Digital Commons Network^™

Review Of The Book Guide To Reference In Genealogy And Biography, John A. Drobnicki

Publications and Research

Review of the book Guide to reference in genealogy and biography.

Collecting Cats: Library Lessons From Neko Atsume, Kelly M. Blanchat, Megan Brooks

Publications and Research

This blog post is the culmination of a Twitter conversation between librarians talking about their experiences playing a phone game. The game is called Nekoatsume and it involves taking care of digital cats in a virtual backyard. Nekoatsume is entirely in Japanese, a key fact that actually started the Twitter conversation (and not the fact that the game involves cats, as might be expected). Despite the language barrier, Nekoatsume is remarkably user-friendly; library databases should be just as user-friendly as a game in a foreign language, but too often they’re not. With so many variables in acquiring research — design, …

Kabanflow, Daniel A. Sabol

Publications and Research

A review of KabanFlow, a tool which helps organize projects. It was used for some time prior to my report to determine if it has any quality in regards to both education and librarianship.

Social Media As Game Strategy: Twitter In The #Infolit Instruction Session, Kelly M. Blanchat, Lydia Willoughby

Publications and Research

The lure of distractions can entice even the strongest of student wills in a computer classroom. Research requires strategic thinking and ordered planning to drown out the noise of online distractions. This poster demonstrates a unique way to capitalize on the natural overlap of research, communication, and social media by employing game strategy to lead learning outcomes for undergraduate student research. Instead of silencing social media, this activity incorporates Twitter as a platform to introduce information literacy concepts and participatory practices of scholarship.

White Paper On Research Opportunities And Cuny Library Faculty: The Need For Annual Leave Parity, Psc Cuny Library Faculty Committee (2014-­2015), Jay H. Bernstein, Jill Cirasella, John A. Drobnicki, Francine Egger-Sider, Lisa Ellis, Robert Farrell, William Gargan, Bonnie Nelson, Mariana Regalado, Sharon Swacker, Tess Tobin

Publications and Research

This White Paper provides an exposition and analysis of how annual leave disparity has arisen for Library Faculty at the City University of New York (CUNY) as compared to other CUNY faculty, its effects on librarians, and what a positive solution to the problem would look like.

Review Of The Book Polish Roots: Korzenie Polskie, 2nd Ed., John A. Drobnicki

Publications and Research

Review of the book Polish roots: Korzenie Polskie, 2nd ed.

Embedded Librarian Ideas: Best Practices Explored And Redefined, Carl R. Andrews

Publications and Research

This paper explores the multitude of ways in which embedded librarianship can be implemented. Although the paper is primarily targeted to academic librarians in higher education settings, the literature examined and the ideas presented can support secondary and college level inter-disciplinary teaching initiatives. The ideas presented are sourced from scholarly journal articles, monographs, and best practices implemented by the author. Attention is given to programs where Information Literacy is infused into a school’s General Education curriculum. Academic librarian pedagogy, outreach, and networking strategies are also highlighted. The author is especially interested in projects that address student academic success after an …

Engage Students Through Flipped Classroom Strategies: A Lesson Planning Guide, Madeline Cohen, Alison Lehner-Quam, Robin Wright

Publications and Research

Presentation at 2015 Connecticut Information Literacy Conference, May 29, 2015.

“I’M Just Really Comfortable:” Learning At Home, Learning In Libraries, Mariana Regalado, Maura A. Smale

Publications and Research

While commuter students may use their college or university libraries, student centers, or other campus locations for academic work, as commuters they will likely also create and negotiate learning spaces in their homes. Our research with urban commuter undergraduates revealed that finding space for their academic work at home was difficult for many students whose needs collided with the needs of other residents using those locations for non-academic purposes. Understanding the details of students’ off-campus academic workspaces can inform the design of learning spaces in academic libraries.

Play A Game, Make A Game: Getting Creative With Professional Development For Library Instruction, Maura A. Smale

Publications and Research

Using games in the library classroom is an active learning strategy that can increase student engagement. However, not all librarians are equally familiar and comfortable with bringing game-based learning to the library. Game On for Information Literacy is a brainstorming card game to help librarians create games for information literacy and library instruction. Inspired by other successful brainstorming card games, this game was developed, playtested, and iterated over several years in workshops, graduate-level MLIS courses, and professional development programs. Game materials are all available to download, use, remix, and share.

