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A busy day today started with

The Proquest Breakfast . Roz and I attended the presentation that was meant to showcase the new Summon Unified Discovery Service.In order to frame the issue, first Alison Head spoke about, “Project information literacy:Through the lens of the Student Experience“

She shared a YouTube video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6cvZPMmYeR4) that summed up the results, and discovered 7 out of 10 students start with Wikipedia first, to get “presearch”.They do not cite, (because they have been told not to use it), but do use.The second speaker, Jane Burke, began by taking a position that if more than half of the academic library’s money is spent on electronic in academic libraries, then the collections have become electronic.They did anthropological research:they went where the students are conducting research…in their dorm, library, coffee shop.Solicited student participation through facebook, asked if they would let Proquest watch while they did research…for money.In the course of discussion, they discovered that students believe that libraries provide superior sources for quality… Web research gives a lot of junk, therefore the library is the most efficient place for research.HOWEVER, the use of Google and GoogleScholar is on the rise.How to explain the dichotomy?When time is tight they go to Google…and they aren’t procrastinating, they are busy!

Conclusions:Why is the library not the first place people go?Libraries provide no clear and compelling starting place.”It is difficult to discern what is the appropriate resource for me”. ” I’m short on time, don’t have wherewithal to start “investigating” where to begin.”She quoted“How do you know that?An investigation of student research practices in the digital age.” , another study, shows the library is seen as intimidating and inconvenient…especially in its primary purpose…helping with research.

Then she introduced “Summon:single search unified access tool”.Not a federated search, but a precoordinated metadata delivery service.Single search, preloaded with content (like Google’s web crawler) that provides the full breadth of digital and physical content available in the library, and to the libraries users.It brings together print, electronic, courseware, databases, institutional repository, conference proceeding, dissertations, your digital library, and all given equal presentation, equal weight.And only provides that which is available to your users…respecting copyright, respecting licenses.This is in beta at Darmouth and Oklahoma State and about to go into University of Liverpool and University of Sydney.

From there I headed to the Cyber Zed Shed and a session that discussed optimizing web pages for mobile use.The presenter told how they condensed the content of web pages and distilled the whole website down to 5 pages.The best take away for me…using Twitter to update the pages when things like “hours of operation” or “changes to a library event” require quickly pushing content out to the web.

Post literacy:Michael Ridley, CIO and Chief Librarian, University of Guelph-Ontario

Fascinating presentation on post literacy, Michael envisions an age when we move beyond literacy to an era of human communication that exceeds and replaces written language.Since we can think so much faster than we can write, literacy is inefficient and slow.Post literacy will provide an opportunity for greater and faster collaboration, utilizing technologies that allow for greater sharing of thought.Like the BORG in Star Trek, we will give up the “I” for the benefit of “we”.His most provocative statement:Literacy is over.Post literacy is an advance:Difficult transition to post literacy, but it is coming.Once we are in a post literacy society, libraries will be unnecessary.(He did say, however, that everyone in the room could relax…our jobs are not immediately threatened.)

Campus disconnect: Cara Bradley, Distance Ed and Outreach Librarian at the University of Regina-Saskatchewan

Cara surveyed campus staff who are not on the teaching faculty and found that the majority of staff have information needs, but do not turn to the library for assistance.To the users in this study, when ranking what is most important, first is accuracy, currency, and convenience.She asked “if you don’t use the library, why not.”An astonishing 14% said they forgot about the library.This response was given in a free text box.She hadn’t included it as a choice on the survey.It never occurred to her that this could be true.The staff indicated that they would be more apt to use the libray if they had a designated contact person, someone to build a rapport with.Library isn’t important to respondents in this survey, but more than half would like to see the library play a larger role when they are looking for information.Recognized benefits:stress reduction; opportunity to learn and reuse new strategies.They would feel more authoritative, credible, and efficient.

Others have already commented on other presentations and I won’t duplicate them here. Lunch provided by Gale, (with Roz) showed off many new and expanded full text databases. They highlighted GREENR, the new database that brings together content for environmental studies and sustainability was particularly interesting.