NorCal IUG November 2017

This past Friday I carpooled down to Santa Clara to attend the 2017 NorCal IUG meeting. Two of my coworkers were presenting on their recent project of updating the public catalog, our WebPAC, so I wanted to support, as well as learn some new things about managing library systems.

Beautiful day to visit Santa Clara University with the peeps for NorCal IUG! #librarylyfe @librarymail @grandmothersbraid

A post shared by kelci m kelci (@bibliobebe) on Nov 17, 2017 at 9:40am PST

The NorCal IUG agenda covered diverse topics and the presentations were informative and inspiring. From Bill Schickling, rep from Innovative, I learned that Innovative is looking to release automatic renewals in Q2 of 2018 probably, and he summarized Innovative's development strategy as a choice between
Build it?
Buy it?
Partner?
which can be parlayed across most industries. Bill gave the group updates about Innovative's future as a company and the PPORs (product plan of record) for Sierra and Polaris.

The individual presentations were great. From Gem Stone-Logan I got pumped up to try scripting in Python. She herself has only been using Python for about a year and is self taught, and encouraged the use of the active listserv and Google in general. Her presentation, which is available on her website, gave a basic roadmap on how to get started. I really feel encouraged to try!

View out of a window near the large conference room on the 3rd floor of the SCU library. 

Next up was John Boggs, who mostly talked about automating tasks using MySQL as a way of saying "if I can do it, you can do it." I don't have experience with MySQL but my take away with Boggs's presentation, as well as Stone-Logan's, is that a lot of the work of systems librarians is repetitive--report pulling every month, for example--so the smart thing is to automate these tasks. And there is "more than one way to skin a cat" when it comes to automating.

Rounding out the presentations were Justine Withers and Anders Lyon, my colleagues from Gleeson. They gave the attendees an overview of our funky system of running Encore and WebPAC from the same interface (keyword goes to Encore, and every other type of search goes to our WebPAC, which we call Ignacio). They gave an overview of the aims of their project refreshing the interface, the function audit they performed, and how they are building buy-in and communicating with stakeholders. Although I already knew a bit about their project, I learned a lot--I thought it was especially wild that they discovered a pretty nice looking beta WebPAC sitting in the sandbox, already branded with USF logos and refreshed! I look forward to the day they give a similar presentation to library staff.

After lunch we got a chance to tour the SCU Automated Retrieval System (ARS). This system occupies where the old library once stood, and the current library is a new construction.

Library futures pic.twitter.com/MxQUnaPHjm

— gina (@librarymail) November 17, 2017

In the afternoon I attended the Circulation and resource sharing break out session. I learned of a lot of new types of collections public libraries are lending (hot spots, gardening tools, Chromebooks...), as well as new patron policies and types (forgiving fines, teacher p-types, etc.). That type of discussion was a refreshing nuts and bolts view of what libraries do that have a direct impact on the lives of their patrons, which is a far cry from the higher level topics at some academic library conferences. We also discussed the loss of the CSUs from Link+, and how the loss of the Claremont colleges may have been even a bigger blow. The conversation flowed freely, was respectful, and was well facilitated. I took special delight in the fact this session was held in SCU's bibliographic instruction lab (the equivalent to our Electronic Classroom) so I got to see what type of technology they use, how the room is configured, and how the room is secured. I was surprised to learn someone stole all the memory out of the iMacs in that lab at some point!

Picture of one group table of iMacs gathered around a wall-mounted screen. 

Picture of SCU's electronic classroom, with empty wired tables in middle, podium at front, projector screen at front, and one group table of iMacs gathered around a wall-mounted screen. 

Another picture of SCU's electronic classroom, with multiple group tables with iMacs and wall-mounted screens. iMacs sit down in a recessed area to create a better line-of-sight to instructor. 

All in all, I spent a wonderful day in the Santa Clara Library meeting with colleagues in the field and coworkers from back home. The campus is gorgeous and spread out, while the library--only about 10 years old--is spacious and well conceived. It is a model example of the learning commons framework.

