With the surge in electronic access to the library’s resources, there has been an ongoing discussion about the need for a physical library building. On a college or university campus, the library is a destination for its users. Students, faculty and staff go to the library for various reasons. Their usage makes the academic library a valuable learning space on campus. However, not much is known about how the library space contributes to user learning. In Assessing Library Space for Learning, chapters discuss library usage at academic institutions and how that usage is an integral part of the student learning experience. Included are the perspectives of an architect who is tasked with designing library spaces with learning in mind, a psychologist whose professional research focuses on the concept of place, and a dynamic group of academic librarians who are dedicated to making the library conducive to the needs of their learners. This book is a combination of theory, practical and research based chapters with an overall focus on the intersection of library space and learning. The authors demonstrate the importance of the library space in our users’ lives. In addition, the authors discuss the importance of determining ways to learn how library space contributes to user learning. Readers will gain an understanding of the library space as a valuable learning space and the steps librarians need to take to assess learning in the academic library.

Four articles cover collections care; historical research methods; historical markers, signage, and public programming online; and digital repository. Books reviews cover museums and innovation, collections and collecting practices, special collections, constructions of knowledge, and digital rights management and digital repositories.

This guide for the evaluation of school libraries both in practice and in research covers analysis, techniques, and research practices for conducting evaluations of curriculum, collections, facilities, and library personnel performance. This new edition of an important tool for school librarians and administrators describes how and why to conduct evaluations of school libraries and explains the evaluation of curriculum, collections, facilities, student programs and services, and library personnel. The results can be used for strategic planning, curriculum development, and conducting action research. New topics to this edition include explorations of community, faculty, students, and school library research, discussing how to bring all stakeholders to the table when evaluating the school library program, personnel and services, and the collection and facilities. Other new topics include information on high-stakes testing, multiculturalism, special needs students, advocacy, school librarians' self-evaluation, dispositions for learning, and evidence-based practice. This title will be of value to new school librarians in assessing how their program compares to others, as well as to school library professors, who will find this book useful in management and administration courses.

Assessment is essential to describe a library’s value and to inform decision-making. Using the four key assessment components of design, data collection, data analysis, and dissemination, Assessing Academic Library Performance: A Handbook provides strategies and case studies for performing four different types of assessments: Service assessments for the library’s outward and inward facing services that either help library users or other library employees to help users. These assessments focus on providing and improving how things are done to better serve others. Resources assessments for the physical and virtual resources that the library has in its holdings or to which it provides access. Resources are the reason libraries exist as they help patrons in instructional and research pursuits. Space assessments for physical and online library spaces. These assessments help ensure that spaces meet user needs. Personnel relationship assessments look at how library employees interact with each other. as library professionals. While not for evaluation or advancement purposes, these types of assessments provide information on what library employees can do to improve their relationships with one another. Each section has information on conducting each aspect of libraries followed by three examples to illustrate how assessment is used to support descriptions of library value and to help library employees make decisions that are critical to library improvement.

Growing student numbers, increased student expectations, new approaches to learning, and fast-paced technological advances all contribute to the need for universities to take a more strategic approach to their buildings, including formal and informal learning spaces. Exploring Informal Learning Space in the University addresses the issue of informal learning space from the perspectives of a comprehensive range of stakeholders, including students, academics, facilities managers, university managers, IT managers, architects, interior designers, and librarians. With contributions from a range of experts, practitioners and academics around the world, this book uses a combination of case studies and theoretical discussion to explore the rationale and theory of informal learning space alongside the practicalities of its planning, development and utilization. The volume is at once ambitious and pragmatic, combining innovative thinking with a firm awareness of practicalities, including the varied constraints faced by universities and the need to work in tandem with broader strategies. Advocating broad collaboration at both planning and delivery stage, the result is essential reading for anyone involved in the delivery of learning space provision – from architects and designers, to university managers and strategists. It will also be of particular interest to academics, researchers and postgraduate students engaged in the study of library & information science or higher education policy and strategy.

