Friday 31 July 2015

IATUL Conference 2015 - Day 2


Day 2:


Keynote 3:


Wilma van Wezenbeek : “Open? Make it easy and fair!”

Ms. Van Wezenbeek focused on the how and why of open access publishing, making the argument that everyone should have easy access to research, as science grows when you spread and use results. This also prevents the unnecessary repeating of research. The assertion was made that science is for all, and that taxpayers should have access to the research that they pay for. The point was made that open access ties to open science, open education and open ICT, which requires responsible data management along the way.
The 3TU federation in the Netherlands have been leaders in the field of data repositories, being founder of the Datacite service in the 3TU Datacentrum. [See https://www.datacite.org/]. Policy in the Netherlands is to work towards 100% open access publishing by 2020. To this end there have been negotiations, including the Chairs of the Dutch Universities, with Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, Sage, Oxford University Press, the American Chemical Society, Taylor and Francis, and Kluwer.
The argument was made that substantial open access output is needed to flip the publishing model in its favour. A call for a FAIR system was made.
Fair System


F
FINDABLE
FLEXIBLE
A
ACCESSIBILE
ASSERTIVE
I
INTEROPERABLE
INNOVATIVE
R
RELIABLE
REALISTIC

Keynote 4:


Wolf-Tilo Balke: “University libraries – between service providers and research institutions”

Mr. Balke argued that the idea of the library is an old one, and now libraries have a big data problem, and need to care more about the semantics in the metadata that they index, as the aim is to provide access to knowledge. The analogy was used that trying to get information from the web was like trying to get a drink from a fire hydrant. Consequently semantic indexing of heterogonous formats is need, such as that used by Google Scholar and Microsoft Academic Search. Major challenges facing indexing at the moment include automatic indexing and searching across paths. The culture of search in the chemistry discipline was used as an example, where researcher search for the chemical structure, but by 2009 the CAS index (for which a license costs +$30,000), had +50 million substances. The proposal was made that index retrieval interfaces are needed for every discipline, type of use and type of person… which differentiate at the level of detail provided in the result. For example: the results to match the question ‘What is the Higgs Boson particle?’ need to be different for users at the primary, secondary and tertiary levels of education.
Many automated data mining approaches now exist, and libraries as information institutions need to be connected to capture the semantics of these, as a large corpus of information sources is now held external to the library itself. In addition libraries should be aware of the increasing levels of publication withdrawals as issues with quality, data massaging, and honest mistakes in research are increasingly identified.

Mr. Balke questioned how reliable Science 2.0 is, and whether it represents collective intelligence or the dictatorship of the few. Hence his call for more collaborative research, and assertion that to extract the full potential of a corpus for researchers is important so that they can truly stand on the shoulders of giants. He stated that collaborative researchers looking to achieve the full potential for their corpus need to remember that what is good for one discipline is not necessarily so for another, as personalized knowledge spaces are still a distant hope at this point in time.

Posters on Stage:

10 posters were presented to the conference, all of which could have provided enough content for an individual parallel session.
Topics covered included:

  • ·        The united activities of 26 Latvian libraries.
  • ·        An analysis of the social networks of chemistry academics, identifying invisible colleges, who collaborates, and where collaboration is generated by this activity.
  • ·        The TIB AV portal, where descriptive metadata is automatically generated leveraging linked open data.
  • ·        Partnership approaches to strategic planning, illustrating 6 phases, 10 steps and 6 key questions.
  • ·        An approach to the digital long term preservation of human data.
  • ·        The use of social media in Academic Libraries
  • ·        New approaches to Reference Services – bridging the digital divide
  • ·        Open Science – Open Access along the research cycle, and data management tools
  • ·        Publishing in an Open Access Repository and the data management infrastructure required to support this.
  • ·        Providing free access to professional organization members to key peer reviewed resources, and the associated advice services.


Changing Environments for Librarians Session

Sagren Moodley: “repurposing library space: How the teaching and development grant and strategic partnerships made this a reality”

This speaker detailed the challenges faced by this relatively new TU (merged in 2003), with 26,000 students of whom 97% are undergraduates. Included in these challenges was the need to change the library ‘as place’, especially as we enter into a period where the size of the physical collection is no longer relevant, as is evidenced by the increase in e-book usage and corresponding fall in circulation. The changes which were undertaken were a strategic response to the introduction in 2010 of a student centred philosophy, aiming to create an environment conducive to learning. Specific issues were to be addressed by the project, including space for the physical collection and reducing noise levels. However, the expected funding did not materialize leading to the necessity of examining other streams of possible funding.
The library applied for funding from the teaching and development grant as the changes would support its role in supporting learning, e-learning, retention to graduate level [graduate hub], differing learning styles, and enhance information literacy provision.
2 pilot projects were undertaken and some interesting observations emerged as a result of these, for example students found the traditional issue desk, the first thing that greeted them when they came in the door, a threat. Sustainability was built into the design, with green technologies applied where practicable.



Hildegard Schaffler: “Value-based pricing, open access, enhanced rights – the impact of current trends on collaborative collection building for digital resources”


