Faculty Publications

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University Libraries is a vibrant, dynamic community of world-class faculty and staff redefining what a university library can and should be. Expert researchers and scholars, their work is helping promote a more engaged and better informed society.

Photograph of Beth Kattelman

Beth Kattelman

Curator, Theatre Research Inst

"Creating Stage Ghosts: The Archeology of Spectral Illusion" Chapter


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

Beth Kattelman's chapter "Creating Stage Ghosts: The Archeology of Spectral Illusion" has been published in DRAMATIC APPARITIONS AND THEATRICAL GHOSTS: THE STAGING OF ILLUSION ACROSS TIME AND CULTURES. Edited by Ann C. Hall and Alan Nadel. New York: Methuen. The chapter chronicles some of the techniques that theatre artists have used to create ghosts onstage, including special mechanical effects and optical tricks such as the Pepper's Ghost illusion.

Photograph of Hilary Bussell

Hilary Bussell

Head, Humanities and Social Sciences Cohort

Scaffolding the Open: Transforming an International Studies Course using Open Pedagogy


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored with Amanda Larson

This case study describes how two librarians transformed an international information literacy course by creating a scaffolded open pedagogy experience for students to build transferable skills while exploring how information is produced, disseminated, and interpreted across the world. The authors discuss how we collaborated on the project to incorporate open pedagogy, tools, and strategies to enhance learning. The result was a scaffolded course using open pedagogy to help students engage with global information issues. Using Pressbooks, students published multimedia content exploring topics including global news media, censorship, misinformation, and digital divides. Then students chose to either openly license their work, share it publicly while retaining their copyright, or hide it from public view. Additionally, students used Hypothesis to socially annotate reading assignments outside of class. We reflect on our experience revising this course, what worked and what did not, and how we will adapt the course in the future.

Photograph of Leigh Bonds

Leigh Bonds

Digital Humanities Librarian

Facilitating Course [Re]Design: A Programmatic Approach to DH Integration


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Publication Type: Article

In his keynote address at the 2019 Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI) on the eve of the Alliance of Digital Humanities Organizations’ (ADHO) Pedagogy Special Interest Group Conference, Matthew Gold reminded us “that we cannot forget the classroom as a central space for DH work” and argued the “incorporation of DH work into your classroom matters and is, in and of itself, DH.” “In order to think through DH,” he concluded, “we need to think through our teaching. And it is in that space of possibility, when computational methods encounter human beings, that DH can reach its fullest, most radiant, most radical, and most surprising potential” (“Thinking”). These ideas resonated with me and echoed many of the voices on the topic I synthesized five years earlier in “Listening in on the Conversations,” such as Bryan Alexander, Stephen Brier, Tanya Clement, Rebecca Frost Davis, Brett Hirsch, Alan Liu, Stephen Ramsay, Geoffrey Rockwell, Tom Scheinfeldt, and Melissa Terras. In fact, I was at the conference and DHSI to think through how to design a program to support the integration of digital humanities (DH) into new and existing arts and humanities courses—a program informed by the existing scholarship on teaching strategies, curricula development, and learning outcomes.

Photograph of Jolie Braun

Jolie Braun

Curator Modrn Lit & Manuscript

Collecting Sarah Piatt at the Ohio State University's Rare Books & Manuscripts Library


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Publication Type: Article

What role can a special collections library play in helping recover a forgotten writer? This article provides a case study from a curator's perspective on building a collection dedicated to the nineteenth-century American poet Sarah Morgan Bryan Piatt at Ohio State University's Rare Books & Manuscripts Library (RBML). A partnership between teaching faculty and RBML has helped make OSU a center for Piatt research by developing published and archival collections, digital projects, and oral histories. I will discuss RBML's approach to collection development and how Piatt fits into the broader collecting goals, the strategies involved in this project, and the benefits of prioritizing a lesser-known writer.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Enabling Inclusive and Equitable Teaching Practices through Instructor Development


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

Co-authored with Amanda Folk, Katie Blocksidge, and Hanna Primeau.

In The Ohio State University Libraries, we support inclusive and equitable teaching practices through instructor development. The Libraries' Teaching and Learning department offers two formal university-wide, cross-campus instructor development programs, Meaningful Inquiry and Teaching Information Literacy. In this chapter, we outline our programs, highlight the equity-focused pedagogical strategies that we incorporate, and provide activities and templates readers can use to support equity and inclusion in their own work with instructors.

Photograph of Daniel Dotson

Daniel Dotson

Head, Geology Library; Map Room

To Err is Human: Part 1


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Publication Type: Article

Mistakes happen. We all make them from time to time. But what does it say when our most respected sources — peer reviewed journals — publish mistakes? This is the first in a series of three articles on issues related to errata and retractions in scholarly journals. This article will focus on the frequency of errata.