New Methods of Teaching and Learning in Libraries is a one-stop introduction to the role of technology in teaching and learning in libraries. Emerging models of library instruction and library support of instruction will be presented. Increasingly, librarians are called upon to partner with educational faculty and community members to deliver content and support innovative educational initiatives. Since libraries reach across academic disciplines and provide resources for the greater community, they are uniquely positioned to provide services and technologies that are available to many, bringing innovation out of silos and facilitating innovation in the community. Chapters covered include: · Active Learning in Collaborative Spaces · Creating Library Spaces that Foster Creation · Teaching Beyond the Library Walls · Teaching Skills for Career Success · Multimedia in Library Education · The Future of Mobile Libraries · Teaching and Learning in the Library of the Future Innovative programs will be highlighted and practical examples will be provided.

The consortial environment provides librarians with new ways to manage collections at their home institutions. Academic libraries in Ohio have been participating in OhioLINK since 1988, and the consortium has had an effect on shaping local collections for more than one decade. While each institution pursues its own collection management strategy, the shared resources and delivery system provided through OhioLINK influence local collections profoundly. What has been the effect? This work is a collection of articles assessing local collections within a consortial environment. The authors assess collections from their own vantage points, considering such diverse factors as cost, regional depositories, book reviews, and faculty input. The influence of consortial ties in shaping local collections is a common thread throughout the work. This book was published as a special issue of Collection Management.

Written specifically to address the library's role in education, this book provides guidance on performing assessment at academic institutions that will serve to improve teaching effectiveness and prove your library's impact on student learning outcomes—and thereby demonstrate your library's value. Academic libraries are increasingly being asked to demonstrate their value as one of many units on campus, but determining the outcomes of an academic library within the context of its collegiate setting is challenging. This book explains and clarifies the practice of assessment in academic institutions, enabling library managers to better understand and explain the impact of the library on student learning outcomes, teaching effectiveness, and research productivity. Providing essential information for all college and university librarians, this volume discusses and summarizes the outcomes of research that has been conducted to investigate assessment within the context of higher education. This updated second edition incorporates additional research, examines new trends, and covers groundbreaking advances in digital assessment tools as well as the changes in the amount and forms of data utilized in the assessment process. The chapters address assessment from a campus setting and present data that demonstrate the value of the library within that setting in terms of learning, research, and overall impact. In sum, the book presents librarians with up-to-date, practical guidelines for planning and conducting assessment.

As technology advances and the skills required for the future workforce continue to change rapidly, academic libraries have begun to expand the definition of information literacy and the type of library services they provide to better prepare students for the constantly-developing world they will face upon graduation. More than teaching the newest technologies, information literacy is expanding to help students develop enduring skills such as critical thinking, creativity, problem solving, communication, teamwork, and more. Innovation and Experiential Learning in Academic Libraries: Meeting the Needs of 21st Century Students addresses the multitude of ways that academic librarians are collaborating with faculty and helping students develop these enduring skills by developing and integrating active and experiential learning approaches into teaching activities. This book is divided into three sections. The first section explores the role that library leaders play in supporting and advocating for innovation in information literacy and library services. The second section features case studies from librarians who are implementing novel and multidisciplinary approaches to information literacy and innovative services, such as maker scholarship, digital humanities, undergraduate research experiences, and new active learning strategies. These case studies also highlight how the COVID-19 pandemic has transformed teaching and learning in academic libraries. The final section looks to the future, providing guidance to information professionals on the issues and technologies that will drive transformations of information literacy in the coming years, such as artificial intelligence and new information literacy applications. As such, library administrators, academic librarians, information literacy practitioners, and technologists will benefit from this book.

Library services are dependent on technology tools in order to host, distribute, and control content. Today, many libraries are creating, testing, and supporting their own tools to better suit their particular communities. Developing In-House Digital Tools in Library Spaces is a pivotal reference source with the latest empirical research on organizational issues, examples of library automation, case studies of developing library products, and assessment of the impact and usefulness of in-house technologies. Featuring coverage on a broad range of topics such as linked data, mobile applications, and web analytics, this book is ideally designed for academicians, researchers, students, and librarians seeking current research on technological products and their development in library use.