A BIG THANKS to everyone who answered my survey on teaching Westlaw &
Lexis. A summary of the results are listed below. If there are
any questions, please contact me directly.
A total of 18 responses were collected from libraries who teach
online research training. Seven other libraries were interested in
what people had to say, as they were considering the possibility of
doing their own teaching as well.
1) Who is responsible for doing the online training?
Generally, training was performed by some combination of the
reference staff. computer services librarian and administrative staff
(director, associate director,etc.) In three cases the library staff
developed scripts which were followed by academic & student reps.
2) When are classes taught?
Almost 2/3 of the libraries taught their classes in the spring
semester or 3rd quarter after the "traditional print resources" had
been taught. Two libraries scheduled their classes in the late fal
Some schools which required training in both services taught one
service in the fall and one in the spring or had half the students
train on each service each semester.
3) How long is the entire training process? Does each student attend
more than one class? How long is each class session?
Almost every school has a different class time schedule. Some of
the class options required for each service include:
-(1) 50 minute session
-(3) 50 minute sessions
-(1) 50 minute lecture and (1) 50 minute lab
-(1) 60 minute lecture and (1) 60 minute lab
-(1) 60 minute lecture and (1) 90 minute lab
-(2) 75 minute sessions
-(1) 90 minute session
-(1) 120 minute lecture and (1) 60 minute lab
4) Is training in one or both systems required?
Five schools required training in one service, 11 schools
required training in both services and 2 schools didn't specify.
5) Is training integrated with the equivalent print sources or taught
after traditional training is complete?
Onlt two schools report that they integrate online training with
the traditional first year legal research course. One school requires
second year students to take an advanced legal research course which
integrates advanced online searching.
6) Why did your school decide to have the library staff provide
training in Westlaw and/or Lexis instead of relying on the account
representatives?
The overwhelming response to this question was the fact that
people felt the comp[any reps were more interested in selling their
service than in providing a good educational service to the students.
Reps were felt to be biased and unable or unwilling to present
comparisons, cost effective search strategies or mention the
interplay between print and online resources. Reps were also seen as
inconsistent, not flexible about evening or weekend classes, and
unwilling to alter their presentations in order to more closely fit
what the students were learning in the legal research classes.
7) What are the benefits of having the library staff provide training?
Benefits that were mentioned included the fact that teaching
promoted better interaction with the students in a professional
capacity, instead of sending students the message that librarians are
only the "experts" when it comes to print resources. Teaching
requires librarians to keep up to date in their searching skills and
knowledge of the database changes. Librarians were also seen as more
willing to compare the two services, provide more uniform teaching,
discuss cost issues, and promote the integration of online and print
research.
8) What are the drawbacks of having the library staff provide
training?
TIME!! Every school answering the survey said that staff time
committments were the main drawback. It takes an enormouse amount of
time and energy to teach all of those small groups of people every
year, particularly if you have a large first year class. Other
drawbacks that were mentioned included scheduling difficulties, staff
burnout, less vendor cooperation with handouts, etc., as well as the
fact that not all librarians feel comfortable teaching.
**Once again, thanks for your cooperation!!**
**********************************************
Patricia Wellinger
University of Denver Law Library
1900 Olive St.
Denver, CO 80220
ph#: (303) 871-6479 fax# (303) 871-6411
Pwelling@lib.law.du.edu
**********************************************
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : 03/09/00 PST