Studying Students
The Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester
edited by
Nancy Fried Foster and Susan Gibbons
Association of College and Research Libraries
A division of the American Library Association
Chicago 2007
Edited by
Nancy Fried Foster
Susan Gibbons
Studying Students:
The Undergraduate Research Project
at the University of Rochester
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National
Standard for Information Sciences–Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI
Z39.48-1992. ∞
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Studying students : the Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester / edited by
Nancy Fried Foster and Susan Gibbons.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8389-8437-6 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. University of Rochester. River Campus Libraries--Case studies. 2. University of Rochester-
-Students--Case studies. 3. Academic libraries--Use studies. 4. Report writing. 5. Research. 6.
Study skills. I. Foster, Nancy Fried. II. Gibbons, Susan (Susan L.), 1970-
Z733.U868S78 2007
025.5’877--dc22
2007028559
Printed in the United States of America.
11 10 09 08 07
5 4 3 2 1
Contents
v
Introduction to the Undergraduate Research Project
Nancy Fried Foster and Susan Gibbons
1
one. Faculty Expectations of Student Research
Barbara Alvarez and Nora Dimmock
7
two. Asking Students about Their Research
Vicki Burns and Kenn Harper
16
three. Night Owl Librarians: Shifting the Reference Clock
Suzanne Bell and Alan Unsworth
20
four. Library Design and Ethnography
Susan Gibbons and Nancy Fried Foster
30
five. Dream Catcher: Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
Jane McCleneghan Smith and Katie Clark
40
six. Photo Surveys: Eliciting More Than You Knew to Ask For
Judi Briden
48
seven. Mapping Diaries, or Where Do They Go All Day?
Katie Clark
55
eight. What an Experience: Library Staff Participation in Ethnographic Research
Helen Anderson and Ann Marshall
63
nine. Then and Now: How Today’s Students Differ
Sarada George
72
ten. The Mommy Model of Service
Nancy Fried Foster
79
eleven. Conclusion: Creating Student-Centered Academic Libraries
Susan Gibbons and Nancy Fried Foster
84
References
88
Author bios
From the start, the Undergraduate Research
Project has had three distinct lines of inquiry:
the interplay of the libraries’ services; facilities;
and digital presence with the academic work of
students. The focus on the libraries’ digital pres-
ence built on our earlier study of how faculty
find, use, and produce gray literature (Foster and
Gibbons 2005). Just as the data gleaned from the
faculty work-practice study had informed design
enhancements of our institutional repository, we
hoped that the findings from the current under-
graduate project would inspire innovative uses of
the libraries’ virtual spaces and services.
In this chapter we focus specifically on two
participatory design workshops conducted by
the project’s digital initiatives subteam. In the
first one, students were asked to build a library
Web site from the ground up. In the second
workshop, students redesigned our current
library Web site to fit their ideal. As we envi-
sioned it, our libraries’ Web site, like the one
of Lakota legend, would be a dream catcher
for our students’ best ideas and, combined with
our own, would help our undergraduates reach
their academic goals and scholarly potential.
Participatory Design: The Workshops
A traditional Web design approach involves lim-
ited and late user input, which is typically solicited
after a prototype has been built. In contrast, the
River Campus Libraries employ a participatory de-
sign process, which brings the users into the design
process much earlier—in fact from the very begin
-
ning.
1
The first phase of our participatory design
process is discovery research. This step helps us
go beyond our preconceived ideas of what users
should need or might need to discover how users
really work, what works for them currently, what
they lack, and where they are frustrated. Once we
have developed a concept of what we could build
that would really benefit users, we go through
cycles of engineering, usability testing, and re-
finement before putting the innovation, such as
a new Web service, into use. The Undergraduate
Research Project provided us with an opportunity
to obtain more user data upon which to base future
redesigns of the libraries’ Web site.
We knew that undergraduate students used
the Web, and we knew they used it in their
academic work. What we lacked, however,
was general knowledge of how the library fit
into their use of the Web, and, specifically,
how students used the library Web site. More-
over, we needed to know how Web services
could help students do their academic work.
Consequently, we designed the workshops to
collect information about students’ Web usage
preferences without restricting them to cur-
rently available library options. Te workshops
allowed students to design their ideal library
homepage while permitting us a glimpse into
the students’ online world.
five. Dream Catcher: Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas
for the Libraries’ Web site
Jane McCleneghan Smith is Library Assistant, Monograph Acquisitions at the River Campus Libraries, University
of Rochester; e-mail: jsmith@library.rochester.edu. Katie Clark is Director, Science and Engineering Libraries at the
River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester; e-mail: kclark@library.rochester.edu.