Photograph of Katie Blocksidge

Katie Blocksidge

Director of Library

Adapting and Evolving: Generation Z's Information Beliefs


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored with Hanna Primeau

Each new generation of students brings with them new information beliefs and practices, with Generation Z being no different, evolving along with the world while finding ways to meet their information needs. Using previous research that had established a scale for information beliefs created by Brenda Dervin, we were able to approach the complexity of “information beliefs” with greater ease.

Photograph of Craig Gibson

Craig Gibson

Professional Development Libr

Information’s Not Neutral, and Neither Are Individuals


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Publication Type: Article

You make decisions all the time about small matters and maybe less frequently about more momentous ones. How do you know which information sources, experts, collections of data, or organizations to rely on in making these decisions? You will choose a major and make decisions about a job, a career, a major purchase, a place to live, as well as selecting information sources for your academic courses. You are learning all the time about information sources and their origins and how they circulate; learning how to trust some sources and not others will be an ongoing process for you.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Wicked Information Literacy: Program, course, and assignment design recommendations


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Publication Type: Article

In Creating Wicked Students: Designing Courses for a Complex World, Paul Hanstedt starts “with the assumption that what we all want for our students is for them to be capable of changing the world.” After graduation, students face a chaotic world full of “wicked problems,” where “the parameters of the problem and the means available for solving them” are “changing constantly.” If we want students to be able to change the world, the goal should be to create “wicked graduates with wicked competencies.”

While not aimed at librarians, we believe that Hanstedt’s ideas could be incorporated into our goals for information literacy, especially critical information literacy. In this essay, we outline Hanstedt’s wicked approach and describe how it can be integrated by teaching librarians. Adapting Hanstedt’s format, we provide ideas for program and course design, assignments, and teaching activities.

Photograph of Craig Gibson

Craig Gibson

Professional Development Libr

Five Years in: The Undergraduate Research Library Fellowship at The Ohio State University


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

Co-authored by Jennifer Schnabel and Katherine Watson

Photograph of Leigh Bonds

Leigh Bonds

Digital Humanities Librarian

Mary Robinson née Darby (1757–1800)


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

The essay overviews Mary Robinson’s life, work, and criticism from contemporary reviews to current scholarship. Biography provides basic details to situate the author relative to her work and period, and Biographical Resources overview the biographical scholarship available, highlighting those works which are more thorough, well researched, and detailed. Works overviews the author’s publications across genres and venues and includes a discussion of Modern Editions, identifying scholarly editions and/or teaching and reading editions to aid research. Archival Holdings directs the researcher to primary sources held in libraries and museums. Critical Reception begins with contemporary reviews and moves by century through trends in literary criticism. Avenues for Further Research points out gaps in the current critical conversation. The final sections of the essay offer further guidance for researchers, including Signatures under which the author published and a List of Works accompanied, whenever possible, with contemporary prices and publishing formats. To facilitate research, a robust Works Cited includes all texts mentioned or quoted in the essay.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Connecting school and academic librarians through professional development: A pilot project


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Publication Type: Article

Collaborations between school and academic librarians centered around the professional development of K-12 media specialists may represent a scalable and sustainable method by which school and academic librarians can support information literacy. This article outlines a pilot project developed between The Ohio State University Libraries (University Libraries), located in Columbus, Ohio, and the Columbus City Schools (CCS) that was intended to forge connections between school and academic librarians through professional development.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

The faculty-focused model of information literacy


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Publication Type: Article

In a faculty-focused, or “teach the teachers” (TTT) model of information literacy (IL), librarians would spend a significant portion of their time on faculty development. To support the adoption of this approach, there needs to be evidence that librarians can act effectively as faculty developers and that faculty development (also referred to as academic or educational development) can produce positive changes in teaching practices and student learning. This paper explores the faculty development literature in order to better understand the potential of the faculty-focused model of IL. Two research questions guided the review. What can the literature on the effectiveness of faculty development tell us about the potential of the faculty development approach to IL? Additionally, what insight can the literature on the background, experiences, and identity of faculty developers provide to our understanding of librarians acting as faculty developers?

The analysis provides indications that a model of IL instruction focused on faculty could support increased integration of IL into the curriculum, as well as additional evidence that faculty development should be considered a viable role for librarians. However, the review also surfaced concerns about the identity and status of developers and the challenges of assessing faculty development that are relevant to librarians’ adoption of the faculty-focused model of IL. By exploring the faculty development literature as part of a consideration of the TTT approach to IL, this paper provides a valuable perspective to the ongoing debates about the future of IL.

