Volume 3, No. 6
Coordinator's Corner: The Year In Review
It's important to remember that, like many endeavors, KIN24x7 has both a calendar year (i.e., January through December) and a fiscal year. Our annual grant runs from July through June, so, as of December 31, we will be halfway through our current grant cycle. Back in May, the State Library of Ohio Board unanimously approved the annual LSTA grant that makes KnowItNow24x7 possible. The continuing support of the Board members and State Librarian Jo Budler is greatly appreciated by everyone connected with this project.
This year, we welcomed Kathy Fisher (Urusuline College), Stacy Anderson (Martins Ferry Public Library), and staff at Portsmouth Public Library as new email-answerers. We also welcomed Washington County Public Library and Martins Ferry Public Library as local queue libraries with KIN24x7. We've also had a number of libraries express interest in staffing their own local service and we are working with them to facilitate their joining or changing their participation. We're looking forward to January when we welcome back Medina County District Library as a KIN24x7 local provider!
Greene County Public Library, the Library for the Blind and Physically Disabled, the AfterDark librarians, and Washington County Public Library all began monitoring commercial IM services this year through the KIN24x7 software. This has allowed an access point for all Ohioans, but especially the visually impaired who have been using AOL and MSN for a long time. This has provided a way to meet that specific community within an environment with which they are already familiar. These KIN24x7 IM libraries are listed at www.knowitnow.org/im.php.
The KIN24x7 Provider site also became much more interactive and content-rich this year. A Who's Online page is now available, transcripts and patron survey comments are posted for KIN24x7 librarians, the Statistics page now has more comprehensive (and user-friendly) formats for information, Documentation includes comprehensive, up-to-date manuals, Training Materials are readily available for training new staff or refreshing skills of established staff members, and the Quality Assurance Committee for KnowItNow24x7 (QuACK) has their own blog.
And speaking of QuACK, the establishment of this committee has been a major step initiated this year to provide recognition for quality service on KIN24x7 as well as to provide examples for other librarians to emulate. The current members of the QuACK are Cheryl Lubow (State Library of Ohio), Wendy Ensor (Orrville Public Library (and AfterDark librarian)), Jodie Lyons (Kirtland Public Library), Michelle Makkos (Cleveland Public Library), Katie Blocksidge (Owens Community College), and Megan Mitchell (Oberlin College). Kristin Michel (Westerville Public Library) was one of the founding members but unfortunately other duties called her away from serving earlier this year. I would like to thank the QuACK members for their continuing hard work and encourage everyone to check out their blog on the Provider site to see the exemplary work being carried out by our colleagues.
Our Spark software also had a round of development this year that provided new features including a transfer alert and the ability for patrons to be able to keep their session open as long as they needed after the librarian disconnected. This round of enhancements was made possible by our collaboration with Oregon's statewide service, L-net, with whom we continue to partner in both staffing as well as sharing of expertise.
In September, KIN24x7 celebrated it's fifth year of providing statewide reference service. In the current financial environment in Ohio, cooperation is becoming even more important, and KIN24x7 is poised to continue to provide libraries with a way to serve their patrons in new and exciting ways within a collaborative framework. If you're not a current KIN24x7 answerer, now is a great time to take another look at joining the service as a local provider, an email-answerer, an IM library, or as a traditional statewide provider. For the 20% of Ohio libraries that are a part of the network, you can be proud of being an integral, vital part of the busiest statewide reference service in the country. It is your staff that makes KIN24x7 possible to serve patrons "online anytime."
2010...Here we come!
