Our Year of Assessment at Columbia University's Business And

Ticker: The Academic Business Librarianship Review, 1:1 (2015) © 2015 Kathleen Dreyer and Nisa Bakkalbasi RESEARCH Our Year of Assessment at Columbia University’s Business and Economics Library KATHLEEN DREYER and NISA BAKKALBASI Columbia University, New York, New York, United States Abstract In order to establish a baseline understanding of the needs and the perceptions of service quality among graduate business and economics students and faculty, we employed a multi-method assessment approach combining quantitative and qualitative statistics through a survey, exit polls, and direct observations to inform improvement planning of library services and spaces. While a substantial number of faculty and students were completely satisfied with the services and staff of the Thomas J. Watson Library of Business and Economics, there were some differences among student groups in terms of their satisfaction and interest in new services, technology, furniture, amount of space in the library, and service hours. The Watson Library is both a social and academic space, and students want to complete their academic work efficiently, without wasting time by switching locations, rooms, and/or devices. Our observation revealed that students rarely seem to engage in just one activity and are often studying, texting and talking with friends simultaneously. Introduction In the past decade, the interest in library assessment has expanded greatly — Libraries have changed rapidly in the last particularly as a method to gather evidence decade as librarians attempt to keep up with and context for strategic planning and the ever-changing needs and demands of decision making. As has been the case with users. The diverse service needs of students our counterparts across the nation, and faculty in various disciplines makes this assessment of the quality and effectiveness of challenge even more daunting. In this climate services and collections has grown of constant change, understanding how exponentially at Columbia University faculty and students become aware of and Libraries. Over the past several years, the interact with new services and technologies is library staff at Columbia University has been critical. A well-planned assessment can collecting and analyzing an array of provide evidence that extends beyond quantitative data, including card swipe access anecdote, allowing library administrators and and interlibrary loan and circulation statistics, other interested parties to make informed in an attempt to understand library visit decisions that better meet the needs of their patterns and collection use. Since 2003, academic community. Columbia University has administered Kathleen Dreyer is the head of the Watson Library of Business and Economics at Columbia University, [email protected]. Nisa Bakkalbasi is assessment coordinator for Columbia University Libraries, [email protected]. 2 Ticker: The Academic Business Librarianship Review, 1:1 (2015) © 2015 Kathleen Dreyer and Nisa Bakkalbasi campus-wide LibQUAL surveys, web-based Library were recorded during the academic instruments created and maintained by the year 2011-2012, making it the second most Association of Research Libraries, to measure frequented library on campus after Butler student and faculty perceptions of library Library, which is the largest library on service quality and to solicit feedback. While campus by both the number of seats and LibQUAL surveys have been useful in collection size. generating broad feedback on a wide range of In seeking to understand how our target library activities, they have provided few groups view and use the space and services of insights regarding the specific needs of Watson Library, it should be noted that MBA graduate students and faculty in business and students in particular have expressed economics. Recognizing the differences in concerns about the library’s facilities. These research and instruction practices across concerns are based on their perceptions of disciplines, we decided to implement an how and by whom the space is used. More iterative assessment process to gain insight specifically, business school students assert into the highly specialized needs of students that there is not enough space for them in and faculty of the School of Business and the Watson Library, because they feel that there Department of Economics. During the 2012- are too many undergraduates using the space. 2013 academic year, Columbia University’s These concerns, in conjunction with our Watson Library initiated the first iteration of desire to better understand the needs of our its assessment process, targeting its core user users, led us to undertake these assessment population of graduate students and faculty projects, the results of which are discussed in in business and economics in order to gain this paper. insight into their needs. The rationale for our assessment is grounded in the Columbia Literature Review University’s Libraries’ 2010-2013 strategic Despite the overall growth of academic plan, specifically the plan’s principles of library assessment (Kyrillidou & Jaggars, research support and facilities improvement. 2013), to the best of our knowledge, almost An important and useful way to begin the nothing has been published on the use of assessment process is by considering the library spaces and services by business and context within which a library system economics graduate students and faculty. functions and operates. Watson Library Although one study targeted a population primarily supports the School of Business that is relevant to our assessment objectives – and the Department of Economics and is the study focused on the information-seeking therefore mostly a graduate student library. behavior of management and commerce However, students from across campus value faculty in Sri Lankan universities Watson Library’s central location, group (Wickramanayake, 2010) -- the paper did not study space, and open food and drink policy. focus on the research behavior of users. This makes Watson Library a popular spot However, there have been several studies for those who prefer a lively atmosphere with a broader focus on the needs of when they study either alone or with others. graduate students and faculty in a variety of More than half a million visits to Watson disciplines. 3 Ticker: The Academic Business Librarianship Review, 1:1 (2015) © 2015 Kathleen Dreyer and Nisa Bakkalbasi Berger and Hines (1994) found in their research (Rempel, Hussong-Christian & survey that four distinct user populations -- Mellinger, 2011). undergraduates, graduate students, faculty, In 2011, Georgetown University and university staff -- each used the library Libraries’ graduate student assessment needs differently. Their research showed that group conducted a survey and focus groups graduate students behaved like a hybrid of of graduate students who used a specific undergraduates and faculty – like graduate library at Georgetown (Gibbs, undergraduates they used the libraries for Boettcher, Hollingsworth & Slania, 2012). study space and like faculty they used the The first part of the study involved an online libraries for the collections and services survey in which participants were asked about (Berger & Hines, 1994). More than a decade their perceptions of the library. The second later, Kayongo and Helm (2009) surveyed part involved focus groups with subsets of graduate students to assess their use of the online survey participants. The services and collections. They found that researchers learned that students were graduate students tended not to ask librarians generally happy with the services provided by for research help and relied heavily on e- the library staff but were dissatisfied with the collections. quality and amount of study space in the The library assessment team at the library (Gibbs, Boettcher, Hollingsworth & University of Chicago surveyed graduate Slania, 2012). students about their use of libraries and The findings from Chicago, Oregon, and collections (Tatarka, Larsen, Olson, Schilt & Georgetown were echoed in a joint study by Twiss-Brooks, 2010). The results showed that the Cornell and Columbia Libraries (Gessner, students placed a greater emphasis on library Jaggars, Rutner and & Tancheva, 2011), study spaces, and their improvement, over which focused on graduate students in the services. Collections were also important, humanities. As the other studies found, PhD particularly the ease of access to resources students who were interviewed for the study (Tatarka, Larsen, Olson, Schilt & Twiss- stated that they were generally happy with Brooks, 2010). It is important to note that the library collections but concerned about the students of the Booth School of Business at type of space provided to them. They the University of Chicago were expressed a need for more space for underrepresented in the survey results due to individual study and a greater sense of low response rate. community on campus (Gessner, Jaggars, At Oregon State University, librarians Rutner and & Tancheva, 2011). conducted focus groups to assess the needs In a seminal study, launched to of graduate students on campus. While understand how University of Rochester students were generally happy with services undergraduate students write research papers, and spaces, researchers discovered that some Foster and Gibbons (2007) borrowed graduate students, particularly those in less observation techniques from anthropologists. well-funded departments, needed extra Using surveys,

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