ALIA 2001 TAFE libraries conference

Building Partnerships Through Discovery - Mentoring TAFE Librarians in Customising Discovery to Support Flexible Learning in TAFE

By Rose Counsel, Jenny Leviston and Vicki Rethus

Rose Counsel has had nearly twenty years experience working in reference and information services in a variety of libraries - university and TAFE, school and government. Since 1995, she has worked as an Information Librarian with the Information Literacy & Research Services team at the University of Ballarat Library. Since February 2000, Rose has been seconded to the Centre for Learning and Teaching to be part of the cross-divisional UBonline project coordination team.

Jenny Leviston is acting SMB Campus Librarian and Collection Resources Librarian at the University of Ballarat. Over the period Jenny has been acting Campus Librarian an increased emphasis on information literacy has resulted in a range of new programs and initiatives that have been widely supported by teaching staff and students.

Vicki Rethus is an Information Librarian at the Horsham campus of the University of Ballarat (Victoria). Whilst this campus was traditionally a TAFE Institution, it now offers a range of higher education courses. Vicki has spent the last eight years working in the areas of reader services, document delivery and information literacy.

Abstract

The emphasis now being placed on flexible delivery of educational information and courses has led to the development of many collaborative projects. It has become imperative that library reference and information services become innovative in ways of providing access to resources and support for learners irrespective of the mode of teaching and learning undertaken.

This paper describes how a librarian working as part of a project at the University of Ballarat to implement online learning programs, developed and implemented a curriculum based template for the online delivery of library, research and information resources that could be customised for individual units, courses and programs in the Higher Education division. The Discovery website was the result of this project.

In 2001, the focus of Discovery has shifted to the University of Ballarat's TAFE division, with particular support for the project being provided through a LearnScope 2001 grant. This grant allowed time-release for librarians working in the TAFE campuses to actively participate in the project by working with the project librarian to develop and customise the template for the TAFE division.

Introduction

The University of Ballarat (UB) established the cross-divisional UBonline project in October 1999 with the aim of enabling the implementation of a strategic approach to the development of flexible online learning programs. A collaborative model of project management was established involving the University's higher education and TAFE schools, the Information Services Branch (which includes the University Library), the Centre for Learning and Teaching (CLT) in the Scholarship & Educational Development Services (SEDS) Branch, and the School of Information Technology and Mathematical Sciences (ITMS).

An allocation from the UBonline project budget to the Information Services Branch (ISB) enabled the part-time secondment of a project librarian throughout 2000 - 2001. As a key member of the UBonline project's coordination team, the project librarian's brief was to develop and implement a curriculum-based template for the online delivery of library, research and information resources that could be customised for individual units, courses and programs in collaboration with curriculum development advisers and academic and teaching staff. The Discovery website is the result of this phase of the UBonline project.

Purpose of Discovery

Discovery was designed to support resource and problem-based learning, critical enquiry and independent/collaborative research within courses delivered online by the University of Ballarat's higher education and TAFE divisions. Underpinning this was the need for Discovery to do more for online learners than simply be a link to the UB Library website.

The UB Library website has a role to provide links to all that the Library has to offer its audience, across the whole spectrum of information and resources available. The purpose of the UB Library website, as a tool to be used by a broad audience (students, teachers, local community, other universities, etc.), means that it is not capable of fulfilling the specialized role that Discovery has through its potential for customisation and integration within the curriculum of an online learning unit.

Stages of development

Discovery's development and implementation evolved through the UBonline project's coordination team, which consisted of a range of collaborative partners - lecturing/teaching staff, colleagues in the University Library, ISB and CLT, and experts in multimedia design.

Planning

Early in the design process, it was decided to adapt an existing model of the University of Ballarat's Graduate Certificate/Diploma of Education (Tertiary Education) website, with the working title of Discovery.

The UBonline project recruited the services of a lecturer from the School of ITMS, with skills in teaching multimedia software, who directed a student project to adapt PowerPoint slides to a fully operational website using Macromedia's Dreamweaver and Fireworks software. Drafts of the Discovery website were refined through regular consultation between members of the UBonline project team, librarians and the web designers.

Implementation

The UBonline project coordination team was established to draw on the skills of a wide range of staff across the University. In addition to those staff undertaking the technical processes associated with the server (which supports the WebCT platform), and the administrative processes associated with getting students enrolled online, other key project members were CLT staff, whose role was to work as curriculum development advisers with nominated teaching staff from each of the University's higher education and TAFE schools.