Ms. Schaffler outlined her experiences as Head of Serials for the Bavarian State Library, and trends observed in relation to subscriptions, renewals, licencing and pricing while in that role. In relation to digital resources she spoke of twenty year trends, which inform what is happening today,  the work of the ‘International Coalition of Library Consortia’, [http://icolc.net/] and how ‘Big Deals’ emerged in response to journals crises. Models of publishing and pricing were discussed. For example ‘Library Journal’s’ Annual survey of periodicals pricing[ http://lj.libraryjournal.com/2015/04/publishing/whole-lotta-shakin-goin-on-periodicals-price-survey-2015/] , issues with double dipping by publishers, charging for access and charging to publish, issues with the price of Gold Standard Open Access Publishing, Mega journals which are essentially databases themselves, Hybrid models such as that used by Springer [where only selected articles are available via the open access model], PLOS publishing on the basis of scientific soundness rather than potential impact,  ACS’ pricing based on more non-traditional usage figures, being the introduction of a tiered pricing structure, and perhaps a next generation publishing model. Further discussion revolved around the 2012 Finch report in the UK where Gold Standard Open Access publishing was put forward as the way to go to Academics in the UK [ http://www.researchinfonet.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Finch-Group-report-FINAL-VERSION.pdf  ], and the 2014 Report for JISC Collections on Total Cost of Ownership Project:  [ http://www.jisc-collections.ac.uk/Global/News%20files%20and%20docs/IPL-Jisc-Total-Cost-of-Ownership-Data-Capture-Report.pdf  ] . It was put to the attendees that in relation to e-journals, the ‘big deal’ still dominates.
The ‘LIBER Response to STM Statement on Text and Data Mining’ was discussed in relation to copyright and licensing changes proposed at EU level, [http://libereurope.eu/blog/2015/06/09/liber-response-to-stm-statement-on-text-and-data-mining/ ], as well as Library Journals assertion that the financial tipping point for Open Access to become the dominant model still being a while away from fruition. Attendees were reminded that it is in our own interest to standardise pricing models, but be aware that usage statistics are ambivalent and value-based price analytics could be a more useful tool.
The Austrian model, which avoids double dipping, was put forward as an exemplar. The point was made that usage right should be considered in addition to access rights when negotiating licenses, with perpetual access viewed in some quarters as added value. Issues with enforcement arise, especially in relation to hosting of open access articles on local servers, and repositories, as text and data-mining rights may not automatically transfer to the local service.  The Green Standard was put forward as that most beneficial to libraries and their home institutions, but the point was made that transition to this may differ across disciplines, or take very different directions, due to the differing nature of the content and subject scope.
It was noted that there are hidden costs to moving to these ‘next generation’ models, as those who use a lot, may also produce a  lot, which in turn generates administration costs.


Sharon L. Bostick/Brian Irwin: “Changing spaces: Creating the next generation of work environments for library staff”

This joint presentation by a Librarian and an Architect was interesting in that it illustrated two differing views of the same project. The librarian’s point of view was that the Architect comes to the project with a different eye. Ms. Bostick asserted that space impacts on behaviour, and that staff spaces were key to the strategic planning of the project. Currently libraries are going through a time of huge change, from storage and study to learning spaces, and becoming busier than ever as a result. This change means that Academic Libraries are now repositioned at the core of Academic Architecture. This has an impact on the special typographies applied to projects such as this, as one size no longer fits all, and spaces need to be designed to be flexible. Contemporary models of study require differing special layouts, as activities are no longer stratified; making the real issue the retro fit of one size fits all buildings to facilitate these blended activities.
Attendees were reminded that the library desk provides the visitors first impression, and asked to consider what it says about their institution. It was highlighted that to break down barriers between staff and patrons it is important not to squirrel staff away in attics, or diffuse them too far away from their collaborative teams. As libraries shift from transactions to consultations as the main business at hand, funding sources and existing building layouts can make it hard to be innovative with the use of space. It is essential therefore to look at the dynamics of the staff to be located within the space at hand. Uniform spaces / room can have multiple uses: offices, project space, group study etc. depending on need / demand. The University of Helsinki City Campus Library was examined in relation to its transition to the promotion of self-service activities with library staff moved to more consultative roles.
The project included the design of library specific furniture, including the library desk, which can be reconfigured easily. The Munday Library was discussed in relation to the desire to test out space usage and not commit to any one solution. Attendees were reminded to design based on library mission rather than staff personality, and that no one gets it right the first time.
Notable trends observed by the project team included the removal of issue desks, and their replacement with information desks, and in parallel the introduction of academic enrichment services into library spaces, in addition the introduction of consultation areas gives some flexibility. (Academic skills, CELT).
The Hunt Library [https://www.lib.ncsu.edu/huntlibrary] was put forward as an example of a very experimental library space where some elements of the space are very successful, in non-traditional library ways.
The project being discussed was designed to created flexible library spaces in response to organisational structure changes and to support the tasks allocated to the library, tying the project into the strategic plan. Green approaches were integrated from the beginning. The common problem of a library having a huge desk with stacks behind it was identified as a key component to be addressed. Significant effort was put into designing a flexible library modular library desk, which in the long run ended up with just one module being utilized by staff to provide services. The rest was repurposed for student use. Spaces for collaboration were included in the project design, both for staff and students.
A key lesson learned was not to design the space around operational needs. In this project it led to:
·        The consolidation of some spaces to create space for new services
·        The relocation of key services to improve access [the special collections and archives being the illustrative example here]
·        Staff being moved out of priority spaces, including the library issue desk, which is now called the information desk
·        Noise management based on the physical hierarchy of the building; quieter spaces are located higher up
·        Spaces were provided for support partners where the user would need support, for example it support on the IT floor
Achieving this was only possible via organization wide support. The Centre for Learning and Technology became an Information Literacy program partner, the Student Representative Council purchased library use laptops, an iPad zone was introduced, and faculties gave support for new equipment and furniture. The key to receiving this support was the Library being seen as a partner in academic success not just a support.
The project was done within the teaching and learning framework. It is now at the stage were the spaces need to be evaluated, as there have been +600,000 more visits.
There was a discussion around the issue of the ‘copyright’ of the design residing with the Architect, and the challenge that provides, as there is often a clause disallowing change to the design once the building is complete.
Mr. Irwin asked librarians to protest the lack of availability of good study furniture, and mentioned a New Zealand source.

















Hester Mountifield: “Impact2: Through power of collaboration. How we increased our impact by helping researchers to increase theirs”

Ms. Mountifield spoke of the learning team becoming part of the library team, and the introduction of a compulsory information literacy course for all students. The focus of the University of Auckland is to improve research quality, and to this end the library began exploring the concept and tools available around research impact. This lead to the idea of creating an evidence portfolio for each researcher, as there seems to never be enough information available about researchers, either to the public, or when applying for funding. This portfolio should also include a description of peer esteem. The library selected a publication management system provided by Symplectic [Elements] in the UK. [ http://symplectic.co.uk/products/elements/ ]. This research information management system has significant functionality. Parallel to this discussion the Institutional Repository was relocated to the library, as the staff had the metadata management and technical skills required for the service. There are 8 full time staff dedicated to publication management on campus. Library staff skills have been utilized to leverage the system so that uploaded portfolios add value to the project. Academic members of staff can manage their own profiles and upload to the repository from there for example they can choose ‘favourite’ publications, or have their last eight publications show in the university directory [i.e. their top output].  This system allows for lots of metrics, including altmetrics.
In tandem with the introduction of the publication management service, a flagship Biblioinformatics Services was introduced. Consultations with Academics and Researchers indicated that they want to be aware of all the metrics which apply to their publications. To this end the library uses the SciVal [http://www.scival.com/] and Incites [https://incites.thomsonreuters.com] citation analytics tools / services. Reports can be generated for Departments / Disciplines, and can assist in raising the profile of some publications.  An ‘Uploadathon’ was held to encourage the addition of materials to the institutional repository, with the by-line of ‘increase your impact’.

