Ask a Librarian Blog

Ask a Librarian is Closed for Labor Day

Just a quick reminder, Ask a Librarian’s Collaborative Desk will be closed Monday, September 3rd for Labor Day.

Add comment August 31st, 2007

Academic Desk Kickoff!

Only 6 more days until the academic desk goes live!

On Tuesday, September 4th, all academic libraries should check the “academic desk” option when logging in between the hours of 10 AM and 4 PM Monday to Friday. The check box to log in to the academic desk will not be available until Tuesday. When you are staffing the academic desk do not check the box for collaborative, only academic.

Collaborative desk staff will still check the collaborative desk option, as they currently do. Academic libraries staffing outside of the academic desk hours will also check the collaborative desk option.

Libraries staffing local desks outside of their collaborative or academic desk hours will check their library’s name when logging in.

We have some answers to frequently asked questions here:
http://www.tblc.org/askalibrarianblog/2007/08/15/academic-desk-kicks-off-september-4th/

Please let us know if you have any other questions.

Add comment August 29th, 2007

What do our users think?

In August we completed our third user survey this year. How did we stack up? 78% of users loved us! I am going through a stack of compl i ments. The following screen names were thanked by name:

Bella, Cathy, Chad, Louis (twice!!), Jorge, Kerrie, Lora, Louise, Mrs Arlene, Pat, Ms Cherly, BarbraA, Neil, Ann.

We had comments like, “From this one experience, it was all I needed, and have placed you in my favorites for now, thanks.” and “I don’t believe you can improve on something that needs no more improvement. This is the best service available for us patrons. Thank you.”

Overall, it was very positive.

Here are some highlights:

- 75% of users were first time users of the service.
- 90% connected with a librarian
- 69% of users said their question was answered completely (slightly up from last year)
- 50% of users were shown web-based resources and 68% felt they would be able to use those same resources on the web on their own later. (slightly down from last year)
- 75.5% of users felt they would be more comfortable doing online research in the future because of Ask a Librarian.
- Over 90% would probably use Ask a Librarian again.

How are they hearing about us? Over 50% of users find Ask a Librarian based on word of mouth from a librarian or your website. So, please continue to talk about the service to users and place the Ask a Librarian link predominantly on your web site.

Add comment August 21st, 2007

Academic Desk Kicks off September 4th

As many of you already know beginning on September 4th, Ask a Librarian will have a two main desks - the Collaborative and an Academic Desk. Below are some frequently asked questions about the the implementation of the new Academic Desk.

1. What is an Academic Desk?

The Academic Desk is an academic queue that will be staffed by academic librarians within Ask a Librarian. As Ask a Librarian has grown, the one queue system has become too busy to staff efficiently. With the academic queue, questions from college students will enter the software from their library’s entry point and enter a separate queue creating two more manageable queues for librarians staffing the desk.

2. Did Ask a Librarian need an Academic Desk?

After the Regional Meetings in 2006, we heard from our participants - “we want an Academic Queue.” In 2006, we formed an Academic Taskforce to evaluate the need and feasibility of a separate queue. The taskforce felt strongly that Ask a Librarian needed a separate queue and it was feasible; therefore, they recommended an Academic Desk begin in the Fall as a pilot project. The desk will officially open on September 4 (The Tuesday after Labor Day).

3. What hours will it be open?

The desk will be open from 10am-4pm EST Monday-Friday starting September 4th. When the academic desk is closed, users will be directed to the general collaborative queue. There are academic libraries staffing the Collaborative Desk during these closed hours.

4. How will users find the desk?

Users will not have to make any conscious decisions about who will help them. The software will route users to the Academic Desk automatically when they enter through their academic institution’s custom portal, unless the institution is currently staffing their local desk or the academic desk is closed. If a local desk is being staffed, users will go to a local queue and if the academic desk is closed, users will go to the collaborative desk.

5. How will staffing work?

Jennifer has created two desk schedules- one for the Collaborative Desk and one for the Academic Desk. These schedules can be viewed within the When to Work software. Using the Display option on the right hand part of the screen, you can view the librarians staffing either the Academic or Collaborative Desk. If you need your login, please contact Jennifer.

6. How do I login to staff the Academic Desk?

The academic desk option will only appear to libraries registered as academic institutions in the software. All colleges, universities and community colleges will be automatically registered. When an academic institution logs in, there will be a new check box ‘Ask a Librarian Academic Desk’. Just check this desk and ‘Enter Live Chat’. It is not recommended to staff more than one desk at a time especially Collaborative and Academic.

