ABSTRACT
This concurrent session shared Albertsons Library’s experience with hosting an Access Services librarian’s sabbatical in Acquisitions and Collections. Original goals of the sabbatical were for the librarian to understand the framework for how the work of acquisitions is structured and executed; and understand the e-resource lifecycle to bring back critical skills to inform better service desk training. Though Access Services maintains the physical collection, and helps patrons navigate the digital collections through information and reference desks, staff in the area traditionally were not exposed to e-resource workflows, and the mechanics of how items are purchased, tracked and categorized. During the five-month long sabbatical, the librarian learned about the responsibilities of the unit and sub-groups that included ordering, receiving, serials, gifts, resource sharing, copy cataloging, budgeting, licensing, and electronic resources. This session discussed the value and benefits of using a sabbatical period to expose traditional public services staff to technical services, to deepen knowledge, and to support the institution.
Background
Boise State University’s Albertsons Library serves a campus of over 26,000 students and 3,300 faculty and staff in Boise, Idaho. Boise State recently earned the categorization of R2: Doctoral Universities, high research activity in the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education. The University has seen a tremendous amount of growth in the past twenty years. Albertsons Library employs fifty staff members that include tenured and pre-tenure librarian faculty. The Library is divided into departments that are responsible for different function and activities. This presentation focused on two of these departments: Access Services (AS) which manages circulation, course reserves, stacks maintenance, technology lending, and building management and safety; and Acquisitions and Collections (A&C) which is composed of three teams: Ordering, Interlibrary Loan, and Gifts; Receiving and Collections; and Serials, Government Documents, and Continuing Resources. A&C manages interlibrary loan, document delivery, ordering, receiving, collections, electronic resources, serials, government documents, and continuing resources.
Preparing for sabbatical
In a 2008 study conducted by Molly R. Flaspohler, of 101 academic libraries, 52% of the institutions allowed for librarian sabbaticals. Of that percent, only 50% of them had a librarian take sabbatical in the most recent five years.Footnote1 At Boise State, although librarians are faculty and are eligible for sabbatical leave after achieving tenure, very few librarians have applied for the opportunity. Previously the emerging technology and experiential learning librarian did a five-month sabbatical investigating instructional strategies and teaching inside of makerspaces. Another librarian had applied for and was granted sabbatical but chose to defer and ultimately did not go on sabbatical for personal reasons.
As the head of Access Services, Mary C. Aagard, one of the authors, had experience helping patrons at the service desk find and use physical collections and electronic resources. She became interested in the life cycle of resources and the acquisition process. She also observed a need for public services staff to have a better understanding of the breadth of electronic resources available and how to help patrons use them. Knowing that the head of Acquisitions and Collections was close to retirement, Aagard developed a sabbatical application to “intern” in the unit. She was the second librarian in the Library’s history to take a sabbatical.
The world of acquisitions, collections, and electronic resources can be complex and intimidating to library faculty who have had little experience in the area. Libraries will often have opportunities for cross-department work, for example on large scale weeding projects, but there are few opportunities for extended learning in non-assigned areas. It is also rare for acquisitions, collections, and electronic resources staff to share their expertise with interested colleagues in long-term settings.
Aagard worked with the head of A&C to develop learning goals and experiences to learn as much as possible about acquisitions and collections in the semester long period. The stated goals of Aagard’s sabbatical follows:
Understand the framework for how the work of acquisitions is structured and executed;
Understand the e-resource lifecycle and develop critical skills in order to better inform service desk training;
Develop knowledge to implement changes in service desk strategy.
Hosting an intern/sabbatical requires time and effort of the unit staff and their support of having a long-term house guest was important. The support of the unit head, Nancy Rosenheim, was essential to the creation and success of the sabbatical. The different teams inside A&C, led by Nancy Donahoo, Marlena Hooyboer, and Pam Kindelberger, were excited to share processes and get feedback from Aagard, and see how A&C might bridge the gap of knowledge between public services and technical services.
History of collaborative work
The Acquisitions and Collections unit has always worked with Access Services and other units in the library. The units’ responsibilities overlap each other to provide services, but they do not always know the detailed scope of each other’s work, only the general overview. Some recent projects required multiple library units’ participation to complete in short windows of time. We relied on each other in a “big way” to complete these tasks, and it really revealed how much we do not know about the depth of knowledge and skill requirements of each employee. Some of these collaborative projects are described in the following sections.
Weeding
Albertsons Library focuses collection management as a research library, based on the University’s focus as a research institution for all levels – doctoral, graduate, and undergraduate. This has evolved over the last sixteen years from a legacy library that did not previously weed much of the collection. The Library is also working on expanding and providing improved workspaces for students. We recently completed a “Collection Rightsizing” project, where we withdrew approximately 93,500 print items from the collection. A&C relied on all library staff to identify, pull, and withdraw these volumes.
A&C started the project by analyzing the collection for duplicate print copies of monographs with low or no usage and duplicate volumes of print serials that the library also held electronically. Subject lists of titles were created for liaison librarians to review with their faculty and make retention recommendations. After review, A&C along with AS verified lists, pulled volumes from the shelf, and created scanned files to update item statuses.
Creation of pioneer hall retrieval facility
Part of the “Collection Rightsizing” project involved developing a place to move low usage volumes of print serial titles that would be retained in the collection. This required the work of multiple units including AS and A&C. Usage reports were created and sent to the Collections Council and subject librarians for review. After finding and preparing a place on campus to house these materials, the shelving and volumes of materials had to be moved to the new location. AS and A&C had to calculate the number of volumes to be housed, how they would be shelved to fit in the space, and then relocated. A workstation to scan and send electronic articles to library patrons without having to bring the physical volume back to the library was also set up. These material requests are managed through interlibrary loan document delivery.