The Nine Circles Of Surveillance Hell: An Institutional View Of Information Flows And Information Threats In Libraries, Seeta Peña Gangadharan, Bonnie Tijerina

LACUNY Institute 2015

In the past few years, libraries have started to design public programs that educate patrons about different tools and techniques to protect personal privacy. But do end user solutions provide adequate safeguards against surveillance by corporate and government actors? What does a comprehensive plan for privacy entail in order that libraries live up to their privacy values? In this paper, the authors discuss the complexity of surveillance architecture that the library institution might confront when seeking to defend the privacy rights of patrons. This architecture consists of three main parts: physical or material aspects, logical characteristics, and social factors of …

Who Does The Internet Think You Are? Three Tools That Teach Students How They Are Actively Profiled Online, All The Time, Robin Camille Davis

LACUNY Institute 2015

Your Internet experience is yours alone. For better but often for worse, websites, ads, search results, and even product prices are tailored to you specifically — but how? A vast collection of data describes you to a number of unseen organizations who use this information to shape the internet you see. This transmission of data is not readily visible, but we have the tools to bring this activity into the foreground. We will answer these questions: How does Google profile you to advertisers? How many trackers are following you around the internet? What information are these trackers transmitting, and for …

Privacy Advocacy In Libraries In The Age Of Mass Surveillance, Alison Macrina

LACUNY Institute 2015

Alison Macrina is the founder and director of the Library Freedom Project, an initiative that aims to make real the promise of intellectual freedom in libraries. The Library Freedom Project trains librarians on the state of global surveillance, privacy rights, and privacy-protecting technology, so that librarians may in turn teach their communities about safeguarding privacy. In 2015, Alison was named one of Library Journal‘s Movers and Shakers. Read more about the Library Freedom Project at libraryfreedomproject.org.

Librarians As Advocates For Social Media Privacy, Sarah Lamdan

LACUNY Institute 2015

Librarians must continue their traditional roles as privacy rights activists and intellectual freedom upholders into the digital age, and across electronic information sources, including social media fora. Social media is quickly becoming a major source of information and center for information seeking, and librarians have an opportunity to promote and help shape social media policies that protect users’ privacy and assure that users can seek information without inhibition. One way librarians can be involved in the promotion of online privacy is by joining the social media user rights movement and advocating terms of use agreements that protect information seekers that …

Library Privacy Policies In 2015: Strategies For Renewed Relevance, Percy Wise

LACUNY Institute 2015

In recent decades, library associations have advocated for the adoption of privacy and confidentiality policies as practical support to the Library Code of Ethics with a threefold purpose to (1) define and uphold privacy practices within the library, (2) convey privacy practices to patrons and, (3) protect against potential liability and public relations problems. The adoption of such policies has been instrumental in providing libraries with effective responses to surveillance initiatives such as warrantless requests and the USA PATRIOT ACT.

Nevertheless, as reflected in recent news stories, the rapid emergence of data brokerage relationships and technologies and the increasing need …

"Flipped Classroom" Information Literacy In Business Management Courses--What Have We Learned?, Madeline Cohen, Deborah Sanders

Publications and Research

This presentation reports on a successful cross-department collaboration between the library and the business department at Lehman to conduct information literacy instruction as a "flipped classroom." Ways that the flipped design have been tailored to meet the needs of teaching business research will be demonstrated. Evidence of student learning and qualitative evaluation of student and faculty experience will be presented. Practical tips on implementing flipped instruction will be provided.

Embedded Librarian Program And Its Impact On Students’ Learning Outcomes, Christine (Mi-Seon) Kim, Michael Dolan

Publications and Research

The purpose of this project is to find out how effective an embedded librarian program is at increasing community college students’ performance on a course assignment on an annotated bibliography and a research paper. This is a collaborative project between a librarian and an English instructor. Participants in this study are Queensborough Community College students enrolled in English 101 and English 102 classes during the fall 2014 semester and the spring 2015 semester. There are 4 classes of English 101 and 3 classes of English 102. An annotated bibliography is the assignment used as a means of measuring students’ performance. …

Apps And Technology Share - A Student Disability Services And Library Collaboration, Rebecca Arzola

Publications and Research

The Library and Office of Student Disability Services at Lehman College provide a collaborative presentation on engaging students in sharing apps and technology they use in higher education to support their educational needs for a successful academic career. Presented at the 6th Annual CUNY Accessibility Conference, Student Success in the Digital Age, May 1st, 2015, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, New York City.

Radical Librarian-Technologists, John Schriner

Publications and Research

Librarians may be finding themselves in the role of the technologist that supports students and faculty in Internet security, censorship circumvention, and supports whistleblowers and journalists. This paper looks at three cases where librarians present and teach technologies with these aims: the Tor anonymity network, secure communication in the field of journalism, and the librarian’s place in the maker/hackerspace movement.