7. Cooperation between the Collaborative Desk and the Academic Desk.

Cooperation between libraries is what makes Ask a Librarian a successful program and even with two desks, this needs to continue. Libraries can chat and transfer users between desks using the drop-down menu for ‘Operators by Virtual Desk’ under the Academic Users tab. Please help with desks when asked if one is exceptionally busy and the other slow taking a user would be a great help. Remember to always ask before transferring a user to another librarian. Most important to the success of Ask a Librarian is our customer service and helping users find the best answer possible.

Thank you for all of your efforts to make this expansion of services a success- because of your flexibility with the schedule and your willingness to take extra hours, we are confident the Academic Desk will be a success. 

A printable version of these FAQ is available here:   ask-a-librarian-academic-desk.pdf

If you have questions or concerns, please contact us immediately.

1 comment August 15th, 2007

The Quality Assurance Workgroup has named June’s Exemplary Reference Awards!

The Quality Assurance Workgroup has been hard at work and has awarded the following transcripts for June Exemplary Reference Awards of the Month. Transcripts were awarded in three categories: Best Detailed Chat, Best Brief Chat, and Best Teaching Chat. Brian Jaudon from Tampa Hillsborough Public Library will receive a gift card to Border’s for his Best Detailed Chat and all three will receive a certificate at a presentation at this year’s Florida Library Association Annual Meeting in St Petersburg, Florida.

Exemplary Detailed Chat
Brian Jaudon, Tampa Hillsborough Public Library.
Brian led the patron to a variety of online abstracts, articles and books on the concept of social support. He cut and pasted some immediate information regarding the broad definition so the patron had something right away. The patron was very happy for the help and even exclaimed that they would “always” come back to use Ask A Librarian. 6/3/2007 3:49:13 PM 47 min.

Exemplary Brief Chat
Dani Lichtenberg Palm Beach County Library District.
Dani helped a patron from another state by locating a helpful literature database in the patron’s home library (California). This chat demonstrates good patron rapport and good use of library resources. 6/6/2007 11 min

Exemplary Teaching Chat
Susan Livingston, South Florida Community College.
Susan successfully walked an FIU patron to the article databases to find journal articles on “high stakes testing” 6/4/2007 8:38:46 PM 31 min.

To nominate a transcript, login to the Ask a Librarian Toolbox
http://info.askalibrarian.org and click on the banner ad.

Add comment August 14th, 2007

May Exemplary Reference Awards!

The Quality Assurance Workgroup recently selected its Exemplary Reference Awards for May.  All three transcripts, exemplify the role of Ask a Librarian as a source for help with Information Literacy, and helping individuals at their moment of need.  The transcripts selected can be read at:  http://info.askalibrarian.org/besttranscript.asp

Exemplary Detailed Chat winner
Ilinskaya, Inna 5/24/2007 9:16:46 PM 33 min 44 sec
Inna gave the patron books, articles and websites for her topic on the “Red Scare.” She showed the patron info about electronic books too, even though the patron did not yet have a username or password. She spent a lot of time with a new library card member, and made sure they had quite enough information to get started on their research even though they were issued a temporary card. She made the patron feel welcomed, and the patron was appreciative.

Exemplary Brief Chat winner
Vicki Flora from Pinellas Park on 5/22/2007 12:14:59 PM  13 min 10 sec
Vicki did an efficient job helping a patron find some technical information on child support. She helped the patron interpret the information and offered to find the court telephone number so the patron could complete the inquiry. Great work in just 13 minutes.

Exemplary Teaching Chat winner
Sally Bissell Lee County 5/9/2007 5:01 P.M. 23 min 14 sec
Sally did a wonderful job helping this patron, instructing her in the use of the database, and in encouraging her to use our service again. The patron seemed excited about the database and finding the information she needed. She also seemed to understand how to use it. Sally made her comfortable asking questions.

Don’t Forget to nominate a session for June or July
in the Ask a Librarian Toolbox! http://info.askalibrarian.org.

The Exemplary Detailed Chat Winner does receive a $20 gift card to Borders.

Add comment July 18th, 2007

Exemplary Reference Award Winners for April Announced

Exemplary Reference Awards
April 2007

The Quality Assurance Workgroup and AaL staff are happy to announce to the April Exemplary Reference Award Winners! Susan Livingston will be receiving a Border’s Gift Card to acknowledge the Detailed Chat.

Congrats! to all the award winners.

