Comments on: Stepping on Toes: The Delicate Art of Talking to Faculty about Questionable Assignments http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/ The murder victim? Your library assumptions. Suspects? It could have been any of us. Thu, 08 Oct 2015 19:41:54 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=4.3.1 By: ellie http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-2186 Mon, 21 Dec 2009 02:54:15 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-2186 Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment. In an ideal world there would always be perfect communication between librarians and faculty. Sadly for each faculty member who doesn’t reply to a librarian’s request for feedback about the collection, there is a librarian who doesn’t ask in the first place.

In response to the visiting and temporary faculty syllabi situation, most librarians would be willing to – at the minimum – do a quick check to let the faculty member know whether their library has those specific articles. Many would also be happy to help provide alternative suggestions and some even have departments to help obtain articles and set up course reserves.

Sadly you are all too right about the lack of clarity for access to online resources. If it’s any consolation, it frustrates us as much as it does you and we do our best to both clarify and work with vendors to simplify what we can.

Our comment policy only requires civility and topicality which you’ve done superbly. I do hope you stop back to see my reply and that you continue sharing alternative perspectives. We need them!

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By: Polly M. Poppers http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-2182 Sun, 20 Dec 2009 19:36:00 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-2182 It might be worth bearing in mind that at some institutions, decisions are made to withdraw or alter library resources without the knowledge of relevant faculty. This can happen either because a librarian decides certain resources are not being used “enough” or because several disciplines use a single electronic resource (e.g. JSTOR) but only the department who fund the resource and decide to cease funding it are aware of the change.

In an example of the first sort, the first the faculty knew of the decision to withdraw certain books due to “lack of use” was finding them on sale in Oxfam. One of the faculty ended up buying back all the books from Oxfam and returning them to the library, pointing out that in many cases the librarian had removed the only copy of a book available and that some of the books were more likely to be used for reference than borrowing (so lack of recent “check-outs” did not constitute evidence that the books were not being used). This occurred at a major university which certainly sees itself as playing in the major research league.

In the second sort of case, it is now really common for electronic journals from various subjects to be bought in bundles. So if department X is buying a bundle which includes journals used by department Y, it is easy for faculty in department Y to be unaware that a journal is no longer available. Even if department X keeps funding the bundle, the publishers sometimes alter the contents of different bundles so an electronic journal can “disappear” without warning.

And it isn’t just adjuncts who may lack time to get to know library resources. The problem also affects visiting and temporary faculty, though perhaps to a lesser extent. If you teach at four different institutions in four years, for example, it can be something of a nightmare to check out all the relevant resources and adapt syllabi to ensure that they don’t require students to read articles which aren’t available in your current library.

It also isn’t always as clear as it could be what’s available only from on-campus and what’s available off-campus and off-campus access methods seem to be different everywhere – and sometimes, they seem to different for different resources at the same institution, too.

Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t mean to suggest librarians are responsible for these problems (except in the case of the librarian who gave half the subject’s books to Oxfam) but electronic resources have made life much more complicated for everybody, even if they have brought many advantages, too. Many of these complications are the responsibility of the publishers, of course. Crippling costs; bundling; closed-source, accessibility-hostile and proprietary formats; and user-hostile database interfaces seem to be par for the course.

I apologise, but the name and email given will be fake. I don’t feel comfortable posting this in my own name but I also don’t wish to less than honest about that. If the site detects fakes, this comment will disappear into the ether – and perhaps that will not be altogether a bad thing.

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By: Wonderful world of blogs … « Market Intelligence for Librarians http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-1630 Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:19:44 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-1630 […] Stepping on Toes: The Delicate Art of Talking to Faculty about Questionable Assignments […]

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By: Ellie http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-784 Fri, 17 Apr 2009 17:22:51 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-784 Thanks for reading my article and thanks for your question. As I recall, this was an intro level survey course in which the assignment was repeated every week with a new topic (including a new country, language, time period, etc.). Before the librarians spoke with the faculty member, no British newspapers would have been considered acceptable sources. So, in the instance I cited, only an eighteenth-century Turkish newspaper would have satisfied the assignment’s requirements.

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By: Mark http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-781 Fri, 17 Apr 2009 00:13:35 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-781 I have a question about the example you give of an assignment requiring students to find a newspaper article or other contemporary source related to eighteenth-century conflicts involving the Ottoman Empire. What was the conflict? Eighteenth-century British newspapers regularly covered military and political affairs involving the Ottoman-Habsburg conflicts in the Balkans. They often reprinted letters purporting to be from merchants, sailors, etc. returning from the area as well as reprinting official (or allegedly official) government communications from other European courts involving those conflicts. Digital surrogates of several such newspapers are available online for free, though learning how to search the interfaces can take a little work. But isn’t that the kind of thing you’re there to teach? What about, for example, the online version of the London Gazette archives, found at http://www.gazettes-online.co.uk/search? (Yes, I know, the London Gazette was the official government paper at the time and maybe the professor wanted the students to find something from an opposition paper, but those sources are available too if one looks carefully.) Or was the problem that the professor expected the students to find an eighteenth-century Turkish newspaper? In any case, I wonder whether you chose a good example for an “impossible” assignment. It’s hard to tell given the limited information you provide about it in your post. I don’t mean to be disrespectful, but anyone with even a cursory knowledge of eighteenth-century newspapers would realize that foreign news and overseas war news formed an important part of the content of those early periodicals.

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By: Ellie http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-775 Wed, 15 Apr 2009 15:11:28 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-775 Thanks so much Maura! I’m glad you found it helpful. And I feel the same way about my first experience and trying to imitate her attitude :)

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By: Maura Smale http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-773 Wed, 15 Apr 2009 13:51:08 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-773 This is a great post, Ellie. I’ll never forget the first time I encountered a questionable assignment while I was interning at a college library during my time in library school (only a couple of years ago). The librarian I was working with at the time had a great attitude that I’ve tried to imitate in my own work: this sort of assignment provides a perfect opportunity for faculty outreach. Crafting those emails to contact faculty can be tricky — thanks for the suggestions in your post.

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By: Ellie http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-748 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:49:40 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-748 Andrew and Renee – Thanks so much for sharing!

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By: Andrew Heiz http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-740 Tue, 07 Apr 2009 19:49:05 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-740 This topic was also in ACRLs podcast

http://www.acrl.ala.org/acrlinsider/2008/05/09/acrl-podcast-eradicating-the-rogue-assignment/

One other impossible assignment that is mentioned is using the resource that no longer exists in the library. I ask for copies of assignments from students so I can contact the instructor with “helpful updates” rather than criticism of their assignments.

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By: Tuesday Links « Bib-Laura-graphy http://www.inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/2009/stepping-on-toes-the-delicate-art-of-talking-to-faculty-about-questionable-assignments/comment-page-1/#comment-710 Wed, 01 Apr 2009 02:09:38 +0000 http://inthelibrarywiththeleadpipe.org/?p=1148#comment-710 […] interesting article at the always thought-provoking In the Library, With the Lead Pipe.  Today’s topic: how to approach faculty members about improving their library […]

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