Lacuny Archives And Special Collections Roundtable, April 2015, Lacuny

Meeting Minutes

No abstract provided.

Randall Munroe’S What If As A Test Case For Open Access In Popular Culture, Nancy M. Foasberg

Publications and Research

Open access to scholarly research benefits not only the academic world but also the general public. Questions have been raised about the popularity of academic materials for nonacademic readers. However, when scholarly materials are available, they are also available to popularizers who can recontextualize them in unexpected and more accessible ways. Randall Munroe’s blog/comic What If uses open access scholarly and governmental documents to answer bizarre hypothetical questions submitted by his readers. His work is engaging, informative, and reaches a large audience. While members of the public may not rush to read open access scientific journals, their availability to writers …

Interference Archive: A Free Space For Social Movement Culture, Alycia Sellie, Jesse Goldstein, Molly Fair, Jennifer Hoyer

Publications and Research

This paper discusses activist archives within the context of community archives and the practices of archiving activism. Interference Archive (IA), a volunteer-run independent archive in Brooklyn, New York, is presented as one example of an activist archive. We explain the manner in which IA functions as a transmovement and prefigurative “free space” under Francis Poletta’s typology of movement spaces. Through this explanation, we illustrate how the structures of free spaces can help us understand the way activist archives forge connections between communities and the ways that they create new networks of solidarity through the archival process.

The Brightly Illuminated Path: Facilitating An Oer Program At Community College, William M. Blick, Sandra Marcus

Publications and Research

The use of Open Education Resources represents a noble cause, but the idea often remains elusive for many faculty members. In 2015, librarians at Queensborough Community College of the City University of New York, implemented a campaign to promote and facilitate the use and development of OERs. The primary objective was to reduce the growing financial burden on students in textbook purchase requirements. Concomitant goals were to provide instructors with greater academic control and freedom in course content, and to add to the pool of knowledge and resources for collaborative faculty work. The core of the Queensborough campaign was the …

Possible Futures: E-Reserves, Decentralization, And Collaboration, Nora Almeida

Publications and Research

E-Reserves is a relatively young library support service that was conceived as a strategic, decentralized response to changes occurring in curricular resource formats during the 1990s. It is a service that has since become ubiquitous in academic libraries and one that is presently facing a crisis spurred by shifts in user culture, e-learning environments, and modes of scholarship production. Challenges facing E-Reserve services are compounded by a professional culture of isolation and by the absence of best practices and internal assessment measures that can serve as effective rubrics to measure changes or test the efficacy of current service models. This …

The James Como Collection, John A. Drobnicki

Publications and Research

Description of books donated to the York College Library by James Como, Professor Emeritus, Department of Performing and Fine Arts.

Being A Lesbian Librarian, Collection Development In Lesbian Librarianship, And Archives As Lesbian Spaces, Shawn(Ta) Smith-Cruz

Publications and Research

Edited talk From Pratt SILS Gender LIS Panel curated by Dinah Handel on March 27th, 2015
Co-presenters include: Sian Evans; #artandfeminism Wikipedia Editathon & Jen LaBarbera; Filling in the Margins: The use of Queer Theory, Feminist Standpoint Theory, and Critical Race Theory to build inclusive archival collections
This talk remarks on the role of the librarian to provide lesbian-specific content.

Lacuny Executive Council Meeting Minutes, March 2015, Lacuny

Meeting Minutes

No abstract provided.

Multimedia Resources Statistics: Understanding Usage Of Non-Text Resources, Jen Hoyer, Katie O'Connell, Elizabeth A. Tietjen

Publications and Research

As budget cuts are a constant threat and resource costs continue to rise, libraries rely on usage data to be sure that they are delivering the content faculty and students need. Simultaneously, patrons are increasingly accessing multimedia content in the library, and usage reporting standards, like COUNTER’s Release 4, have adapted to reflect this use. This poster explores whether usage of text and non-text resources be compared according to the same measurements, as well as what best practices have emerged, and what gaps remain in current reporting methods.

Sprouting Stems: Science Librarianship Internships For Undergraduates, Matthew Harrick, Lee Ann Fullington

Publications and Research

No abstract provided.

Pulp Poets And Superhero Prophets: A Case For Popular Culture In Academic Library Collection Development, William Blick

Publications and Research

For decades, popular culture was neglected and frowned upon by academics. In recent years, cultural critics, including librarians, have found popular culture materials to be didactic tools, and vital to the study of society and the zeitgeist that has prevailed at the time of their production. As a result, many academic librarians have found it useful to develop collections in their libraries that reflect a range of sociological change as demonstrated in these resources. With diligence and research, academic collection development managers may choose materials that will enhance the role of popular culture in their libraries