Leila Wallenius, Engineering and Psychology Librarian, Leddy Library, University of Windsor
Questions asked:
- “…why students use the service.”
- “What will these results [of their data analysis] mean for reference services at the university?”
Software:
- Use HumanClick for VR; costs approx $1,500/year.
- Don’t like IM programs because users must login.
- Chose HumanClick because it allows more than one ‘librarian’ to be on at a time.
- Students do not need to install the software.
- Like HumanClick because of the ‘box’: browser-based
- HumanClick turns starts up when machine is booted.
Procedures:
- Treat VR similar to telephone.
- Make in-person patrons the priority (when providing VR from RLD).
- In ‘quieter’ RLD, receive less than 10 questions per hour.
No co-browse:
- Don’t use (or subscribe to) co-browse featur.
- Examined transcripts and determined that there wer very few occasions when co-browse would’ve been useful. In such cases, they send users to the information desk.
- Feel that co-browse is like ‘shadowing’ patrons, like looking over their shoulder. Want patrons to be independent.
Staffing, Hours:
- Official 9am-5pm; unofficial 8am (or whenever people get in) – whenever the last person leaves for the day.
- Don’t schedule peope – whoever is on is on.
- The 1st person to have the software installed is the 1st person to be ‘poked’ when a patron ‘calls’. 2nd person to have the software installed is 2nd, etc.
- Also have software installed on not-so-busy RLD (Real Life Desk); RLD doesn’t feel overwhelmed.
- Everyone volunteered to provide the service.
- Approx 12 (out of 18/19) staff actuall provide VR; others may be overwhelmed by speed of chat interactions.
Stats:
- 2001-2: VR < 600, email = 600
- 2002-3: VR = 850, email = 750
- 2003-4: VR = 850, email = 750
- 2004-5: VR > 1000, email = 850
- 2005-6: VR ~ 1400, email = 845 (Note: They’d expanded chat reference to include 5-8 pm, Monday – Thursday.)
- Most questions < 5 min (and proportion of these growing at highest rate); fewer questions 5-10 min (proportion seeing moderate growth); even fewer 10-15 min; 15-20 min and 20+ min very few in number.
- 80% of questions were answered in < 10 min; this isn’t changing year-to-year.
Trends:
- Peaks in November & March, around paper-writing time.
- ‘Heavy use’ first thing in the morning – these are likely questions that have been sent while no one is logged-in; not busy again until lunch.
- 3-6pm is the busiest.
- Real reference questions continue to decline, even while their user population grows; overall number of questions (including VR) grows… received 1,000 more than last year.
Users, questions:
- Their library has a policy re. people getting booted from machines by others – i.e. don’t leave your stuff here because if you’re absent, someone else can and will take your place. Therefore, they get a lot of in-library users. [We see similar things at UW - a lot of in-library users.]
- Majority of questions were ‘true reference questions’ re. journal articles, books, DVDs…. Get same types of reference questions through VR as at RLD.
- Categorized questions as follows: citations, access, problems (or maybe it was access problems), RefWorks and Other
- The ’10-15 min’ users are ‘unplugged’ – they need more help, but aren’t ‘clueless’.
What they learned:
- Used questions to fix their website (e.g., frequently received question re. hours… made hours link more prominent).
Publicity:
- No marketing done to date.
Next Steps:
- Expand hours to include weekends, matching RLD. Might still have to make this voluntary.
- Will consider allowing providers to work from home.