Photograph of Annamarie Klose

Annamarie Klose

Metadata Initiatives Librarian

Coins in the library: the creation of a digital collection of Roman Republican coins


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Publication Type: Article

In 2001, Rutgers University Libraries (RUL) accepted a substantial donation of Roman Republican coins. The work to catalog, house, digitize, describe, and present this collection online provided unique challenges for the institution. Coins are often seen as museum objects; however, they can serve pedagogical purposes within libraries. In the quest to innovate, RUL digitized coins from seven angles to provide a 180-degree view of coins. However, this strategy had its drawbacks; it had to be reassessed as the project continued. RUCore, RUL’s digital repository, uses Metadata Object Description Schema (MODS). Accordingly, it was necessary to adapt numismatic description to bibliographic metadata standards.With generous funding from the Loeb Foundation, the resulting digital collection of 1200 coins was added to RUCore from 2012 to 2018. Rutgers’s Badian Roman Coins Collection serves as an exemplar of numismatics in a library environment that is freely available to all on the Web.

Photograph of Meris Longmeier

Meris Longmeier

Head, Research Services

Consider “HACKS” when designing hackathon challenges: Hook, action, collaborative knowledge sharing


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Publication Type: Article

Our world’s complex challenges increase the need for those entering STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) disciplines to be able to creatively approach and collaboratively address wicked problems – complex problems with no “right” answer that span disciplines. Hackathons are environments that leverage problem-based learning practices so student teams can solve problems creatively and collaboratively by developing a solution to given challenges using engineering and computer science knowledge, skills, and abilities. The purpose of this paper is to offer a framework for interdisciplinary hackathon challenge development, as well as provide resources to aid interdisciplinary teams in better understanding the context and needs of a hackathon to evaluate and refine hackathon challenges. Three cohorts of interdisciplinary STEAM researchers were observed and interviewed as they collaboratively created a hackathon challenge incorporating all cohort-member disciplines for an online high school hackathon. The observation data and interview transcripts were analyzed using thematic analysis to distill the processes cohorts underwent and resources that were necessary for successfully creating a hackathon challenge. Through this research we found that the cohorts worked through four sequential stages as they collaborated to create a hackathon challenge. We detail the stages and offer them as a framework for future teams who seek to develop an interdisciplinary hackathon challenge. Additionally, we found that all cohorts lacked the knowledge and experience with hackathons to make fully informed decisions related to the challenge’s topic, scope, outcomes, etc. In response, this manuscript offers five hackathon quality considerations and three guiding principles for challenge developers to best meet the needs and goals of hackathon sponsors and participants.

Photograph of Amanda Larson

Amanda Larson

Affordable Learning Inst Const

Framing Open Education Within the Library


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

This chapter explores explicit connections between the six frames of the ACRL Framework and the work librarians do to support faculty interested in adopting, adapting, and authoring OER. These connections can work as touchstones that open education librarians can leverage with their subject librarian colleagues to generate buy-in for open education and open educational resources.

Photograph of Annamarie Klose

Annamarie Klose

Metadata Initiatives Librarian

Numismatics & Bibliographic Description: How Rutgers University Libraries Described Coins with MODS


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Publication Type: Article

Realia pose challenges when utilizing bibliographic metadata standards. Rutgers University Libraries, in collaboration with Rutgers University’s Classics Department, created a large digital library collection of ancient Roman coins in RUcore, Rutgers University’s Community Repository. RUcore records use Metadata Object Description Standard (MODS) for descriptive metadata and many custom fields. Therefore, it was necessary to adapt numismatic description to fit this structure. During the planning stage of the project, Numismatic Description Standard (NUDS), a numismatic database standard implemented and maintained by the American Numismatic Society (ANS), and VRA Core, an art-centered XML metadata standard created by the Visual Resources Association, provided valuable insights. However, this project faced challenges in terms of interoperability and time constraints that required altering the team’s approach to this unique set of resources in a digital library environment. Key issues were encoding B.C.E. dates in a machine-readable format for optimal searching and browsing, developing local controlled vocabularies, providing subject access to the iconography on coins, and the research-intensive work of metadata description. This article provides “how to” information, as well as a critical analysis of lessons learned and opportunities for improvement as the linked data landscape has changed both bibliographic and numismatic description.

Photograph of Beth Kattelman

Beth Kattelman

Curator, Theatre Research Inst

The sound of evil: How the sound design of Hereditary manifests the unseen and triggers fear


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Publication Type: Article

This article examines the soundtrack and score for Ari Aster’s 2018 film Hereditary, illustrating how the sound design heightens the film’s emotional and psychological impact by delivering unseen elements of the narrative auditorily and through its inclusion of sonic elements that can directly affect audience members physiologically. Hereditary’s narrative is strongly supported by musician Colin Stetson’s evocative score, which relies heavily upon his ability to coax unusual sounds from reed instruments by using uncommon fingerings, accompanying vocalizations, percussive key striking and circular breathing. After a brief synopsis and examination of the film’s themes, the article delves into particular elements that make Hereditary’s soundscape so effective, including the Shepard tone, infrasound, subliminal and corporeal sounds, and the use of silence, exploring in-depth how the sound design supports and enriches the film by building tension, enhancing dread, triggering fear and delivering unseen narrative information in a shorthand way. The article also has a wider application in that it discusses how the critical-yet under-theorized element of sound design is crucial to horror entertainments’ ability to create affect in a variety of ways and shows how the sonic components used in Hereditary have a demonstrated efficacy as shown by their use in a wide variety of horror films and thrillers.

