1st Edition

Library Outreach, Partnerships, and Distance Education Reference Librarians at the Gateway

By Wendy Arent, Pixey Anne Mosley Copyright 2000
    338 Pages
    by CRC Press

    338 Pages
    by CRC Press

    Increase patronage with effective outreach strategies!

    From the Introduction, by Wendi Arant and Pixie Anne Mosley: “Outreach is a concept that is gaining more and more significance for libraries, particularly with the recent developments in information technology. Dictionaries define it as 'the act of extending services, benefits, etc. to a wider section of the population.’This definition also implies a mission to communicate a particular message to an audience in order to gain their support. Its meaning for libraries is profound, having consequences for fund raising, public service, and public relations.”

    Library Outreach, Partnerships, and Distance Education: Reference Librarians at the Gateway focuses on extending community outreach in libraries toward a broader public by expanding services that are based on recent advances in information technology.

    This crucial volume with help you will explore many of the issues that are currently affecting libraries, including:

    • the growth of technology and its effect on libraries and library users
    • emerging literacy issues (computer literacy, non-English-speaking populations)
    • providing effective services to at-risk populations
    • diversity and multiculturalism and how they are changing the ways that libraries are used
    • targeting and reaching specific user groups
    • distance education--bringing the mountain to Mohammed

      If the public perception of libraries is ever to move beyond that of “musty old book warehouses,” librarians must take a more active role in the development of new services and in heightening awareness of their existing services and collections. Library Outreach, Partnerships, and Distance Education presents ideas and strategies that are now being implemented around the United States to do just that. This book should be a part of every library's plans for the future!

    Contents
    • Introduction
    • I. Technology and Outreach
    • Wired But Not Connected: Accessibility of Academic Library Home Pages
    • Real-Time Reference Service for the Remote User: From the Telephone and Electronic Mail to Internet Chat, Instant Messaging, and Collaborative software
    • Marketing Electronic Resources and Services: Surveying Faculty Use as a First Step
    • Accessing the Old and the New: Outreach via Web Exhibits and Archive Collections at the University of Arizona Library
    • Expanding Outreach to a Unique User Community: The Slavic Reference Service and the Internet
    • II. Targeting Special Connections: Specific User Groups and Liaison Partners
    • Ready to Read: A Collaborative, Community-Wide Emergent Literacy Program
    • Pressing the F1 Key--And Retrieving Each Other
    • Orienting Neighborhood Youth to an Academic Library: Creating Campus-Community Connections
    • Providing Library Outreach to Student Athletes
    • Developing Proactive Partnerships: Minority Cultural Centers
    • Expanding the Learning Community: An Academic Library Outreach Program to High Schools
    • III. A Different Approach: New User Programs and Outreach Services
    • The “Open House,” An Effective Library Public Relations and Instruction Tool
    • Outside the Exhibit Case: An Undergraduate Library Welcomes the Community
    • Developing a Liaison Program in a New Organizational Structure--A Work in Progress
    • Collaborative Learning: University Archives and Freshman Composition
    • Academic Library Outreach Through Faculty Partnerships and Web-Based Research Aids
    • IV. Outreach in an Academic Library: Overview, Issues, and Background
    • Improving ADA Access: Critical Planning
    • Instruction and Outreach at Colorado State University Libraries
    • Outreach at a Public, Academic, Regional Library--Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi
    • Outreach to Distance Learners: When the Distance Education Instructor Sends Students to the Library, Where Do They Go?
    • Index

    Biography

    Wendy Arent, Pixey Anne Mosley