Outreach in Reference Services: Capitalizing in Emerging Technologies Columbia Reference Symposium March 10, 2005 Kathryn Shaughnessy Instructional Services.

Outreach in Reference Services:Capitalizing in Emerging Technologies

Columbia Reference Symposium

March 10, 2005

Kathryn Shaughnessy

Instructional Services Librarian

Reference Outreach: the Mission

University’s Mission:• Leveraging Technology

– Academic Computing Initiative – Infrastructure– St. John’s Portal and WebCT CMS

• Social Justice• Student Engagement

Reference Mission:• Instruction• Information Literacy• Outreach to Faculty• Equity of service for DL & on-campus

Reference Outreach: the Mission plan

Using technological innovations for outreach:

• RSS• Podcasts• Wikis• Blogs

Need to research, build up skills/resources

Outreach by modeling use of the technologies

Reference Outreach: the Mission Allies

Allies in the developing Outreach innovations

– Library faculty & Staff– E-services department– DLIS– Distance Learning– Center for Teaching and Learning

Reference Outreach: RSS

RSS is…Rich Site SummaryReally Simple Syndication

A growing method of delivering text & audio information– Time-shifted or real-time notification of web-site update– Self-selected or personalized syndication

• An informational broadcast in “lite-XML” or RDF

• Users access RSS feeds at their convenience via aggregator or Feed-reader


RSS timeline…• 1997: Dave Winer (Userland) develops “scriptingNews” format

• 1999: Userland & Netscape “RSS0.91” continue to develop and improve upon formatting versions, simplifying and standardizing the XML

• 2000: RSS 1.0 developed by Dornfest (O’Reilly) using RDF and namespaces; DW/USerland develop xml version of “RSS 0.92”

• 2002: MetaWeblog API uses Winer’s RSS 0.92 with XML-RPC for Blogging delivery; DW designs xml-based RSS 2.0

• 2003: RSS 2.0 Specs released through Harvard under a Creative Commons license

• 2004: “iPodders” search for a way to retrieve old blogs and audiofiles – develop RSS (Winer) and podcast software (Curry) for podcast delivery

From RSS at Harvard Law, by Dave Winer & Hobson & Holtz


RSS evolution …

• News delivery

• Website updates

• Blogging : Personal / information sharing

• Podcast delivery

• Education & Research


RSS for Professional Development and Informed Outreach

Put together training program on RSS, readers and provided some basic pertinent feeds:

• RSS feeds from Professional Associations:

ACRLog: http://acrlblog.org/index.php?feed=rss2

• RSS feeds from Professional Journal-Blogs

Library Journal Tech Blog: http://www.libraryjournal.com/LJTechblog.xml

• RSS feeds from other practicing librarians

Stephen Bell (Academic) : http://keptup.typepad.com/academic/atom.xml

• RSS feeds from Vendors/Innovators

OCLC Lorcan Blog: http://orweblog.oclc.org/index.xml


Developing RSS in St. John’s Libraries for Outreach

– Feeds for finding/compiling podcast lectures

– Scholarly Communication/Open Access journal updates

– Library News/Program updates (webpage)

– New book updates (OPAC)

– ProQuest (Currently Business) & Ebsco (in Development)

– Information sharing among professionals


Practical Questions:

– Investment of Money: minimal• Computer access• Aggregator:

– free or fee-based– Desktop or web-based– through academic portal

Newsgator (www.Newsgator.com) &

Bloglines (www.bloglines.com) seem most popular now;

a reader directory is available through dmoz


Practical Questions:

– Investment of time: • to learn aggregator• to build up *your* collection of sites

– Personal interest– Professional development– Reference-based

• to weed out less-helpful sites over time


• Strengths of using RSS in libraries (worth the time/effort):

– Richer resource-base for research/reference/outreach

– Facilitates keeping up in your outreach-specialty field

– Facilitates keeping abreast of news within your organization

– Convenience of checking all sites at once, on your own time

– Sharing/Learning from other library professionals

– Keep up with developments in other technologies • podcasts, wikis, blogs

Reference Outreach: Podcasts

A podcast is…

A growing method of delivering audio information– Time-shifted– Place-shifted

• An informational “broadcast” saved as an audio file (mp3) and distributed via the web (strictly speaking via RSS)

• Listeners download/listen at their convenience via desktop/laptop or on a personal player


Podcasting timeline…

• August 2004: “iPodders” search for a way to retrieve old blogs and audiofiles – develop RSS (Winer) and podcast software (Curry)

• July 2005: iTunes supports/distributes podcasts, get 1 million subscribers in first 2 days

• August 2005: 8,000 podcasts, 6 million listeners

• December 2005: Podcast selected as “Word of the Year” by editors of New Oxford American Dictionary: "a digital recording of a radio broadcast or similar program, made available on the Internet for downloading to a personal audio player"

• January 2006: iTunesU offers “free” courseware distribution

Hobson and Holtz Report, 8/4/2005 http://forimmediaterelease.biz/index.php/weblog/2005/08/05/ )Oxford University Press, US website, http://www.oup.com/us/brochure/NOAD_podcast/?view=usa


Podcasting evolution …

• Personal / information sharing

• Business applications

• Religious groups

• Education


Duke Report (2004 - 2005) Noted education benefits:

• playback of difficult content/material, especially in sciences

• multiple repetitions for students who have difficulty with English

• review/study class materials while multitasking (e.g.: commuting or exercising).