The library is a sought after partner in these projects where funds from strategic development funds regarding open access publishing are made available for the delivery of services. However, it remains to be seen who / which department will pay for gold access publishing in journals by staff.  The library works with the Dean of Research on this. The Research / Publication management system was relatively cheap for what it delivers. ORCID will be launched at an institutional level in the near future. 
















Friday 24 July 2015

IATUL Conference 2015 - Day 1.

DAY 1 

OPENING SESSION:

The Host library TIB was highlighted: with 9 million items, 500 staff, 1700 workspaces, and opening 95 hours a week, as the largest science and technology library in the world. The T9 Universities were also introduced. The T9 libraries are the libraries of the nine leading German Institutes of Technology, many of whom have University status. The role and importance of IATUL was outlined, in that since its formation in 1955 IATUL has provided an international forum for the exchange of information.
Find out more about TIB at http://www.tib.uni-hannover.de/en/

KEYNOTE 1:

Martin Hofmann-Apitius:  “Innovative usage of unstructured information sources: From text- and data-mining to model-driven decision-support”

This session outlined efforts undertaken to develop methods to make unstructured scientific data available in a structured format, enabling computer processing of said data. The illustrative example of 'a needed genome sequencing to facilitate personalized medicine' was used. As each person differs, the question of how to assess the individual case becomes imperative to answer. This is especially true when one might be met with the case of a patient with 6 weeks to live. Existing tools, at the Fraunhofer Institute, for such analysis include: Text miner, Prominer, SCAIview, Dictionaries, Medline Abstracts, NLM pdf’s, PMID and entities. These are analysed using Named Entity Recognition (NER) and Normalization. The Pro-miner tool pre-processes include NLP and NER [named entity recognition].  SCAIviewer allows for semantic search and document retrieval. To develop this further and identify causal relationships, machine learning is needed. KNIME is leverage for this. UIMA (OS standard for content analysis) is used to identify relationships and allow for the extraction of BEL like statements. This simplified syntax allows for the application of automated reasoning. Encoded queries or statements can create graphs. The process is still quite manual and input intensive.  See examples of this graphing at http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1552526015000837

A recent project (sponsored by Philip Morris) worked to create a more integrated workflow linking UIMA, SCAiview, to create a semi-automated workflow called BELIEF. During the project it became evident that there is a greater information gain if the full text of an item is mined as opposed to just the abstract.

This process has a 70-90% recall and precision rate for the biomedical field. As more dictionaries are added NER matches improve, the data is improved culminating in improved results.
BEL records full provenance of the process, can encode entire datasets, thus significantly speeding up the analysis process. This is especially important if you are faced with the example above, where the patient has weeks to live. There needs to be a change in the management of copyright and copyright law to allow for this type of decision support to begin saving lives, in critical time sensitive scenarios, as many databases where important research in this area do not allow for full text mining.


 KEYNOTE 2: JOSÉ COTTA: “FROM OPEN ACCESS TO OPEN SCIENCE: A VISION”

Mr. Cotta outlined changes that have resulted from the appointment of the new European Commission in 2014, relative to his position in the European Commission Directorate General for Communications Networks, Content & Technology [DG Connect]. The directorate is working towards their aim of creating a single digital market, which allows for the free flow of data, including research data. Copyright reform is a very important aspect of this new direction, especially in relation to text and data mining. This move dove tails with the EU commission’s policy for open science, plans to create an e-infrastructure, and the commission’s emphasis on open access publishing.
As much of the research undertaken within the EU is done under the auspices of publicly funded institutions, the case grows for research, data, process and even software generated via such funding structures to be made publicly available, so the citizens of the funding countries can see the end result of the projects undertaken, and when applicable, benefit from the results. The open availability of this information is essential with the move towards evidence based decision making, but may necessitate a change in publishing, intellectual property, data protection and copyright models. Indeed, Mr. Cotta called attention to issues with peer review, and indicated that this too, may also need an alternative. For example, the Horizon 2020 funding stream emphasises the open access publishing of project results, as evidenced by the OpenAIRE project.



PANEL DISCUSSION: “INFORMATION RESOURCES AND SOCIETAL CHANGE”  

Chair: Peter Löwe

PANEL DISCUSSION PARTICIPANTS:
Martin Hofmann-Apitius, Fraunhofer Institute SCAI
José Cotta, European Commission
Frank Scholze, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology University, Germany
Elisha Chiware, Director CPUT Libraries, South Africa

This lively discussion created insight into how similar issues are in relation to sourcing funding, globally, although the scale of the funding may differ. Mr. Chiware argued that the information which users consider critical to their needs is often that which is most expensive, leaving the librarian with the need to balance budget against the provision of relevant information. Mr. Scholze, spoke about issues surrounding relating data back to the basis of science, and emerging issues around transparency and re-usability vis a vie scientific data. Mr. Cotta highlighted the importance of ensuring the rules relating to copyright and data protection do not ‘kill’ science, especially in relation to data and text mining. Mr. Hofmann-Apitius spoke of the lack of critical thinking skills in the current generation of researchers, as they have become Google dependant. Mr Chinware, confirmed this as a global trend, while Mr. Scholze, put forward that libraries are needed as facilitators, for the teaching of skills to access scientific data commented upon by Mr. Hofmann-Apitius. The importance of making research data available in its raw formats was discussed, especially in the light of young students facing societal change, not just that of the ‘academic world’. Additionally the importance of exposing research published in local periodicals to global users was identified as an issue.
At the end of this session it was interesting to see the illustration of the issues and topics created by the graphical artist who was present in the main hall for the duration of the morning.


LIBRARY STRATEGY AND MANAGEMENT SESSION

ELLEN SAFLEY: “UNCOMFORTABLE – COMMITTING TO CHANGE – FINDING SUCCESS”

Ms. Safley discussed the decision of the library to become an early adopter of the Alma library platform, the issues which arose from this, and integrating it with the resource discovery layer. The project was outlined, and approaches to relieving staff stress given. In addition testing and problems which arose from going live on the new system on the first day of semester were detailed.


