Category Archives: Uncategorized

New Resources!

What do all of the following resources have in common?

Oxford English Dictionary—not only theEnglish-language dictionary but also theauthority on its evolution over the last millennium—and great for Scrabble too!

American Antiquarian Society (AAS) Historical Periodicals Collection—a digital collection of American magazines, newspapers, and journals published 1684 – 1912that documents American life from the Colonial Era through the Civil War and Reconstruction. Subjects include the history of slavery, European views of the Americas, politics, religious issues, science, culture and the arts, health, women’s issues, industry and professions, education, advertising, and more. Contains illustrations, letters, excerpts of speeches.

The Anchorage Times—full-text content of local and regional news from 1970 – 1992. Gaps in coverage are being filled in over time, with the entire newspaper from 1915 – 1992 available eventually.

Now, add in additional E journal and E book titles from Masterfile and even more titles covering science and engineering.

You spoke, we listened! These are all new resources that we have added to our collection!

LibQUAL+ Comment Analysis

In addition to the standard survey questions, LibQUAL+ includes a box for comments.  The Consortium Library Assessment Team has coded and analyzed the comments from the 2017 UAA and APU surveys.

Here are some highlights.

370 UAA users left a total of 637 comments.  The most frequent comments had to do with library hours, quiet spaces, building temperature, and food/drink/vending after hours.  Almost 10% of the comments expressed dissatisfaction with the library hours, and we were able to add more library hours during spring semester.

40 APU users left a total of 74 comments.  The most frequent comments from this group were about wifi and parking.  Not everyone is aware that since the last LibQUAL+ survey APU parking permits are now honored in the Consortium Library’s parking lots.  UAA provides public wifi that APU users can access in the library.

Overall, we received more positive than negative comments, and we received fewer negative comments about staff than in past surveys.  Many users named specific resources they would like to see reinstated when the budget allows.  You can read the 2017 LibQUAL+ comments here.

Watch this space for more information about changes at the library based on user comments.  We hear you!

LibQUAL+ four year comparison

After conducting the LibQUAL+ Survey in November 2017, we have begun analyzing the results.  For the most part, our users are satisfied with the services we provide and with our library building, but satisfaction with our resources is declining.  This observation confirms our concern that budget reductions are causing our collection to suffer.

More details will be released in the weeks and months to come.  For now, we would like to share a few slides that demonstrate our users’ changing perceptions over the past nine years.

These radar charts show the aggregate results for the core survey questions.  Each axis represents one question. Please see the LibQUAL site for further explanation about reading these charts.

Essentially, Green is considered very favorable, blue is good, yellow is adequate, while red is unsatisfactory.