Conference talk by Angie Applegate, Royal College of Art.
‘Despite the RCA’s buildings reopening in March 2021, a large proportion of our students continued their studies remotely. In this session I will be sharing my experience of two initiatives employed to open up the Library’s physical collections to students who could not come in to access them. The first of which is individual live browsing of the shelves via Zoom. The second is capturing images of the Library space and creating a 360° virtual tour.’
A few years back I first learnt about Padlet from one of Angie’s talks – I’ve been using it regularly since, for promoting resources (in lieu of a resource like Browzine), collecting feedback, and more – so I was looking forward to hearing about these two new initiatives. Firstly Angie has introduced virtual browsing via Zoom on her phone. She scheduled 30 minute slots outside library opening hours (to accommodate different time zones for students) and used Moodle to facilitate the bookings. It was particularly interesting to hear her design and thought processes, for example the need to make it mandatory for students to specify what they are interested in at the time of booking, but later moving toward starting with a more traditional reference interview.
Not everyone’s library building had been open in the preceding months and not all librarians were back working in their libraries, but we have certainly all been contending with how to provide enquiry services during COVID. On occasion I’ve used short screencasts to help with complex enquiries, but without access to our library building to offer more. Angie’s Zoom based approach to resource wayfinding in the library itself is fascinating. It might not be for everyone and it might not be required long-term, as social distancing ends and other rules change, but it’s a great example of creative problem solving in the moment, prioritising the student experience.
It was also interesting to hear about Angie’s work developing 360o mapping of the library for a virtual tour. This was a very practical and honest exploration of what software can be used, what it can do, its limitations, the time investment required and learning curve with the software. If this is something you’re looking to explore, it is well worth your time watching the (forthcoming) recording of the talk on the ARCLIB website. I consider myself very lucky that my institution’s Marketing department decided to take 3D recordings in several buildings around our campus last year, including the library. Whilst I assisted with the scheduling and planning which areas would be ‘mapped’, my involvement was limited and entirely from the comfort of my own home! I certainly have an added level of appreciation for the effort involved; this talk really has demonstrated the value of innovation in a time of crisis.
Review: David Stacey, University of Bath
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