How do you supervise a graduate student working in a library—and not just adequately, but well? What is a valuable and meaningful work experience? How can libraries design more equitable and ethical positions for students?Learning in Action: Designing Successful Graduate Student Work Experiences in Academic Libraries provides practical, how-to guidance on creating and managing impactful programs as well as meaningful personal experiences for students and library staff in academic libraries. Fourteen chapters are divided into four thorough sections: Creating Access Pathways Developing, Running, and Evolving Programs for LIS Students Working with Graduate Students without an LIS Background: Mutual Opportunities for Growth Centering the Person  Chapters cover topics including developing experiential learning opportunities for online students; cocreated cocurricular graduate learning experiences; an empathy-driven approach to crafting an internship; self-advocacy and mentorship in LIS graduate student employment; and sharing perspectives on work and identity between a graduate student and an academic library manager. Throughout the book you’ll find “Voices from the Field,� profiles that showcase the voices and reflections of the graduate students themselves, recent graduates, and managers.   Learning in Action brings together a range of topics and perspectives from authors of diverse backgrounds and institutions to offer practical inspiration and a framework for creating meaningful graduate student work experiences at your institutions.

Helping readers understand the challenges and barriers faced by teens in urban communities, this one-of-a-kind resource offers real-world recommendations, case studies, and experience-based programmatic solutions for fostering crucial media literacy skills. Information and digital literacies are essential skills to survive and thrive in today's media-saturated world. But minoritized and economically disadvantaged youth in urban communities often lack these critical media literacy competencies. Offering a multi-faceted perspective, this book guides those who serve teens in libraries towards implementing innovative and transformative learning experiences. Librarians and YA specialists who serve urban youth in public, school, and academic libraries will gain insight on how factors such as lack of information and communication technology proficiency, inadequate technology and internet access, and instructional inequity place urban teens at high risk for media and informational illiteracy; receive hands-on and strategic guidance for connecting successfully with and creating spaces for teens in urban communities, illustrated through teen reflections, narratives from librarians and educators across the US, and voices from scholars in the field; learn about several successful media literacy programs that have been implemented in libraries and communities, from Hip Hop Studies at Virginia Tech to youth podcasting, a zine club, Black Girls Film Camp, and others; and find a toolkit of additional resources such as handout templates, sample lesson plans, and information about books and websites.

Whether you're an administrator or library leader concerned about the health and well-being of your team, or a library worker excited to launch a health and wellness movement in your library, you'll find sensible guidance and inspiration in Newman's handbook.As part of their dedication to improving the lives of their patrons, libraries have long offered services, programs, and outreach dedicated to the health and wellness of their communities. There is a growing recognition that library workers themselves are in urgent need of such attention; low morale, and complaints of burnout and a toxic work environment, are only a few of the obvious symptoms. The good news is that by turning inward, libraries can foster wellness in their workplace and make a real difference in the day-to-day lives of their staff. Newman, who has led a popular course on the subject attended by workers from many types of different libraries, here takes a holistic approach to examine why and how libraries should focus on improving the health and wellness of employees. Filled with hands-on advice, examples of successful initiatives, and suggested action steps, in this book readers will learn: How to define health and wellness, including its physical, psychological, and social aspects, and why they touch upon nearly everything that happens in the workplace. What a workplace looks like when it strives to ensure the complete physical, mental, and social well-being of workers, and the ways in which this approach to a work environment benefits both the library and the community it serves; the role played by the physical aspects of the workplace, such as the ergonomics of sitting and standing desks, the effects of air quality and smell on worker health and productivity, and noise levels stemming from open plan workspaces. About key policies relating to wages, working schedules, where employees work, and child and elder care. Real-world advice on addressing complicated workplace issues like emotional and invisible labor, with a look at the part that burdensome or indifferent policies and practices can play in contributing to compassion fatigue and burnout. Ways to make healthy choices for oneself and encourage healthy choices in co-workers and staff; concrete, evidence-based steps that libraries can take to improve workplace wellness. How to make a lasting difference by focusing on one aspect they can change personally and one that they can advocate changing library wide.