CAROLIN BECKER:  “PERFORMANCE INDICATORS AT TUM LIBRARY”

Ms. Becker outlined, how, in pursuit of ISO9001, performance measures both qualitative and quantative were needed which integrated into budgets, staffing structures, policy and strategy. The quality management team were able to identify data already gathered which match Key Performance Indicators (KPI’s) in the German national library statistics scheme (BIX). However, the weakness of the existing data is that they focus on traditional library tasks, with over 400 KPIs for 6 dimensions [... of the balanced scorecard]. TUM decided to select 10-20 KPIs for each functional area, and consulted staff in the area as to what these should be. While some overlap arose, the library executive committee decided on the final set.
A Quality Management Officer has been put in place, and the focus on measurement moved to improving services, rather than controlling staff.
Examples of KPI’s included, physical and electronic collections versus the levels of usage, and cost per use, the library as a place - down to branch level, technical services workload versus the up to datedness of services, information support requests via phone, e-mail what’s app, usage of e-learning materials, Facebook reach. Only some KPI’s have a target to be met.


PETRA DÜREN: “SHADOW OF THE LEADER: HOW LIBRARY LEADERS UNDERMINE OR BOLSTER CHANGE EFFORTS”


Prof. Duren stated that with 19% of major changes evaluated as successful, there is a need for managers to use leadership skills to manage change both perpetual and deliberate, to have a vision of the outcome, a plan for the change process, and to address staff anxieties. A study was undertaken in Germany and the USA of what staff expect from managers implementing changes. While there were some similarities, there were also significant differences, indicating a different set of expectations / culture around change. For example to German speaking respondents, clear project management was more important than participating in the process. Communication was identified as a key element in both countries responses.


SIMONE FÜHLES-UBACH: “VALIDATING LIBRARY STRATEGIES BY ASSUMING THE USER PERSPECTIVE”


Dr Fuhles-Ubach put forward a new model of addressing library strategy, which has been used on New Zealand, and the UK in the business administration arena, where the strategy is looked at from the user perspective, leveraging the PRUB model. [See https://openstrategies.com/what-is-prub-introduction  for more on this model] This should help describe what users want to do. The Horizon Report 2014, Library Edition was listed as containing examples of the types of strategies that libraries should consider applying the ORUB model to. [It can be found at http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2014-nmc-horizon-report-library-EN.pdf]. The common characteristics of strategies were outlined and a definition put to the attendees. All strategies should be evaluated using at least the following questions: Is it logical? Will it definitely work? Is it worth it? Applying the PRUB model is not as easy as it looks, but it can help identify orphan projects in advance, as you can apply the model to backwards planning. It was reported that libraries are often in a sandwich position, needing to address the strategy of the host organisation, while integrating the user perspective to avoid investing in orphan projects.
It was advised that as it is hard to get user participation in strategy planning sessions, the alternative is to observe user behaviour, as in what they do, not what they say they do.


EWALD BRAHMS: “HILDESHEIM UNIVERSITY LIBRARY – USER-ORIENTED CHANGE MANAGEMENT”

Dr Brahms began by discussing change management as a business management concept, and then expanded this to library management, highlighting that change is an ongoing process, and definitely non-linear in nature. His experience indicates that there can be several change processes happening at once, all of which need to be managed, but perhaps using different approaches to do so. Hildesheim experienced significant changes as a result of external decisions regarding funding sources for the University, including the introduction of fees, which had a knock on effect on the library. In addition, parallel to this was an increase of +78% in student numbers, and + 60% in staff numbers between 2002 and 2014. Dr Brahms pointed out that libraries can make Universities more attractive, and leveraging this over 8 to 9 years allowed significant investment in library resources and facilities to be achieved.  In recognition of the level of change facing the library, the librarians took part in a change management workshop. The closing remarks for day 1 included the assertion to always have a plan B.



Friday 17 July 2015

IATUL Conference July 2015

I attended the IATUL conference in Hannover, Germany this month. The following series of posts will detail the experience. Click on the day listed below to view the blog post, and photos form that day. Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5.




Conference details:  

“Strategic Partnerships for Access and Discovery”, 36th IATUL Conference: Hannover, Germany; 5-9 July, 2015. 

The conference sponsors were:
·        Elsevier
·        IEEE Xplore
·        ExLibris
The following posts give a general summary of the IATUL conference and is laid out so that the sessions attended by the author are outlined in brief. The aim of the conference was to explore collaboration, provide talks at the cutting edge of strategy, management and practice, while allowing attendees to discover state of the art developments in librarianship, worldwide. Any errors or omission are entirely the author’s own.

The conference was spread over 4 days, succeeded by a half day visit to the TIB library [German National Library of Science and Technology] at Leibnitz University. A large range of topics were covered, with days being structured with a unified morning session, followed by break outs into parallel sessions. This allowed attendees to focus on topics of relevance / interest to them.



Topic Streams

  • Library Strategy and Management: Methods of strategic planning and steering
  • Strategic Partnerships: International and national networks and alliances for improving library services
  • Changing Environment for Librarians: In between new types of publication, access options and discovery tools – challenges and solutions
  • Open Science/Science 2.0: Enabling networked web-based scientific collaboration
  • Management of Research Data: New approaches and best practices for data repositories
  • Non-textual Information: Novel ways to provide added value while managing growing data volumes
  • Digital Preservation: Collaborative projects, service and business models, limitations in legal framework, involving researchers in curation

In addition to a very busy and insightful programme, I attended some sessions with the staff of the TU9 libraries in the exhibition hall, discovering services such as Bibsonomy [http://www.bibsonomy.org/ ] on the way. Exploring the exhibition hall led to discovering library system suppliers such as H+H Software and angewandte Systemtechnik GmbH, which were previously unknown to me.
This was a very worthwhile programme, which certainly brought me more up to date with developments in the library and technology fields in a very short space of time, in addition to allowing me to meet colleagues from all around the world.

