Student Worker Training Round Table-Minutes

Student Worker Training Round Table

January 11, 2008 9-12

Attendees:

Wendy Shortridge, Linda DeFord, Rosiland Parker Yocom-Mines;Marianne Aldrich, Mike McEvers-CC; CC; Jane Thomas and Curt Williams-UCB; DaveHodgins and Kevin Jacobs –UCCS; Donna Goben-DU; Sara Vaughn and Deb Myers-UNC;

Scheduling:

• Scheduling training really varies from library to library.  It can be particularly challenging at CC as the classes change every 3-5 weeks.  Planning ahead is important, but they also let students know upfront that they need to be responsible for their schedule. 
• UNC-Access Services tells the library administration the hours they need to fill.  They then match up the hours that are needed with student workers. 
• CSM- Beginning of each semester the students fill in a blank schedule and then Roz quits hiring once all the shifts are covered on the schedule.
• DU-more structured schedule staff member on call for every hour of the day. Course work comes first, but students must meet minimum standards. 

Common Practices

• Duty board-to let people know what they are responsible for.  It's a white board so changes can be easily made.  Students can then see what they are doing for the next couple of hours.
• CSM has a less formal approach-let students decide what needs to be done when they come in for their shift
• CU-students in a sense, "earn" there way on the desk after they have learned the other aspects of Access Services work.  This works for CU because they have a large body of workers. Other libraries don't have such a large student work force.
• DU-Primarily place students based on their experience and skills-shyer students may prefer backroom duties while the more social students may want to work on the desk.
• "Make work" miscellaneous tasks that aren't that important don't go over well with students.  Several librarians talked about this.  Finding work can be a challenge.  However, some staff has been creative in tasks they assign to student workers.
• UCCS-David has student workers help design the website.  He's used art students to do displays and communications students work on the training manual. 
• CC-there is a student worker who likes to decorate for every holiday. 
• CC-Mike has created a list of common tasks that students can do if things aren't busy
• CC-one very effective way to train was to conduct a group meeting among student workers about customer service.  An open discussion seemed to work better than supervisors covering the topic or having students read about it.

 

Training Tips

• Informal mentoring works well between students-veteran workers help the new student workers.  They seem to retain more instruction when it's provided through their peers rather than a staff member
• Make tasks short-10 minute each. CU recently had a backload of Prospector items that need to be pulled and sent to borrowing libraries.  Jane asked student workers to take about 10 minutes and just pull a few items during their shift.  Over the course of the weekend, they were able to eliminate the backload by having everyone pitch in just a little.
• Train students to be flexible and adapt to a variety of tasks.
• Use multiple modalities when training students-say it verbally, show them the documentation, and let them try doing it.  There are a variety of learning styles so it's important to try and address all of them.

Training

• Training is a long term task.  Some of it takes place through more formal procedures, while other things are learned on the fly or as situations occur.
• This new generation of student workers pick up the mechanics very quickly.  They know how to navigate on the web and using a computer is second nature to them.
• At the beginning of the year, CC does a "follow the book" training session where students are shown the whole process of the book from acquisition to checkout.  They take a tour of each department.  This gives them the big picture of how all departments work together to make items available for checkout. 
• There is a varying degree of responsibility that a student can have.  Some libraries allow there veteran students to collect money or pay fines.  Other libraries don't allow students to do this. CC has a policy that if it's the first time doing a particular task, the student must ask a staff member to watch them. 
• Several institutions brought orientation manuals.  Most of these manuals covered basic policies, confidentiality agreements and general practices, but not in depth training on procedures. 
• Several staff mentioned that they are working with a different generation that is not as accustomed to training solely through print materials.  There is a need for tactile training-putting them on the front line and seeing how it goes, verbal training, and print manuals that they can reference.  Staff also mentioned that it was important to look at different learning styles when training student workers. 
• CC uses competency checklist that supervisors can check off on when training student workers.
• Checklist-kept in a folder at the Circ desk, try to have the staff train the students and check things off as they are going over various tasks
• Some libraries use the "Shelf It" online training module even though there are some errors in the program. 
• CC is starting to develop some online training.  Card test-call # order
• Pre-shelve after the card test and then staff check a cart, talk about what the error meant
• UNC conducts group training session in fall it covers an introduction to the library, confidentiality, role plays on customer service and a tour of the department. 

