Keynote Speaker, Meredith Farkas
Meredith Farkas is the Distance Learning Librarian at Norwich University in Vermont. She was named a Library Journal Mover and Shaker in 2006.
Link to the full set of slides
First, Meredith explored the question: what is library 2.0?
- Web 1.0 is democratized access to information. The model of Web 1.0 is consumer-based and exclusive.
- Web 2.0 has democratized participation. In this new web environment, anyone and everyone can contribute to the development of the web.
According to an OCLC survey, use of the social network has gone up while use of catalog has gone down.
Our 2.0 state of mind, as Meredith puts it, should incorporate the following philosophies:
- Working toward change in order to meet our user’s needs.
- Radical Trust: trusting our users, their feedback, and their ability to tell us what they want and need in an open forum. Opening up comments on our catalog or web site is an example of radical trust.
- Getting rid of the culture of perfect (don’t try to create the perfect web 2.0 application). Web 2.0 requires experimentation and being open to trying new applications.
- Being aware of emerging technologies and opportunities
- Looking outside of the library world for applications, opportunities, and inspiration (museums, public libraries and institutions, etc.)
About knowing your users
- Ask students what they value. Don’t just jump on the bandwagon; ask students what they want and need out of library services.
- An example Farkas gave is using Facebook to have conversations with students about library collections, or to answer their questions. (Example: Bennington College librarian on Facebook). But don’t just create a Facebook account to be where your students are—create a Facebook account to be USEFUL where your students are.
- BECOME MORE TRANSPARENT. Reach students at point of need (when students are given an assignment). For example, think about having library presence on a class web site.
- Set up a blog to have conversations with patrons. This will illustrate that we do care about them and what they think and are willing to discuss their issues in an open forum.
- Virginia Commonwealth University Suggestion Blog: An example of a library Blog where comments are given and answered in a Blog format
- Ohio University Business Blog – provides help for specific assignments
- McMaster University Director Blog – although this is pretty buried on the site, it does allow open conversation
- Use Flickr to highlight historical collections and archival images. NCSU has its photo collections on Flickr
- University of Alberta has RSS feeds to highlight new books collections – students can sign up to receive alerts when new books for their favorite subject come in.
- Put links in relevant Wikipedia articles that point back to library collections. This is especially useful for archival/primary collections.
- If students aren’t using the library web site but are constantly on Facebook and Myspace, consider creating a library page on these sites.
- Example: University of Miami on Myspace. On this Myspace library page, you will find links to style guides and an Internet Messaging meebo widget. This is a perfect example of a service point on sites other than the library web site. The look/feel of the library’s Myspace page mirrors the library web site in order to maintain continuity.
- Norwich University has a library link on its WebCT course pages (this would be akin to integrating the library into SJSU’s Blackboard). This page explains the program
- Let users help build a resources Wiki (in a subject area). This offers a way to collaborate and share knowledge. It also offers an excellent hands-on exercise for library instruction.
- Allowing social bookmarking – PennTags: “members of the Penn Community can collect and maintain URLs, links to journal articles, and records in Franklin, our online catalog and VCat, our online video catalog.”
- McMaster Library Experience Wiki: allows comments from students
Develop a learning culture
- In-house continuing education like PLCMC’s Learning 2.0 Program; a discovery learning program designed to encourage staff to explore new technologies.
- Always put something out there, evaluate it, query users, and make changes accordingly.
- Such as a Wiki to collect knowledge from reference librarians.
- Use Facebook as an online rolodex (Farkas has a very active professional Facebook profile). Ask questions of your peers outside your institution.
- McMaster U “transforming our future”. This Blog discusses the process of transformation to 2.0. It allows staff to give input and celebrates the fact that good ideas can come from anyone and anywhere (like student workers). Have mechanism for feedback from everywhere in the library.
Nurture talent
- Appreciate your employee’s talent. Encourage their creativity and ideas.
- Involve staff in decision making and planning.
- Don’t just do it because it is the technology of the moment. Think about need; think about communicating internally.
- Understand that employees resist change.
- Post emails to Wiki to encourage use of it.
- Not everyone learns through documentation. Some need a training space. Offer help to those who are not comfortable with the technology.
- TIME: give staff time to embrace the change.
- Make keeping up a part of people’s job descriptions. Make it a part of one’s job so that they feel the institution values keeping up
On having parameters for Myspace, etc. – tread lightly. Do not invade a student’s privacy. Have policies for inappropriate comments. Give careful thought and planning to parameters in this space. Market your Myspace page: like have an Ipod raffle to encourage use of a Myspace page. Have policies of acceptable use (no ads, no off topic posts, no use of profanity). This has a need for moderation on a frequent basis.
Marketing: Web 2.0 offers much in terms of marketing outside of the library and traditional library venues. Getting students to use your Web 2.0 spaces requires aggressive marketing.
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