All posts by Angela Zoss

Behind the Scenes, Projects, Technology

How we broke up with Basecamp

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We recently published a blog post outlining our recent decision to drop Basecamp as a project management platform. Several people have asked us to share our new solution(s), and we thought we would take the opportunity to explain at a high level how we approached migrating away from Basecamp.

When DUL decided we would not be renewing our Basecamp subscription, there were about 88 active projects representing work across the entire organization. The owners of these projects would have just over two months to export their content and, if necessarily, migrate it to a new solution.

Exporting Content

Our first step was to form a 3-person migration team to explore different options for exporting content from Basecamp. We identified two main export options: DIY exporting and administrator exporting. For both options, we proactively tested the workflow, made screencasts, and wrote tutorials to ensure staff were well-prepared for either option.

Before explaining the export options, however, we emphasized to staff that they should only export content that is needed for ongoing work or archival purposes. For completed projects that are no longer needed, we encouraged staff to “let it go.”

DIY exporting: We established that any member of a Basecamp project or team could export content from Basecamp. For projects that primarily used Basecamp to create documents or share files, we recommended they use the built-in export functionality within the Docs & Files section of the project. Project members could just go to Docs & Files, click the three dots menu in the upper-right corner, and select “Download this folder.” The download would include all of the same subfolders that were created in Basecamp. Basecamp documents would be saved as HTML files, and additional files would appear in their original format. One note, however, is that the HTML versions of the Basecamp documents would not include the comments added to those documents.

To export documents with their comments, or to export other Basecamp content like Message Boards or To-dos, another option was to save the individual pages as PDFs. While this took more time and didn’t work well for large and complicated projects, it had the added benefit of preserving the look-and-feel of the original Basecamp content. PDF was also preferable to HTML for some situations, like viewing the files in different file storage solutions.

Administrator exporting: If a team really needed a complete export of the current Basecamp content, an administrator for the Basecamp account could generate a full export. This type of export generated an HTML-based set of files that included all components of the project and any comments on documents. Every page available in Basecamp in the browser became a separate HTML file. With this export, however, the HTML files that were created for Docs & Files were stored in the same directory, all in a bunch. End users could still see subfolders when navigating the HTML files in a web browser, but the downloaded files weren’t organized that way anymore.

We decided not to track the DIY exporting but needed to organize the requests for administrator exporting as only a few accounts were “Basecamp Owners.” To organize and facilitate this process, we created an online request form for staff to complete.

To help folks decide what they needed, we created a visual decision tree representing export options.

A flow diagram highlighting the different export options for Basecamp content.

Alternative Project Management Tools

We realized early on that it was out of scope to complete a formal migration from Basecamp to one specific, alternate tool. We didn’t have staff capacity for that kind of project, and we weren’t inclined to prescribe the same solution for every project or team. To promote reliability and additional support systems, we encouraged teams to take advantage of enterprise solutions already supported by Duke University. The primary alternatives supported by Duke at this time were Box and MS Teams. Box had been in use in the Libraries for several years, but MS Teams was newer and not used in as widespread a manner across all staff.

To help folks decide what tool they wanted to use, we created some documentation comparing the various features of Box and MS Teams with the functionality folks were used to in Basecamp. We also created screencasts that demonstrated how one can use Tasks in Box or the Planner app within Teams for managing projects and assignments.

Basecamp to Teams and Box Features
Basecamp Teams Box Others
Campfire Chat Comments on Files, BoxNotes
Message Board Chat (can thread chats in Teams) Comments on Files, Box Notes
To-dos Tasks by Planner and To Do Task List
Schedule Channel Calendar, Tasks by Planner and To Do (timelines and due dates for tasks) Task List (due date scheduling) Outlook: Resource or Shared Calendar
Automatic Check-ins
Docs & Files Files tab (add Shortcut to OneDrive for desktop access) All of Box (add Box Drive for desktop access)
Email Forwards
Card Table Tasks by Planner and To Do MeisterTask

Managing Exported HTML Files

To be honest, having all our Basecamp created documents export as HTML files was challenging. In Box, the HTML files would just display the code view when opened online, and this was frustrating to our colleagues who use Box. While Teams would display the rendered web pages of the HTML files very well, any relative links between HTML files would be broken. For staff who wanted, essentially, a clone of their Basecamp project site, we directed them to use Box Drive or to sync a folder in their Team to OneDrive. When opened that way, the exported files would be navigable as normal, so we saw this as more of a challenge of guiding user behavior rather than manipulating the files themselves. Since we had encountered these issues in our preliminary testing of workflows and exports, we built that guidance into the first explanatory screencasts we made. Foregrounding those issues helped many people avoid them altogether.

