True Reward from the Embedded Librarianship

It's been a year since I started embedding library services into academic courses with the College of Nursing and the College of Allied Health.  This email message makes my day! It tells all what embedded services mean to the students.

E-Tracking Reference Statistics

Desk Statistics Record Sheet

If you want to turn manually recording of Reference Desk statistics into digital, read this article, "How to Build a Desk Statistics Tracker in Less Than an Hour Using Forms in Google Docs" by Sunshine Carter and Thomas Ambrosi  from the University of Minnesota–Duluth. The article provided detailed instructions on how to create a form for your library.  It would be better and more helpful if Google Docs form provided more functions for data collection and analysis.

Texting a Librarian Using a GV Number: Pros and Cons

I finally got a Google Voice (GV) number for my library to launch Text a Librarian reference service! After running some tests, it seems to work well so far. To monitor the service, the text messages are forwarded to the library email account. A FAQ page was created to help those who need more information about this service.

There are two ways to send messages (SMS) using a Google Voice (GV) number:

1). Sending text messages from Gmail Chat box

Pros:

• Avoid SMS charges
• Convenient for Gmail account holders
• Convenient for patrons without a cellphone
• Act like live chat or IM

Cons

• Some learning curve for the initial setup. Users have to know where to enable SMS to send a text message
• Have to have internet connection to be able to send and receive text messages

2). Sending text messages from a cellphone

Pros:

• Instant, direct, and fast communications
• Convenient for those who have text message service from their cellphone carriers
• No internet connection is needed
  

Cons:

• display sender's cellphone number

From the stand point of providing Text a Librarian service, here are my wish list for GV:

• Be able to choose a desired GV phone number
• Be able to reply to the text message from any non-Gmail accounts once GV messages are forwarded
• Be able to archive text messages in a meaningful way within GV account (e.g., create folders or subfolders)

You are welcome to share your experience in using GV to provide library services.