Libraries often engage in services that require collaboration across stakeholder boundaries to be successful. Institutional repositories (IRs) are a good example of such a service. IRs are an infrastructure to preserve intellectual assets within a university or college, and to provide an open access showcase for that institution's research,…

The purpose of this dissertation is to illuminate the missing voices of historically black college and university dance programs in the national discussion on the history and development of dance in American higher education. The methodology included the selection of five subject schools that are historically black colleges and universities…

This document analysis examined the academic library and the changing role of the academic librarian in higher education. A comparison of the trends and issues reported by prominent librarians in the 20th century was made to those reported in the 21st century. Emphasis was placed on the following decades: 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s in the 20th…

The purpose of this multi-case study was to describe how library deans and directors at large comprehensive community colleges strategically advocate for and support instructional and technological innovation despite the reality of limited resources and the stress caused by recurring funding crises in higher education. It further sought to examine…

The College Libraries Section (CLS) of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) is the only section specifically for college librarians. In response to a 1989 conference panel of directors' recommendation that there be program for developing college librarians as leaders for the next century, CLS sponsored activities to…

This research highlights the scenarios that might serve as a strategic vision to describe a future beyond the current library, one which both guides provosts and creates a map for the transformation of human resources and technology in the university research libraries. The scenarios offer managerial leaders an opportunity to envision new roles…

An emphasis on instruction has been growing in libraries as a result of the cumbersome amount of information that is produced and available globally. This, coupled with the growing diverse student populations and the demand for higher education, has created the need for students entering the workforce who can think critically, adapt quickly and…

This constructivist grounded theory study proposes an explanation of community college library instruction coordinators' efforts to sustain effective library instruction programs in southern California. The theory explains library instruction coordinators' positive approaches to the paradoxes, or persistent tensions, that they encounter when they…

Living inside built environments--infrastructure--it is easy to take for granted the things that we do not need to engage, but are at work behind the scenes nonetheless. Well-designed systems become invisible, but to engage them, how do we know which perspectives, objects, and relationships are useful? I examine the University of Michigan Digital…

Designers-by-assignment, or subject matter experts (SMEs) who are pressed into training service, have become common in the workplace. A review of more than 24 studies on expert and novice instructional designers, however, revealed that little is known about how designers-by-assignment think about design and make design decisions in the field. A…

College students are accessing virtual libraries whether they are on campus or learning from a distance. Academic institutions serving virtual patrons must remain focused on meeting the needs of those library users by continually examining their preferences, their searching behavior, and the information they seek. The purpose of this research was…

The purpose of this research was to examine the relationship between learning organization dimensions and academic library performance. It studied whether differences existed in learning organization dimensions given the predictor variables of performance indicators, library resources, and demographics of the academic library. This research…

The purpose of this mixed-method case study was to explore the institutional practices that may influence persistence for Hispanic undergraduate students at a four-year public research university in Texas. Data were gathered from 255 students using an on-line survey and follow-up interviews with ten students and three administrators. The combined…

The intent of this research was to discover what, if any, disconnect exists between community college students' library perceptions and technology use. The researcher studied how students at a very-large southwestern community college are using the physical and virtual college library, and their overall technology and library technology use. The…

Collaboration is a best practice for integrating information literacy into teaching and learning, but extant research suggests that differences between the professional practice and professional socialization of faculty and librarians can hinder collaboration. This dissertation examines interprofessional factors that facilitate and hinder…