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Leta Hendricks

Assistant Professor

Amplifying Antiracism Resources through Intra-University Collaboration


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored by Gene Springs

In the summer of 2020, The Ohio State University Libraries was asked by The Ohio State University Office of Diversity and Inclusion (ODI) to collaborate with them to provide expanded access to antiracism book content in support of continuing education, reading groups, and professional development across the university. The Libraries’ African American and African Studies Librarian worked with ODI’s Director for Strategic Diversity Planning, Training, and Assessment to identify antiracism book titles of interest to recommend to the Collections Strategist for purchase or expanded access. The African American and African Studies Librarian created research guides to supplement the reading lists, expanded them to support campus-wide antiracism educational opportunities, and iterated the collection practices. This paper details not only the process of collaboration with another unit within the university, but also outlines challenges and opportunities faced with budget management, publishing and vendor practices with antiracism resources, and COVID-19 implications. It also addresses critical approaches to antiracism within library collaborations to university campus communities, including outreach, teaching, and collections as part of the evolving Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Access (DEIA) movement.

Photograph of Craig Gibson

Craig Gibson

Professional Development Libr

Insiders’ Perspective on the ACRL Framework on Information Literacy


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Publication Type: Article

This interview with the two U.S. librarians who co-chaired the Task Force that led to the creation of the Association of College & Research Libraries' Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education (ACRL 2016) revisits the process of its creation as well as the reception this document has received five years after its inception. The authors retrace the main conceptual debates that have shaped the Framework and propose a typology of contemporary currents in information literacy, providing insight into the issues that inform the evolution of different conceptions of the pedagogical role of librarians in higher education from yesterday until today. This interview was translated into French.

Photograph of Alan Green

Alan Green

Head, Music & Dance Library

Allen Sapp, Piano Sonatas I-IV


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

This volume presents a critical edition of Allen Sapp’s four earliest piano sonatas, the first written at just age nineteen while he was a student of Walter Piston at Harvard in 1941. Piano Sonatas II, III, and IV were completed while Sapp was on sabbatical from Harvard and living in Rome in 1957. The three Roman piano sonatas are remarkable in that they were composed using serial procedures, yet they were intentionally written to have strong tonal centers (especially the third sonata). Irving Fine, who gave the premiere performance of Piano Sonata I, composed an ossia of a passage in the second movement, which is included in the edition.

Photograph of Tracey Overbey

Tracey Overbey

Food & Nutrition, Human Sciences, Sociology Librarian

Nature-based interventions for vulnerable youth: a scoping review


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored by Florian Diekmann and Kristi Lekies

Nature-based interventions hold promise for vulnerable youth experiencing mental, emotional, developmental, behavioral, or social difficulties. This scoping review examined wilderness therapy, animal assisted therapy, care farming, and gardening and horticultural therapy programs to raise awareness and guide future development of research and treatment options. Studies included in this review were identified through a systematic search of the literature informed by a scoping review framework. Studies were examined by design, sample, intervention, and key findings. The majority of studies were quantitative using repeated measures designs and were conducted primarily in the United States. Sample sizes were generally small. Interventions were residential and community based with varying degrees of duration. Outcomes were largely positive across a wide range of psychosocial and behavioral measures and often maintained post-treatment. We emphasize the importance of robust empirical designs, comprehensive description of the interventions and surrounding therapies, and identification of target groups.

Photograph of Pamela Espinosa de los Monteros

Pamela Espinosa de los Monteros

Latin American, Iberian, and Latino/a Studies Librarian

Global Inclusion: Designing an Annotated Bibliography for Global Search and Selection


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored with Beth Black, Undergraduate Engagement Librarian

The COVID-19 pandemic has reinforced the notion that our world is global and interdependent. Despite the ever-increasing connection of global with local, there continues to be formidable barriers in accessing information produced in different international contexts and languages. This Innovative Practices article details the redesign of an annotated bibliography assignment in an international studies course to support the inclusion of global perspectives into the information practices of undergraduate students. The redesign embedded explicit information literacy dispositions and global citizenship education competencies through the search and selection of global information sources. The authors discuss the instructional elements used, student outcomes, and the connection between information literacy and global citizenship pedagogies. The goal of this article is to support librarians in developing inclusive and global information literacy curriculum enabling students to connect to international voices.

