It's Academic

Dispositions outlined under the ACRL Framework suggest several ways students should gather, analyze, synthesize, create, and ultimately disseminate information. Too often these performative practices are limited by the language and parameters of the framework to purely academic contexts, however. While following the new framework, librarians typically guide students to interact with information as students only, thus limiting discussion of their eventual responsibilities as professionals, academic or otherwise. Outside departments of journalism, or those disciplines incorporating pedagogical coursework, students rarely learn how to curate information once they pivot toward a professional setting.

One field librarians overlook in this sense is healthcare. While medical and allied health departments often include communication coursework aimed specifically at preparing students to speak and interact with patients in their care, librarians are given little explicit direction in the framework for supplementing this instruction.

We are told learners who recognize that information has value should “see themselves as contributors to the information marketplace rather than only consumers of it” and “are inclined to examine their own information privilege.”[1] These respectable outcomes, however, tell us little about the ways newly-minted nurses, physical and occupational therapists, or athletic trainers, can transfer information and impart at least a fundamental level of information literacy to their patients. I fear we are doing too little to acknowledge, let alone instructionally address, the fact that these students will soon transition from seeking, vetting, and consuming information for themselves to serving a public eager to do the same for themselves.

We know that patients, caregivers, and others routinely seek supplemental healthcare information during times of sickness or injury. We also know that an abundance of misinformation is easy to find and often even impossible to avoid. As authorities in their field, healthcare professionals should feel comfortable providing valid information to patients. They should also recognize that patients are more and more likely to seek second opinions, alternative treatments, and all the knowledge they can possibly obtain.

It seems to me that librarians may provide a significant service by teaching healthcare students (and those in other disciplines as well) that they have an obligation to pass on to others both knowledge and the basic skills to discern, access, and acquire it. There is no frame entitled “Information as Obligation,” but in reality it will come with the job for many of the students we teach. Are we currently doing enough to prepare them for it?

[1] ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education, 2015, http://www.ala.org/acrl/standards/ilframework

PROTECTING PRIVACY: West Branch Chapter Spring Workshop

Thursday May 31, 2018 at Lycoming College in Williamsport

Join the West Branch Chapter of the Pennsylvania Library Association as they help you protect the privacy of your patrons, your community, and yourself. The PROTECTING PRIVACY workshop features dynamic keynote speakers and informative sessions on online privacy, identity theft & social media.

Workshop Schedule

8:30 – 9:00           Registration, breakfast

9:00 – 9:15           Welcome/Opening remarks

9:15 – 10:15         “The Human Firewall” Lisa Bock, Associate Professor, Pennsylvania College of Technology

10:15 – 10:30        Break

10:30 – 11:30        “The Current State of Fake News” Linda Beck, Adjunct Faculty, Harrisburg Area Community College and Lebanon Valley College

11:30 – 1:00          Lunch and Chapter business meeting

1:00 – 1:45           “Avoiding and Recovering from Identity Theft” Sara Weiser, PSECU Financial Education Manager

1:45 – 2:30           “Nothing to Hide: Youth and Privacy in a Digital World” Tess Wilson, LYNCS Librarian at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh

2:30 – 2:45           “The Intersection of Libraries and Privacy” Carrie Gardner Ph.D. Principal consultant, Clairmaxine

Registration is still open!

Registration fees: Members $40 Non-members $60 Student members $20 (breakfast & lunch included). PaLA will not issue refunds for cancellations or no-shows. Substitute attendees permitted with proper notice.  You can register at: http://www.palibraries.org/event/2018WBWorkshop

This project is made possible in part by a grant from the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the Pennsylvania Department of Education and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom Wolf, Governor, and through the College and Research Division (https://crdpala.org/ ) of Pennsylvania Library Association

This summer the College and Research Division (CRD) will pilot a virtual journal club as a benefit to all members.

