample Courses Page visits Page visit   2005 - 2006 2006 - 2007 Increase Public Speaking (100 level) 4783 5670 26% Basic Composition (100 level) 2799 6177 65% Advanced Writing (300 level) 290 319 9% Social Science (300 level) 333 405 18% Total 8205 12571 34% 10

SRG Examples Psychology – University of Michigan Graduate Library http://www.lib.umich.edu/grad/guide/guide.php?id=1 Accounting – Rutgers University Library http://www.libraries.rutgers.edu/rul/rr_gateway/research_guides/busi/account.shtml Language & Literature – Oregon State University Library http://osulibrary.oregonstate.edu/research/srg/langlit.htm 11

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SRG Data Elements Title and other metadata Citations and citation lists Links to library databases Canned search link for Web, database, or library catalog Constrained search box for Web, databases, or library catalog RSS feeds Links to arbitrary web sites Links to people (e.g. subject librarian) Freeform rich text Audio files Comments and annotations

SRG Organization Various ways to organize guides and components of guides: Type of resource Subject and sub-area Course and coursework (syllabus, assignments) Information need Type of user Document structure needs to be flexible Storage as XML document Potential interchange format with other systems

SRG Authoring Need to support: Creation Editing Sharing Using existing guides as templates Authoring by librarians and others (instructors, students)

SRG Authoring Authoring interface should be flexible and interactive Use of AJAX/DHTML Probably based on RSF and Dojo Looking at Fluid toolkit Learn from other similar UIs: LibGuides Google Notebook Probably implemented as Sakai tool

SRG Timeline Goal: Develop initial version by Summer 2008 Sakai Conference Mellon grant ends June 2008 Seek additional funding to complete development

SRG Issues Sharing Organization Content ownership

More Information Project web site: Contrib:Sakaibrary Confluence site: www.sakaibrary.org Contrib:Sakaibrary Confluence site: http://confluence.sakaiproject.org/confluence/ display/SLIB/