Abstract
Declining reference statistics, diminishing human resources, and the desire to be more proactive and embedded in academic departments, prompted the University of South Florida Library to create a taskforce for re-envisioning reference services. The taskforce was charged with examining the staffing patterns at the desk and developing recommendations to give librarians greater flexibility and to better respond to the information-seeking needs of users. These recommendations were based on statistics of desk usage, collected with the newly adapted online tool Desk Tracker, and structured interviews with library administrators. The taskforce was interested in how these stakeholders use quantitative data in decision-making.
Original language | American English |
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Journal | Public Services Quarterly |
Volume | 7 |
State | Published - May 20 2011 |
Keywords
- academic libraries
- special collections
- reference services
- assessment
- Desk Tracker
- virtual reference
- tiered reference
Disciplines
- Library and Information Science