Photograph of Amanda Folk

Amanda Folk

Head, Teaching and Learning

Exploring the Development of Undergraduate Students’ Information Literacy through Their Experiences with Research Assignments


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Publication Type: Article

Although information literacy has been fundamental to the work of teaching librarians for decades, the ways in which students develop their information literacy is not well understood. In addition, the sociocultural nature of information literacy is often neglected when attempting to assess students’ information literacy development. The purpose of this study is to discover factors that could potentially enable or constrain the development of undergraduate students’ information literacy through qualitative research that explores first-generation college students’ experiences with research assignments throughout college.

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Michael Flierl

Student Learning Librarian

Developing the Informed Learning Scale: Measuring Information Literacy in Higher Education


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Publication Type: Article

Academic libraries continue to face challenges communicating their value. One dimension of this challenge is in demonstrating how information literacy relates to important measures of student learning, like course grades and motivation. This study documents the development and exploratory pilot testing of the Informed Learning scale—which is intended to produce data for institutional reporting purposes at scale in alignment with contemporary IL theory, specifically Informed Learning. Preliminary findings include small correlations between the Informed Learning scale and course grades and moderate correlations between the scale and student perceptions of their learning climate and self-determined motivation.

Photograph of Jolie Braun

Jolie Braun

Curator Modrn Lit & Manuscript

Unconventional Collecting in Extraordinary Times: Documenting the Pandemic through a COVID-19 Zine Collection


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Publication Type: Article

When COVID-19 caused the world to go into lockdown in early 2020, some were inspired to create zines documenting their lives and experiences during the pandemic. That spring, The Ohio State University’s Rare Books & Manuscripts Library (RBML) began seeking out these publications, and now has a collection of more than 80 COVID-19 and quarantine zines. This article discusses how and why RBML has developed this zine collection, including the process of finding and acquiring zines, exploring their content, and plans for the collection.

Photograph of Mara Frazier

Mara Frazier

Curator of Dance

Labanotation is Creative: How a Systems Perspective Reveals Generativity in Dance Notation and its Archives


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Publication Type: Article

Labanotation is commonly viewed as a purely quantitative form of movement description. Because of a preoccupation in the world of professional and educational dance with the individual’s act of movement invention, scholars often overlook Labanotation’s systemic creativity. Scholarship to date has more commonly discussed Motif Notation and creativity. However, when studied in light of Csikszentmihalyi’s ‘systems model of creativity’ as an integrated environment of individual, field, and domain, Labanotation shows itself to be a vehicle for creativity. Recognition of the creativity of notators, notation technologists, and stagers can benefit the field of dance notation. This article gives an account of the systemic creativity in Labanotation drawing on archival Labanotation materials to provide examples from the work of notators such as Doris Green and Toni’ Intravaia.

Photograph of Meris Longmeier

Meris Longmeier

Head, Research Services

Tech Culture through Campus Collaborations: A Case Study of a Hackathon and Library Partnership


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Publication Type: Article

Co-authored with Danny Dotson and Julia Armstrong

Hackathons are time-bound, competitive coding contests that are often judged for prizes. Their name originates from joining hacking, playful exploration of hardware and software issues, with marathons, endurance competitions. The intent is to challenge participants to build working prototypes of hardware or software in a short time period, anywhere from one day to several weeks, though typically between 24–28 hours. While they are a mainstay in computer science fields, they are becoming increasingly popular in other domains, including libraries. Libraries have long championed life-long learning, a democratization of data, and access to information. These are similar mentalities of the maker movement, echoed in hackathons. Rapid iteration, problem solving, and cooperative learning are regularly present at events and within library systems. This paper details a case study of one institution’s growth from a hackathon event host to deeper library engagement and partnership with an informal learning program. The authors will highlight benefits that both partners observed and will end with a pitch for why other libraries should consider hosting similar events. Finally, several recommended resources for libraries who are contemplating hosting hackathon events will be presented.

Photograph of Rocki Strader

Rocki Strader

Catalog/Authorities Librarian

Cataloging to Support Information Literacy: The IFLA Library Reference Model’s User Tasks in the Context of the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education


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Publication Type: Article

Cataloging practices, as exemplified by the five user tasks of the IFLA Library Reference Model, can support information literacy practices. The six frames of the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education are used as lenses to examine the user tasks. Two themes emerge from this examination: context matters, and catalogers must tailor bibliographic descriptions to meet users’ expectations and information needs. Catalogers need to solicit feedback from various user communities to reform cataloging practices to remain current and viable. Such conversations will enrich the catalog and enhance (reclaim?) its position as a primary tool for research and learning.