After holding initial meetings with lecturers/teachers, CLT staff included the project librarian in the process at the appropriate time, to work with them to establish ways in which Discovery could be integrated into their units' learning and assessment tasks.

Follow-up meetings were arranged with individual lecturers/teachers that enabled the project librarian to work more closely with them, outlining exactly how specific elements of the Discovery website could be customised.

Skills acquired through working with the project's web developers enabled the project librarian to undertake the customisation of Discovery - this involved using the web page authoring and site management software (Dreamweaver and Fireworks) to edit html files.

This collaboration now sees a link to Discovery appearing on the home page of each online unit, represented as 'Resources & Support' with the 'information' symbol.

Review / Evaluation

The implementation of Discovery necessitated the development of innovative solutions to information access and use. The University of Ballarat is a regional institution offering higher education and TAFE programs across five campuses in western Victoria. Therefore, it was necessary to facilitate seamless access to key resources (especially electronic journal databases) for online learners, students studying flexibly, as well as on-campus students, regardless of their location. As an offshoot of the UBonline project, the project librarian managed a small project team within the Information Services Branch, which resulted in NaviGate - Gateway to Online Resources.

In 2001, the focus of the project librarian's work within the UBonline project has been liaising directly with academic staff in the Higher Education division and TAFE teaching staff to customise Discovery to support the units, courses and programs they are preparing for online delivery. As yet, no formal process of evaluation of Discovery has been undertaken, though it is hoped that this will be implemented for those courses being planned for delivery during Semester 1, 2002.

FEATURES OF DISCOVERY

As mentioned previously, Discovery has been closely modeled on the original version of the Graduate Certificate/Diploma of Education course website. A circular design is utilized to link the five elements, with no particular starting point so that learners are free to choose elements as appropriate to their needs. The purpose of Discovery is to facilitate access to key library and research resources, with the added benefit of providing links to a wide variety of learners' anticipated needs, e.g. an email link to the Unit/Course team to ask specific questions, relevant websites compiled by teachers and/or librarians, 'tools' that support critical use and evaluation of information (guidelines on preparing an annotated bibliography, citation style guides, etc.).

Getting Started Introduces Discovery Sets the context for its purpose within a particular unit
Your Questions Provides email hyperlink to both the Unit/Course team (likely to comprise lecturer/teacher, tutor and/or liaison librarian) and to the 'Ask a Library Question' email service Also links to both UB Library and ISB websites in anticipation of answering other queries that online learners may have
The Internet 'Useful Websites' page Can be customised, with input from teaching staff, to support different discipline areas/teaching & learning situations Also links to 'Searching the Internet' tutorial from Library website
Research & Information Resources Links to Electronic databases, journals and reference resources, and Library catalogues Most links can be customised to support different discipline areas/teaching & learning situations
Critical Researcher Provides links to strategies and tools that support learning and research, such as a concept map, guides to citation style, doing a literature review, etc. Content within this element really dependent on input from academics/ teachers to make it relevant Focus is on encouraging students to learn how to go about academic research, etc.

Supporting flexible learning in TAFE

In 2001, the focus of Discovery shifted to the University of Ballarat's TAFE division, with particular support for the project being provided through a LearnScope 2001 grant (a national professional development initiative within the VET sector). This grant has allowed time-release for nominated librarians working at the University's TAFE campuses to actively participate in UBonline by working with the project librarian as a peer mentor, in developing their skills in multimedia software application and design, and liaising with TAFE teachers to integrate information literacy principles and skills within the curricula. This project has been an ideal opportunity to test and adapt the Discovery model to better suit the TAFE division.

Implementation

After initial meetings with the project librarian and nominated TAFE librarians, to discuss the evolution of Discovery and its potential for customisation to support TAFE courses published online, the following plans were put in place.

• Allocation of a portion of the LearnScope grant, to allow time release for the TAFE librarians to work on the project.
• Establishment of a timetable for future team meetings, and meetings with teaching staff, (two from each of the TAFE campuses) involved in the project.
• Meetings held between teaching staff and librarians to introduce Discovery and discuss customisation requirements for their online curriculum modules.
• A two-day training session with the project librarian, for TAFE librarians to develop their skills in using Dreamweaver software, using data gathered from consultations with teaching staff.
• Customised files to be uploaded to the UBonline server so that they can be viewed by teaching staff.
• Consultations between librarians and teaching staff on the results of their customised units so that any alterations can be followed up before final approval to publish online.

