Next meeting: June 12

Our next meeting will be Thursday, June 12 from 2:30-4:30 pm at WPI's Gordon Library Anderson Lab A . The topic will be The Library's Role in First Year Experience and Orientation.

Directions to WPI: http://www.wpi.edu/About/Visitors/directions.html
Park in Boynton Street, Library Lot.

January 8, 2008: Meeting Notes

Getting the Message Out: Facebook, MySpace, and Creative Ideas

Please see post below (11/26/07) for list of resources and further reading on this subject.

Attendees

Fyiane Nsilo-Swai (QCC), Carolyn Noah (CMRLS), Pingsheng Chen (Worcester Public), Pam McKay (Worcester State), Alice Barron ( Anna Maria), Carole Myles (Assumption), Rachel Shea (Clark), Laura Robinson Hanlan (WPI), Lynne Riley (WPI), Ellen Madigan Pratt (MWCC), Christine Drew (WPI), Dale LaBonte (QCC), Mary Brunelle (Assumption), Callie Curran Morrell (Assumption), Barbara Merolli via web (Holy Cross)

Description of if/how attendees are using free social networking sites, such as Facebook and MySpace.

WPI- Several librarians have individual Facebook profiles (either personal or professional) and recently they created a Page for the library—a new Facebook feature. In the month since, they’ve received 23 “fans.” It includes library screen savers, short videos, hours, JSTOR and Worldcat search applications. They have an official Facebook Statement, including goals for the site, measures of its success, and steps for planning their profile.

MWCC- Ellen has a personal Facebook profile, but she would only get students she sees in the Library everyday. Doesn’t see it as accomplishing outreach.

Assumption- Some librarians have individual profiles, but have not really used it for reference. More social relationship-building with a few students who they know.

QCC and Worcester State- Not doing anything in social networking realm right now.

Clark- Rachel has a personal Facebook profile which she has used to let her Facebook friends know about events. It seems to work well for this.

Holy Cross- the main library is using it some.

Marketing/Promotion Ideas

There are lots of “Facebook apps” or applications that are already developed and available for you to add to your profile (check the Facebook group FacebookAppsForLibraries for lists). One is a bookshelf application- has potential for libraries to use to market their new books. (This idea similar to Clark’s Leisure Reading Bookshelf which is a visual display of cover art of leisure books, but links to the catalog record.)

Another marketing idea was to build and link to a library news blog, or a calendar of events. Libraries could post videos or tutorials on the Facebook page. Penn State offered a nice raffle prize to students for becoming a Facebook friend, and was able to gain lots of student friends through this method.

Fall semester, WPI tested out the Facebook flyer option ($10 for 2 days; to WPI undergraduates) about an event. They have no idea or way to track if anyone saw it.

Assumption is currently working on filming instructional commercials for its library and in addition to youtube, etc. may put the finished product on Facebook.

Questions/Concerns

Some attendees had concerns or hesitation about whether students want them in “their territory” or whether maintaining a Facebook presence was necessary even though it would likely be some new site in the future. Some responded to this with their feeling that it’s a way to make ourselves more accessible, pointing out that our territory is not just the library building. Another concern was brought up about keeping an individual profile professional and not too personal (or vice versa, if individuals had planned to use it outside of work). There was a feeling that you need to keep it balanced, perhaps with some harmless personal info (since it is a norm of the medium), but not too much (ie, political leanings, etc).

In addition to MySpace and Facebook, wikis, blogs, and other social technologies were discussed. Assumption, for example uses a wiki at their reference desk to keep all ref librarians abreast of current assignments or issues, and as a repository for answers to FAQs. Worcester Public has a Children’s Blog and the Regional Reference Blog. MWCC has a blog to advertise to faculty and likes that it is less intrusive that constantly sending an email. They also keep their Library Policy Manual on a wiki for easy access and changes. Christine at WPI briefly demonstrated social bookmarking tool del.icio.us; it can be used to share appropriate web sites for a course with students. GoodReads is another social networking site that lets you see what books your “friends” have, are, or would like to read.

ARC Strategic Plan

We again discussed the new ARC strategic plan and its goal to have this SIG organize an Information Literacy symposium for a larger community. Timing would be in 2011. Possibly want to ask NELIG or others to collaborate.

The group recommended that a symposium steering committee be made up of at least one representative of the ARC directors, as well as some representatives from the SIG. It would be helpful to have rep’s from both community colleges and four-year colleges.

Next meeting

The next meeting will be on The Library’s Role in First Year Experience and Orientation. It looks like it will be either June 10^th or 12^th. Please let Callie (ccurran@assumption.edu) or Christine (cdrew@wpi.edu) know if one works better for you.