Can we demonstrate academic library value without violating student privacy?
Zoe Fisher
Assistant Professor, Pedagogy & Assessment Librarian
University of Colorado Denver
Colorado Academic Library Association
Intellectual and Academic Freedom and the Academic Library
University of Denver
Friday, July 21, 2017
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“We won’t know what difference the library makes until we collect data on individual library users.”
--Megan Oakleaf in her keynote address to the Library Assessment Workshop, Colorado Academic Library Association,
November 2016
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Agenda
In today’s talk, I will…
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Common Metrics of Student Success
Concerns
Data Points
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Trends in Higher Education
The 6-year graduation rate for first-time, full-time undergraduate students who began seeking a bachelor's degree at a 4-year degree-granting institution in fall 2009 was __ percent.
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Trends in Higher Education
The 6-year graduation rate for first-time, full-time undergraduate students who began seeking a bachelor's degree at a 4-year degree-granting institution in fall 2009 was 59 percent.
Source: National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education
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Trends in Higher Education
If 3 out of 5 students finish a Bachelor’s degree in six years, what are those students doing differently than the other 40%?
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Trends in Library Assessment
Librarians are eager to prove that library use has a demonstrated impact on student success.
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How has ACRL responded?
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What kinds of library use data are being collected?
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How is data being collected?
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How is library use data being connected to “student learning and success”?
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What are the key findings?
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Library Assessment Conference 2016
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Library Assessment Conference 2016
Grand Valley State University
Mary O’Kelly
Key Finding
“Students who had at least one professor work with a librarian—regardless of whether those students saw a librarian in their own classes—were retained at a statistically significant higher rate.”
All conference proceedings are available at http://www.libraryassessment.org/.
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Library Assessment Conference 2016
University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
Jan Fransen & Kate Peterson
Key Finding
All conference proceedings are available at http://www.libraryassessment.org/.
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Correlation is not…
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Correlation is not…
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When I see studies that correlate library use with student success, I think…
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When I see studies that correlate library use with student success, I think…
The library is not the thing that makes the student successful. Privilege is.
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The problem with correlation, continued.
Studies that correlate library use with student success reinforce the narrative that academic success is a series of individual choices (rather than the result of a system designed to help some people succeed more than others).
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Getting back to privacy…
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Required Reading
“Learning Analytics and the Academic Library: Professional Ethics Commitments at a Crossroads”
Kyle M. L. Jones (Indiana University) and Dorothea Salo (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
College & Research Libraries, March 2018
Available now as a pre-print
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Learning Analytics
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Jones & Salo, 2018
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Trends in Research Literature
Kogut found 38 articles used quantitative methods to explore:
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Recommendations from Kogut 2016
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Dreams of Qualitative Methodologies
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Qualitative Research Methods
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Qualitative Research Methods
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Qualitative Research Methods
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Qualitative Research Methods
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Qualitative Research Methods
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Libraries are not the answer to the question of student success.
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Libraries are not the answer to the question of student success.
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Agenda
In today’s talk, I have…
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