Exemplary Detailed Chat
Susan Livingston
South Florida Community College
Susan used good interview skills to determine the student’s needs. She found an example for the student and cited the book it came from. Susan used good follow-up by offering to transfer the student to another librarian when she had to leave.
4/18/2007 9:48:06 PM 0 hr 23 min 55 sec

Exemplary Brief Chat
James Paul
Miami Dade Public
James was able to give the patron good, quality information very quickly.
4/17/2007 10:52:48 AM 0 hr 6 min 8 sec

Exemplary Teaching Chat
Sonia Alcantara
Lee county
Sonia could have very easily left the customer to browse the SEC website on his own but instead she offered to walk him through the process using the co-browse technique which appeared to have worked perfectly that day. She also showed great patience and kept coming back to the customer to be sure that he was following her. 4/11/2007 3:42:04 PM 0 hr 43 min 26 sec

Please remember to nominate sessions for May!!!! To nominate just login to the Ask a Librarian Toolbox and Click on the Banner!

Add comment June 19th, 2007

New Practice Day Schedule

Due to a great suggestion by one of our librarians, I have decided to start having regular, monthly practice sessions for anyone in the state who would like to log on and practice with others. The second Tuesday of every month will be an Ask a Librarian practice day. I will log on to practice with you as many of the days as I am available, but you are encouraged to log on and practice with each other on those days. If you log on to practice as a librarian then please also log on to take a turn asking questions as a patron.

Here is the link for the training room:

http://www.askalibrarian.org/info/training.asp

Please let me know if you need a log in to the training room. Most of you should have one if you’ve been though training.

The dates of the practices will be:
June 12th
July 10th
Aug. 14th
Sept. 11th
Oct 9th and so on . . .

It is very easy to get rusty if you don’t staff the desk very often, so please log in and keep in practice!

Add comment May 31st, 2007

Ask a Librarian Regional User Group Meetings

Ask a Librarian is growing like a weed, and with growth comes a few growing pains, some changes and a lot of exciting news. At the Regional User Group Meetings for Ask a Librarian, site coordinators and interested participants are invited to take part in an interactive meeting to discuss Ask a Librarian.

The agenda includes a project update and discussions on usage, customer service, marketing, staffing and the pilot project for an academic desk. Meeting participants will help shape the project’s direction.

Regionals meetings will be at the following locations. Please sign up by clicking on the session you can attend:

May 21- CFLC Maitland from 10-12pm
May 23- Tampa Bay Library Consortium Tampa from 10-12pm.
June 5- Central Florida Community College Library Ocala from 10-12pm.
June 7- NEFLIN Orange Park from 10-12pm.
June 12- International College-Room 195, Ft Myers from 10-12pm.
June 14- Palm Beach Community College, Lake Worth from 1-3pm.
June 15- Nova Southeastern University, Ft Lauderdale from 10-12pm
July 10- Leroy Collins - Leon County Public Library, Tallahassee from 10-12pm.
UPDATE:  July 11- Gulf Coast Community College, Panama City from 10:30CT - 12:30.

Add comment May 2nd, 2007

Academic Taskforce Recommendations

At the FLA User Forum at the Florida Library Association, the Ask a Librarian Academic Desk Task Force made its recommendation. In the Fall, Ask a Librarian will debut its academic desk.

The taskforce consisted of:
Pam Beegle (Nova Southeastern University)
Judy Born (Manatee Community College)
Juana Careaga (Florida Keys Community College)
Caryl Harris (Lake County Library System)
Sandy Hawes (Saint Leo University)
Rob Krull (Palm Beach Community College)
Chad Mairn (St. Petersburg College)
Jana Ronan (University of Florida)
Debora Stewart (Palm Beach Atlantic University)

Full-text of the report:

The group was asked to decide if there is a demand for an Academic Desk. If so, what hours should the Academic Desk be available, and how would the desk be staffed.

The group met and looked at many questions and concerns. Some of them included:

• Identifying the need for an Academic Desk
• Staffing of the Academic Desk
• Members were unenthusiastic regarding the answering of questions of an academic library if they are from a public library and vice versa.
• Number of students entering via an academic library or public library.

So the group decided to survey Ask A Librarian site members. Please see the attached survey for results. http://www.surveymonkey.com/Report.asp?U=297274714001

The survey consisted of 16 questions and we had 68 respondents. The survey leaned towards the fact that there is a need for an Academic Ask a Librarian desk.

The task force met again to discuss the results and findings of the information gathered from the survey.

The results provided the fact that there is a need from the librarian’s side but the survey was not able to determine the need from the patron’s side.

The hours should reflect all open hours. Students are using the desk during school hours as well as after school.

The organization would be that when a patron accesses Ask a Librarian, their point of entry would determine the desk - academic or collaborative desk. This will alleviate the unfamiliarity of the librarian with one another’s sources.

The task force would like to recommend that an Academic Desk should be put in place as a pilot project. In order for this to work we need the support of everyone especially from the Library Directors by providing more staff coverage.

This is a huge change for Ask a Librarian, what do you think?

Add comment April 16th, 2007