Librarians support student research

Guest post by Diane Harvey, Head, Instruction and Outreach, Librarian for Global Health and the Thompson Writing Program, Perkins Library

“It’s
 mostly
 the 
same
 steps 
for 
me 
when
 conducting 
research.
  I 
think 
now, if
 you 
do it right,
 the 
Internet 
is good 
to 
give 
you 
any 
information 
you 
need 
that’s 
relevant 
to 
what
 you’re 
doing.  
It’s 
not 
like 
back 
in 
the day 
when 
your 
first 
step 
was 
going 
to 
the 
library, and
 going through 
books.”

Do your students approach research projects this way? Project Information Literacy, an ongoing national research project at the University of Washington, studies how students conceptualize and operationalize research activities.  One of their studies found that 8 out of 10 students did not use librarians for help with course related research.

As you’re gathering resources to support your spring courses, add your subject librarian to the list.  Every department and program at Duke is assigned a librarian who has expertise in that subject or geographic area.  Subject librarians can help your students work more effectively.   Your librarian can lead a hands-on instruction session when students are beginning their research papers and projects.  In that session, your students will learn about credible and useful resources, and have time to focus on refining their research question and using electronic and print resources.  Library research sessions can take place in one of the campus libraries or in your classroom.

Librarians are also happy to work with individual students who might be struggling to conceptualize their research question, identify good tools and resources, or develop effective searching techniques.  Some librarians have office hours in departments, so you can easily refer students to them.

Librarians can also prepare course-specific library research guides that can be linked into your Sakai, WordPress or BlackBoard course site.  A LibGuide contains links to resources as well as suggestions for research strategies and useful tips, and is available to students 24/7.

Call on your subject librarian if you have questions about whether a particular research assignment might work, because Duke librarians have worked with a range of research assignments – good and bad – and would be happy to share their experience with you.