Engaging with Our Communities: Future Trends and Opportunities for Reference Services

How do Asian international students use Australian university libraries? A literature review

The findings of this literature review are applicable to university libraries globally, as students accessing libraries are now more culturally diverse than was the case historically. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, this diversity was due to increased numbers of international students attending selected universities in Europe, Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Canada. The literature suggests that the different information seeking, cultural transition, information disruption, English-language challenges and learning styles of Asian international students are not fully understood by western university libraries. Consequently, university libraries may not have strategically aligned to their university’s internationalisation objectives. Lack of understanding of the experiences of Asian international students potentially attenuates their well-being and academic success. Furthermore, this lack of adaption could place universities, such as those in Australia, at risk of not meeting national regulatory compliance expectations. This review examines the literature about the context of Asian international students’ use of Australian university libraries and introduces a research project that explores the lived experience of using Australian university libraries. The review identifies literature regarding the changing profile of Asian international students enrolled in Australian universities, their information-seeking behaviour, cross-cultural dimensions, their communication skills, and the expectations of an Australian university library. The review of this literature also seeks to explore who is studying international students, which methods are being used to do so, and which topics are of particular interest to the researchers. Finally, the review considers new post-COVID-19 pandemic opportunities for both libraries and other service areas to understand the needs of Asian international students as universities competitively recruit for their return.

Transforming a university library into a learning organisation

Purpose

The purpose of this study is to discuss the strategies to promote a culture of professional learning within an Australian academic library. As the COVID-19 experience has shown new and evolving roles require skills, knowledge and abilities that current library employees may not have trained for. One framework which supports continuous professional development and employee motivation is the concept of a learning organisation, where staff across all levels of the library acknowledge the value of continuous learning and autonomously engage in activities to keep their skills up to date and relevant.

Design/methodology/approach

The article is a case study of a three-year period of interventions and outcomes in an Australian academic library.

Findings

The strategies discussed provide insights for library managers and leaders about how organisational change can be incrementally embedded through clarity of purpose, aligned leadership, transparent processes, self-determination and social learning.

Research limitations/implications

The case study examines a single institution.

Originality/value

The paper provides practical strategies and examples from the case study of one university library which has successful embedded workplace learning as a regular and accepted part of staff routines.

What is innovative to public libraries in the United States? A perspective of library administrators for classifying innovations

Innovations are critical for public libraries but rarely does any primary research study the scope and interpretation of the term “innovation” by public libraries. Also, few of the existing innovation typologies are based on data collected from public libraries. This study fills in the gap by eliciting 80 innovations reported by the administrators of 108 award-winning public libraries in the United States, and proposes the first organic classification of innovations for public libraries, with the following four types of innovations: Program (access-oriented/use-oriented), Process (efficiency-driven/effectiveness-driven), Partnership (internal/external), and Technology (web-based technologies/assistive technologies/artificial intelligence). Findings can advance the state of innovations in libraries.

Electronic reference services: a quality and satisfaction evaluation

Purpose

An evaluation of libraries and their overall quality should consider the quality of the services they provide. Satisfaction in terms of the service provided is indicative of the quality of reference services and since these services are expensive, evaluation is therefore essential. This paper aims to outline the development of a structural equations model to evaluate service quality and user satisfaction with regard to the electronic reference service provided by Francisco Xavier Clavigero Library belongs to the Iberoamericana University, located in Mexico City.

Design/methodology/approach

This model suggests that service quality can be explained by way of the five dimensions of the SERVQUAL methodology, (reliability, assurance, tangibles, empathy and responsiveness) and in turn, quality explains both user satisfaction and the value of the service to its patrons. Finally, this model suggests that a positive increase in user satisfaction leads to a lineal and positive increase in user loyalty. The evaluation considered 297 users who made at least one electronic reference request during 2014.

Findings

The adjustment of the structural model reveals that the latent variables that explain quality are reliability and responsiveness, and that quality explains satisfaction, which in turn explains user loyalty.

Originality

The generation of an indicator to evaluate the reference services enables identification of its strengths and weaknesses to offer a more efficient service, considering that it represents a significant percentage of the library’s financial and human resources.

Encountering relatable information in experiential learning spaces

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide an emerging framework for university libraries’ research and reference services, which aims to strengthen partnerships between research information specialists and early career researchers (ECRs).

Design/methodology/approach

The conceptual model used in this paper was originally developed from a constructivist grounded theory study, analyzing data from a sample of ECRs across multiple disciplines at two universities and contextualized by a review of recent research into ECRs’ information experiences, and researcher–librarian partnerships in experiential learning spaces within and beyond libraries.

Findings

This paper provides a review of the literature on one aspect of the knowledge ecosystem model relevant to research information specialists: tangible forms of information such as texts, tools, humans, cultures and environments encountered during informal learning experiences in six spaces: professional development programs, formal coursework, events, community, home and social media.

Research limitations/implications

This paper is a catalyst for discussions and research into how research information specialists can facilitate access to the forms of information and learning experienced by ECRs, and what research information specialists can do with tangible information to respond to ECRs needs for experiential learning.

Practical implications

As the previous study found that ECRs perceived their knowledge as vital resources toward their research career progression, it would be useful for research information specialists to understand and design services paying attention to the importance of ECRs’ initial encounters with tangible information to create the knowledge they need.

Social implications

Working toward improved engagement and partnership through increased awareness and understanding of informed learning experiences between ECRs, their mentors and other developers and research librarians/information specialists can result in higher quality development and communication of new research, which can impact on society’s innovation and advancement.

Originality/value

The new integrative framework presented in this paper can assist in terms of identifying what informs ECRs professional development toward strengthening ECR and librarian/information specialist partnerships.