The full conference programme and the proceedings / presentations are available at: http://www.iatulconference2015.org/programme

IATUL

IATUL is The International Association of University Libraries.
The main objective of IATUL is to provide a forum where library directors and senior managers can meet to exchange views on matters of current significance and to provide an opportunity for them to develop a collaborative approach to solving problems. IATUL also welcomes organizations who supply services to university libraries into membership, if they wish to be identified with the association’s activities. Find out more at: http://iatul.org/about/

My attendance was made possible by funding from BI International [Bibliothek and Informaiton Deutschland]. Find out more about these grants at: http://www.bi-international.de/english/grants/


Wednesday 1 July 2015

Academic and Special Libraries: Conference 2015 - Report

Academic and Special Libraries Conference 2015


I attended the Academic and Special Libraries Conference as a bursary winner, funded by the Academic and Special Libraries Section of the Library Association of Ireland. My conference report. notes and adjunct pieces of information are below. Conference videos and presentations are available online at: http://www.aslibraries.com/#!asl2015-presentations--videos/c1puf. Please note all errors and omissions are mine, for which I apologise in advance. 



Day 1

KEYNOTE: Finding Facts in the Heat of the Moment

Malachy Browne of Reported.ly.

The conference opened with the key note speaker: Malachy Browne of Reported.ly. He gave an excellent overview of how he validates information and the credibility of his sources, outlining key tools and technologies that he leverages online to do so. This was a great presentation, and really brought home to me how online sources can be used to verify information. This is really transferable to the Academic Library environment where we provide support and training to researchers... some of whom are future journalists themselves.

As breaking news is often published to social media outlets first, it's imperative for Reported.ly, or any journalist /journalistic organisation, to be able to quick verify a story. As Reported.ly consists of a small team spread across the US and Europe, this gives Reported.ly the opportunity to respond and investigate in real-time. For Malachy, the key to successful reporting is to correct errors quickly and verify your sources. 


Verification can take less than 1 hour, using online tools and services. In addition one should build up sources so that if social media sites are offline, they will know where and how to find you. 


Here follows examples of the types of verification tools used by Malachy. 



Images


Uploading an image to Google allows you to access it's meta data, identifying if it is already indexed by Google. This is a reveres image search. Upload an image to Google images using the camera icon and it searches for it. [See... Angela Jolie shows in my matches!] 



To verify the information / image / video/ text, you need check your source, verify the date (1st seen), and check the location (this can be done by checking that the place reported matches Google Street-view). 

Photos

Photo file's carry meta data. For example Cannon camera's data is kept by Flickr when the photo's are uploaded. The exif [exchangeable image file data] data from a photo can be checked by uploading it to http://exifdata.com. Instagram can be searched by using Gramfeed, (
/http://www.gramfeed.com/) including Geo-tags (location). Additionally attempts should be made to locate corroborating photos. Other sources to leverage include: Twitter (advance search), Storyful (multi-search). Locating the first mention of an event, is the equivalent of likely having located an eye witness. 

Sources / People / Organisations. 


Checking sources can be as straight forward as search for a YouTube username on Twitter, and vice versa, to locate additional personal information, especially contact details. Other online sources to check using a username, or attempting to track an anonymous source include: Google, Google Plus, Pinterest, Facebook, LinkedIN, Attendee lists for events, and people finder websites such as SPOKEO. (http://www.spokeo.com/ (US only)). However, because of privacy settings it can take some digging to verify a source. 

Google translate is of value when attempting to track someone who does not have the same native language as you, because it is good for identifying keywords. These could then be taken and searched for elsewhere in the other language.  For example YouTube, can be searched to locate the earliest video of an event, or person. The people posting, and their other posts should also flag any biases. 

The 'Who is' DNS registry is useful for locating those behind a web site. https://who.is/


Geo-location

Google Maps, with the addition of geo-located images can be used to confirm an actual location. Google Earth can place a building within a grid reference on a map. 
Wikimapia, aims to describe buildings, and indicate their locations. 

Date

Upload  the file you want to date to Google. It should locate any other versions of it in the index, and the date's associated with it. Check the weather for the day you are tracking. Wolfram Alpha can be checked for events etc. (https://www.wolframalpha.com), and Topsy (http://topsy.com/) will let you search back through Twitter. 

When attempting to verify a source etc., it is important not only to vary your search terms, but also to put yourself in the uploader's shoes. 

Additional tools 




Challenges for the reporter / researcher / verifier 

  • Disappearing archives
  • Graphic footage
  • Perspective / Representations 
  • Safety 
  • Support for independent media 
  • Propaganda 
  • Twitter accounts offline 

See more about reported.ly at https://medium.com/reportedly/ and more about Malachy Browne at  https://medium.com/reportedly/who-we-are-and-how-to-reach-us-df5a9fc31eb9 .
Also of use: Pocket guide to verifying video:  https://storify.com/reportedly/a-pocket-guide-to
and the 'Verification Handbook': http://www.verificationhandbook.com/


CASE STUDY: Promoting a Unique Collection: Maynooth University & The Ken Saro-Wiwa Archive. 

Helen Fallon - Maynooth University 

Helen discussed the Ken Saro-Wiwa archive at the library, and how it raised awareness of the library and the archive by being made publicly available. The archive was digitized and make publicly available via the library in consultation with the extended family and Sr. Majella McCarron. The university's communication office looks for uniqueness, in order to get involved in projects and promotion. The book published from the archive was published on an not-for-profit basis using a Trocáire grant. The archive has resulted in significant publicity for the library and the university in Ireland and Nigeria. Newspaper and Radio coverage was received in both countries. 

The project has enabled the success introduction of the concept of archival literacy to undergraduate courses. 

CASE STUDY 1: Librarian as Databrarian

Jennifer O'Neill - DRI Data Curator / Databrarian

Jennifer's role involves collaboration with Software Engineers, Systems Administrators, and  Librarians on behalf of the 6 partner institutions: RIA, DIT, MU, NUIG, and TCD. She also serves on working groups. 
 In a nutshell... 


The DRI database is a custom design which does on conform to any one standard. She described the issues with field description that were encountered, and the logic for deciding that Dublin Core was closest to the needs of the project for meta data. The key to all decisions regarding the selection of the meta data scheme was ensuring that researchers would have the greatest possible capacity for resource / information discovery when the DRI becomes available. 

Data clean up used Open Refine (http://openrefine.org/), while dates were brought in line with ISO 8601, to enable timeline visualization tools to leverage the date data. The project is also using the LCSH linked data service. (http://id.loc.gov/). The next step in the project is to leverage the meta data across all the formats in the DRI, and finish with a bulk import. 