Reflecting on working with teaching staff in the TAFE division.

In the context of the University as a whole, it is likely that the project will evolve to become a fully-fledged program from 2002, as the impetus for the delivery of flexible online learning programs gathers momentum within the higher education and TAFE sectors across Australia. However, at this stage it is unclear whether the currently funded position for a project librarian to work directly with UBonline will continue into the future.

Library staff at the University of Ballarat are proactive in seeking new ways of working with teaching staff to integrate information literacy within the curricula and involvement with the UBonline project has provided them with the opportunity to work 'outside the square'. As participants in the UBonline project (together with teachers, curriculum development advisers, etc.), library staff involved have been regarded as more of an 'equal', given that we can all be generally regarded as novices as we embark on this new mode of teaching and learning.

Although there were no major problems experienced, some common themes emerged when working with teaching staff from different campuses. Teaching staff were continually grappling with time to allocate to setting up their online courses, and as such, found difficulty in meeting with, and providing input into Discovery. Teaching staff were also under the pressure of creating and/or adapting units/courses for online delivery and were preoccupied with their course content and the way it could be presented utilizing the technology.

Consequently, there was a tendency for teachers to regard a resource such as Discovery as incidental to the core curriculum, and possibly an additional problem to deal with. Thus teachers happily accepted input from library staff (i.e. in customising Discovery to suit their unit/course), but were not prepared or able to develop it as a support for resource and problem-based learning embedded within the curriculum. Some confusion was evident with teaching staff as to where Discovery would sit within their online course structure.

Evaluation of Discovery (whether formal or informal) has been difficult to establish, given the lack of feedback received from teaching staff, who are busy with a range of commitments in addition to their time-consuming work with the UBonline project.

A very positive outcome has been the relationship, which has developed between teaching staff and librarians in working closely on developing supported online learning. Also evident were the rewards teaching staff experienced as a result of knowing more about the valuable resources available to their students and themselves through the Library, both in human and physical terms.

Adapting Discovery for TAFE

As a result of discussions with teaching staff and colleagues, it was decided that the generic template for Discovery was equally appropriate for supporting TAFE online courses with the exception of some minor changes. These changes included replacing the term 'critical researcher' with 'research strategies' whilst adding the words 'finding journal articles' to the link called 'Databases' and including the link 'Browse recommended reading list'.

Challenges for the future

Challenges for the future include the need to maintain 'quality control' of the design and content of Discovery, particularly when the task of customising versions is shared by a number of librarians across all of the University's campuses.

The need to regularly review the existing customised versions of Discovery within online units/courses and to regularly review the design of the website to ensure that it remains adequate for its use/s and is appealing to its users.

It will be important to ensure that systems and resources are in place so that the librarians can work with teaching staff at different campuses. Often it was the practical issues of connectivity and equipment that caused the greatest problems as the librarians attempted to meet and plan at various campuses away from their own 'home' campus.

There will be significant challenges for librarians when online learning increases and becomes mainstream. They will need to develop new ways of working with students particularly in relation to information provision. Services offered at present will need to be assessed as to how they may be improved to better support online learning. In particular, the provision of resources for remote students will need to be further investigated.

It will be vital to maintain and develop good working relationships with teaching staff, and encourage them to better understand the importance of information support for online learning and to provide good feedback in relation to customising Discovery.

It is possible that the workloads of librarians will increase as they attempt to meet traditional demands as well as the demands of online learning support. The project has already demonstrated the need to learn new technical skills particularly in the area of web publishing and design.

The role of the peer-mentor in this project has been an important one in guiding, supporting and ensuring the coordination and quality control of information within Discovery. This has demonstrated the importance of having a staff member coordinating information support for online learning so that it develops and grows in a controlled and well-managed fashion.

Acknowledgments

We would like to acknowledge the contribution and support of colleagues at the University of Ballarat, especially:

• Project librarian and peer-mentor - Rose Counsel
• University of Ballarat Library staff members, particularly those who have assisted with the project.
• Online Services & Flexible Delivery team members - Andrew Segrott and Ian Wright
• Staff and students from the School of Information Technology & Mathematical Sciences, particularly Scott Hebbard and Don Pennell
• Teaching staff from the TAFE Campuses at Ballarat and Horsham.