Talis Insight Europe 2017 - Improving accesibility through reading lists - University of Kent

Editor's Notes

• #2: Introducing ourselves. Justine Rush. I am the Faculty Librarian covering Education and Humanities. As the lead for Education within Information Services. I head up the Reading List Service for the Library. Louise Price - the Senior Library Assistant covering Education and Humanities, I work with Justine leading on the Reading List Service @Kent. Introduction to the presentation. - JUSTINE In this presentation we will talk about how we are delivering: accessible information through mainstream library processes via our Reading List Service. We will: Share the Kent context within which this work is developing. Show how we started out and tell you about some of the challenges, before we go on to how we developed solutions to meet those challenges.
• #3: The University of Kent. A few facts. Kent is a leading university, ranked among the best in the UK by three national league tables: The Guardian University Guide, The Times Good University Guide and The Complete University Guide. It has the fourth highest score for overall student satisfaction in the National Student Survey 2016, out of all multi-faculty institutions. Kent has over 20,000 students. The largest library in Kent, the Templeman Library is currently being redeveloped, and this slide highlights some headline facts. Readinglists@kent. We implemented Talis Apire in late 2011. Module convenors and administrators within faculty academic schools are responsible for creating and updating their lists. In 2015/16, Kent ran 464 programmes which incorporated 1,625 modules. Of these,1588 were in Readinglists@kent. The current context: As a Library team, we’ve looked again at the way we engage with our faculties and schools to deliver reading lists through Readinglists@kent. Now, I’ll talk about the work we’ve been taking forward and how this has helped us to achieve our aims.
• #4: Readinglists@kent As mentioned before, module convenors and administrators within faculty academic schools are responsible for creating and updating their lists. Across the faculties and schools, there was differing levels of engagement and perspectives around the value of using Readinglists@kent. (CLICK x 2) In late 2015, we took forward a major project Collection Engagement Project to revisit how we engage with our faculties and academic schools and work in partnership to develop and manage our library collections. The Reading List Work Package was a major element of the project. This work raised interest, discussion and debate amongst the academic community and has taken on a more longitudinal aspect. The project is also enabling a cultural switch in the perception of reading lists. We achieved this by changing the way we communicated with our schools. We adopted a user orientated view focussed on academic needs and how they are fulfilled by collections. Throughout the project we sought to align our activities with key university initiatives and projects. (CLICK) – This included collaborating with the OPERA project. We’ll tell you about OPERA in the next slide. But it was the link between the work of the OPERA project and our Reading List work through the Collection Engagement Project, that has enabled the Library to deliver accessible information at Kent. (CLICK x 2)
• #5: OPERA stands for: Opportunity, Productivity, Engagement, Reducing barriers, Achievement It is a university-wide accessibility project supported by advice and guidance from Joint Information Systems Committee (Jisc). AIM: To implement a range of accessibility initiatives and monitor their impact on the development of a more accessible information environment at the University of Kent.   Technologies afford opportunities. E-books are more accessible to students with visual impairment. People can use technology to access electronic materials. It’s inclusive, as all students can benefit from these materials For example, people can listen to audio whilst travelling to campus. This is a productivity benefit. Justine to pass to Louise for ILPs. ILP total number = c. 1800   Print disability = if we include Specific Learning Disabilities then it would be a very high number e.g. 1200. However, the alt formats service was directed mainly at students with significant print disabilities e.g. visual impairment, physical disability or severe SpLD so we were providing the reading list ILP review part of the service to around 30 students with the most significant barriers to accessing print.
• #6: In late 2015 Academic Liaison began a trial process with the Collection Engagement (J Rush et al) pilot schools to provide accessible materials to ILP students. While we were already using Talis Aspire reading lists at Kent as standard for the majority of mainstream modules there had been no formal process in place for students with specific accessibility requirements. The aim of the trial was to encourage tutors to share essential reading requirements with the library in time for us to either purchase multiuser licence eBooks or use the Load2Learn service (now RNIB Book Share) to request accessible scans from publishers. What were we doing? In short - List publishers were encouraged to inform us that they had published their reading list when they had an ILP student on their module and to highlight any essential or ‘Core’ reading the student would require. This was done either via the talis reading lists or in many cases by using a proforma or emailing key texts to the librarian. ALS staff would then review the list with an E-First purchasing policy on all items from our regular suppliers. We would also contact Load2Learn for anything we were unable to buy through our usual suppliers. We would then email to SSW explaining the varying responses from Load2learn. – Sounds pretty simple but it proved to be anything but!