Don Boozer
KnowItNow24x7 Coordinator
(Note: For another year-in-review article concerning KnowItNow24x7, check out the State Library of Ohio News December issue)
Upcoming Consolidation
As already mentioned in previous newsletters and on the KIN24x7 Provider site, Ohio's statewide virtual reference project is in the market for a new logo to freshen up its image and serve as the new "brand" of KnowItNow24x7. The Statewide Coordinator is currently working with two finalists to design that new logo, which should be available for unveiling in the next couple weeks. As part of the re-branding effort, the service will be consolidating its portals into one URL: knowitnow.org. HomeworkNow and ReadThisNow will re-direct to that URL. This will provide for streamlined marketing of the service, an opportunity to re-introduce the service to students and other patrons, and other benefits. The new website (along with our new logo) is planned to be ready before the end of December or early January. We will continue to keep all libraries in the state updated on developments. Stay tuned...
A Sampling of KIN24x7 Patron Survey Comments from November 2009
The following are a sample of constructive criticism and kudos from the Patron Surveys from November. KIN24x7 librarians: Remember that you really are making a difference. People take the time to sincerely thank you for your efforts when they're typing in their comments. For example, check out the lengthy comment at the bottom of the list of Kudos. Keep up the great work!
Constructive Criticism
- I feel like I was cut off before I had satisfactory information. I did get some links, but telling someone to just go to Google.com for searching is not a good answer.
- they left in a hurry and did not give me a chance to ask my all of my questions. but did provide a helpful site!
- The librarian answered the question but closed us out before asking us if we needed any more help. This was a class demonstration and a little disappointing. :( (NOTE: Emphasis added by KIN24x7 Coordinator)
- It's always just interesting to be a SLIS student and almost never have the librarian on the other end give me correct info. I guess things are changing pretty quickly in the information world, but I just wish they were more knowledgeable in this area. Then again, I probably shouldn't be trying to get homework help for my library degree from KnowitNow (kind of like cheating, isn't it?... or is it just good use of resources?)
- Answering a question by suggesting to search on google is not the answer I was looking for... I had much better experience with your service in the past...
Kudos
- It is the first time I used this service. I seldom "chat" online and was a little uncertain about the process but it went fine. The librarian was prompt and courteous. Great service!
- ad. conner was super-helpful! I received all the information I was looking for, and then some! Thank you!
- Jeanna was very helpful and was able to pint me in the right direction within minutes. When I clicked on the chat button, I was feeling very discouraged and frustrated, but she helped me and made me feel much better.
- I love OWL it helped me soooooooo much,I had no clue what MLA was, I read and read, but OWL helped,I owe it all to ad.Mckenkie from live Library that's I get it now.
- Paszabo is amazing. He is so helpful. I recomend him as being amazing.
- I LOVE this service!!! Found it completely by accident...I will surely be back over and over again. IT IS AWSOME!
- I had been searching for all day and the librarian found it in just a few seconds!! I was very impressed!
- I would like to thank the person for being so patient and kind in helping me find the information. Thank you. It is good to know that people can actually take time out to actually help others. I really extremely appreciate it.
- this site is awesome it is so handy you can just go on the computer and its like asking your teacher a question
- This was the first time I've used KnowItNow after picking up a bookmark about it my local library. I was very impressed with how easy it was to use and how efficient the person was I chatted with.
- just thank-you for the service, as a parent I really appreciate the assistance.
- libranan 53 make sure they get exta points crerdit claps whatever awesome and nicest
- While I usally try to Wikipedia most things I have found this to be much more through and complete. Great service.
- You all have helped me VERY much when I've needed help on my homework for school when i didn't have enough research or needed more information i knew i could turn to this website when my brother wasn't here or my family wasn't sure of the answer!I love how I have this website to go to in general questions or just regular questions for school :). I'm glad to know i can turn to someone when I'm not sure of the answer or my family isn't sure of it!Thank you so much for your help!I appreciate it SO much!
(Remember, if you are a KnowItNow24x7 librarian, you can sign up for an account on the Provider site to access all transcripts and survey comments. If you're not currently a part of the KIN24x7 team, contact support@knowitnow.org to find out how to get involved.)
