ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 6 3 4 / C&RL News Reference roving at Boston College By A d ean e B regm an an d Barbara M ento Moving aw ay fro m the reference desk to reduce stress T he explosion of electronic resources has forced our library and m any others to re­ view traditional m ethods of providing refere services. B oston College (BC) created the “ref­ erence rover” to address patrons’ needs brought about by this explosion. The reference rover is a staff m em ber w ho circulates am ong the vari­ ous electronic resources to offer assistance at the point o f use. Patrons appreciate the indi­ vidualized instruction available w h en they need it an d are left w ith a sense o f accom plishment. H elping patrons at the p oint o f use gives li­ brarians a m eans of keeping u p to date o n the new resources an d also provides an idea o f h o w patrons deal w ith the technology. At the O ’Neill Library w e found reference roving to be not only an effective w ay to address user needs, but also a w ay to m anage th e stressful impact o f electronic information resources on the delivery of reference services. B a c k g ro u n d The idea o f librarians asking patrons if they n e e d e d help as o p p o sed to patrons asking li­ brarians cam e as a result o f th e R eference D epartm ent’s discussions o n th e future o f ref­ erence service at BC. The departm ent held a day-long retreat to plan for the various changes it faced at that time w hich included: • introducing a n ew online library catalog, changing from a GEAC to a NOTIS system; • upgrading of the MultiPlatter system from four stand-alone w orkstations to a ten-station LAN (local area netw ork) w ith access to six dif­ ferent CD-ROM databases; nc • installing tw o UMI d atab ases (A B I I n ­ fo r m an d D issertation Abstracts) at a stan d ­ alone w orkstation n e a r four Infotrac w orksta­ tions and next to the O xford English D ictionary w orkstation; • relocating the w orkstation used for D ow Jones News Retrieval an d BRS A fter D ark from teh e reference desk to a location som e 10 feet away; • upgrading the OCLC terminal. The O ’Neill Library supports over 50 public w orkstations in the Electronic Information Area. The resources are accessible to a student body o f approxim ately 14,000 an d a faculty o f over 700. In addition, as a m em ber o f the B oston Library C onsortium our resources are shared by 11 area libraries, many area businesses, and the community at large. The im pending changes m ad e us un d erstan d ab ly co n c e rn e d a b o u t the im pact of th e proliferation of electronic re ­ sources o n b o th an already stressed staff an d o u r p a tr o n s w h o h a d to d e a l w ith th e s e changes too. We anticipated that o u r patrons w ould n eed the m ost help in differentiating b etw een the v arious elec tro n ic inform ation system s and learning th e skills o f searching each one. We h ad already perceived p atrons’ confusion over w hich system to use an d w hich com m ands and features, such as the truncation symbol, w ere appropriate for each. Traditionally w e had staffed the reference desk 92 hours a w eek and w aited for patrons to request our assistance. Some inquiries w ere answ ered at the desk, b u t questions involving search strategies an d com puter skills required that the m em ber of th e reference staff leave the d esk to h elp th e p atro n at the w orkstation, som etim es for ex tended periods o f time. A d e a n e B reg m a n a n d B arbara M ento a re reference librarians/bibliographers a t Boston College N o v em b er 1 9 9 2 / 6 3 5 R e fe re n c e ro v in g In light o f all th e p ro p o sed changes an d the increase in the n u m b er an d variety o f w orksta­ tions, the Reference D epartm ent discussed the im pact o f spending m ore tim e aw ay from the reference desk. After brainstorm ing for possible solutions to this problem , w e d ecid e d that li­ brarians an d staff should “rove” around the area w h ere the electronic resources w ere located to assist patrons as they n e e d e d help an d instruc­ tion. It w as h o p e d that reference roving w ould reduce stress for b o th staff at the reference desk and for p atrons at w orkstations b y providing im m ediate assistance an d instruction. Reference roving b eg an in the fall of 1989 after orientation sessions for n ew students and introductory