• #7: Slide 6 The challenges raised by this first approach were felt across all the parties involved. Academics who chose to use the pro forma had an online list for non ILP students and a paper list for ILP students that ideally would need to be integrated to the online system. For the library the challenges were numerous •          The tools we were using – online lists, paper lists, pro formas and emails meant resources for one module were being requested via multiple sources and risked both duplication of work. Load2Learn itself was complicated, we would need to identify the publisher of the book we needed, and indeed the sub publisher or offshoot of the main company. Load2Learn could request scans from some publishers but not others and you were liable to get an unhappy email from them if you asked for something they couldn’t help with. Different publishers had different forms to fill in, different criteria and different timescales for responding. Some wouldn’t respond at all. Some required student details and information we weren’t in a position to share. This made the completion of the reading list slow and dependent on other teams. •   Communication – we would have emails from multiple publishers and emails from Load2Learn and no two requests had the same outcome through Load2learn meaning keeping the academic and SSW up-to-date on progress was difficult and time consuming. If a member of staff was unwell or on leave there’s be very little to show what progress they had made with a list. Work load and scalability – very long lists were taking a disproportionate amount of time and meant multiple items were being requested through Load2Learn. Bearing in mind how frustrating Load2Learn was proving to be, long lists with multiple items requiring attention caused confusion and delays. This was not felt to be something we could scale up to all ILP lists across the Kent tenancy. List length also had a financial implication - a 400 item list bought with an e-first policy could very possibly spend a schools entire book budget But fundamentally the challenge that most needed addressing was our own approach, we were viewing an ILP list as ‘other’, something separate from the non ILP list and that workflow and in effect we were doubling our own work load.
• #8: Slide 7 – By early 2016 it was clear that the pilot had laudable aims and was timely piece of work, in view of the shift in thinking that Justine has shared in previous slides but the actual process we were using just wasn’t going to work for us or for students. OPERA was making strides and Ben had designed a handbook for academics and list owners setting out the roles of the library, SSW, the academic and the student in the ‘accessibility’ partnership. This was the point that we in the library could step in and see our process in black and white and start streamlining our workflow. We agreed that all resources for all students should be bookmarked on to the online reading list and no pro formas or separate request would be accepted. This was an important decision. It would make all the course resources visible in one place in line with Collection Engagement policy. It would streamline the library process by having one point of truth for the materials that were needed for that module regardless of the needs of the students on the module and it made the academics life easier by meaning only one list had to be updated for each module and they only needed to email us to let us know their list had been published. The email from the owner is vital as the list can not have any kind of ‘ILP’ flag on it that would indicate any student might have a disability and so our only indication of the need to prioritise is from this email. The list is prioritised as Kent ILP policy and because there can still be inconsistencies and delays when approaching publishers and Bookshare for e-copies of texts we have been unable to buy through ordinary suppliers. . Slide 7 – By early 2016 it was clear that the pilot had laudable aims and was timely piece of work, in view of the shift in thinking that Justine has shared in previous slides but the actual process we were using just wasn’t going to work for us or for students. OPERA was making strides and Ben had designed a handbook for academics and list owners setting out the roles of the library, SSW, the academic and the student in the ‘accessibility’ partnership. This was the point that we in the library could step in and see our process in black and white and start streamlining our workflow. We agreed that all resources for all students should be bookmarked on to the online reading list and no pro formas or separate request would be accepted. This was an important decision. It would make all the course resources visible in one place in line with Collection Engagement policy. It would streamline the library process by having one point of truth for the materials that were needed for that module regardless of the needs of the students on the module and it made the academics life easier by meaning only one list had to be updated for each module and they only needed to email us to let us know their list had been published. The email from the owner is vital as the list can not have any kind of ‘ILP’ flag on it that would indicate any student might have a disability and so our only indication of the need to prioritise is from this email. The list is prioritised as Kent ILP policy and because there can still be inconsistencies and delays when approaching publishers and Bookshare for e-copies of texts we have been unable to buy through ordinary suppliers. .
