After three years of collecting electronic resources of troubleshooting tickets in Springhare's LibAnswers at University of Houston Libraries, the author conducted an analysis of over 300 tickets. The type of problem was identified for each ticket and then categorized into a functional area using an existing categorization schema developed at…

As governments around the world are beginning to recognize the role of creativity in the promotion of innovation and competitive advantage in a Global Knowledge Economy (GKE), Creative Knowledge-based Industries are becoming the focus of attention. Nevertheless, and in spite of the rise of Big Data, the prevailing absence of systematic library…

Academic librarians have embraced tools such as e-mail or chat that allow them to deliver reference services virtually, but not many studies have advocated for using social networking sites (SNS) as a medium for answering user questions. Even as reference departments field fewer questions requiring in-depth resources or responses, librarians have…

Recently, a great deal of literature on patron-driven acquisition (PDA) has been published that addresses the implementation and results of PDA programs at academic libraries. However, despite widespread worries that PDA will lead to unbalanced collections, little attention has been paid to whether patrons' and librarians' purchasing differ…

The MLA's report "Language and Literature Research in Regional Comprehensive Institutions" identifies and documents the research support needs of faculty members in the disciplines of literature and language, cultural studies, and writing studies in the United States and its territories, focusing on institutions considered regional…

"University Futures, Library Futures: Aligning library strategies with institutional directions" establishes a new framework for understanding the fit between emerging library service paradigms and university types. It examined the impact of increased institutional differentiation in universities on the organization of academic libraries…

Introduction: Disciplinarity and other forms of differentiation in science have long been studied in the fields of science and technology studies, information science and scientometrics. However, it is not obvious whether these fields are building on each other's findings. Methods: An analysis is made of 609 articles on disciplinarity…

There has been longstanding debate about whether the level of complexity of questions received at reference desks and via online chat services requires a librarian's expertise. Continued decreases in the number and complexity of reference questions have all but ended the debate; many academic libraries no longer staff service points with…

University rankings play an increasingly large role in shaping the goals of academic institutions and departments, while removing universities themselves from the evaluation process. This study compares the library-related results of two university ranking publications with scores on the LibQUAL+™ survey to identify if library service quality--as…

This study analyzed the relationships between variables of institutional expenses, library expenses, and library use and variables representing graduation and retention rates for colleges and universities. Using data drawn from the Integrated Postsecondary Educational Data System and the Academic Library Survey, institutions were compared by their…

The University of Michigan Library wanted to learn more about the kinds of searches its users were conducting through the "one search" search box on the Library Web site. Library staff conducted two investigations. A preliminary investigation in 2011 involved the manual review of the 100 most frequently occurring queries conducted…

With the purpose of designing a training program for a new team serving at a technology service point, the author analyzed the transactions log using a new, multi-faceted, taxonomy. The resulting list of competencies and the methodology would be useful for managers of information or learning commons. (Contains 5 tables.)

In 2012, "U.S. News & World Report" ranked nineteen institutions on its Up-and-Coming national universities list. The universities were put on the list based on rankings from experts in higher education administration. The experts were asked to identify institutions that had implemented innovative ideas in the areas of academics,…

The purpose of this study was to explore patronage and usage of the children's section of a public library. Patrons of the children's section of a public library in a small Northern Arizona city were observed for a total of 24 h over 12 sessions. Analytic induction was used to formulate categories based on field notes made during these…

A report of preliminary findings and analysis from student discussion groups held on 7 U.S. campuses in Fall 2008, as part of Project Information Literacy. Qualitative data from discussions with higher education students across the country suggest that conducting research is particularly challenging. Students' greatest challenges are related to…