PECHA KUCHA SESSIONS

DIGITAL LITERACY AND SCHOLARSHIP: WHY LIBRARIES ARE CRITICAL TO TEACHING, LEARNING AND RESEARCH IN HIGHER EDUCATION / Mary Delaney, Institute Librarian - IT Carlow. 

Mary spoke about her PhD research into digital literacy and scholarship. She highlighted that the ability to assess research may become more important than being able to carry out research - in some contexts. She also noted that the assumption of technology skills for the current intake of students is a misnomer, and a method to bridge this gap in digital literacy is needed.


RIAM LIBRARY AND RIAM OPERA: PERFORMING IN PERFECT HARMONY / Laoise Doherty - RIAM

Laoise outlined how a dedicated opera archive was created at the Royal Irish Academy of Music (RIAM) using word press, thus creating an online exhibition of the RIAM's materials. This archive includes Alumni information. https://riamlibrary.wordpress.com/ The wordpress site was set up, and then content was sought from with RIAM. 

The project spurred the creation of a collection development policy. Kathleen Tynan provided much information in relation to Alumni. Flickr was used to create a photo archive, and was launched in January 2014. A twitter account followed in September 2014 (@RIAMOpera). Further collaboration within RIAM inspired two culture night events. 

The project was informal and ad hoc in nature, however, it did change the perception of the library internally and externally, while gaining a very important advocate in Kathleen Tynan.


 COLLABORATIVE RELATIONSHIPS - ESSENTIAL TO UNIVERSITY ORIENTATION / Jennifer Collery - UCD

Jennifer spoke about the need to develop collaborative relationships within your organisation, and focused on how doing so successfully has benefited UCD on the whole, including the library, with regards to orientation and registration. She highlighted that building connections within a large organisation helps build the position of the library and the individual as a professional. The student advisory team were key to the success of the project, as they were able to provide appropriate timetabling.

In order to ensure delivery in time for student registration in the autumn, the process of agreeing to collaborate and plan induction activities began the previous February. Branding was matched for all orientation activities across the campus and across the services. Library staff were included in 'Welcome' talks. A unified hash tag was used for orientation. A virtual tour of the library was made in conjunction with media services using captivate. Peer mentors provided library visits.


LIGHTNING SESSION BY PLATINUM SPONSOR / Paul Canning - IEEE

Paul thanked attendees for their continuing support of IEEE products. He highlighted their 8 open access journals (http://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/authorrightsresponsibilities.html). Partner organisations to IEEE were outlined including IET, MIT Press and IBM Journal, Peach Pit E-books have also joined. 

He asked that those with discovery layers check their implementations, as 10% of access is coming via Resource Discovery Layers. 

CASE STUDY: From Crowd Surfing to crowd sourcing - collaboration & Sir Henrys @UCCLibrary

Martin O'Connor - UCC

Martin spoke about crowd sourcing being the ultimate act of outsourcing in relation to his exhibition about the Sir Henry's night club in Cork city. His project was a collaborative work with others. He spent 6 months online, building a buzz, and collection materials for a virtual  exhibition (https://sirhenrys2014.wordpress.com/). The following summer there was a physical exhibition in the library. The activity on twitter about Sir Henry's brought the project to the attention of the media. RTE News, Dave Fanning, TG4, Local radio and the national press all carried coverage. The exhibition has formed the beginning of a popular music archive in UCC. 

There was a blog, which didn't really take u=off until personal stories started to be posted to it.
Facebook was used to gather information for inclusion in the exhibition, and built a community around it. Using social media this way too time and effort. 

However there is a list of reasons to commit to projects like this, as they have a very strong promotional pull for the library, and tie into some strategic objective for the university and the library: 



200 people attended the opening night, and there were 200 pages in the comment book.



Day 2

KEYNOTE: Transformative Shifts in Libraries

Helen Shenton - TCD

Helen spoke of her experience presenting her TedX talk - '
Collaboratories and bubbles of shush – how libraries are transforming' and recapped some of the content. 


Topics such as disruptive innovation, and globalisation are core to the TedX movement. She introduced the concept that we re all competitors in this context. We work in spaces that are Inter / Multi/ Anti Disciplinary. Big data, big content, MOOC's Digital Humanities, mobile technologies and open access all impact on us. Our environment is one where there is pressure on resources, before any of the fore-mentioned are entered into the equation. From digitisation to digitalisation, expectations of what libraries can and should deliver have shifted. A strong example of this is the introduction of social spaces within library zones. 




On the topic of collaborative content and collection development, Helen spoke of both the RECAP project and the 2CUL project in the USA, the UK Research Reserve, and IREL here in Ireland.



Side note: Information about these projects. 

ReCap : The Research Collections and Preservation Consortium (ReCAP) is located on Princeton University's Forrestal Campus. ReCAP consists of a preservation repository and resource sharing services, jointly owned and operated by Columbia UniversityThe New York Public Library and Princeton University. More than eleven million items are currently in ReCAP's care, and ReCAP fills well over 250,000 requests for materials each year, from its partners and from libraries around the world. See more at http://recap.princeton.edu/

2CUL is a transformative partnership between two major academic research libraries, the Columbia University Libraries (http://www.columbia.edu/library) and the Cornell University Library (http://library.cornell.edu),  based on a broad integration of resources, collections, services, and expertise.  The collaboration is supported by a two-year planning grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation (http://www.mellon.org/).  Ithaka  (http://ithaka.org/) provides external consultation services to the project including project management, research, and data mining and analysis. See more at: https://www.2cul.org/node/1.  