A virtual journal club consists of online meetings where participants engage in discussion or critical appraisal of research publications and other professional literature in their field. Virtual journal clubs allow participants to build knowledge, improve professional and research skills, prioritize time for learning, and meet and interact with others. The CRD virtual journal club is designed to appeal to a wide variety of academic librarians and will discuss professional literature that covers a broad range of topics in or related to librarianship.

The first CRD virtual journal club series will meet June 19, July 17, and August 21 from 12:00 – 1:00.  Those interested in participating must register at https://goo.gl/forms/EfryCaluEWSsvClp1 by May 16.

When registering, you will have the opportunity to vote on the topic you would like to focus on in this summer’s sessions. Prior to the first meeting, registered participants will receive an email containing a link to the online Zoom meeting, a link to the open access article for discussion, and a list of discussion questions/prompts to consider.

If you have any questions or suggestions for the planning committee, please feel free to contact Carrie, Christina, or Melissa.

Carrie Bishop
Indiana University of Pennsylvania
814-938-1381
cbishop@iup.edu

Melissa Correll
Arcadia University
215-572-5828
correllm@arcadia.edu

Christina Riehman-Murphy
Penn State Abington
215-881-7911
cer20@psu.edu

It has been 175 years since the Order of Saint Augustine (OSA) established Villanova University. The major library for the University, Falvey Memorial Library, is a complex of three interconnected structures. Thought of as a single entity, the building hosts a variety of offices, classrooms and conference spaces designed to support various campus activities and academic services; some not typically affiliated with the traditional function of a library. This however has increasingly become the new norm for a lot of libraries, particularly on university campuses where space is at a premium. Learning support centers, IT and communication-related areas, innovation and makerspaces, even a virtual reality laboratory have been incorporated into the main university library at Villanova.

In the process, every nook and cranny has been evaluated for maximum utilization. Nevertheless, for multiple reasons and for many years, one space existed in a kind of bubble. Its location was considered remote and its purpose was obscure. Off the beaten path and inaccessible to many, “The Augustinian Room” was the home of the Augustinian Historical Institute (AHI) at Villanova University. Its situation recalls something from the musical “The Music Man.” In that show, the library building belongs to the town, but the books belong to the head-strong librarian. In the case of the AHI, the room is in the library and is the property of the University, but its contents are owned by the OSA.

Room 301 Falvey Hall, formerly the “The Augustinian Room,” is currently being used as student
study space and an occasional conference room. Photo taken by Justin D’Agnese, 25 August 17.

A few years ago, several Augustinian provinces in North America corporately agreed the books and other materials in the AHI collection be held collectively, to maintain ownership by the OSA. The collection would merely be housed by Villanova University in its library. Even though the AHI had a storied past, producing scholarship and even sponsoring archaeological digs, in recent years it had basically become a non-circulating research collection focused on the OSA. The Augustinian presence is still very strong at Villanova, as seen by the development of another institute for the study of the life and writings of St. Augustine, and other initiatives associated with the heritage of the OSA by the Office for Mission and Ministry at the University. A long-standing body of materials collected to gather scholarly resources relevant to the study of the OSA at one of the Augustinians’ flagship insititutions, what haunted the AHI was that it was too little known, including by folks at Villanova, and too little used by the scholarly community in general.

The OSA founded the University in the mid-19th century. The seminal AHI collection was originally in Riverdale, N.Y. and brought to Villanova in the early 1970s. It was in the library but maintained a separate identity until 2016. Integration began when items were identified in the Library’s catalog as: “On deposit from the Order of Saint Augustine as part of the Augustinian Historical Institute.” However, even this potential online visibility did not show it as anything more than more holdings. The greater solution is still getting worked out, through the active collaboration of the subject librarian who curates the collection, and the heads of special collections, access services, and cataloging. Cross-departmental cooperation and internal communication are key to integrating a distinctive collection, and this is an excellent example of the kind of protected but hidden special collection that are good for a library’s identity, but which vex librarians.