The Future of Libraries is Open: Updates, Demos, and Plans for the FOLIO Library Services Platform (Jesse Koennecke) ---
The FOLIO Library Services Platform is here. Learn about this innovative open source community project, see how it works, and find out why the Future of Libraries is Open. In this session, members of the FOLIO community will discuss the nature of the project and how ideas are turned into reality. Presenters will demo current functionality and integrations with knowledgebases and other third-party tools. As libraries prepare to implement FOLIO, what does the future hold that motivates them to be involved in this movement.
Wherever discovery starts: the library’s critical role in connecting users to content in a world of fragmented access (Emily Singley, Kendall Bartsch) ---
The contrast between researcher expectations and the reality of what it takes to get a full text article is stark. This presentation will discuss these expectations, the challenges preventing them from being fully met and how users are responding as a result.
When starting within the library, users face challenges navigating multiple vendor platforms, using systems like link resolvers, and understanding library-centric naming conventions. All of which are often confusing or time consuming to use. When starting from outside the library, researchers face paywalls, often for content they are entitled to access. All act as impediments to the research process and run counter-grain to user expectation. These challenges have pushed researchers to seek content socially, from networked sites such as Twitter and ResearchGate to pirate sites like Sci-Hub.
The presentation will discuss the emergence of new technologies that aim to simplify access to content, both when starting in and outside the library. The attributes of these new services and experiences of libraries using them will be discussed.
Let the APIs Bring Your Digital Content Together: NISO FASTEN (Nettie Lagace) ---
One of the biggest barriers for library digital patrons is navigating between the many content platforms libraries must offer to ensure a depth and variety of digital content. Having to create an account for two, or three, or more vendors makes for a confusing and fragmented experience. Libraries need to be able to offer all their digital content in one easy-to-use, integrated, and comprehensive platform--a platform that can be accessed and operated by the devices most commonly used by library patrons.
A NISO working group is developing a Recommended Practice that will allow this vision to become a reality. The FASTEN (NISO Flexible API STandard for E-content NISO) Working Group scope includes areas such as login/authentication, account information, availability, item status, item check-out, audio/video/online recording streaming, patron registration with vendor(s), etc. Attendees will learn in six minutes how they can support this work and communicate with others about its advantages!
e-Resource Troubleshooting: a Staff Training Strategy (Christee Pascale, Li Ma) ---
Troubleshooting subscription e-resource access is a complex task that lives at the intersection of specialized serial subscription knowledge and the convergence of technologies like discovery tools, authentication and proxy servers. Technical Service departments consider providing access to the library’s electronic collection a frontline service. When access issues are reported staff performing troubleshooting cease other work to address the outage, creating stress and straining fundamental departmental workflow support. The more staff equipped to perform e-resource troubleshooting, the better a department can manage this responsibility. With growing electronic collections and static staffing for e-resource subscriptions and management, the University of South Carolina Thomas Cooper Library is undertaking training staff who currently work with print resources to perform e-resource troubleshooting. Join us for a lively presentation where we consider the intricate e-resource landscape including how patrons interact with the libraries e-collection, how access issues are reported, the most common types of access problems, and our thoughts on the most effective ways to tackle and train staff to handle e-resource access issues.
Systems and the application of complexity in academic libraries (Seth Porter) ---
Academic libraries are complex systems, and need operational processes that are interoperable with this reality. Throughout this paper the author will illustrate the need for a systems understanding of operational performance. This school of thought focuses on the interlinking relationships between systems, subsystems, and actors within an organization (Katz & Khan, 1966). This is uniquely applicable to academic libraries because of the complexity of the many different roles.
Unlike profit-driven organizations, the output of academic libraries is not as clear, and this can lead to processes and models of organization that can seem like anarchy to organizational practitioners and theorists. However, there are models that incorporate this perceived anarchy into the performance process, such as systems theory which illustrates the diffuse and diverse nature of higher education and its subsystems, including the library. (Katz & Khan, 1966). While systems theory is inadequate by itself to describe and manage a higher education organization, it is a foundation theory and model to understand various goals, missions, departments, and stakeholders involved in higher education, including academic libraries.
This proposal is unique in the application of organizational theory to higher education and specifically, academic libraries. Understanding outside literature and its relevance to the academic library is vital for the 21st century. We cannot just reference other library literature, innovation from diffusion is a must.
The participants will walk away from this presentation with a foundation in a practical and applicable organizational theory and relevant processes to improve organizational performance. The session will engage the audience through a theoretical discussion, applicable insights, and a lively active case study that the participants will analyze through the potential application of the frameworks covered.
