Two years after the onset of the COVID-19 health pandemic, electronic resources librarians are assessing how the work in their libraries has changed and determining if certain modifications made to services and workflow processes are, in fact, transformational. The authors detail how service changes and telework during the pandemic affected…

Effective for the 2012-2013 academic year, the Hilda C. Landers Library at St. Mary's College of Maryland (SMCM) eliminated daily overdue fines for undergraduates on books and some other materials. In 2019, nine years of comprehensive data on overdue returns (comprising three years before and three years after the change) was extracted from the…

At the University of Maryland Libraries, Angie Ohler, Director of Collection Services, discusses the history of the management of electronic resources for the past ten years at the Maryland Libraries, including the challenges of in an ever-changing environment and solutions she developed over time. The history she describes are lessons learned…

This report discusses the benefits of canine-assisted reading through the "Tail Waggin' Tutors" program at the Glen Burnie Regional Library in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. Presented are the two different types of therapy dog interactions, Animal-Assisted Therapy (AAT) and Animal-Assisted Activities (AAA). The first canine-assisted…

Inspired by the 2017 Big Ten Academic Alliance Library Conference's collective collection theme, the authors undertook a study to better understand the consortium's resource-sharing needs for Spanish and Portuguese materials published in Latin America. The authors employed multiple technologies to expedite gathering, reconciling, and analyzing…

There is an established history of academic libraries collaborating with their institutions' athletics departments to provide learning and research support to student-athletes in order to achieve positive educational outcomes. It is rarer to find documented the effect that athletics has had on the professional life of an academic librarian. The…

In Fall 2014 the University of Maryland Libraries launched a textbook reserves program to help relieve the burden of high textbook costs on students. Although its initial performance was lackluster, workflow refinements and expanded promotion greatly improved usage, resulting in a tenfold increase in circulation and expansion of the program. This…

As young people increasingly need computer science (CS) and other related STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) skills, libraries have been identified as spaces in which this learning can occur. However, librarians often perceive they lack the skills or confidence required to lead this type of education. As a result, funding sources,…

Family engagement is a shared responsibility among families, educators, and communities to support children's learning and development. For families, it is about the knowledge, attitudes, values, and behaviors that enable children to be motivated, enthusiastic, and successful learners. For libraries, this means having respectful partnerships with…

High-quality customer service is an important aim of the library experience. Its importance is evidenced by attention given to the topic in scholarly literature and academic conference proceedings. This article describes the challenging process of creating and delivering a blended customer service training curriculum to all library staff working…

In this policy brief, the authors examine and provide examples of the ways that public libraries have become invaluable partners in supporting family STEM learning. Although emerging research points to the strong influence of families on children's growth and development, a focus on joint parent and child STEM learning is still nascent. This brief…

J. Linda Williams was coordinator of school library services for Anne Arundel County Public Schools prior to her retirement. She served as AASL President 2005-2006 and is also a past president of the Maryland Association of School Librarians. Looking back on her 2005-2006 term as AASL President, Williams writes that she feels that particular year…

The school district library supervisor occupies a pivotal position in library and information services programs that support and enhance the instructional efforts of a school district: providing leadership; advocating for the programs; supporting, advising, and providing professional development to building-level librarians; and representing…

This article is an exploration of ways in which LIS educators can consider culture, heritage, and identity as a framework for becoming participatory agents of their teaching practices in the LIS classroom. To support this framework, this discussion introduces the research methodology, practitioner inquiry, as a meaningful approach to studying…

This article describes the application of electronic resources management (ERM) to digital repository management at the Health Sciences and Human Services Library at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. The authors discuss electronic resources management techniques, through the application of "Techniques for Electronic Management,"…