Photograph of Joshua Sadvari

Joshua Sadvari

Geospatial Information Librn

GIS Day across the Association of Research Libraries: Outreach, Education, and Collaboration


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Publication Type: Article

GIS Day is an annual, international celebration of geographic information systems (GIS) and geospatial technologies that provides organizations with an opportunity to help others learn about the real-world applications and positive societal impacts of geography and GIS, highlight services, and celebrate accomplishments. Many academic libraries participate in GIS Day programs, using this well-known event to engage with their campus and local communities. In this article, we build on earlier research conducted by Weimer, Olivares, and Bedenbaugh to reassess the landscape of Association of Research Libraries (ARL) member involvement in GIS Day programs and, in particular, how these events demonstrate the educational and collaborative aspects of geospatial information services in libraries. For our web content analysis, we specifically focus on gathering information about GIS Day programs in 2019 and 2020, allowing for an examination of how libraries participating in GIS Day responded to the operational challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as new opportunities that may have emerged during this period. Finally, we offer our own 2020 GIS Day program as a brief example highlighting how it led to our first cross-institutional collaboration and fostered new opportunities for promoting and partnering on digital scholarship projects at our institutions.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Information literacy leadership: The traits we didn’t know we had


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Publication Type: Article

The role of teaching librarians has naturally evolved over the decades as information literacy (IL) has been defined, redefined, and conceptualized from a set of standardized skills to an interconnected group of understandings. To build effective instruction programs, teaching librarians quickly develop numerous competencies. The successful teaching librarian learns to communicate effectively with students, collaborate with disciplinary faculty across the campus, and develop innovative approaches for teaching IL. Over time, although perhaps unknown to the teaching librarian, all of these skills that create good teachers also create good leaders.

Photograph of Courtney Hunt

Courtney Hunt

Art and Design Librarian

“My Work is Work:" Artistic Research Practice and Knowledge Creation in the Work of Carmen Winant and Tomashi Jackson


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Publication Type: Article

Many studies on the information-seeking habits of artists have been largely library-centric instead of considering the entire process of artists as integral to their research. This article examines the research behavior of artists Carmen Winant and Tomashi Jackson. The study recognizes the past literature on the information-seeking behavior of artists, framing it within literature by and for artists on artistic research practice. From this perspective, the authors analyze how research manifests into physical artwork in the cases of these two artists in order to situate the act of making as knowledge and research creation.

Photograph of Courtney Hunt

Courtney Hunt

Art and Design Librarian

Exhibiting Student Artwork in the Fine Arts Library


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

The case study "Exhibiting Student Artwork in the Fine Arts Library" looks at the successes and lessons learned from the student art exhibition and accompanying program at the Fine Arts Library in Spring 2020.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Strategic Instruction through Connected One-Shots


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

Hidden Architectures of Information Literacy Programs attempts to make all information literacy program labor visible, raise its importance, and encourage more scholarship on what might seem like the “boring” parts of program development. This book is for graduate students learning about information literacy programs, administrators who may never have taught an information literacy session, instruction librarians looking to step out of the everyday and understand the depth and breadth of their program, and all educators interested in the accomplishments and inner workings of information literacy programming.

Photograph of Amanda Folk

Amanda Folk

Head, Teaching and Learning

Mathematics Courses and the Ohio Open Ed Collaborative: Collaborative Course Content Building for Statewide Use


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

With the cost of higher education increasingly on the minds of students and a rising amount of course time being spent in a virtual environment, initiatives to provide online course content at low or no cost to students are an important way to make higher education more affordable. The initiative described in this chapter is an example of how Ohio tackled this issue, providing access to course content for use across the state. The materials developed are fully available online and are provided at no additional cost to students. This chapter focuses on efforts to develop materials for mathematics courses, but the Ohio Open Ed Collaborative included courses from multiple disciplines for the Ohio higher education community. With users beyond Ohio able to adapt most of the content as well, this initiative adds valuable content that enables course instructors around the world to adapt affordable online content for their classes.

This article was co-authored with Daniel Dotson and four other authors from different institutions.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Teaching the teachers to teach information literacy: A literature review


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Publication Type: Article

As part of the ongoing debates over the best methods for teaching information literacy, some librarians have argued for a “teach the teachers” strategy. In this approach, librarians concentrate some of their instructional energies on teaching disciplinary faculty to teach information literacy. In this paper, multiple examples of “teach the teachers” efforts are reviewed, in order to provide insight into the impact that taking this approach might have on librarians, faculty, and students. Results indicate that the “teach the teachers” approach shows promise as one method by which librarians can support the integration of information literacy into the curriculum, but that more assessment is needed to determine the long-term impact of such initiatives on faculty teaching practices and students' information literacy development.

Photograph of Jane Hammons

Jane Hammons

Tch&Lrn Engagement Librarian

Teaching information literacy: Developing an online course for faculty


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Publication Type: Article

As part of the profession’s ongoing efforts to integrate information literacy into the curriculum, some librarians have taken an approach centered on teaching disciplinary faculty to teach information literacy. Indeed, some have argued that the best way for librarians to ensure that students are developing information literacy is to focus primarily on faculty, rather than on providing instruction to students. Although most librarians do not seem prepared to stop all direct instruction to students, there are many examples of libraries offering faculty development programming. While many of these programs involve face-to-face interactions between librarians and disciplinary faculty, there are examples of librarians creating online information literacy workshops or courses for faculty.