Thoughts on HR Workshop: Avoiding Bias in the Hiring Process

Last Friday (September 15) I attended a workshop put on by the HR department called Avoiding Bias in the Hiring Process. Mikael Villalobos gave the presentation, which was totally interactive, thought-provoking, and informative. My main motivation for attending this workshop was to increase my awareness of diversity issues and to help me recruit student assistants in the most equitable method possible.

I learned that bias happens because each of us is a product of our experiences, which have conditioned us to hold certain beliefs. We cannot rid ourself of bias completely. Accepting the fact we all are biased allows each one of us to have an authentic conversation about it, and can only help us work to mitigate bias.

We did an exercise where Mikael flashed photos of different people on the projection screen, and we jotted down the first thoughts that came to mind. I was embarrassed of the adjectives I wrote down, words such as woman, happy, black, old, white, sly, demure, professional. I learned that, you know what though? Those thoughts are natural. They are my observations.

Observations are fine. However, I can probe my thought process to determine if I am creating a story in my head around those observations based on my socialized values. If so, that story is bias. If I make a hiring decision based on that story I've created, I am enforcing my bias.

On the other hand, by exercising awareness I can go through the process of interrupting the circuit between observation, story, and action which results in enforcing bias. This can cause me to experience dissonance, which happens if I take a step back and acknowledge the system of inequalities/marginalization that clashes with my socialized values. Dissonance can be disorienting and uncomfortable, but it is also my learning edge, and is very valuable!

To apply the theory to the hiring process, I can employ interviewing approaches that mitigate bias. For example, I can ask interview questions that challenge or confirm the "dilettante/renaissance" persona of a candidate; I can conduct reference checks to ask questions about qualifications rather than creating my own story about qualifications; I can set up role playing exercises to allow the candidate to actively demonstrate whether or not they are able to perform a certain job duty.

In total, it feels liberating to recognize the bias we all carry, and I am already able to put new thought processes in action that short-circuit those stories I tell based on my observations. I feel less guilt while also feel more capable of encountering people from different backgrounds than myself with an open mind.

By Dietmar Rabich - Self-photographed, CC BY-SA 4.0

Ebsco Study on Usability for Students with Print Disabilities

Yesterday a group of us at work got together to participate in the webinar EBSCO Accessibility Study on User Experience, presented by Jill Power, Ebsco technical product manager.

This webinar was not only enlightening regarding the ways in which students with print disabilities use Ebsco products, but in general how they do research, navigate graphic user interfaces, and what tools they use to do so. 

Here is a brief digest of the findings:

• WCAG compliance ≠ accessibility 

• Accessibility ≠ WCAG compliance 

(For example, strident use of alt tags with images can impede the use of a webpage if they do not bring value to the visually impaired user. Ask yourself the question, what value do these alt tags bring, or are they repetitive?)

• No vision users use screen readers

• Low vision users use magnification and text to speech 

• Accessibility a journey, not a destination--there is always room for continue improvement 

• Ebsco Discovery Service (Fusion at my library) provided a positive experience for the participants in the study. The ease of doing some tasks should be improved, but overall, users could get what they needed and trusted the academic scope of the content. 

• Manual testing should still be employed, regardless of advances in automated testing. Each user drew on different tools and techniques and insight into those behaviors was enlightening. 

One visually impaired student said she really likes Google because the result display is high contrast and very well organized. I think as librarians we tend to think of reasons to use or not use Google for different reasons (mostly related to the content of the search results, questions of credibility of results, and mercenary driving forces like Google ad revenue). However, the Google result page still displays dark blue, dark green, or dark grey text on a white background (high contrast), unlike many sites that have switched to light grey text; furthermore, the Google result page is not muddied with floating ads or pop-ups urging viewers to sign up for an email list or another call to action, which often confuses the screen readers that visually impaired users employ.  

