Professional Development for Digital Scholarship
Notes: View the community notes Google doc for this session.
Session Type: Presentation
Session Description In Fall 2012, as part of the Digital Humanities & Libraries THATCamp, discussions among library staff from several institutions ignited brainstorming sessions about training reference and subject librarians for more technically-oriented services offered in emerging and centrally located digital scholarship centers in our libraries. Discussions about professional development methods and approaches are still in the forefront. We propose a moderated panel discussion in which we will explore:
- Administrative support, staff adoption and cultural shifts in our respective libraries
- Strengths and weaknesses of professional development models for digital scholarship including format, audience, and implementation realities
- Modular approaches to implementing training for libraries across the board
The members of this panel have been grappling with the above-questions, and serve as advocates for professional development in our respective libraries while pursuing distinct yet complementary training models:
- Columbia’s Developing Librarian Project adopted the Praxis model developed at UVa for the training of academic librarians in digital humanities to enable them to serve as first point of reference for and collaborators with faculty and students on digital projects.
- Duke implemented project- and task-focused training, organized by disciplines to address skills and competencies needed for supporting digital research across the lifecycle.
- Indiana University’s Research Now: Cross Training for Digital Scholarship initiative follows a praxis-based model with a focus on digital humanities in which digital library staff and reference/subject librarians are learning the domain of each in preparation for the opening of the Scholars’ Commons, Fall 2014.
- The University of Virginia’s Library Praxis program aims, through digital skill building and ownership of deep research, to better situate librarians as participants in, rather than simply purveyors of, scholarship.
Join our discussion as we explore sensible ways to build institutional capacity in digital scholarship and cross-disciplinary research practices.
Session Leaders Michelle Dalmau, Indiana University Catherine Minter, Indiana University Liz Milewicz, Duke University Laura Miller, University of Virginia Trevor Muñoz, University of Maryland (Moderator) Bob Scott, Columbia University Sarah Witte, Columbia University