Service Learning Librarian

After a summer & early fall hiatus, Service-Learning Librarian is back with a guest post from Dr. Julianne Gassman: Director, Office of Community Engagement and Professor, Recreation, Tourism & Nonprofit Leadership at University of Northern Iowa. We hope you appreciate Julianne's take on how to ensure our institutions center the community part of community engagement, with support from service-learning librarians.

Educating students to be engaged citizens, while not always so bluntly stated, is likely the goal of most, if not all, institutes of higher ... Continue reading

Our post today is by SLL Librarian facilitator, Anne Marie Gruber, Liaison & Textbook Equity Librarian at University of Northern Iowa.

As we approach the end of another academic year and I approach mid-career, I'm finding myself being reflective about my roles, my institution (University of Northern Iowa), my impact, and my connections with students, faculty, and colleagues. It's from that stance that I write this post, which I fully admit is an ill-formed thought experiment!

Like most of you, I wear several hats in my professional life. I am a ... Continue reading

This post is co-authored by Beth Hohenfeld, Service Learning Literacy educator, and Lorri Kingan, Library Media Specialist, from Hudson Middle School in Hudson, Ohio. 

“Service Learning has taught me so much.  I love coming to this class every day, knowing that I can, will, and did make a difference in the world. It could be very challenging sometimes, but it is truly worth every second of hard work. I feel like service learning needs to be a class that every Middle Schooler takes from all around the world. Together, we can make a difference!” - 8th grade student reflection ... Continue reading

This post is by SLL blog coordinator, Anne Marie Gruber, Liaison & Textbook Equity Librarian at University of Northern Iowa's Rod Library.

In an age of challenging political discourse and rampant mis- and disinformation, increasingly librarians collaborate with teaching faculty to help students evaluate, find, and use sources from across the information spectrum. Some non-library faculty may not consider it within librarians' scope to teach research strategies for sources that aren't scholarly (Gruber, 2018). But for service-learning courses and projects, non-scholarly sources ... Continue reading

Our author today is SLL blog facilitator Anne Marie Gruber, Liaison & Textbook Equity Librarian, University of Northern Iowa

Chemistry and community-engaged learning may seem like strange bedfellows. So might a mastodon tusk and a library! But at University of Northern Iowa, upper-level chemistry and biochemistry majors in the Instrumental Analysis course conduct research on behalf of campus and community partners, and the results have been impactful and inspiring! 

Students in the course ... Continue reading

Today's guest post is authored by Joyce Garczynski, Assistant University Librarian for Development and Communication at Towson University.

A few years ago, I was invited to give a 30-minute presentation about scholarly publishing to my university’s Service-Learning Faculty Fellows, a community of practice for faculty who are new or relatively new to teaching courses with a community engagement component. Because this group is cross-disciplinary and I was the library representative to the team supporting community engagement, the presentation was mine to give. I went ... Continue reading

Today's guest post is co-authored by Kristen Hoffman and Liz Gruchala-Gilbert. Kristen is the Psychology and Scholarly Communications Librarian, and Liz is the College of Arts and Sciences Librarian.

Sometimes an idea hits you like a bolt of lightning and what seemed like unconnected thoughts come together to make a dynamic, energized plan. That’s exactly what happened to Kristen after attending the Colloquium on Libraries and Service-Learning in 2017. At the airport preparing to fly home, she suddenly realized that service-learning (S-L) would fit perfectly into the new ... Continue reading

Today's guest post is by Ben Chiewphasa, Economics and Data Librarian with the Navari Family Center for Digital Scholarship, part of University of Notre Dame's Hesburgh Libraries.

I am inspired by the growing number of academic librarians who are actively pursuing community engagement work, facilitating high-impact experiential learning in information literacy through civic engagement and service. These librarians are continually developing services built around engagement and I even noticed that some libraries have even gone as far as to hire/seek out specialized ... Continue reading

Today's guest post author is Cameron Tuai, Data & Business Librarian at Drake University's Cowles Library. 

For the past seven years, I’ve taught a two-credit information literacy class and as I searched around for some post-virtual inspiration, Paulo Friere's concept of the critical consciousness or conscientização emerged out the ether.  While I had touched upon Friere in past classes, this focus presented two significant challenges, first I had only a passing conception of what critical consciousness was or does.  The second problem was that I did not know how ... Continue reading

Today's post is by Nicole Branch, Associate University Librarian for Learning and Engagement at Santa Clara University and Andrea Brewster, Assessment Manager, Undergraduate Studies at Santa Clara University. It describes research they conducted with Jennifer Nutefall, formerly of Santa Clara University and currently Dean of University Libraries at University of Northern Colorado.

“...we are living in a moment that requires attention to and action for social justice.”

Tania ... Continue reading