• #9: Slide 8 We set guidelines restricting purchase of eBooks to Core and Recommended texts. This decision was made on the grounds that very long lists would be cost prohibitive if bought entirely as e-first, it was also felt that students without ILPs in place would not be expected to read all core, recommended and background texts on a long list and so it would be unreasonable to expect ILP students to do so. ILP students have close contact with SSW and if a student felt a background item was useful to them a scan could be arranged – as back ground items are bought on a 1 copy basis this would be no more of a disadvantage to the ILP student than for a non-ILP student waiting for the hard copy to be returned to the library. Key to streamlining the process was allowing library staff to focus solely on managing the reading list and buying what was available as an eBook by passing all contact with students and Load2Learn/RNIB bookshare to Student Support and Wellbeing to manage. As previously noted publishers often ask for student details that we can’t share, SSW are able to manage this contact. We don’t label lists and we don’t share student data We make lots of notes - Talis 2.0 made this significantly more achievable as we were no longer printing usable reviews to make handwritten notes on but could now share notes on individual titles. These notes are a legacy that can help streamline reviews in subsequent years. Once the orders have been completed ALS go back and link the eBooks rather than hard copies directly to the reading list ensuring full accessibility for the ILP student by removing the extra layer of search required via the library catalogue. ILP students then have access to Bookshare resources through their own login details.
• #10: Slide 9 – Standard email to SSW – The content of the standard email we send to SSW was very much dictated by them and the information they need to get the best results from RNIB Bookshare and suppliers. We link to the reading list in Talis and confirm that where available, all core and recommended titles have been bought as multiuser licence. We then list the core and recommended titles we were unable to supply with the 13 digit ISBN of the edition we require and the status of the copy we hold in the library as this can be key to gaining accessible copies from publishers. We then save the email with a standard title so we can see at a glance which modules we have completed.
• #11: This has proved to be a scalable and effective process for managing ILP reading lists using the mainstream reading list processes. For academics and list owners their extra work load has been reduced to a single email informing us of the need for a review. For ALS we have incorporated small changes to our daily process that allow us to review as many ILP lists as needed – 62 across the busy autumn 2016 and spring 2017 terms. But the most important outcome can be summed up in an anecdote our colleague Ben Watson shared with me as we prepared this presentation. He was trying to contact a student with an ILP for some time at the start of term and she had managed to miss his emails for a couple of weeks. When he finally caught up with he asked her how she was getting on and whether she needed any help accessing readings or resources and she seemed genuinely nonplussed by the question as she explained, everything she needed was on her reading list this year so she really wouldn’t be needing any SSW support for that course. We joked at how frustrating it was that so much background work had gone unnoticed. In reality that is exactly what we aimed to achieve, a list that is fully accessible to all without any student feeling they have a compromised route to resources.
• #12: What’s great is that with our preference for eBooks and support in the use of technologies such as Sensus Access, the numbers requiring ongoing support dropped as we went through the year as students were finding that the reading list/alternative formats service was either providing what they needed at source or they were empowered to be self-sufficient using technologies and training Kent has provided.
• #13: Through this talk, we’ve shared how we’re delivering a more accessible information environment at the University of Kent through mainstream library processes using Readinglists@kent. Linking back to the Collection Engagement Project, Ben Watson and I then engaged with academic schools and faculties at Kent. We reinforced the importance of the Library being informed of the resources How engaging with Readinglists@kent was the best way to ensure students had access to resources they needed. (CLICK). We introduced the concept of the dynamic bridge. How our Reading List Service was the means to providing accessible information for all. Additional benefits of this approach: Greater student satisfaction. Better learning outcomes.