Current Issue: September 2020
Feature
Selene Colburn
Beyond the bathroom wars
Increasing gender-free restroom access in libraries
In May 2016, protesters affiliated with the student organization Justice for Queer and Trans Students occupied the University of Vermont’s (UVM) Dean of Libraries’ office to demand that the David W. Howe Memorial Library (then known ...
Feature
Chase Ollis
ACRL’s 2021 Awards Program
Honoring outstanding achievements in the academic and research library community
Every year, ACRL celebrates the opportunity to honor the outstanding achievements of the academic and research library community. These inspiring innovators have continued to demonstrate ...
Feature
Lana Mariko Wood
Empty shelves
How your academic library can address food insecurity
Researchers have only recently begun looking at food insecurity on college campuses. Food insecurity is characterized by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) as limited or uncertain access to nutritionally adequate and safe foods ...
Perspectives on the Framework
Karin Heffernan
Loaded questions
The Framework for Information Literacy through a DEI lens
Just after our university published its Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) Strategic Plan, I found myself driving home from the “Engaging with the ACRL Framework” Roadshow. My head was full of converting knowledge practices into learning outcomes when the frames began to emerge through a DEI lens, and threshold concepts became questions. The very asking of a question inherently invites diverse, individual perspectives. Published before current higher education DEI efforts, the Framework prompts us to ask questions and pursue answers, especially from unheard or systemically silenced voices. It encourages us to challenge elitism ...
Feature
Elizabeth Hobart
Antiracism in the catalog
An analysis of records
As people seek to learn more about race, bookstores have begun selling out of books on antiracism. These titles are, of course, also available in libraries, but can be difficult to locate in the catalog. Patrons will be able to find them through known title searches, but the catalog should go beyond this.
The first user task in the “Library Reference Model” is to find, defined as “to bring together information about one or more resources of interest by searching on any relevant criteria.” Ideally, a patron should be able to search terms such as racism or antiracism in the library’s catalog and find a comprehensive list of titles on the topic or start with a known title ...
Scholarly Communication
Jon E. Cawthorne
Mountains to climb
Leadership for sustainable change in scholarly communication
We live in complex, challenging times. In March 2020 a novel coronavirus called COVID-19 transformed our lives. Then, several months into shelter-in-place orders for the virus, George Floyd was killed in police custody. For weeks we saw Black Lives Matter protests around the world demanding change. Floyd’s death inspired new, open discussions about oppression, systemic racism, and the current and historical injustices faced by Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC).
For many of us this moment represents an incredible turn of events—an opening of hearts, minds, and beliefs on a global scale. In only three months ...