Statistics: November 2009
This month we again take a look at the Top 25 busiest answerers (by institution) on the service. Taking into account a total volume for November of 7,997 (including the 43 live sessions handled by the Statewide Coordinator and the 168 questions answered by KIN24x7's email-answerers this month): 39.1% of all sessions were handled by AfterDark librarians, and 30.7% by Cleveland Public Library staff. For more details, check out the Statistics page.
| Institution | Number of Sessions Handled |
|---|---|
| Total for NEO-RLS | 3124 |
| Total for Cleveland Public Library | 2459 |
| Total for Cuyahoga County Public Library | 368 |
| Total for Akron-Summit County Public Library | 204 |
| Total for Columbus Metropolitan Library | 169 |
| Total for Public Library of Youngstown & Mahoning County | 116 |
| Total for Lorain Public Library System | 67 |
| Total for Owens Community College | 64 |
| Total for Worthington Libraries | 52 |
| Total for Dayton Metro Library | 49 |
| Total for Oberlin College | 48 |
| Total for Toledo-Lucas County Public Library | 46 |
| Total for Twinsburg Public Library | 46 |
| Total for Ashtabula County District Library | 43 |
| Total for Wright State University | 43 |
| Total for Orrville Public Library | 42 |
| Total for Geauga County Public Library | 41 |
| Total for Mansfield/Richland County Public Library | 40 |
| Total for Columbus State Community College | 37 |
| Total for Public Library of Cincinnati & Hamilton County | 37 |
| Total for University of Cincinnati | 36 |
| Total for Bowling Green State University | 35 |
| Total for Elyria Public Library | 33 |
| Total for Avon Lake Public Library | 31 |
| Total for Birchard Public Library | 31 |
As always, thanks to everyone who assists patrons on KnowItNow24x7. Your contributions are crucial to the service and are greatly appreciated.
ONLINE RESOURCES OF THE MONTH: Design, Create, Share
This month's online resources focus on some fun online applications and websites that can faciliate designing or enhancing your online presence (or other projects):
- Paint.NET at www.getpaint.net - "Paint.NET is free image and photo editing software for computers that run Windows. It features an intuitive and innovative user interface with support for layers, unlimited undo, special effects, and a wide variety of useful and powerful tools. An active and growing online community provides friendly help, tutorials, and plugins."
- mypictr at mypictr.com/ - "mypictr provides a free picture resizing service, which allows you to create a custom profile avatar for your favorite social network. You don't need to install any programs, plug-ins or any other software, just upload your picture, resize it online and download it from our server."
- Kuler at kuler.adobe.com/ - "web-hosted application for generating color themes that can inspire any project. No matter what you're creating, with Kuler you can experiment quickly with color variations and browse thousands of themes from the Kuler community."
- Fontstruct at fontstruct.fontshop.com - "FontStruct lets you quickly and easily create fonts constructed out of geometrical shapes, which are arranged in a grid pattern, like tiles or bricks. You create ‘FontStructions’ using the ‘FontStructor’ font editor. Once you're done building, FontStruct generates high-quality TrueType fonts, ready to use in any Mac or Windows application."
- Odosketch at sketch.odopod.com - "Odosketch is a Flash drawing application ... first launched in August of 2006 for an Adobe Design Gallery feature on Odopod. ... over 19,000 sketches had been saved." This application allows people to share their online artwork with a larger community.
Enjoy!
If you have any online resources you'd like to share with other KIN24x7 librarians, feel free to send them to support@knowitnow.org or post it on the Provider site.
KnowItNow24x7 Staff
Don Boozer, KnowItNow24x7 Coordinator
Brian Leszcz, KnowItNow24x7 Web Services Coordinator
Noah Himes, KnowItNow24x7 AfterDark Coordinator
Megan Mitchell, OhioLINK Liaison and Reference Librarian, Oberlin College
...and KnowItNow24x7 agents across Ohio!
The KnowItNow24x7 Newsletter highlights news, resources, and statistics for providers and fans of Ohio's 24x7 virtual reference service. Email your comments, questions, advice, helpful resources, and other contributions to support@knowitnow.org.