Photograph of Beth Black

Beth Black

Undergrad Engagement Librarian

Instructional design for single information literacy sessions


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Publication Type: Article

The purpose of this paper is to describe how the Understanding by Design instructional design framework can be applied to design high-quality single-session information literacy instruction. The author describes the Understanding by Design process in detail, noting modifications for single instructional session design with examples from the application of this instructional design process to design co-curricular instruction sessions for undergraduates.

Photograph of Daniel Dotson

Daniel Dotson

Head, Geology Library; Map Room

Google Scholar Versions: Errors and Implications


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Publication Type: Article

Google Scholar combines versions of what should be the same item into a single record with multiple versions listed and a common citation rate for all versions. However, these versions are not always the same document. A study on the citations of theses and dissertations found unusually high citation rates for some titles. On closer examination, these titles had versions that were other formats, sometimes with additional authors. A close examination of highly cited theses and dissertations revealed that nearly half of the titles were considered versions of other different formats, often much shorter and sometimes multi-authored journal articles.

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Florian Diekmann

Head, FAES Library

A scoping review of research funding for small-scale farmers in water scarce regions


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Publication Type: Article

Water scarcity is a global issue that disproportionately affects small-scale farmers in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Through geospatial analysis, we estimated that less than 37% of small-scale farms probably have irrigation in water scarce regions across LMICs, compared with 42% of non-small-scale farms. Through a literature synthesis assisted by machine learning, we then systematically mapped the existing research for on-farm interventions that improve the incomes or yields of small-scale farmers in water scarce regions. We mapped over 888 on-farm interventions used to combat water scarcity from 560 publications and showed a research bias towards yields rather than livelihoods. We found gaps in evidence for many commonly proposed solutions, including livestock management, digital technology and solutions to protect natural resources at the farm-level, such as buffer strips. Our findings can be used to set a funding agenda for research on the geographies that are most at risk of water scarcity and the interventions that most lack evidence.

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Jessica Page

Head, Vet Med Library and Sciences Cohort

A scoping review on incentives for adoption of sustainable agricultural practices and their outcomes


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Publication Type: Article

The increasing pressure on agricultural production systems to achieve global food security and prevent environmental degradation necessitates a transition towards more sustainable practices. The purpose of this scoping review is to understand how the incentives offered to farmers motivate the adoption of sustainable agricultural practices and, ultimately, how and whether they result in measurable outcomes. To this end, this scoping review examines the evidence of nearly 18,000 papers on whether incentive-based programmes lead to the adoption of sustainable practices and their effect on environmental, economic and productivity outcomes. We find that independent of the incentive type, programmes linked to short-term economic benefit have a higher adoption rate than those aimed solely at providing an ecological service. In the long run, one of the strongest motivations for farmers to adopt sustainable practices is perceived benefits for either their farms, the environment or both. Beyond this, the importance of technical assistance and extension services in promoting sustainable practices emerges strongly from this scoping review. Finally, we find that policy instruments are more effective if their design considers the characteristics of the target population, and the associated trade-offs between economic, environmental and social outcomes.

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Daniel Dotson

Head, Geology Library; Map Room

Affordability of course materials: Reactive and proactive measures at The Ohio State University Libraries


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Publication Type: Article

The Ohio State University Libraries has been working on affordability issues related to course materials for some time. This article details some of those efforts, going into detail about moving from reactive methods of dealing with course materials via instructor-initiated reserve requests to more proactive methods of a general education textbook project and curriculum mapping to provide information about ebooks and streaming media as course content.

This article was co-authored with Aaron Olivera.

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Hilary Bussell

Head, Humanities and Social Sciences Cohort

When Two Homes Are Better Than One: Collaborating on Cross-Institutional Research


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Publication Type: Book Chapter

In this chapter, we describe the process of working on a cross-institutional study. We begin with background information on our study’s aims and methods and then move on to the nuts and bolts of collaborating on a research project with librarians at other institutions. We discuss designing a research project, applying for IRB approval at multiple institutions, obtaining funding, collaborating on data analysis and the literature review process, project management and communicating, establishing realistic timeframes and goals, and collaborating on writing up and disseminating your research. We conclude the chapter with a reflection on the value of cross-institutional research and lessons learned from our experience.

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Craig Gibson

Professional Development Libr

The Engaged Librarian Framework at The Ohio State University Libraries


Publication Date:
Publication Type: Article

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Jessica Page

Head, Vet Med Library and Sciences Cohort

Expanding a single-institution survey to multiple institutions: Lessons learned in research design and deployment


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Publication Type: Article

Creating generalizable knowledge across institutions is a step beyond a successful local research project. The purpose of this article is to share the process and lessons learned from expanding a survey tool developed and piloted at a single veterinary college to its deployment at multiple veterinary colleges in the United States and Canada.