Screenshot of Google result page from August 3, 2017

The takeaways:

• Focus on accessibility rather than compliance

• Take a hands-on approach

• Remember the student's goal (write the paper)

• Consider the overall experience 

Some free tools:

• Accessibility tools that come in Mac OS 

• WAVE browser plug-in 

• NAVD screen reader -- free alternative to JAWS

After the webinar, a few of us discussed the webinar's takeaways in context of our workplace, and our role vs. that of the office of Student Disability Services. Sounds like there is interest in hosting the SDS folks for a library presentation to find out more! 

My own personal takeaway is to look into changing the text color on my blogs and website to improve the contrast--I am guilty of using grey text for both! 

Reflections on Fake News Webinar

As many have pointed out, it's unfortunate that the term "fake news" has entered the daily lexicon only following the 2016 US presidential election because fake news isn't new and is only a small piece of the information literacy equation. Nonetheless it presents an opportune moment for information professionals to claim a leadership role in fighting an issue that is of mainstream attention. For these reasons I was happy to participate in a webinar through ALA yesterday with some colleagues. It was called Fake News, Real Concerns: Developing Information-Literate Students Workshop and was presented by Donald A. Barclay, who wrote a popular article on the topic earlier this year.

Barclay proposed thinking about the 1964 release of the Surgeon General's Report on Smoking and Health within the context of our current information landscape: how might have social media, the internet, memes, and predatory journals diffused the credibility of the report and waylaid a major public health improvement effort?

This ended up being a great context through which to examine the fake news issue of the current year, because we are so used to living with social media and living in an information glut that it is sometimes hard to see the forest for the trees. It is important to inspect all contemporary driving forces and economic motivators of media influence on public opinion when evaluating information.

I had some very concrete takeaways from this webinar, which I live-tweeted.

"Fake news" is:
lying
mercenary (sell papers, ad revenue)
propaganda
clickbait (can be mercenary or propaganda)
humor
not new!#LibFNRC

— ₭elci M. ₭elci (@bibliobebe) July 27, 2017

What can we do?
address emotional component
teach the tricks
use the framework
partner with allies #fightfakenews #LibFNRC

— ₭elci M. ₭elci (@bibliobebe) July 27, 2017

When Barclay says "teach the tricks," he means these:

And when he says use the ACRL Framework, he points out that "credibility and applicability of most information is not an either/or proposition." He advises to rate the level of the stakes in order to gauge risk corresponding to the amount of time it takes to ascertain the "truth" of a claim.

Barclay also suggested using the concept of the Dunning-Kruger effect as a model for an in-class activity to expose students to their own overestimation of their ability to evaluate information. To engage students during a library instruction session, show students something that most would think is credible (for example martinlutherking.org), poll them, and then deconstruct why it is not credible according to the "tricks" above and the framework. It will make them realize how scrutinizing they need to be because their gullibility is exposed. I am looking forward to using this in some of the instruction sessions I will co-teach this fall!

Libraries and Accessibility for Print Disabilities

I have been working with the campus communication and marketing office to revise our print user guides, and I became concerned about the accessibility of the back panel (featured to the left) for people with print disabilities. Print disabilities are types of disability that affect people who are blind, vision impaired, dyslexic, etc. Due to the low contrast of white on yellow, people with vision impairment could not read the text. While the campus office of communication and marketing attempted to address my concern in one of the revisions, it became clear they do not employ standards of accessibility for the university's print marketing materials.

Accessibility is a diversity and inclusion issue. What campus departments are responsible for accessibility outside the office of student disability services or academic support services? Surely the web services department is a stakeholder, but what about the office of communication and marketing, IT, or the library?

This question got me interested in the issue of libraries and accessibility for print disabilities. To continue my education on the topic, I watched a video from the Spring 2017 CNI Project Briefings meeting called Advancing Accessibility through Libraries.

Advancing Accessibility through Libraries from CNI Video Channel on Vimeo.

One accessibility issue facing institutions of higher education and their libraries involve print disabilities--making course texts and library materials accessible to students with print disabilities. This is in addition to many other concerns, chief among them audio accessibility, which comes into play with captioning videos and providing transcripts for live panels and discussions; however, this is a specific topic for another post.