Jane McCleneghan Smith and Katie Clark
30
Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
31
We conducted two Web design workshops,
one in the fall of 2005 and another in the
spring of 2006. With each, the first order of
business was to select the students to be in-
vited. Drawing on a pool of participants from
previous Undergraduate Research Project
activities, we invited students by e-mail to
attend one of the workshops. Sessions were
planned for weekday evenings because few
classes are scheduled then and our late-night
visits to the residence halls and mapping dia-
ries (see Chapter 7) showed us that students’
energy levels would be high at a late-evening
workshop. On the day of the second work-
shop, we recruited additional students by put-
ting a sign on the reference desk offering free
pizza and $15.00 in exchange for two hours of
their time (see Table 5.1 for workshop time-
table).
We reserved venues for the workshops in
advance and chose them with the activities of
the sessions in mind. Te first workshop was
held in a library reading room with comfort-
able chairs and sofas and several long tables.
Te relaxed atmosphere of this room was per-
fect for a lively brainstorming session, and the
tables were well suited to the drawing and con-
struction activities. Te second workshop was
conducted in a smaller, more intimate library
conference room. Tis setting was conducive to
the online coviewing activities that preceded
the principle redesign exercise.
Food is always a useful incentive for student
participation. We purchased assorted edibles
and beverages ahead of time and ordered pizza
immediately before the events. Other than
refreshments, the only other supplies needed
were a camcorder and tripod, a laptop comput-
er, a projector, posterboard, markers and pens,
sticky notes, tape, and scissors.
Each workshop consisted of four activi-
ties: a questionnaire to help us understand the
participants’ view of themselves and their rela-
tionship with the library; a warm-up exercise;
a brainstorming session; and the main exercise.
Te main exercise for the first workshop was
to have the students design their ideal library
homepage from scratch, without looking at our
current homepage. In the second workshop,
students first reviewed the libraries’ existing
homepage and then based an ideal homepage
on the model we provided.
Workshop One
Warm-Up Exercise
We began each workshop with a warm-up
exercise designed to get the students to think
creatively and feel comfortable in the workshop
Table 5.1 Timetable for First Design Workshop
Time
Type
Content
8:00–8:30
Individuals > small groups
Students fill out brief questionnaire when they arrive
and then break into groups of three as they finish
Create an electronic device
Pizza and snacks as desired
8:30–9:00
Full group
Introductions (“coolest place you’ve been”)
Debrief
9:00–9:15
Full group
Brainstorming what to put on Web site
9:15–9:45
Small groups
Working on Web sites
9:45–10:00
Full group
Share
10:00–10:15
Full group
Conclude and pay
10:15–10:30
Wiggle room
32
Studying Students: The Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester
setting.In the first workshop we asked two groups
of three students:
If you could have only one portable
electronic device that did everything you
wanted it to do, and you could magically
make it small and light even while
including everything you wanted, what
would it be like?
Te first group built an “Everything Ma-
chine.”Te students taped pieces of poster-
board together to form a large box with four
“screens.”Te four sides of the gadget—labeled
School Supplies, Entertainment, Personal
Health, and Miscellaneous—contained physi
-
cal, electronic, and digital objects. Te Miscella-
neous screen included a cell phone, PDA (with
scheduler), and how-to and self-help books.
Te Entertainment screen included a music
and DVD library and a cable TV connection.
A coffee machine, mirror, clock, toothpaste and
toothbrush, and fold out bed(!) were included
in the Personal Health screen. And last but
not least, the School Supplies screen included
a dictionary, thesaurus, language translator,
stapler, tape, pens, and pencils. Tis fantasy
device would be small enough to throw into
a backpack. Te students explained that the
Everything Machine would be great for school
because there would be no need to carry things
like a dictionary or highlighters. Te only thing
it lacked was food, but, as the students pointed
out, with the cell phone a food order was just a
call away.
