When universities began closing their campuses and going to online classes in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, academic librarians were faced with questions about how those decisions would affect libraries and whether to close their doors or restrict access.
“People are looking to best practices in the field, but also to what actions their colleagues and peers are taking and how they are thinking about this,” said Lisa Janicke Hinchliffe, the coordinator for information literacy services and instruction and a professor in the University Library at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
But there was no one collecting information on what libraries were doing. Hinchliffe talked with frequent collaborator Christine Wolff-Eisenberg, the manager for surveys and research at Ithaka S+R, a research and strategy group on issues related to libraries, museums and publishing. In one day, they developed a prototype survey for academic librarians; asked the library community on Twitter to take the survey and provide feedback; fine-tuned their questions; and put the survey online.
Gary Price (gprice@gmail.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area.
He earned his MLIS degree from Wayne State University in Detroit.
Price has won several awards including the SLA Innovations in Technology Award and Alumnus of the Year from the Wayne St. University Library and Information Science Program. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com.