sessions to our n e w N O U S o n ­ lin e c ata lo g , QUEST, w e re com pleted. The n e w roving service consisted o f 20 one- h o u r shifts (M onday through Friday from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m .), a d d e d to o u r regular schedule. Librarians a n d staff from circulation, cataloging, an d the special cam pus librar­ ies a sk ed to be in clu d ed in the reference roving schedule. O utside staff view ed roving as a n o p p o rtu n ity to in c re a se their know ledge o f o u r elec­ Reference rovers sport these buttons while roving. Because their visibility has increased, patrons now recognize and stop them even w hen they aren’t wearing their buttons. tronic resources, w hile refer­ ence staff benefited from the additional help. To d eterm ine th e im pact o n p a tro n s a n d to evaluate th e n ew service, tw o surveys w ere designed. O ne survey w as d ev elo p ed to determ ine w hat type o f assistance patrons required m ost often from o u r rovers an d the o ther to establish a profile of our users. First s u r v e y s u m m a r y The first w as a statistical survey desig n ed to record the num ber of times a user n e e d e d tech­ nical assistance (i.e., use of com m and language an d fu n ctio n keys, m ach in e p ro b lem s) an d co n cep tu al assistance (i.e., search strategies, determ ining the appropriate system, ex p lan a­ tion o f a thesaurus). Statistics w ere collected by rovers over an eight-w eek period an d provided data o n approxim ately 1,093 interactions. T he follow ing areas o f u ser assistance are listed in o rder of frequency: • search strategies; • m echanical problem s (m achine freezes, in adequate supply of p a p e r an d ink, etc.); • se a rc h m e c h a n ic s (a p p r o p ria te c o m ­ m ands, h o w to print, etc.); • overall introduction to th e system; • screen interpretations; • appropriate resource choice (p atro n us­ ing the w ro n g system). We fo u n d that ab o u t three-fourths o f the rover interactions lasted less than five minutes. G uiding our users to the right system or strat­ egy at the beginning of the search process saved tim e b ecau se reference staff aren ’t running b e­ tw een the reference d esk and the w orkstations. As a result the p atro n ’ s ap p ro ach is more effi­ cient from th e outset. Second s u r v e y s u m m a r y T he goal o f th e second sur­ vey w as to provide a profile o f o u r users. To get a broad sa m p lin g , 70 p a tro n s w e re random ly interview ed during lb er t G i G ar y di t: cr e too Ph various rover shifts. O ur p ro ­ file indicated that 90% of our electronic inform ation users h a d som e co m p u ter ex p eri­ ence; 71% h ad searched the system they w ere using at least once before; an d 64% h ad re­ ceived som e sort o f assistance. O f those users w h o h ad re­ ceiv e d assistance, 98% said they fo u n d th e assistance use­ ful. Overall, 90% of the users said they fo u n d the inform ation they needed. This high success rate has led to greater user satisfaction an d red u ced dem ands o n the staff. As a result o f these surveys, the roving ref­ eren ce service w as e x p a n d e d tw o hours each day, extending coverage from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m . an d steps w ere tak en to address the areas w h ere patrons n e e d e d th e m ost assistance. The d e p a rtm e n t s c h e d u le d a d d itio n a l tours an d dem onstrations at the beginning of each se­ m ester to explain the various systems. Signs listing th e available d a ta b a se s w e re p lace d ab o v e each w orkstation. Selected keys o n the w orkstation keyboards w ere either disabled o r re p ro g ra m m e d to reso lv e so m e m echanical problem s. Student library assistants w ere asked to m onitor th e printers o n a regular basis and to check for ad eq u ate p a p e r an d ink supplies. N ovem ber 1 9 9 2 / 6 3 7 Since the initiation o f reference roving, three ew dial-in services (Lexis/Nexis/Medis, D ialog/ lassmate, and Univnet), a Latin American wire ervice, and tw o CD-ROM databases (.Million ollar Directory and N ational Newspaper In d ex n Infotraè) have b e e n added. Three Wilson atabases (Humanities, Social Sciences, and Gen­ ral Science Indexes) w ere m o u n ted o n our OTIS system an d th e UMI databases w ere oved onto o u r MultiPlatter netw ork, along ith PAIS an d GPO. H aving