The Distant Librarian

Go to Hawaii (or not)

The Teaching in the Community Colleges Online Conference is produced by University of Hawai'i Kapi`olani Community College, but it's an online conference, so you wouldn't actually get to go. Though I suppose there's no reason you couldn't go, as I'm sure they have Internet access in Hawaii and you could attend from there as easily as you could from wherever you are now.

Anyhoo, deadline for proposals is Dec 31, 2004, and the conference itself runs April 19-21, 2005.

They're specifically asking for librarians:

The TCC Online Conference coordinators invite faculty, support staff, librarians, counselors, administrators, and consultants to submit proposals for papers and other presentations that address the impact of technological change, the Internet, and other technologies on how we teach and learn in colleges and universities worldwide.

Google Cheat Sheet

I hadn't seen this Google Cheat Sheet before. There are a couple of operators (like the ~ for synonyms) that were new to me, so I thought I'd share in case you found them interesting too...

PRIMO: Peer-Reviewed Instructional Materials Online

Got an online tutorial of which you're particularly proud?

The Emerging Technologies in Instruction Committee of the ACRL Instruction Section invites you to submit your online information literacy tutorial, virtual tour, or other online library instruction project for review and possible inclusion in PRIMO: Peer-Reviewed Instructional Materials Online.

PRIMO is the new name for the Internet Education Project. This name emphasizes both the peer-reviewed nature of the project and the first-rate instruction models found in the project database. It also reflects how the project has evolved from teaching about the Internet, to teaching using the Internet as a medium.

***Deadlines***

Nominations: November 5, 2004
Submissions: November 19, 2004

International Journal of eLiteracy

Just received an announcement about the International Journal of eLiteracy, a new peer-reviewed publication. From the Editorial of the inaugural issue:

We can define “eLiteracy” simply as referring to the awarenesses, skills, understandings, and reflective approaches necessary for an individual to operate comfortably in information-rich and IT-enabled environments.

Sounds right up the alley of our distance students.

Distance Education Clearinghouse Conference Database

Just added a link over on the right side of the page under "websites" for the Distance Education Clearinghouse Conference Database, which, well, here's the description from the site:

The Conference Database of the Distance Education Clearinghouse identifies worldwide conferences, seminars, workshops, and other events of interest to distance education and related fields. Events may be on site or online, but in all cases, the topic must always relate to distance education. You can find conferences by title, location, or date. Call for Papers information is also available in the Conference Database. Additionally, you are invited to submit a conference or call for consideration for this database.

Searching for Digital Books

Gary Price has a nice little annotated list of three sites where you can Search for Digital Books. The first site, Digital Book Index, while cumbersome, appears to hold the most academic content, so this is where I'll be poking around for the next little bit. I entered fake registration info and got in, so if you're worried about having to register for access, go ahead and enter whatever you want.

Survey of Library Services Offered to Walk-in Distance Users

My old boss at Nova Southeastern University is running a survey of library services and Librarian attitudes towards walk-in distance users. Would you take the time to fill it out? It needs to be completed by November 3.

The increasing numbers of distance students using local public and unaffiliated academic libraries is creating staffing, budgeting, and resource challenges for the impacted libraries. The following surveys will look at this issue from the public and academic library perspectives. We would like participation from as many librarians as possible. Please select either the Academic or Public library link to the survey from the following page: http://www.nova.edu/library/survey/ACRLsurveylink.htm

By completing the survey online, your answers will be collected anonymously. You may also request the
survey be sent to you by email, fax, or mail; characteristics identifying any individuals will be removed
from the results. Please complete by November 3rd. Results will be presented at the ACRL 12th National
Conference in April 2005.

Thank you for your cooperation.

For more information, please contact any of the following:
Rita Barsun
Walden University Liaison Librarian, Indiana University - Bloomington
(800) 437-0501, (812) 855-6058
rbarsun@waldenu.edu

Johanna Tuñón
Head of Distance and Instructional Library Services, Nova Southeastern University
(800) 541-6682 ext. 4608
tunon@nsu.nova.edu

Laura L. Ramirez
North Miami Beach Branch Librarian, Nova Southeastern University
(800) 541-6682 ext. 8423
lucio@nsu.nova.edu

P.S. A preliminary survey of academic librarians was conducted in Spring of 2003, and the results were
presented at the Off-Campus Library Services Conference in Arizona, May 2004. After you complete the
revised and expanded surveys using the link above, you may wish to see the PowerPoint presenting results of
the 2003 survey.
http://ocls.cmich.edu/conference/presentations/tunon_barsun_ram.ppt

Why RoboDemo 5 Sucks

Way back in June I posted a brief product comparison of ViewletBuilder vs. Wink, and Ilene Frank suggested RoboDemo would be another product to examine.  I've not gotten around to trying RoboDemo, but Michael Feldstein did, and didn't seem very impressed...

Why RoboDemo 5 Sucks

This post isn’t a litany of the things that I don’t like about RoboDemo, although there will necessarily will be some of that. Rather, it’s my own speculation as to why a smart company with a reputation for good software produced a lemon of a release. Make no mistake about it, though; Robodemo 5 sucks. It mostly sucks in fixable ways and it’s possible that some of the problems have already been fixed in Captivate,…

[via e-Literate]

Awesome Viewlet Display

It's been a long time coming, but other departments on this campus have finally realized that Viewlets are pretty useful for remote instruction. This past summer, our Learning Commons took these things several steps further than I've seen before, and have produced a slew of tutorials on
how to use BlackBoard.

I haven't had a chance to talk with Patrick to see how he made them look so fancy, but kudos to him! Do have a look.

2006 OCLS Conference

This was, of course, recently announced on the OFFCAMP list, but I thought a post here might make it easier to find when you (or I) go looking for the announcement in a couple months :-)

The 2006 Off Campus Library Services Conference (12th) will be held in Savannah, Georgia. The dates of the conference are April 26th to April 28th 2006, and the conference hotel is the Hyatt Regency (which looks pretty nice on their website).

The Call for Presentations will be available December 1, 2004 on the web site at http://ocls.cmich.edu/conference (and of course I'll mention it here too).

If you're a distance librarian (especially a new distance librarian), this is definately the conference to attend. Remember too that most of the procedings are available for purchase (no, I don't get a cut), and at least the last few are also available from Haworth Press in the Journal of Library Administration, (vol 37 issue 1/2 & 3/4, and vol 31 issue 3/4 and vol 32 issue 1/2 ) which you may have in your collection. I wonder if subsequent procedings will be in the Journal of Library and Information Services in Distance Learning instead - wouldn't that make more sense? Stephen, do you know anything about this?

ACRL/DLS Haworth Press Distance Learning Librarian Conference Sponsorship Award

On this page you'll find a link to an MS Word nomination form for the ACRL/DLS Haworth Press Distance Learning Librarian Conference Sponsorship Award. This is a $1200 award with a December 1, 2004 deadline. Award criteria can be found in the nomination information.