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Jolie Braun

Curator Modrn Lit & Manuscript

Your Zine Changed My Life’: The Impact and Legacy of Zines in Sassy Magazine


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Publication Type: Article

The teen magazine Sassy (1988–1996) positioned itself as an edgier alternative to its competitors; underground culture, and particularly zines, were important parts of its identity. By featuring zines by young women and girls, Sassy made reading and writing zines accessible to its readers. This message was especially powerful within the context of Sassy’s larger project of encouraging readers to produce their own media. Yet as small-circulation, self-published works, zines are not intended for mainstream audiences, and some zine writers saw the magazine’s interest as exploitative. This essay explores the consequences of covering them in a mainstream magazine for teen girls.

Photograph of Hilary Bussell

Hilary Bussell

Head, Humanities and Social Sciences Cohort

Meeting graduate student needs: An exploration of disciplinary differences


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Publication Type: Article

To better engage our graduate students, we asked them to describe their research strategy and challenges, helpful research support services, and their preferred venue for learning research skills. We conducted a thematic analysis and found that participants’ top reported research strategies included “Research Topic Development” and “Literature Review,” while their challenges cited “Finding and Evaluating Information” and “Access Issues.” The students mentioned “Library Databases” most frequently as helpful and websites were their most preferred learning venue. We found evidence that discipline-specific library instruction may be more relevant than large, in-person orientations and discovered a concerning trend of situational challenges.

This article was co-authored with Jennifer Schnabel and Amanda Rinehart.

Photograph of Hilary Bussell

Hilary Bussell

Head, Humanities and Social Sciences Cohort

Meeting graduate student needs: An exploration of disciplinary differences


Publication Date:
Publication Type: Article

To better engage our graduate students, we asked them to describe their research strategy and challenges, helpful research support services, and their preferred venue for learning research skills. We conducted a thematic analysis and found that participants’ top reported research strategies included “Research Topic Development” and “Literature Review,” while their challenges cited “Finding and Evaluating Information” and “Access Issues.” The students mentioned “Library Databases” most frequently as helpful and websites were their most preferred learning venue. We found evidence that discipline-specific library instruction may be more relevant than large, in-person orientations and discovered a concerning trend of situational challenges.

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Amanda Larson

Affordable Learning Inst Const

Exploring Faculty Perceptions of OER and Impediments to their Use: A Multi-Institutional Study.


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Publication Type: Article

Understanding faculty perceptions about OER is a vital step for those hoping to support the growth of OER initiatives at higher education institutions. Faculty members’ perceptions of OER often influence their interest in adopting open educational practices and their willingness to seek out support from campus staff. To explore how faculty members across their four institutions feel about open education, the authors developed a survey to discover faculty members’ (1) perspectives on, (2) barriers to, and (3) beliefs about OER use. The survey corroborated past research findings that faculty often have difficulty finding time to locate and evaluate OER, and that there is a need among the academic community to better compensate educators for their work developing open content. More notably, the authors discovered that the faculty who are aware of library support services and other institutional OER initiatives are more engaged in open educational practices and willing to explore OER, regardless of their prior experience with open education.

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Amanda Larson

Affordable Learning Inst Const

Open Education Librarianship: A Position Description Analysis of the Newly Emerging Role in Academic Libraries


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Publication Type: Article

According to the latest Babson Survey, Freeing the Textbook: Educational Resources in US Higher Education, “faculty awareness of OER has increased every year, with 46 percent of faculty now aware of open educational resources, up from 34 percent three years ago” (Seaman and Seaman 2018). While open educational resources (OER) gain traction with faculty who are looking to lower costs for their students and re-engage with their pedagogy, academic libraries are creating a variety of open or affordable textbook programs to help increase the use of OER or low-cost materials as replacements for high-cost traditional materials. Some libraries are creating specific positions to support these initiatives that aim to help faculty who want to adopt, adapt, or author OER. As more of these roles emerge, it raises questions about what the field perceives as the role of an Open Education or OER librarian, and the support that libraries provide OER initiatives. To explore these concerns, I collected position descriptions for librarians whose role it is to support OER initiatives into a corpus. I applied deductive thematic analysis to code it while investigating four main questions: 1) What inspires academic libraries to hire OER-related support? 2) What skills do they anticipate applicants to possess? 3) Where do these positions fit within the organization chart of the library? 4) Is there a standard scope of work that emerges from the corpus? In addition to these four questions, this research also explored the expectations for librarians in these roles to change faculty’s perception of OER through outreach and if they are expected to run burgeoning grant initiatives to launch adoption, adaptation, or authoring efforts at their institution.