“Reference Librarians at the Reference Desk in a Learning Commons: A Qualitative Evaluation.” PREPRINT

Elizabeth B. Fitzpatrick, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Abstract

This is a preprint of an article co-written with Dr. Anne C. Moore, and Beth W. Lang, Head of Reference, W.E.B. Du Bois Library, University of Massachusetts Amherst.

At the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s W.E.B. Du Bois Library’s Learning Commons, only Reference librarians staff the Reference & Research Assistance desk. Surveys, a focus group, reference question transcriptions, and question-type tallies indicate this service model is strongly preferred by users and librarians over the previous tiered model.