Te second group designed a device that
folded out like a flip phone, with gold stars
representing different sets of functionalities:
phone, calculator, calendar, camera, alarm clock,
PC, television, TIVO, music, MP3 player, mov-
ies, lighter to make fire, thermometer, USB
port, and Swiss army knife. Again, the device
Table 5.2. First Workshop Brainstorming, by Category
1. Connect to library resources including librarians
Online catalog (books, catalogues, articles, DVDs)
Subject area search engines
Find movies/DVDs
Subject area librarian
Virtual librarian
Food delivery in library
Online slide library
Books sorted by class
When you login a list of your classes pops up along with a list of useful books
PDF copies of all books and articles so you never have to leave your dorm room
2. Connect to class material including professors
Links to professors’ sites
Audio of class lectures in single centralized location
Paper help with professor controls
Virtual office hours, online chat with professors
Search by department
Chat rooms for multiple subjects
Study group message boards
Links to tests
Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
33
Table 5.2. First Workshop Brainstorming, by Category
3. Class Supplies and Support
List of everyone in the class so you can set up study groups
Upcoming assignments (calendar)
Assignment sorter from online syllabi (what’s due?)
Recommendations
Course history of student
Course planner (e-mailed work)
Facebook list of people who took class year before so you can talk to them about the first test
Download option to PDA
Folder to save PDFs of articles, etc.
Highlight PDF articles
Ability to make notes in PDF files
Ability to search through PDF files for highlighted text, note, and keywords
List of figures and photographs
Paper help with professor controls
Major builder
List of university policies
Books sorted by class
Automatically print out reserve articles when the assignment is due
Connection to someone who will answer your questions about writing or grammar
Calculator
Translator
Help Web (literary terms) for subject matter
Dictionary
Instant bibliography
Dictionary.com
Writing guides, e.g., MLA, APA
Specialized dictionaries, e.g., biology, art history
Grammar link
AIM with grammar help
4. Connect to people and entertainment
Facebook, AIM
Connect to your music, your personal library
Radio station
TV and movie schedules
Movies and DVDs
Newspapers, e.g., New York Times
Order drinks online
Food delivery in the library
Bored.com
Meal plan status
Horoscopes
34
Studying Students: The Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester
they designed was only slightly larger than a
cell phone and would be easy to carry any-
where.
Te warm-up exercise yielded useful infor-
mation. Te students’ ideal electronic devices
designed to do “everything you want it to do”
did just that. Both devices had more than
just entertainment and social tools; they also
included academic and work resources. Both
groups designed devices with library and aca-
demic resources as well as access to entertain-
ment media and the functionality to stay in
touch with friends (cell phone, camera). Tey
even made sure that the essentials, caffeine and
food, were part of their ideal electronic devices.
Brainstorming
After the warm-up exercise,we asked the students
to do some brainstorming. In this group activity,
students came up with suggestions for anything
they wanted to see on the library Web homepage.
They wrote their ideas on sticky notes, which
we later organized into four categories: library
resources, class materials, class supplies and
support, and social and entertainment resources
(see Table 5.2). Several items mentioned by the
students are traditionally found on a library Web
site, such as links to the online catalog and the
capability to find books and articles. Many items,
however, represented functionality and services
that are absent from most library homepages. For
example, they wanted to customize the library
page so there were links not just to music but
to
their
music. Another important element was
food.The students were quite adamant that food
(and caffeine in particular) should be available all
the hours the library is open: “I need coffee, and
deliver it to me in the library.”
Another preference put forward was a single
login to a list of their classes that they could
sort by upcoming assignments. Tis included
links to professors’ Web sites and to online chat
with their professors. Tey were also enthused
about a tool that could create bibliographies,
thereby saving them time, since it was “hard
and tedious” to pull one together manually.
Table 5.3. First Workshop, Group One, Transcription of Webpage Design Drawing
ACADEMIC
Lecture recordings
Lecture notes
Course history of students
Links to professor sites
Chat with professors
Folders to store viewed PDF’s
Links to old tests with answers
RESOURCE ACADEMIC
Translator
Grammar link
Books sorted by class
Catalogues for music books, articles, etc.
Links to newspaper
Search engines
Instant bibliography
Dictionary
Study group message board
Calculator TI-89
UPDATES
This section would include
upcoming assignment due
dates and similar alerts.
NONACADEMIC
Music
Games
Other Web sites
Weather
(OPTIONS)
Download option
Print option
Personalization options
ADMINISTRATION
Major builder
Course listings
School policies (Study abroad, Take 5)
Meal plan status
Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
35
Main Exercise
At this point, one hour into the workshop, we
were ready for the main exercise. After the list of
brainstorming ideas had been gathered, we asked
the students to design their ideal library webpage
starting from scratch. We gave the students the
following assignment:
Using the ideas we just discussed and any
more ideas you have, design a new library
Web site. Include everything you would want
to help you do your schoolwork and every-
thing that would make your life as a student
better.
Te two groups of students organized their
large collection of sticky note links from the
brainstorming session into categories on their
new Web site. In designing their ideal library
homepage from scratch, students did not de-
sign one that linked only to library resources.
