New Approaches to Student Training at University of Canberra Library
Both the content and promotion of training sessions to introduce students to the process and techniques of searching online resources have been given a new look at the University of Canberra, and the students are loving it.
Staff at UC Library are presenting a wide range of training sessions, aimed at undergraduate students, postgraduate researchers and academic staff: Early in semester library clients are encouraged to attend these independent but inter-related sessions:
• Introduction to Academic Research
• Finding journal articles
• Google & beyond
• Citations & bibliographies
• Introductory session for both RefWorks or Endnote
The Library has also combined with UC’s Academic Skills Program staff to offer Trouble shooting for Research & Writing, drop-in sessions where students can ask for guidance in any aspect of their research or writing later in semester. Attendance statistics make it readily apparent that students greatly appreciate this “one stop shop”, flexible approach to support in their studies
Academic staff also may draw on the expertise of Library staff by asking for a visit by one of our Librarians On-Call for an update on library resources in their own office. We hope to make our academics so excited about our resources that they promote them readily to students, thereby causing a “trickle-down effect” to increase the take-up of student training sessions.
The expanded training programme has been promoted widely across campus, to both students and academic staff, and the result has been attendance numbers far in excess of previous programmes. Feedback from both students and academic staff has been positive and encouraging.
This paper outlines the background and content of our new programme, and analyses the response by the UC community.