"The book is effervescent with potential to transform our work in everything from our relations with students to our role in developing teaching cultures on campus." -from the Foreword by Margy MacMillan Teaching and learning communities are communities of practice in which a group of faculty and staff from across disciplines regularly meet to discuss topics of common interest and to learn together how to enhance teaching and learning. Since these teaching and learning communities can bring together members who might not have otherwise interacted, new ideas, practices, and synergies can arise. The role of librarians in teaching and learning has been reexamined and reinvigorated by the introduction of the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education, which offers a conceptual approach and theoretical foundations that are new and challenging. Building Teaching and Learning Communities: Creating Shared Meaning and Purpose goes beyond the library profession for inspiration and insights from leading experts in higher education pedagogy and educational development across North America to open a window on the wider world of teaching and learning, and includes discussion of pedagogical theories and practices including threshold concepts and stuck places; the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL); disciplinary approaches to pedagogy; the role of signature pedagogies; inclusion of student voices; metaliteracy; reflective practice; affective, behavioral, and cognitive aspects of learning; liminal spaces; and faculty as learners. This unique collection asks each of the authors to address this question: What do we as educators need to learn (or unlearn) and experience so we can create teaching and learning communities across disciplines and learning levels based on shared meaning and purpose? Six fascinating chapters explore this question in different ways: Building a Culture of Teaching and Learning, Pat Hutchings and Mary Deane Sorcinelli Sit a Spell: Embracing the Liminality of Pedagogical Change through the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Linda Hodges The Crossroads of SoTL and Signature Pedagogies, Nancy L. Chick Bottlenecks of Information Literacy, Joan Middendorf and Andrea Baer Developing Learning Partnerships: Navigating Troublesome and Transformational Relationships, Peter Felten, Kristina Meinking, Shannon Tennant, and Katherine Westover When Teachers Talk to Teachers: Shared Traits between Writing Across the Curriculum and Faculty Learning Communities, Kateryna A. R. Schray Building Teaching and Learning Communities is an entry into some of the most interesting conversations in higher education and offers ways for librarians to socialize in learning theory and begin "thinking together" with faculty. It proposes questions, challenges assumptions, provides examples to be used and adapted, and can help you better prepare as teachers and pursue the essential role of conversation and collaboration with faculty and students.

Librarianship is still a predominantly white profession. It is essential that current practitioners as well as those about to enter the field take an unflinching look at the profession's legacy of racial discrimination, including the ways in which race might impact service to users such as students in school, public, and academic libraries. Given the prevalence of implicit and explicit bias against Black and African American people, authors Folk and Overbey argue that we must speak to these students directly to hear their stories and thereby understand their experiences. This Special Report shares the findings of a qualitative research study that explored the library experiences of Black and African American undergraduate students both before and during college, grounding it within an equity framework. From this Report readers will learn details about the study, which focused on the potential role of race in the students' interactions with library staff, including white staff and staff of color; gain insight into Black and African American users' perceptions of libraries and library staff, attitudes towards reading, frequency of library usage, and the importance of family; understand the implications of the study's findings for our practice and for librarianship more broadly, including our ongoing commitment to diversifying the profession; and walk away with recommendations that can be applied to every library and educational context, such as guidance for developing an antiracist organization and more equitable service provision.

Build trust with your library's users by securing their data privacy. Taking a holistic approach, this guide presents practical ways to implement privacy ethics into data practices. Libraries are not exempt from the financial costs of data breaches or leaks, no matter the size. Whether from a library worker unwittingly sharing a patron's address with a perpetrator of domestic violence to leaving sensitive patron data unprotected, patrons can also pay a hefty price when libraries fail to manage patron data securely and ethically. In this guide, readers will learn concrete action steps for putting the ethical management of data into practice, following two common public and academic library cumulative case studies. The authors explore such key topics as succinct summaries of major U.S. laws and other regulations and standards governing patron data management; information security practices to protect patrons and libraries from common threats; how to navigate barriers in organizational culture when implementing data privacy measures; sources for publicly available, customizable privacy training material for library workers; the data life cycle from planning and collecting to disposal; how to conduct a data inventory; understanding the associated privacy risks of different types of library data; why the current popular model of library assessment can become a huge privacy invasion; addressing key topics while keeping your privacy policy clear and understandable to patrons; and data privacy and security provisions to look for in vendor contracts.