Research Reserve: UKRR is a collaborative and coordinated approach between Higher Education Libraries and the British Library to manage the long-term sustainability of retaining low-use print journals. Large collections of journal back-runs represent a valuable source of knowledge, meaning libraries need to provide a means of access for researchers in order to allow this content to be used. However the low levels of use for some of these titles means that holdings can potentially be consolidated off-site, allowing space to be released for other library uses. See more: http://www.ukrr.ac.uk/ 


IReL’s Collection IReL provides access to online resources in Science, Technology and Medicine, and Humanities and Social Sciences. Resources are selected for inclusion following consultation with researchers and academic staff at participating institutions. IReL consists of a wide variety of resource types: E-journals: 50 collections and 4 single title subscriptions, giving users access to approximately 25,000 full-text journals 26 databases 16 e-books / reference collections Funding Funding for IReL has come from the HEA (Higher Education Authority), SFI (Science Foundation Ireland), DJEI (Department of Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation) and the IUA Council (Irish Universities Association). Accessing Resources Staff and students of the seven participating universities have access to all IReL resources. Staff and students at RCSI and the Institutes of Technology have access to selected resources. Access to resources is managed by each institution’s library and they can be accessed by staff and students via their library’s website. See more: http://www.irelibrary.ie/


Digitization was the next topic addressed, with a brief discussion about democratization via digitization. Helen pointed out that it tends to be unique items which are digitized, and that these collections of unique items are becoming distinguishing factors between libraries. In addition the digitization of materials leads to increased demand for access to the originals.


Partnership and Collaboration was introduced to the audience next. While Helen finished this segment with the assertion that Bi & Tri lateral collaborations are easier, projects of this nature have a cost factor associated with them which needs to be acknowledged. Helen asserted that as the student experience becomes more focused on collaborative working this has changed the way that library space is used and allocated, in addition to the introduction of the ability to access services 24 hours a day.


Libraries are experienced in working with content, data and meta data, this has evolved into having expertise in dealing with big content and meta data (big), after all our library catalogues have to / should inspire research. The library is now many things to many people: laboratory, social space, cultural space - to name but a few. Students of the millennial generation need noise to work and that group sessions will often create a bubble of noise around the work table.


An innovative use of library data is the creation of heat maps of collection use. An example of this is 'Stack View' . Stack View from the Harvard Library Innovation Lab is a library browsing tool. It gives visual clues to the character of the holdings and their frequency of use.



Stack View from Harvard Library Innovation Lab on Vimeo.
The code is available on GitHub at https://github.com/harvard-lil/stackview 

RLUK provides a unique and distinctive collection via a union catalogue / Database (COPAC) and opportunities for research libraries. 



Side note: About RLUK

Research Libraries UK (RLUK) represents 34 of the leading and most significant research libraries in the UK and Ireland. They aim to optimise the contribution that research libraries and collections make to the economic, technological and cultural success of the UK and Ireland. There has never been a stronger link between the quality of the information infrastructure for research and digital literacy and the health of the economy by investing in and developing strategic projects, reports and innovations that are fomenting much greater engagement with and services for the research community. See more: http://www.rluk.ac.uk/ 

Skill sets still need to be further developed especially in the area of Digital Humanities (just now maturing), e-learning and teaching (know the impact of teaching), and Public Engagement. Concepts such as data curation, and mining, embedded librarians, User-centricity, all provide opportunities for up-skilling and re-skilling. 



CASE STUDY: Bridging the Gap between 2nd and 3rd Level Education - A Maynooth University Case Study. 

Elaine Bean - MU 

Elaine spoke about Information Literacy, secondary students and the transition to third level education. It was highlighted that Information Literacy is often crammed into an already busy programme. At MU there is a designed programme to go out to the schools in the area during transition year. 4 weeks are spent in the school and the 5th is spend at MU visiting the library. 

Topics covered in the programme include: the catalogue, shelf numbers, digital foot print, search v research. (As in - research improves assignments). The illustrative examples are kept up to date so the participants can relate to them. Tools used include tweet map  (http://www.tweetmap.co/), a boolean logic game, powtoon (http://www.powtoon.com/), and animoto (http://animoto.com). 

The LIST programme has undergone some changes in design with regard to the school based sessions as some gaps had been identified. The programme helps with the transition to third level, given the absence of school librarians in these schools. 

The library is also part of the university tour given to second level visitors. 


CASE STUDY: Stepping Outside Of The Library Walls - Broadening our Role in Supporting Academic Skills. 

Monica Crump - NUIG

Monica spoke about steeping out beyond the walls of the library / traditional library based role. She highlighted how evolving roles necessitate this. Roles such as teacher, content manager, publishing expert. Monica spoke also about the lack of awareness outside of the library of the subject librarian role. To highlight the skill of these librarians, a few nights a week, group study rooms were used in the Academic Writing Centre. The growth in demand for workshops led to the development of an online module for students (http://vmserver83.nuigalway.ie/LARK/LARK/)

One of the challenges that the subject librarian team at NUIG faced was trying to balance the academic staff requests for library tours with the library staff desire to turn these into information literacy sessions. This led to a discussion about transition versus retention. 


Discussions with staff based outside of the library showed that the library could not afford to be an 'ivory tower', that the library services were not known about and that study skills were needed for 1st year, by both Academics and Students. 


Consequently the library became involved in Skills Support. This was rolled out across campus, but some issues with ongoing provision have arisen. Ongoing funding is not guaranteed, and sharing of information about funding sources is not part of the organisational culture. More support and better integration is needed. 


A formal report was submitted with clear recommendations and findings. The key to moving forward seems to be peer assisted learning, with allows peers to accrue volunteering credits. Students relate to their peers better. 



LIGHTENING SESSION BY PLATINUM SPONSOR: ProQuest

The ProQuest speaker spoke about the challenges of matching resources to courses. In this vein they mentioned the usefulness of PDA (Patron Driven Acquistion: http://www.proquest.com/products-services/related/demand-driven-acquisition.html) and EBL (Electronic Book Library ; http://www.eblib.com/) in providing recommendations for e-book purchasing. Their E-book Central has 750,000 ebooks, available via a UK/Ireland ebrary platform. The aim with their new interface is for WCAG AAA accessibility. 

CASE STUDY 2. Getting the Measure of Analytics: Using Bibliometrics and Usage Statistics To Evaluate E-Journals. 

Fintan Bracken - UL & Arlene Healy - TCD (IREL Monitoring Group)

Fintan and Arlene spoke about the use of bibliometrics in relation to establishing the value of e-journals, by evaluating impact and value. Their joint project blended usage statistics with bibliometric data for the university libraries participating in IREL. A 'normalized citation' technique was used to calculate the expected citation count of an article in comparison to the actual level of citation. This took the data in relation to the citation levels of other articles in the same journal to create the base line comparator data. This 'global average' informed the measurement of impact for articles published by participating Universities. 