Image from Brailleworks.com

When it comes to providing reliable machine-readable text for students with print disabilities, texts must be scanned with OCR and then fine-tuned so that a DAISY Talking Book or the JAWS software, as two examples, can read the text aloud to the student. In the past, in my department (the Reference & Research Services Department), vision impaired students were often limited to doing research in the full text databases because the texts could be read by JAWS or the built-in database tool. If the student wished to consult a print book, they would need to build in extra time for the Student Disability Services office to scan the book or chapter.

In the CNI presentation, Laura C. Wood points out it is important to build collaboration within institutional departments (e.g. student disability services and library) as well as between institutions. The future may hold some exciting partnerships building shared repositories of accessible materials (e.g. scans of most used text books or files containing captioning of videos), which could eliminate double efforts. Also in the CNI presentation, Laura C. Wood communicated Beth Sandore Namachchivaya's part in Beth's absence, which reports on an exciting project between HathiTrust, Internet Archive, and University of Illinois to offer DAISY files for some of the textual items held in HathiTrust. The project is just getting going but it seems like it will be able to avoid copyright issues by nesting the DAISY files under the texts, which will not be viewable in general searches, and only available to print disabled readers when they are logged in.

Next week a group of us from the library will be participating in the EBSCO Accessibility Study on User Experience webinar. Considering that we subscribe to EDS as our discovery service and have therefore shifted to Ebsco as a vendor for many of our databases, I am glad they conducted this user study and very much look forward to seeing what they found out. 

The Road Paved by the Removal of Bound Periodicals

They removed a window from the 2nd floor of the library and are lifting book carts wrapped in cellophane with a wheel loader forklift down to the plaza. This apparently is the efficient way a company like Iron Mountain takes possession of mass quantities of bound volumes for storage. And their workers are efficient—the large team hustles to get the carts filled, moved down, and then loaded into the truck. While us librarians and library assistants enjoy the luxury of quiet summer at the University. Information professionals vs. manual laborers.

Of all the topics around which the academic activity of professional librarianship takes place, why are the matters of the physical library the least discussed yet are the ones that occupy my mind most? Am I low minded, have not yet cut my librarian teeth?

It is simply momentous to stroll into work and pass by dozens of carts of bound periodicals wrapped in cellophane placidly waiting for transport.

The most momentous is to come: the demolition of the stacks that formerly held the periodicals, the construction of new classrooms and "huddle"/group study rooms, the movement of three discrete departments into the library.

I take in the physical cues of my work environment hungrily and poetically, looking for signals indicating fortune or predicting turmoil. My focus is always on the change in the library, and I suppose I see the path plowed by this change opening the possibilities for the "future of libraries": more meeting, more instruction, more collaboration, more technology; the confluence of campus services to make a one stop shop for students.

A research question for myself as I cut my librarian teeth: what profound influence does technology have on vending library services to our clientele? Beyond the ways in which and reasons I fastidiously manage the computer lab. (For example: what about the assumption students bring their own laptops—or are able to bring their own laptops—to library instruction sessions or to the library in general. Where is the data and what is the impact?) CIT seems to think everyone is BYOL, but I think students find it inconvenient to lug a laptop to campus due to the increase in student commute times due to rent prices in the City and space issues on campus.

To think about penetrating this question, get to the bottom of it: user testing and user surveys vs. going out on a limb in the name of innovation—how are they really using the library's electronic resources (including the website), where is the intersection of socio-economic class and the need for access to technological tools (student demographics).

Regardless of it all, the efficacy and immediacy of servicing an article request via instant message during my reference desk shift this past Saturday hit on the creature comforts of keeping physical holdings in-house. On the other side, the glaring price we pay for innovation, for embracing change: having to wait a couple days or weeks to get that 1968 article from Adult Leadership through document delivery/interlibrary loan... because there are betters ways to utilize our meager space than house massive print collections in the 21st century.