Invitation to participate in ARL Study of Emerging New Model Publications
About the study
ARL is conducting a study of new kinds of scholarly works, generally described as new-model publications. A field study will begin April 1 that will engage librarian volunteers in interviewing faculty members at their institutions to learn about new model publications that are currently in use by scholars and researchers. ARL has contracted with Ithaka to manage the field study and to write a final report based on an analysis of the collected works. The field study will be open to participation by individual librarians and to libraries that wish to engage all of their liaison librarians. Participating librarians are asked to commit to conducting a minimum of one faculty member interview between April 1, 2008 and June 1, 2008. The database of collected works will be made available as a publicly accessible web resource with the release of the study’s final report, but during the field study phase only participants will have access to the information gathered.
Who can participate
Participation in the study is open to institutions and individuals. Libraries can partner in the field study by committing to participation by all of their liaison librarians. Individual librarians can volunteer to join the field study team. Three institutions are already partnering in the field study activities and are assisting in the development of training and support mechanisms for the field study team members. The University of British Columbia, Cornell University, and the University of Washington are playing this role.
Participation is also open to individual librarians willing to make the commitment to interview at least one faculty member at their institution. Participation is not limited to librarians at ARL member libraries. While a special invitation to participate is extended to alumni of the Institute on Scholarly Communication, any interested librarian can participate as an interviewer. Institute alumni should feel free to extend an invitation to participate to colleagues.
Why participate
Many librarians are initiating conversations with faculty members from their user communities to build understanding of their scholarly communication practices. Data collection for the field study provides a reason to initiate a conversation and a structure for a positive discussion of change in scholarly communication. The field study conversation can focus just on the study question or can be part of a more extended conversation covering additional topics of local concern. The time commitment is quite brief; field study participants can choose to speak to several faculty members or only one. The exploratory conversation can occur in a half hour or less while the other time commitments are for learning about the interview guide and entering any information gathered into a database of new model publications. The database will include only basic data from the interview or information that can be collected by inspecting the web publication.
How to register
Libraries wishing to partner in the field study should contact Karla Hahn karla@arl.org.
What is involved
To participate as a field study librarian, individuals will
· View an instructional webcast and otherwise familiarize themselves with the study interview guide.
· Interview at least one faculty member to identify new model publications in her/his research specialty.
· Enter basic information on new model publications identified by faculty members into the study’s database.
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Karla Hahn, Director
Office of Scholarly Communications
Association of Research Libraries
21 Dupont Circle
Washington, D.C. 20036
voice: 202-296-2296
fax: 202-872-0884
email: karla@arl.org