Document delivery
A&C works with AS to provide document delivery services for library patrons. Article and chapter requests submitted through interlibrary loan, or as materials requests through the unit email, require the two units to gather and submit patron and citation information, research copyright and associated costs, then purchase and deliver article or chapter requests electronically.
Course reserves
The two units also work together to order, catalog, and notify faculty about the titles requested for course reserves. Both units make sure resources are accurately displayed in the library catalog and made available for students as quickly as possible.
Learning from the teams
Though each of the three teams in the Acquisitions and Collections unit have specific processes and procedures, they all worked with Aagard in similar ways. Kindelberger, Hooyboer, and Donahoo started meeting with their teams to talk about the skills and competencies they would be sharing with Aagard. They also discussed the questions that Aagard presented to them to help her learn about their responsibilities. These included:
How did you learn to do what you do?
What tools do you need to do your job?
How have you learned to use those tools?
What do you like most about your work?
Most people who work in a library have a basic understanding of what happens in technical services units and likely have a general idea of how those responsibilities transcend the unit. However, the work undertaken by the A&C unit has become more technical and requires much more critical thinking and understanding of copyright law and licensing language, so trying to figure out how to explain that to someone outside the unit takes time and patience. All three supervisors started by giving Aagard the big picture overview of their teams. Then, staff members explained the scope of their responsibilities and demonstrated the workflow and procedures of the team. Finally, individual team members demonstrated specific tasks and explained each procedure in detail to Aagard.
One project that Kindelberger and Aagard worked on together during the sabbatical was the Software and Accessibility Review Board (SARB) process for electronic resources. The SARB process is a university-wide software review to reduce redundancy and ensure accessibility compliance. All pieces of software, particularly those that have user interfaces require review. Kindelberger and Aagard also worked on the committee to create the Equally Effective Alternate Access Plan (EEAAP) for library resources. The EEAAP provides a path for patrons to alert us to inaccessible content and provides remedies for patrons with the materials that they need for research and classwork in a format that they can use.
Aagard also worked on a serials package renewal, and took part in reviewing licensing language, interpreting contracts, incorporating usage data, and making retention recommendations. A limitation of the sabbatical is that it is difficult to teach complicated tasks in a short period of time. Aagard was able to obtain a better understanding of the work undertaken in A&C, but noted that this should not be confused with true mastery of the required skills to do any of the jobs in the unit permanently.
Lessons learned from the sabbatical
During the sabbatical, Aagard was able to identify differences and similarities between Access Services and Acquisitions and Collections. She realized that the units use the integrated library system differently. Aagard saw similarities of work processes between AS and A&C. As an example, both units used similar or duplicate processes of quality control verification, including searching for missing print books that have unfulfilled patron holds. Each group also had a process for searching and contacting patrons if the item is not found. Knowing this helped the teams eliminate redundant work.
There were many takeaways the supervisors learned from the experience. First, they found they needed to create a glossary of terminology. While Access Services and Acquisitions and Collections work in the same building, they do not always understand the terminology that is unique to each unit. Next, procedure documentation needed more pictures or other visual examples. The teams in A&C found that it was helpful to have an example to work through when showing someone outside the area what they do, and more detailed procedures would facilitate this exchange. Also, having team members explain tasks to someone outside their area helped reinforce the learning process for the person who does the task regularly. Giving staff time to demonstrate and teach their work was good for growth. It helped them acquire a better understanding of the process instead of “just doing the steps” of a task. A final benefit of having a public services librarian was having team members think about what they do and share what they like most about their jobs. The experience helped spark confidence in their skills and appreciation for their work.
The ability to work with the A&C team and learn about their work was an incredible experience for Aagard. She built stronger working relationships with the A&C unit. The unit’s support and willingness to teach her was greatly appreciated. The Library also benefited by having a traditional public services librarian exposed to the workflow and complex work environment of A&C.
The team realized the importance of promoting the work of A&C and developing opportunities for library staff to learn the responsibilities of the unit. The A&C teams hope to explore micro-sabbaticals, or concentrated periods of learning for unit employees. These opportunities for learning can help with succession planning, talent development, and strategic skill building for growth in emerging areas.
For any librarian considering a sabbatical or professional development opportunity that is structured like an internship, Aagard suggests:
Establish structure! Schedule times you will be learning in the space and when you will be doing independent study.
Be clear about your intentions post-sabbatical. Is this knowledge going to be used to launch to a new position, etc.? An internship sabbatical strengthens relationships but also complicates them. Have frank conversations with the unit you currently work in if you know you are hoping to transition to a new work area.
Embrace learning by immersion. If you do not know much about the area you will be working in, it may feel like you are learning a new language. It takes time and lots of listening. Eventually it will all click.
Find commonalities, redundancies, and opportunities for deeper collaboration between your “home” unit and where you are doing the sabbatical.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to thank Nancy Rosenheim and Nancy Donahoo for the support and training they provided in this process.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Mary C. Aagard
Mary C. Aagard is Head, Acquisitions and Collections, Albertsons Library, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho.
Marlena Hooyboer
Marlena Hooyboer is Receiving and Collections Manager, Albertsons Library, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho.
Pamela D. Kindelberger
Pamela D. Kindelberger is Ordering, Interlibrary Loan, and Gifts Manager, Albertsons Library, Boise State University, Boise, Idaho.
Notes
1. Molly R. Flaspohler, “Librarian Sabbatical Leaves: Do We Need to Get Out More?” The Journal of Academic Librarianship 35, no. 2 (2009): 152-161, doi: 10.1016/j.acalib.2009.01.009.