Drawing on diverse experience and knowledge within our extended team we are flexible and responsive to your needs. We invite you to see samples of our work, below.
Service Enhancement
Seamless Access to Library Resources
Created tailored subject, course, and exam pages, which are systematically embedded in courses at point of need.
Provided an online, private institution with customized subject and course-specific Libguides and implemented Learning Tool Interoperability (LTI) in its Learning Management System (LMS) to provide seamless access to the appropriate guide in each course. Implementing the LTI tool ensures that the applicable guide is linked in each course either on the subject or course level to give easy access to assignment-specific resources. This enhanced the student experience, adding a variety of resources in a single location in each course and increased visibility of library materials and instruction.
Service Enhancement
Enhancing Service Visibility
Developing and implementing impactful marketing strategies.
Librarians increased the visibility of online library resources and services by analyzing data and using targeted marketing techniques such as distributing carefully-timed announcements to specific user groups and placing advertisements on high-traffic library webpages. For example, as a result of developing a strategic approach to marketing instructional webinars, librarians were able to nearly triple the library’s average webinar attendance in just one year.
Service Enhancement
Corporate Library Development
Analyzed online resource needs and streamlined licensing
Helped company in the life sciences assess scientific and business resource needs distributed across a large organization. Identified opportunities to improve licensing and resource access while identifying savings through resource consolidation and mitigation of potential risk associated with inadvertent sharing of licensed materials.
Service Enhancement
User Assessment from a Distance
Improving the user experience, meeting them where they are.
Drawing on past experience in conducting virtual focus groups with students around the globe, a small team of librarians designed virtual usability testing of a library’s discovery tool. The goal of testing was to learn how the tool was being used and what changes could be made to increase user satisfaction. The librarians identified and implemented several customizations to meet unique user population’s needs. These improvements increased user satisfaction by simplifying the search process and making it easier to get help when needed. There are now tutorials and the ability to chat with librarians at point of need within the discovery tool if they get stuck, and difficult to find resources that users needed have been surfaced to the top of the results list.
Service Enhancement
Retirement Risk Mitigation
Helped contain retirement risk with library service area audit.
Library operations expert completed a rapid, yet thorough, review of a medical library leadership position, identifying responsibilities, workflows, documentation, and priorities for the role and all positions thereunder. Study outcomes provided leadership with: a) operational detail to help smooth short-term management transitions, and b) strategic analysis of staffing talent, service demand, and opportunities to reshape positions and the unit to meet future needs.
Service Enhancement
Exploring Library Value
Understanding user trends helps to improve quality of services.
Created a survey to assess student perceptions of librarian assistance in an online, masters–level, research and writing course. The results showed that engagement with a librarian gave needed support and that the students found value in having a librarian in the course. Students also noted that having a librarian in their online course improved their knowledge of citation formatting and research skills, and that they were likely to use the skills they learned in future courses. We also evaluated the grades of student’s assignments for formatting citations of various sources used in an annotated bibliography. The initial assignment was graded by librarians who provided feedback for correcting citations. The student was allowed to resubmit the assignment with corrections for a second grade. Overall, students received an average of 8-11 points higher on the second submission than the first.
Training
Copyright Infringement Risk
Provided copyright training to reduce risk in online course development.
A team of librarians created a customized training for online program and course development teams to build awareness of copyright considerations when integrating materials into courses. Training illuminated the differences between the use of licensed resources, open access materials, and Open Educational Resources. Training was integrated into the standard onboarding process for new personnel, creating a common set of expectations and standards for resource use in online courses.
Training
Research Skills Training
Enhanced research skills of professional writers.
Worked with the American Medical Writers Association Baltimore chapter to identify skill development needs in finding online medical information. Librarians developed training materials for medical writers and identified online training delivery technology to reach the widest possible audience. Response to the training was overwhelmingly positive and a second round of training was requested for the regional chapter.
Training
High School Writing Skills
Improved Baltimore high school student information seeking skills.
In collaboration with a Baltimore City High School teacher at the National Academy Foundation (NAF), one of our librarians identified research and writing skill gaps and opportunities to improve student success. A workbook and instructional materials closely aligned with the Common Core standards were created to guide students through the writing process. Pre and post assessments with 130 students helped target areas of difficulty for students. Success of the instructional materials led to further adoption in other courses.
Training
Federal Regulations Resource
Surfaced and organized federal compliance expectations for data management.
Data management specialists partnered with SPARC to create a community resource for tracking and understanding federal funder research data policies and anticipated requirements for research data stated in public access plans. Key information was extracted from all released Federal Agency Public access plans, common specifications across existing and future policies identified, information organized for flexible retrieval and presentation. Launched in 2016 and provided library community with an important professional learning resource for building data sharing expertise.
Go to Resource
Training
Library Accreditation Preparation
Completed audit of library services against all accrediting requirements
Worked with solo librarian to inventory and review all library support services and functions for a growing online university based in the western United States. Identified all library specific accreditation requirements by accrediting body and provided recommended path for improving services to support successful accreditation and reaccreditation. Worked with the librarian to grow their knowledge of accreditation requirements for libraries and improve planning for self-management of process in the future.
Revenue Generation
Café Vendor Evaluation
Developed library café RFP success requirements.
A member of our hospitality services team helped articulate the primary goals for establishing a new café presence in the Johns Hopkins Brody Learning Commons which informed service, operational, financial, facilities, and branding expectations. The vendor bid process was managed by ELP, including contracting and transition planning between vendors. As a result the library was able to successfully transfer the cafe operations to new vendor with no interruption in service for customers.
Revenue Generation
Events Program Opportunity
Evaluated potential rental space for special/private events.
A non-profit organization with an existing meeting space was interested in evaluating what would be involved in operating an events program for supplemental revenue. An onsite review of the space was conducted to evaluate feasibility of the space for events from the perspective of logistics, managing event flow, identifying potential health and safety risks, surfacing permitting and other compliance expectations for planning, vendor evaluation and management, staffing, etc. The review saved the client costly time and resources in pursuing a program with limited potential to net money worth the investment.
Revenue Generation
Fee-based Library Services
Identified and implemented best practices for fee-based library services.
Inventoried and analyzed fee-based services across a library client with the end goal of improving consistency in management and reducing risks. Services were categorized by objective i.e. supporting cost recovery, goodwill service, and revenue generating services. Structuring of service types and purpose helped narrow the focus to those services specifically designed to provide additional financial support. This project narrowed the focus to services with the strongest revenue potential while saving staff time.
Revenue Generation
Digitization Services Pricing
Established cost recovery pricing model for digitization services.
Increased demand for digitization services by non-University affiliates in tandem with limited staff capacity necessitated a review of available digitization services. Levels of effort needed for digitization projects, types of projects, customer types, and funding were analyzed. New cost recovery fees were developed to recoup costs associated with digitization requests from external users. The project resulted in clearer categorization of projects, balancing of priorities, and cost recovery for projects outside of the main mission of the service unit.
Contact us today to discuss your project.