r. michael young, ph.d director, digital games research ... michael...how i learned to stop worrying...

one professor’s view on the Hunt’s research-enabling design

orhow I learned to stop worrying and love the

library

r. michael young, ph.d

director, digital games research center & professor, department of computer science

nc state university

Tuesday, October 8, 13

perspective on libraries as research partners• Important elements:

• render servers, cloud-based infrastructure, telepresence, staff support services, overhead agreements, grant-writing expertise

• these are important, but these are not the key


perspective on libraries as research partners• The single most

important factor to the design of the Hunt Library as a research component at NCSU is the new relationship between the Library and the faculty member.


the relationship between faculty and library

• context

• all faculty members were, at one time, undergraduates and then graduate students

• the relationship between libraries and faculty:

• libraries provide the great, often exclusive access to a wide range of resources for many people over a sustained period of time

• achieved by placing careful control on the access to and use of these resources


• While we were busy working, the internet disrupted that relationship

• Institutional digital resources/archives and information sources are directly accessible

• Individuals can now create and share resources that may be of comparable quality to that of curated library content

the relationship between faculty and library


• not enough just to create digital archives, though that’s one important element

• you need to lead with a change to the relationship

making the change


• The NCSU Library’s philosophy turns the relationship on its head

• They give us the keys to the starship

• They join in the research effort as equal partners in the innovation, but with specific areas of expertise

making the change


first steps: build a track record

DH Hill Learning Commons

focus on student engagement within the library space

integrates life of the student with life of the scholar

scholarstudent


translating this idea to faculty

What’s the intersection of these two sets of capabilities?

librarianresearcher


first steps: create stakeholders

• Library engaged faculty early in the design of facilities

• I thought they were nuts

• (please don’t tell them I said this)

librarianresearcher


infrastructure & facilities

Design your infrastructure to match the research excellence of your faculty

librarianresearcher


staffing

Design your staffing plan and hire people who understand the culture of research and who are themselves masters of the point of intersection from their own disciplinary perspectives

librarianresearcher


walk the walk

librarianresearcher

At every point, expect the faculty member to share responsibility


consequences

• the Hunt library is the single largest, most visible investment in the future of scholarship on our campus

• I completely believe that the Hunt library was designed for me

• I’m not alone. Every faculty member engaged in research with the library feels this same thing.


results: teaching and research integration

• the library has been open for 10 months

• I’ve taught/co-taught four undergraduate classes here that provide my students with access to resources no other students in the country have

• Co-directed (with LIbrary staff) 2 departmentally funded undergraduates developing core software infrastructure for controlling large displays

• Directed 2 NSF-funded REU undergraduates integrating the touch screen large displays into an ongoing $1M+ NSF research project


• the library has been open for 10 months

• I’ve worked with Library staff to submit 3 proposals and we have an additional proposal under development

• Of those three proposals, we’ve received 2 awards totaling over $1M

• includes a IMLS National Leadership award to start next month, a collaboration between NCSU Libraries and Departments of Art+Design, Computer Science (lead), Education and Electrical and Computer Engineering

results: new efforts


one professor’s view on the Hunt’s research-enabling design

orhow I learned to stop worrying and love the

library

r. michael young, ph.d

director, digital games research center & professor, department of computer science

nc state university


r. michael young, ph.d director, digital games research ... michael...how i learned to stop worrying...

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