InCites, the Thomson Reuters research evaluation tool was leveraged for research analytics.  (http://researchanalytics.thomsonreuters.com/incites/) This service utilizes Web of Science (webofknowledge.com) data such as citations, rankings and usage data (COUNTER standard http://www.projectcounter.org/). This was used to identify the most popular journals. The resultant journals were tied into the national research prioritization exercise classification scheme. Articles cited more that the global average were then identified from within these journals.




It was noted that Humanties journals were not represented within the 
scope of the Web of Science data used for the project. However, it was found that e-journal usage was spread more evenly across the disciplines than might have previously been thought. The research also included comparisons of usage pre and post the IREL initiative. This illustrated that the IREL initiative provides vital access for library users. 

A significant finding of the research was the identification of important journals where Irish Academics are not publishing. 


It is planned that this analysis will be repeated on a 3 yearly basis. Altmetrics are on the radar for consideration for inclusion into the future. 



WORKSHOP 1.  The Scavenger Hunt: Is it an effective tool to teach & learn about collaboration. 

Jane Burns, RCSI & UCD SILS. 

This workshop included active participation by all attendees. Worksheets were circulated at lunch time, giving participants the afternoon to solve three clues:
  1. Ice Breaker (meet two people on the hunt too)
  2. QR code at the Poster Section, lead to a riddle to be solved. 
  3. Locating a physical Item. 
During her presentation Jane spoke about the use of the 'Scavenger Hunt' technique with UCD SILS students. This technique was brought to bear to encourage the development on team and collaborative work skills. Syllabus changes now mean that collaborative / group assignments and projects now form a significant component on SILS courses. The development of these skills should assist graduates as they are developing real life skills on real life scenarios. Some of the skills developed are those to deal with a scenario where you are given unclear information, are under time pressure and have tasks to fulfil. 

During the exercise, the students learn to pay attention to their environment, as the scavenger hunt clues were placed literally anywhere. It brought them along the UCD sculpture trail. Videos were created of the different teams experiences. Geographical and social meta data was added to the video afterwards, as participants were busy capturing the event while it was ongoing. This was followed by the submission of an individual reflection on the experience. 

Lessons learned:
  • Irrespective of how you put a scavenger hunt together some people are going to hate it. 
  • Keep the size small. 
  • Considerable time commitment is required to set up a scavenger hunt.
  • Including the Metro newspaper timestamped the activity to prevent judicious additions subsequent to the official scavenger hunt date. 
  • The individual reflection piece needs to be weighted stronger than the group video component. 

CASE STUDY: United we Stand: Divided we Fall. The Benefits, Value and Impact of Collaboration. 

Aoife Lawton - HSE

Aoife outlined the HSE (Health Service Executive) library services (20 FTE librarians, 100,000 staff), and the necessity to measure the impact of the library on HSE services. She mentioned being inspired by the open access journal 'Collaborative Librarianship' http://www.collaborativelibrarianship.org/. The concept of collaborative librarianship was appealing, as literature showed that it can be an effective method for project delivery. 

Open plan office layouts were discussed in the context of collaboration. The development of a pecking order within such an environment and the impact of differing personality types on the physical an work environment was used as an example of the theory not quite matching the reality when put into practice in some cases. 

Successful collaborations were identified, such as, Wikipedia, Web 2.0, DOAJ, RIAN, IREL, Informationliteracy.ie, IFLA, and the library management software procurement consortia of the Institutes of Technology (Millennium) and the Public Libraries (Sierra).

Collaborations are unsuccessful when there are leadership and communication issues, when the project goes off topic, there are differing expectations or participants don't actively participate. 


The potential for collaboration between the HSE and DIT at the new Grangegorman campus exists, especially as upgraded network connectivity will be delivered as part of the campus development. 

The Lenus repository has been a successful collaboration for the HSE libraries. It has an identifiable benefit, recognised value and demonstrable impact. http://www.lenus.ie/hse/

Another collaborative project for HSE libraries is Repository Network Ireland, where knowledge and expertise are shared. http://rni.wikispaces.com/  As is HEAR (Health Evidence Awareness Report; http://www.hslg.ie/category/hear/) published monthly by a collaboration of health institutions.


There was a caveat to all this, in that collaborative ideas can go wrong, especially when a small geographically dispersed group are attempting to work together and the central figure becomes unavailable, in an unplanned way. 

Aoife closed by giving examples for where opportunities for further collaboration arise. (Co-publishing, co-teaching etc.)

CASE STUDY: Breaking the Third Dimension: Bringing 3d Printing to the Library.

Hugh Murphy and Michael Leigh - MU

Hugh and Michael spoke about the decision at MU library to make a 3d printer available to users, opening it up to those on campus outside of the engineering and science fields, where departments might be expected to provide access to such equipment. Hugh explained the rational behind the library's decision to introduce 3d printing. It was done in the spirit of the maker spaces movement. It has the advantage of supporting emerging styles of learning. 3D printing is about what you do with the artifact produced. Providing this equipment allows the library to support knowledge creation, allowing users to learn by doing, but with support from the library staff. As 3d printing increases in importance to business this is an important capacity for all students to develop, not just those in the engineering and / or science fields. 

As the library IT Developer, Michael outlined the process, highlighting how fast it is to create a 3d item. The design (in the correct format) is run through slicing software to convert it into gcode (open source code) so that the printer can read the code and follow the instructions held therein. 

An item taking 47 minutes to print, cost 27c in materials. 

MU have a chefjet 3d printer, which can print using both PLA and ABS materials (both thermoplastics), is very reliable and prints in a modular fashion. There was some discussion of the selection process, including an outline of the different types of 3d printing equipment available on the mass market. (Sterolithograhy and Extrusion). The materials available to create the 3d printed artifacts were also mentioned. (PLA, ABS and Resin)  

Michael stressed that it did take some experimentation to get the settings right; for example, 0.1mm layer height being the optimum. 

During the current introductory period, the length of time the printer will run for any job has been limited to 9 hours. Print jobs are submitted via a web form, and are limited to the .stl file format. The library uses netfab software to ensure that the model is structurally sound. 

Maintenance is essential, especially a clean build plate. 

MU library welcomes visits to see this new technology in action. 

Example of use: 3d print neolithic figure for use by a post graduate student. 
This application of the technology revolutionises our traditional relationship with our cultural heritage.