Library Assessment: Why Today and not Tomorrow Library Assessment Thessaloniki, Greece June 13-15, 2005 Martha Kyrillidou, Association of Research Libraries Colleen Cook, Texas A&M University

Bangor University considers removing librarians posted by Blake on Thursday January -753 hits Ms Information writes "News from the University of Wales Bangor in the UK. senior management no longer feel that subject librarians / academic liaison librarians are needed in the modern academic library. They have made restructuring proposals which include removing all bar one of the subject librarians and a tier of the library management, including the Head of Bibliographic Services. The university management thinks that technology has 'deskilled' literature searching. As far as I know, this proposal is unprecedented in the United Kingdom. In essence, there will remain 4 professional librarians serving a 'research-led' university of 8,000 plus FTEs and with 8 library sites. These will be the university librarian, cataloguing librarian, acquisitions librarian and Law librarian. Has anything like this happened anywhere that you know of? If so, what have been the effects? Blake Ms Information

Today is Tomorrow

Rise of User-Centered Library Concept and the Culture of Assessment in the 1990’s User-Centered Library All services and activities are viewed through the eyes of the customers Customers determine quality Library services and resources add value to the customer Culture of Assessment Organizational environment in which decisions are based on facts, research and analysis, Services are planned and delivered to maximize positive customer outcomes

Why Assess? Accountability and justification Improvement of services Comparison with others Identification of changing patterns Identification of questionable services Marketing and promotion Decisions based on data, not assumptions – Assumicide!

Good Assessment Practices Focus on the user Diverse samples/representative groups of users Fair and unbiased queries Measurable results that can be used Criteria for success Employ qualitative and quantitative techniques Corroboration from other sources

What Are We Measuring? “ Institutional assessment efforts should not be concerned about valuing what can be measured, but instead about measuring what is valued.” A.W. Astin, “Assessment for Excellence, 1991 “ What is easy to measure is not necessarily what is desirable to measure. M. Kyrillidou, “An overview of performance measures in higher education and libraries”, 1998

Effective Assessment Easier Said Than Done Libraries in many cases are collecting data without really having the will, organizational capacity, or interest to interpret and use the data effectively in library planning. The profession could benefit from case studies of those libraries that have conducted research efficiently and applied the results effectively. (Denise Troll Covey, Usage and Usability Assessment: Practices and Concerns, 2002)

What data do YOU collect What Why How

Impact of Information Technology Upon Libraries Costs Access Restrictions Scalability User Behavior

ARL Overall

ARL Undergraduate

ARL Graduate

ARL Faculty

Libraries Remain a Credible Resource in 21 st Century 98% agree with statement, “My … library contains information from credible and known sources.” Note. Digital Library Federation and Council on Library and Information Resources. (2002). Dimensions and Use of the Scholarly Information Environment.

Changing Behaviors Recent Survey: Only 15.7% agreed with the statement “The Internet has not changed the way I use the library.” Note. Digital Library Federation and Council on Library and Information Resources. (2002). Dimensions and Use of the Scholarly Information Environment.

Googlization

“…everyone in class tried to get those articles on line and some people didn’t even bother to go to the stacks when they couldn’t Google them.” Graduate Student NYT Online 6/21/04 (Katie Hafner, “Old search engine in the the library tries to fit into a Google world”)

The Internet Goes to College Early data from ethnographic interviews –“I use Google because I heard it searches for more things” (than other sources). –“I believe I can find anything on the Internet. There hasn’t been anything I haven’t been able to find.” –“Because I’m lazy.” –Books have “so much information that no one can go through it all.” –I use “the Internet first is because it is more convenient.” –I go to the library “because that’s what teachers like.” –“Google has gotten me through college.” Source: Steve Jones, The Internet Goes to College, ARL Talk

What It Means - Implications What might reliance on Google (or other sites) mean for the future?

Emphasis on understanding the role and contributions of libraries to the teaching, learning and research missions of parent institutions and individual users

… a revolution in making Il est plus nécessaire d'étudier les hommes que les livres —FRANÇOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD (1613–1680)