Reinventing Reference How Libraries Deliver Value In The Age Of Google

This collection takes a critical look at the overarching trends that affect current library policy and practice regarding the process of delivering information services, and how factors such as public policy, economics, and popular culture will continue to affect those trends in the future

Uniquely positioned to connect library users to the information they seek, and thus to the wider world, library staff who serve on the front lines of reference have both the power and responsibility to position the library as an institution that remains relevant and responsive. This collection takes a critical look at the overarching trends that affect current library policy and practice regarding the process of delivering information services, and how factors such as public policy, economics, and popular culture will continue to affect those trends in the future. Library leaders and visionaries from across the spectrum of institutions address such topics as -The history of reference librarianship and how it relates to the current landscape -Privacy, censorship, and reference ethics -The effects of the born digital library user on the purpose and function of reference -Strategic challenges for reference in the coming decade -A reference forecast for 2025 Placing these issues in historical and cultural context, this book offers practical solutions for new paradigms of reference service for all users.

In this book, Cassell and Hiremath provide the tools needed to manage the ebb and flow of changing reference services in today's libraries.

This second edition of Information Services Today: An Introduction demonstrates the ever-changing landscape of information services today and the need to re-evaluate curriculum, competency training, and one’s personal learning network in order to stay abreast of current trends and issues, and more significantly, remain competent to address the changing user needs of the information community. Specifically, the book • provides a thorough introduction, history, and overall state of the field, • gives a diverse and global perspective of what it means to be a library and information professional today, • addresses why information organizations and information and technological literacy are more important today than ever before, • discusses how technology has influenced the ways that information professionals provide information resources and services in today’s digital environment, • highlights current issues and trends and provides expert insight into emerging challenges, innovations, and opportunities for the future, and, • identifies career management strategies and leadership opportunities in the information profession. The new edition features chapter updates to address changes in information services, introducing new topics such as strategic planning, change management, design thinking, advocacy, and data management and analysis, and includes new contributing authors. The book begins with an overview of libraries and their transformation as information and technological hubs within their local and digital communities. It covers the various specializations within the field – emphasizing the exciting yet complex roles and opportunities for information professionals in a variety of information environments. With that foundation in place, it presents the fundamentals of information services, delves into management skills needed by information professionals today, and explores emerging issues related to the rapid development of new technologies. The book addresses how libraries and information centers serve different kinds of communities, highlighting the unique needs of increasingly diverse users and how information organizations and information professional’s work to fulfill those needs. This book provokes discussion, critical thinking, and interaction to facilitate the learning process. The content and supplemental materials – discussion questions, rich sets of online accessible materials, multimedia webcast interviews featuring authors from this book discussing the trends and issues in their respective areas, and chapter presentation slides for use by instructors – give readers the opportunity to develop a deeper understanding of and engagement with the topics. Additionally, this book recognizes the broad range of environments that people with Master of Library and Information Science (MLIS) degrees work in, which include both libraries and other information environments. Thus, this book does not only focus on libraries, but instead encompasses ALL kinds of information organizations.

Offering a broad overview of consequential changes in the landscape of reference services, this guide also provides practical guidance on how to meet the new challenges they present. For the past decade, librarians have been lamenting the demise of reference services. Encouraging recent research shows that reference librarians are actually in more demand than ever; however, nearly everything about reference has changed—from technologies, tools, and techniques to models of service. What are these changes, and how can the profession respond to and prepare for shifting priorities and user needs? In this volume, business librarians Diane Zabel and Lauren Reiter bring together a host of experts to answer these timely questions. Topics range from the education and training of professionals to meeting the needs and wants of employers. Covered are trends in chat reference, research consultations, do-it-yourself reference, tracking trends with user populations, assessment, and data-driven decisions about reference services. Grounded in the principle that, regardless of the evolutions in service, the user remains at the center of reference, this guide offers readers an exciting look at the future of this important public service.

Reference and information services are more important than ever for today’s young people. By analyzing key features of reference and information services to young people in school and public library environments, including the research behind the trends and issues, librarians can make sure that those services are appropriately responsive to children and teens. Based on standards and evidence-based practice, this book helps you to optimize those resources and services by: providing guidance in assessing youth communities, determining youth’s information needs and information behaviors, developing and maintaining age-appropriate reference collections (starting with the book’s core list of print and online resources), optimizing physical and virtual access to reference and information sources, interacting with youth and facilitating their reference and information literacy skills, curating and producing reference and information products, dealing with relevant legal and ethical issues, and planning effective library reference and information services for youth. Chapter sidebar examples provide food for thought.

Former university lecturer and Caribbean immigrant Mark-Shane Scale offers an unsettling look at how the centuries-old legacy of colonialism and imperialism continues to haunt one of the most seemingly innocuous and unexpected of spaces: the world’s modern libraries. Library and information sciences emerged from a noble commitment to making knowledge more easily accessible to the world. Yet, empowering and global library institutions with the ability to facilitate intercultural communication, social cohesion, and conflict resolution, have simultaneously been weaponized as instruments of ideological and cultural propaganda throughout the ages. A meticulous analysis of historical and current library systems and practices crescendos to a visionary proposal for paving the way ahead: a holistic, integrated approach to finally decolonize global libraries in a way that builds an ever-evolving archive of human knowledge and human experience that is truly inclusive of all voices—indigenous, colonized, formerly colonized, and immigrant voices alike. At the height of the information age, this book is a foundational must-read for all librarians, library school students, and library users around the world, a contemporary perspective that boldly lays out a timely and much-needed reform to an institution that might otherwise risk its relevance to the modern global landscape.