the roving service lready in place, w e w ere able to effectively ntroduce the new systems to o u r patrons. onclusion poll o f the reference staff a year later indi­ ates that our staff unanim ously think reference n C s D o d e N m w a i C A c roving is w orthw hile a n d sh o u ld b e contin­ ued. It m akes staff m ore accessible an d allows time for in-depth help o n an individual basis. Roving provides the opportunity for a pro-ac­ tive ap p ro ach an d a first-hand view o f how patrons use electronic resources. It also helps relieve the stress felt at the reference desk by allowing referrals to the reference rovers. Several recent articles, including Charles A. B unge’s “CD-ROM Stress” (LibraryJournal, April 15, 1991), em phasized that this proliferation of e le c tro n ic re s o u rc e s h as le d to th e rise of technostress in reference departm ents. Refer­ ence roving at B oston College’s O ’Neill Library has p ro v ed to be a successful ap p ro ach for dealing w ith these problem s an d m eeting our patrons’ needs. ■ (A ca d em ic reference cont. fr o m p a g e 6 3 2 ) idea o f h o w fast the service may o r m ay n o t be an d how appropriate to present need. (We have b een checking five times a day, seven days a w eek; b u t w e h ad n o t com m unicated this to o u r users an d a few have ex p ressed d isa p ­ pointm ent that they did not get sp eed ier re­ plies. They m ay have im agined som e ongoing constant m onitoring.) 6 ) P ick u p th e m e s sa g e s reg u la rly a n d m o n ito r th a t r e s p o n s e s h a v e b e e n se n t. In o u r case the office m anager assum es this task M onday th ro u g h Friday. She th e n gives the questions to the librarian o r staff m em ber on duty at th e Reference Desk. A nother m odel might be to rotate the responsibility on a w eekly basis to individual staff m em bers. W hatever the m odel, it is im portant that the expertise o f the staff b e utilized w h en appropriate. Any q u e s­ tion w e receive o n cinem a goes autom atically to o u r resident expert. O ne o f the benefits o f e- mail is that it allows you to take advantage of such expertise. It frees both librarian an d p a ­ tron from the lottery they each face in handling reference transactions over the telep h o n e o r in perso n — w h e n a n answ er to th e q u estio n is m ost often attem pted im m ediately by the p e r­ so n o n duty, w hatever subject o r language ex­ pertise they may o r m ay no t possess. 7 ) Cite th e so u rce y o u r “fact” co m e s from . This n e e d no t b e in correct an d com plete b ib ­ liographic form, unless that is requested. That associate in stru cto r w h o u ses us to d o u b le check facts his students use in their papers has rem inded us again that o n e w o m an ’s fact is an o th er’s mistake. Unless you plan to check the fact in six different sources (finding three different answ ers), pick a reputable source and say w h at it is. This principle is hardly unique to reference w ork in an electronic setting. That it’s w orth m entioning here probably reflects the fact that librarians a n d staff accustom ed to the generally unm onitored, oral, one-on-one style of m ost reference w ork may respond differently to w ritte n c o m m u n ic a tio n s w h ic h m ay b e view ed (an d review ed) by their colleagues. It is a goo d rem inder o f the form an d substance o f the answ ers w e give to all questions. 8 ) T h is se r v ic e w ill lik e ly stim u la te d e ­ m an d fo r oth er library services su ch as d ocu ­ m e n t d eliv ery , d atab ases b e y o n d o u r o w n lin e ca ta lo g s, a n d e x p e r t sy s te m s d e sig n e d w ith in s p e c ific ra n g es o f in q u iry . The re­ sponses w e received ab o u t the delivery service and additional databases over the netw ork w ere not m otivated only by local events but b y a vision o f th e total array o f services desired from the scholar’s o w n w orkstation. Even in the richest, m ost intelligent online environm ent, how ever, there is probably a use­ ful niche for a “reference” option. Such an o p ­ tion requires the user to kn o w only w hat she w ants to k n o w an d to answ er n o questions ab o u t h e r question before she can ask it! It is a service users appreciate. N o te 1D escribed in this journal by Miriam Bonham, “Library services through electronic mail,” C&RL News 48:9 (O ctober 1987): 537-38. ■