 

Technology as aide intraining

 

• Email seems to be the most effective mode of communication with student workers
• CC is developing online training
• Most libraries haven't pursued much in terms of online training
• UCCS has an intranet that has a student area where staff/students can post announcements
• CU-used SharePoint, but hasn't had a lot of success with this technology

 

Sexual HarassmentTraining

 

Most libraries offer this through the campus or at minimumacknowledges that this can be an issue and tell students what they should do ifthey encounter this.

 

Hiring Students andskills assessment

• Institutions rely heavily on work study funds to hire students.  Hourly workers are often very appreciative if they are hired because they realize it costs the library more to hire them so they tend to work hard.
• Mines-Part of the interviewing process is assessing where students should be
• UNC-Library administration does the first screening of student workers and then Access Services and ILL do the hiring from those selected based on screening.
• The interview process can be a win-win situation for both the applicant and the library.  For some students, their library job is the first job they have ever had and possibly their first interview.  It teaches them what to expect in a job.  The interview is beneficial to staff because it helps them to understand what tasks best suit the student
• One of the challenges is that some students don't see work study jobs as "real" jobs

 

Incentives forStudent Workers

Simple incentives to make the work environment more comfortablego a long way in fostering student retention.

• At the beginning of the year students can apply for library positions at the annual ice cream social.  Library jobs have a good reputation so there is lots of interest in getting a position in the library.  
• Find out what some of the favorite snacks of students and try to purchase them from time to time.
• Mines has an all day "food fest" where each staff member brings in a dish and student workers are free to help them self throughout the day even if they aren't working a shift.  They start with coffee and donuts in the morning and show a training video they have food available throughout the day until midnight. 
• Several libraries have one on one or group orientations in which they show a training video and provide snacks. 
• Tell students how working in the library can assist them throughout their college career because by helping others at the desk, they will help to improve their own research skills. 
• Libraries do allow their student workers to study if it's slow or they are working at the desk.
• Deb from UNC created a "find it in the library" game that she distributed through the email newsletter.  If students were able to find where a particular object was in the library, they would receive a small prize.  She thought this would be a way to get students to read the newsletter which also contained work related information.
• CC Provides access to the staff lounge so students can get a cup of coffee or soda. 
• Mandatory group meetings-CC  feed them and pay them, plus they have to sign up for their schedule for the next block.  Will show video on customer service or something
• UCCS-has potlucks once a month and they always invite students to these

 

Evaluation

• It's easier to do qualitative evaluations rather than quantitative ones because there are multiple variables when conducting an evaluation.  For example, a student may be able to shelve an entire truck of books in ½ hour, while it takes another student 45 min to an hour to do the same task.  It's important to also consider accuracy and other outside factors such as reference questions that come up from patrons while the student is shelving. 
• It's important to do mid-year evaluations instead of just saving them for the end of the year.  It lets the student know how things are going mid-way through the process.
• It's important to give students a chance to give feedback
• How libraries hand student evaluations:
• Mines-Evaluation comes from Human Resources and raises are based on evaluations; conduct eval's end of semester
• UNC -standard evaluation for every student position (put in the student orientation packet)
• UNC Uses a campus evaluation form that doesn't apply specifically to library work, but they can also devise another form for Access Services
• CC-Does impromptu eval's and give incentives on this.  E.g. accuracy shelving test who ever shelves their cart perfectly gets a prize
• Let the students self rate.  How can we make your job easier? 
• Dialogue is very important to the appraisal process
• Giving the student a chance to give feedback is important
• UCCS-provides quizzes on some known problem areas to see where they need to do further student training.
• CU-ask team leaders to check off on competencies that a particular student can do before this student moves on to the next level.  However, not all team leaders are working with students.

 

Minutes prepared by Rose Nelson-CO Alliance