• inspired students to create podcasts outside of the classroom; noted increase of “frequency and depth of student interaction,” especially in language & music courses

• increased communication between faculty, library and IT; led to better, collaborative planning, both within the university and with other institutions.


Current Uses of Podcasting in Higher Education (2005-2006)

– Classroom Lectures for current students (U of New S. Wales)

– Class and Guest Lectures for Alumni (Stanford)

– Scholarly Communication (Princeton & U. of Florida)

– Audio tours & newscasts (Purdue & U. of Western Ontario)

– Admissions & Orientation materials (Mansfield & Drexel)

– Outreach to potential students (Peterson’s Directory)


Library of Congress http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/results.php?cat=2&mode=a

FirstGov http://firstgov.gov/Topics/Reference_Shelf/Libraries/Podcasts.shtml

OYEZ Supreme Court Podcasts http://www.oyez.org/podcast/

WhiteHouse Radio Addresses: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/radio/

NASA http://science.nasa.gov/podcast.htm

AAAS Science podcast http://www.sciencemag.org/about/podcast.dtl

UNICEF http://www.unicef.org/videoaudio/video_podcast.html

BBC http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/downloadtrial/

NPR http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_directory.php


Finding New Podcast Resources:

• Podcast Directories

• List-servs

• RSS feeds from blogs and your favorite websites

• Suggestions from others


“Programming” Podcasts captured by the St. John’s Libraries

– Poetry Readings: Poets Maria Mazziotti Gillan

and Jane Augustine

– Author visit: Richard Vetere “Third Miracle”

– Guest Lectures: Italian Consul General and diplomat, Minister Antonio Bandini on “Italy and World Diplomacy”

– Student essay winners, e.g.: Service Learning Essay

– Title III Project: Colloquia & meetings


Podcasts in the Department / Classroom

– DLIS Academic Library class: Dr. Becker’s Graduate course lecture & discussion

– Guest Lectures: McKeever Chair, Paul Lauritzen’s Lecture

on “The Commodification of Education”

– Distance Learning: Orientation to using WebCT, library resources; Pre-class lecture for “Just-in-time ”quiz & discussion

– English Student Projects: Graduate Poetry final


Instruction-related Podcasts

– Audio Tours: of physical library & library website

– Database Tutorials: Audio guide to supplement current online and paper-based tutorials

– Distributed Learning: Greetings from director, Orientation to using CMS, Intranet and/or information portal; Podcasts of instructional workshops, for patrons who cannot attend during instruction sessions

– Professional Development: Podcasts of professional / association meetings; podcast of information sessions for fellow faculty/staff; Continuing Education lectures/workshops


Legal Questions:

– Release form for electronic recording• Library developed one, approved by counsel

– Clarify distribution to lecturer• On main website: available to all• On WebCT / SJ Central: Although password protected,

once in digital format it is relatively easy to duplicate.


• Strengths of using external/internal podcasts:

– facilitates development of information literacy and life-long learning

– faculty contact re: information literacy throughout the course

– enriches primary-resource reference base

– coach vs. sage – facilitating/motivating individual learner inquiry and peer discussion

– engages different styles of learning

– assists low-vision and ESL patrons


Some Recent/Relevant coverage of Podcasting in Academia

• Chronicle of Higher Education: “Lectures on the Go” (10/28/2005) http://chronicle.com/weekly/v52/i10/10a03901.htm (Subscription req’d)and “Apple Releases Free 'iTunes U' Software to Colleges for Coursecasting “ (01/25/2006) Accessible for free. http://chronicle.com/free/2006/01/2006012501t.htm

• Duke University. “Duke University iPod First Year experience evaluation Report” (June 2005) Accessible electronically http://cit.duke.edu/pdf/ipod_initiative_04_05.pdf

• US News & World Report. (From the 10/17/05 print issue)http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/articles/051017/17elearn.htm

• Educause article on Podcasting (December 2005) http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/erm0561.pdf

Reference Outreach: Websites, Blogs & Wikis

Social/collaborative trends in education

– For Students: • learn best from each other• learn to work together• greater engagement in the task

– For Faculty: • learn to be facilitator• E-portfolio for long-term assessment

– For Libraries: • learn to model life-long learning• Facilitates hands-on “evaluation”

Reference Outreach: Websites, Blogs & Wikis

Using Website development, blogs and wikis for outreach:

– Model use of instruction via library instruction• Reference desk wiki• Global Master’s program resources

– Set up “resource libraries” for these technologies• For in-house reference and instruction• For outreach to patron/faculty

– Offer collaboration with specialists: • Encourage/model life-long learning• Facilitate creation of assignments that provide new

evaluative insight

Reference Outreach: the Mission Allies

Allies in executing Outreach innovations

– E-services department – Library faculty & Staff– DLIS– Distance Learning– Center for Teaching and Learning– Center for Technology Education

Reference Outreach: Using Technologies

Please contact me with comments or ideas:

– Kathryn Shaughnessy, x1454

[email protected]

St. John’s University

Augustine Library 304

Instructional Services Lab

Outreach in Reference Services: Capitalizing in Emerging Technologies Columbia Reference Symposium March 10, 2005 Kathryn Shaughnessy Instructional Services.

Documents

rss rss timeline

reference outreach

rss winer

winers rss

rss pract

outreach feeds

rss2 rss feeds

xml version of rss