AASL's new integrated standards are designed to empower leaders to transform teaching and learning. The new "National School Library Standards for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries" reflect an evolution of AASL Standards, building on philosophical foundations and familiar elements of previous standards while featuring the…

The Quality Matters™ (QM) Program is utilized by over 700 colleges and universities to ensure that online course design meets standards imperative to student success in a Web-based classroom. Although a faculty-driven peer-review process, QM provides assessment from a student perspective, thereby identifying opportunities for improvement that may…

This article serves as a primer for assessment and evaluation design by describing the range of methods commonly employed in library settings. Quantitative methods, such as counting and benchmarking measures, are useful for investigating the internal operations of an access services department in order to identify workflow inefficiencies or…

This article presents a qualitative evaluation methodology of academic departments for library organizational learning and library enhancement planning. This evaluation used campus units' academic program review reports as a data source and employed collaborative content analysis by library liaisons to extract departmental strengths, weaknesses,…

This article discusses a project undertaken to assess the journals in a Big Deal package by applying a weighted value algorithm measuring quality, utility, and value of individual titles. Carried out by a national library consortium in Canada, the project confirmed the value of the Big Deal package while providing a quantitative approach for…

Purposeful assessment of space for the understanding and improvement of the academic library is a relatively new area of inquiry. This essay offers a framework to consider different factors affecting such an assessment and insights for undertaking a meaningful inquiry about the relationship of space to an academic library's evolving purpose as…

Identifies research topics related to outcomes assessment in a networked environment and discusses issues affecting these topics. Proposes a framework to relate traditional evaluation components and terminology to the networked environment and identifies factors in the networked environment that affect assessment methods. Suggests outcomes…

Discusses the challenges facing digital library evaluation and suggests a conceptual framework for evaluation derived from the systems approach. A review of evaluation efforts in research and practice concentrates on derivation of criteria used in evaluation. Essential requirements for evaluation are stated. Discussed are constructs, context, and…

In the rapidly changing information environment, libraries have to demonstrate that their services have relevance, value, and impact for stakeholders and customers. To deliver effective and high quality services, libraries have to assess their performance from the customer point of view. Moving to an assessment framework will be more successful if…

This book shows teacher-librarians and school library media specialists how to perform qualitative research and use the results effectively to promote the school library and build a shared understanding of the impact of school libraries on student learning. Hands-on guidance is provided for performing action research, including how to establish…

This book brings together the literature on information skills instruction with particular reference to models related to information seeking and the information search process, including representational, instructional/teaching, and facilitation models. Chapter 1 provides an overview of the development of the library curriculum as it has evolved…

During the last decade, research has become increasingly important to the profession of librarianship. Seven library schools now have doctoral programs, foundation grants have stimulated and supported scores of major projects, and the research method has been recognized as an accepted technique for solving library problems. The increasing volume…

Views academic libraries through the lens of the assessment and accountability movements. Illustrates how a research library at the University of Rochester (Rochester, New York) has created an assessment environment in an effort to focus on educational impact. Discusses principles of good practice, and formal and informal evaluation. (AEF)

In 1996, the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) supported a project at Rutgers University that applied new economic theories to measuring how well research libraries fulfill their service roles. This summary draws on the original proposal and the final report from the project's directors. The evaluation of library performance is…

The Association of Research Libraries (ARL) E-Metrics study was designed as an 18-month project in three phases: an inventory of what libraries were already doing about data collection for electronic resources and an identification of any libraries that could provide best practice; identifying and testing data elements that could be collected and…