New Drop-in Reference Service
The National Library runs a comprehensive suite of reader education programs, covering a diverse range of training in collection access and information literacy. The goals of this program are to provide the user with the skills necessary to navigate the Library’s collections and to foster an environment of lifelong learning through increasing information literacy. The Reader Services Policy states that ‘we aim to inform people about the National Library’s collections and assist people to find and get the information they require’. One way the Library achieves this aim is through its Reader Education program, with members of staff giving lecture-style presentations to groups of readers. The standard format for these sessions is to use a pre-prepared script that enables any member of the Reader Services staff to present.
Seeing a Need
We began to notice a pattern, however, where participants would linger at the end of a session to ask specific questions that related directly to their own line of research or areas of interest. In many cases the reason they attended was solely to ask a question or find help with a particular resource. We realised that there was a group of people using the Library who had specific information needs that were not being fully met. They might have been long-term users of libraries and quite information-literate but they were, for whatever reason, unable to make a breakthrough in a particular area of their research.
To help meet the needs of this group, we decided on a new style of reader education program—a session that would allow the attendee to have one-on-one access to a professional librarian. The concept is more common in the university and educational sectors, where it’s known as ‘“know your library” workshops’ or ‘drop-in sessions’.
A Popular Response
The National Library’s new drop-in session has now been held twice, in September and October 2007, and has proved to be quite popular. Prior to the class, staff from our specialist reading rooms were asked to be available to handle any highly specific questions; but otherwise the sessions required little formal preparation (in contrast to the regular sessions) as the topics to be covered were determined by the participants, though a variety of guides and other literature was used on the day. In each session the group was asked to explain a little about their areas of research, and some common themes emerged, enabling the Library staff member to give short presentations on areas of common interest. The librarians then provided each person with one-on-one assistance on their individual topics, which were varied and included Australian steamship history, family history, newspaper researching, assistance with a university assignment, accessing of online journals, and some general internet and computer help. The participants also benefitted from peer interaction as they started helping each other, answering each other’s questions and suggesting alternative sources to search.
The sessions received very positive feedback from those attending, with comments including ‘relaxed and informal atmosphere’; ‘thanks for running this course’; and ‘we are only visitors, we were lucky to catch this course’. We also received suggestions such as ‘any chance of a video link course to other libraries?’, a possibility that has started us all thinking about other new directions in information literacy programs for the National Library. The success of the drop-in sessions has encouraged us to continue to explore other new ways to enhance our Reader Education program.
Russell Latham
Reference Librarian, Information Services