Rather, the students pulled in links to other
university academic resources as well as to
social resources. In fact, only a
small subset of the links then on
the libraries’ actual homepage—
to the online catalog, articles
databases, newspapers, prior se-
mesters’ tests, and course reserve
materials—could be found in the
students’ designs. Noticeably ab-
sent were links to e-journals and
subject guides (see Tables 5.3
and 5.4).
We came away from this first
design workshop knowing that
undergraduates do use some, but
not all, of our library resources.
Tese students wanted to have
access to everything they use
(for work and play) from a single
page and not have to travel to
different university Web sites to
accomplish different tasks.
Workshop Two
Warm-Up Exercise
The main purpose of the second design workshop
was to ask seven students to redesign the libraries’
current homepage. Here again we started with a
warm-up exercise.This time we asked students to
design their ideal Facebook page after coviewing
and commenting on a live Facebook page.
Te students shared the desire to be able to
customize the Facebook site by arranging their
friends, much as they do with their IM friends
list, and create their own categories of friends:
cool people, nerds, friends who always have
food, stalkers, high school friends, friends with
a car, and so on. But they wanted these catego-
ries to be private; they did not want anyone to
see how they had arranged their friends.
Brainstorming
For the brainstorming segment of the second
workshop, we asked the students to look at
Table 5.4. First Workshop, Group Two, Transcription
of Webpage Design Drawing
You are looking for…
Other links
Welcome (NAME)
Databases
My Folder
Image of Rush Rhees
Library from Quad
Books
www.facebook.com
(Click “Enter” at the
door and image will
change to interior of
library in 3-D)
Articles
Class resources
Webmail
Librarians
Resources
University hours
My schedule
My access
Web CT
Course catalogue
Professors
Chat
Music
Google
Customize
36
Studying Students: The Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester
posterboard mock-ups of our current homepage
and do three things: cross off things they did
not want, circle features they wanted to keep,
and use sticky notes to add new things (Fig. 5.1).
Using that as a basis, the students amended the
libraries’ homepage so that it represented their
ideal site.
We were pleasantly surprised at the number
of different links and services students wanted
to keep on the homepage, such as Course re-
Figure 5.1. Students’ critique of libraries’ homepage
Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
37
sources (for reserve reading and prior exams);
Databases; Find Articles (a federated search
box); Look for books; Renew books; Recall
books; Reserve a room; and Interlibrary loan.
It was equally useful to see the homepage
elements the students had crossed off. As with
many academic libraries, we had a static pic-
ture on our homepage. Te students immedi-
ately drew a big line through the picture; they
hated it. Many wanted images that changed
frequently, like the rotation of pictures on our
university’s homepage. Others thought the pic-
ture should be functional or removable if they
did not want it. Tey also drew a line through
the New Titles link because it retrieved too
many titles to look through. And they crossed
out the More Resources link because they did
not know what it meant.
Tese undergraduates had plenty of ideas
for what to add to the homepage. Tey quickly
moved from a library-only page to one that did
everything they needed, including, but certainly
not limited to, library activities. Among their
additions were:
• Shopping cart to save sources (books and
articles)
• Software to convert saved sources to a
bibliography in their preferred format
• Toggle link to subject librarians’ webpages
that could be turned on or off depending
on the subjects of the student’s current
semester classes
• Map of the book stacks, since many stu-
dents see the stacks as intimidating and a
deterrent to using the library
• Any links and favorites of one’s personal
choice
Tey also wanted to add several university-
related links including the final exams sched-
ule, links to professors’ sites, directory of pro-
fessors’ office hours and contact information,
and an audio library of lectures as a means to
take notes from missed classes. Te students
added links to social and entertainment activi-
ties, including live webcams, Facebook, AOL
Instant Messenger, e-mail, scrolling news, and
countdowns to Christmas, exams, and study
breaks.
Te students asked, “Where is the phone
number of the library?” Tis was a huge sur-
prise to us. We had made a deliberate decision
not to include one on the homepage because
we thought students primarily used e-mail and
instant messaging to communicate. Obviously
they
do
use e-mail and instant messaging, but
most are never without a cell phone. Tey are
just as likely to make a phone call to get the
answer they need as they are to send an e-mail
or text message.
Main Exercise
As the main exercise of the night, we asked par-
ticipants to draw a new River Campus Libraries’
homepage on a blank piece of paper using the
mock-ups. Once again, students kept many of
the current features on the libraries’ homepage,
especially those relating to reserves, the online
catalog, and circulation. They also added new
links relating to their schoolwork and enter-
tainment and social interests. Some of the links
were to already existing sites and services (e.g.,
translator sites, Facebook, dining center hours),
but other ideas were purely imaginary (e.g., PDF
versions of every book and journal).