Library instruction is like acting: There's a live audience, in person or online; you may be doing a one-shot, limited engagement, or play to the same crowd repeatedly over the course of a term; and you usually expect reviews. Most important, instruction is like acting in that you're playing a role, and it's crucial to prepare your performance before you go on in order to shine and connect authentically with students. Your Craft as a Teaching Librarian: Using Acting Skills to Create a Dynamic Presence -a revised and expanded edition of The Craft of Librarian Instruction-captures how acting techniques can sharpen your instructional skills and establish your teaching identity, enliven your performance, and create an invigorating learning experience for your students. It's divided into three entertaining sections: Prepare and Rehearse: Centering yourself, physical and vocal preparation, mindfulness, and avoiding stage fright Perform and Connect: Role playing, identity, action/reaction, and information literacy Reflect and Sharpen: Assessment and adaptation Chapters feature exercises to explore on your own or with a colleague, question and answer sections to help you identify potential challenges and solutions, and tips on deepening your teaching skills. A glossary of acting terms and a "learn more about it" bibliography provide additional context for the methods and techniques presented. Your Craft as a Teaching Librarian can help you personalize and characterize your teaching presence and help those with little to no teaching experience, instructors dealing with shyness or stage fright, and more experienced librarians in need of a refreshed perspective, adding an undeniable star quality to your instructional performance.

So, what are library patrons doing with makerspaces and other innovative technology? This book explores how patrons are using innovative technologies utilizing real-life case studies from a variety of academic institutions. Authors were selected based on the technology provided and their expertise in establishing and marketing this technology. Readers will discover: -which pieces of technology get the most use -if patrons tend to use the tech for class assignments or leisure activities -the importance of working with faculty to increase use -unusual collaboration opportunities -examples of libraries nimbly expanding their spaces to include tech students need -unique ways patrons employ the technology -best practices for designing collaborative creative spaces Technologies discussed include: -Microsoft Hololens -virtual reality and augmented reality systems and support tools -3D modeling and printing -makerspace additions beyond the usual -instructional technologies used by patrons -video production and editing equipment -tool library -technology lending programs (what students want!) Dive in to explore the uncharted seas of which technologies patrons are using, how they are using them, and the purposes of use. As added bonuses, authors include best practices on designing space, marketing the technology, and collaborating to enhance the use. While authors do not go into any depth on the workings of the technology, there are other supplementary books which will cover this area. Makerspace and Collaborative Technologies specifically looks at how and why patrons are using library-provided creative technologies. Library staff who work with creative technologies in any way, shape, or form will find this book useful. With the valuable information contained in this guide, libraries can reach their users and create spaces and interactions that keep them coming back.

Libraries have a distinctive role to play in the small business ecosystem and can effectively partner to complement existing business services in the community. A nationwide initiative that launched in 2020, Libraries Build Business (LBB) aims to build capacity in libraries offering programming or services to local entrepreneurs and the small business community, prioritizing low-income and underrepresented entrepreneurs. And libraries have already begun to transform communities, with programs ranging from one-on-one business consultations, classes, and workshops to networking and equipment lending, as the many initiatives spotlighted in this book demonstrate. Serving as powerful models of how libraries and their staff can advance innovation and economic growth on any budget and scale, these examples will inspire you to plug into your own community while guiding you through the nuts-and-bolts of making it happen. You'll learn the value to libraries of getting involved in entrepreneurship development; how libraries are integrating equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) into their efforts, working to create more inclusive business communities and, in turn, cultivate a vision for justice in communities across the country; vivid case studies of more than two dozen programs representing a cross-section of urban, suburban, and rural libraries, such as Entrepreneurship Academy, a training program; a 6-month business incubator targeting the formerly incarcerated; empowering street vendors, a consulting service with local business experts; and a makerspace for business; best practices related to budgeting, partnerships, staff, outreach, evaluation, sustainability, and other core components; and information about additional resources to support your work.