Even more than at the first design work-
shop, we heard from students about how
important it was to be able to personalize and
customize the site. Tey wanted to be able to
change the background colors and move items
around on the page. Tey wanted to include
a link to a subject librarian when they were
working on a big research project and remove
it when they were not. Te Web site they de-
signed ended up being all about “me,” a site
easily tailored to their personal needs and vi-
sual preferences.
38
Studying Students: The Undergraduate Research Project at the University of Rochester
Findings
Though the workshops were held six months
apart and included different students, there were
many common themes. In the first workshop, we
asked the students to design a library homepage
from scratch, without first looking at our current
library homepage. In the second workshop, stu
-
dents first reviewed the existing library homep-
age and then designed their ideal site.The pages
they designed in the two separate workshops
were remarkably similar. Here is a synopsis of
the main ideas:
1. Students chose to keep many of the links
to existing library services. It was clear from
these choices and the workshop discussions
that the students did use the library Web site.
2. All participants placed additional links
onto the library homepage. Some of these were
to professors’ Web sites and contact informa-
tion and others were to departments on cam-
pus, such as the registrar and dining services.
Some were for entertainment and social pur-
poses, including music, instant messaging, and
a food delivery service.
3. It’s all about me. We knew this issue was
important to our professors from our previ-
ous faculty work-practice research (Foster and
Gibbons 2005), so we should not have been
surprised to discover that the same is true of
our undergraduate students. It was especially
evident in the second workshop that the abil-
ity to customize and personalize was a high
priority for students. Tey wanted links to
their
professors,
their
courses,
their
grades, and
their
assignments, and
they
wanted to control
everything. Tey sought to take links on and
off depending on the semester or point within
the semester. Tey wanted to add “whatever
would make the Web site best for me.” Tese
students have already used customizable sites
such as My Yahoo, and they carry their ex-
pectations for this functionality to the library
Web site.
4. In both workshops, what the students
essentially designed was a portal. Tey want ev-
erything they need to be pulled together into a
single place; it made the library resources more
useful for them if they were also able to include
other important resources. What they clearly
did not want were information silos. Moreover,
they did not want a generic undergraduate stu-
dent portal, but one that they could customize
and personalize.
Future Plans and Applications
We found that students do use online library
resources and services, but that the library is just
one small part of their total suite of resources.
Through these workshops, we came to recognize
“how the Library Web site is structured around
the library and not around the students’ far-
reaching needs. In these design workshops, the
library often appeared as a tool, but within the
context of many needs and many tools” (Briden
et al. 2007).
Our Web design workshops yielded brain-
storming lists, artifacts, discussions, and draw-
ings from which we hope to distill specifically
articulated student needs and desires. Tis
information will inform our work over the next
year to redesign the library Web site.
We clearly saw that the students desired a
portal, a single Web site that included library
and academic resources, entertainment, social
networking links, connections to faculty and
their lectures, tools to manage their assign-
ments and class work, and access to food deliv-
ery services. Consequently, building a student
portal has become a high priority for the River
Campus Libraries, which in the fall of 2006
began a partnership with University Informa-
tion Technology to design a student portal that
will include many of the personalized links and
customizable elements undergraduates want.
We realize that many of our plans will
take a long time to come to fruition. Still,
Capturing Student-Inspired Ideas for the Libraries’ Web site
39
we wanted to implement some changes right
away. Adding the library phone number to the
homepage was quickly and easily done. Te
boring, static homepage photo is now a rotat-
ing gallery of library-centered images, many
featuring students. Tus, with a couple of small
steps, we were on our way to weaving student-
inspired ideas into the libraries’ Web presence.
Note
1. More information about the River Campus Libraries’ participatory design process is available through
David Lindahl and Brenda Reeb’s LITA Regional Institute workshop, “User Centered Design: Design Pro-
cess and Usability.”
Abbott, Andrew. 2006.
Te University library:
Report of the task force on the university li-
brary
. http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/staff-
web/groups/space/abbott-report.html.
Albanese, Andrew Richard. 2005. Te best thing
a library can be is open.
Library Journal
130
(15): 42–44.
Alch, Mark L. 2000. Te echo-boom genera-
tion: A growing force in American society.
Futurist
34 (5): 42.
Alvarez, Barbara. 2007.
A new perspective on ref-