Supporting Staff through the Transition

Overall, we had a very smooth transition for staff. In terms of time invested in this process, the Basecamp Migration Team spent a lot of time upfront preparing documentation and helpful how-to videos. We set up a centralized space for staff to find all of our documentation and to ask questions, and we also scheduled several blocks of open office hours to offer more personalized help. That work supported staff who were comfortable managing their own export, and the number of teams requiring administrator support or additional training ended up being manageable. The deadline for submitting requests for an administrator export was about one month before the cancellation date, but many teams submitted their requests earlier than that. All of these strategies worked well, and we felt very comfortable cancelling our account on the appointed day. We migrated out of Basecamp, and you can too!

Assessment, Technology

On Protecting Patron Privacy

First, a bit of history

Back in the summer of 2018, calls for applications for the National Web Privacy Forum started circulating around the library community. I’ll be honest — at that point I knew almost nothing about how libraries protect patron privacy. That summer I’d been conducting a library data inventory, interviewing stakeholders of various data systems across the library, and I had just gotten my first hints of some of the processes we use to protect the data we collect from patrons.

Long story short, Duke Libraries submitted an application to the Forum, we were selected, and I attended. The experience was really meaningful, and it gave me a nice overview of the various issues that affect a library’s ability to protect patron privacy. The following spring (2019), the leaders of the National Forum released an action handbook that recommended conducting a data privacy audit, and DUL undertook such an audit during the Fall of 2019. The results of that audit suggested that we still have a bit of work to do to make sure all of our systems are working together to protect our patrons.

Forming a task force

In response to the audit report, Duke Libraries charged a task force called the Data Privacy and Retention Task Force. Despite the pandemic and lockdown, this task force started meeting in the spring of 2020, and we met biweekly for the rest of the year. Our goals were to develop guiding principles and priorities around data privacy and retention, as well as to recommend specific project work that should be undertaken to improve our systems.

The task force included staff members from across the various divisions of the library. Pretty quickly, we determined that we all come with different experiences around patron privacy. We decided to begin with a sort of book club, identifying and reviewing introductory materials related to different components of patron privacy, from web analytics to the GDPR to privacy in archives and special collections. Once we all felt a bit more knowledgeable, we turned our attention to creating a statement of our priorities and principles.

Defining our values

There are a lot of existing statements of library values, and many make mention of patron privacy. Other documents that cover privacy values include regulatory documents and organizational privacy statements. Some of the statements we reviewed include:

Duke University Libraries' Strategic PlanWhile these statements are all relevant, the task force found some of them far too general to truly guide action for an organization. We were looking to create a document that outlined more specifics, helped us make decisions about how to organize our work. At Duke Libraries, we already have one document we use to organize our work and make decisions — our strategic plan.

When we reviewed the strategic plan, we noticed that for each section of the plan, a focus on patron privacy resulted in a set of implications for our work. To express these implications, we devised a rough hierarchy of directed action, indicating our ability and obligation to undertake certain actions.  We use the following terms in our final report:

For actions within our sphere of influence:

  • obligation: DUL should devote significant time and resources toward this work
  • responsibility: DUL should make a concerted effort toward this work, but the work may not receive the same attention and resources as that devoted to our obligations

For actions outside our sphere of influence:

  • commitment: DUL will need to partner with other groups to perform this work and thus cannot promise to accomplish all tasks

An example of our principles and priorities

One section from our strategic plan is Strategic Priority #2: Our Libraries Teach and Support Emerging Literacies. Within this priority, the strategic plan identifies the following goals:

  1. Expand the presence of library staff in the student experience in order to understand and support emerging scholarship, information, data, and literacy needs
  2. Mentor first-year students in scholarly research and learning practices, embracing and building upon their diverse backgrounds, prior knowledge, literacies, and expectations as they begin their Duke experience.
  3. Partner with faculty to develop research methods, curricula, and collaborative projects connecting their courses to our collections.
  4. Enhance the library instruction curriculum, focusing on standards and best practices for pedagogy that will prepare users for lifelong learning in a global and ever-changing research environment.

In our final report, Priorities and Guiding Principles for Protecting Patron Privacy, we identify the following actions for this same strategic priority:

  • We have an obligation to communicate in plain language what data we and our partners collect while providing our services.
  • We have a responsibility to provide education, tools, and collection materials to shed light on the general processes of information exchange behind technology systems.
  • We commit to partnering with researchers seeking to understand the effects of information exchange processes and related policy interventions.

We now have the strategic plan, which outlines types of activities we might undertake, and the new report on protecting patron privacy, which adds to that list new activities and methods to achieve patron privacy protections in each area.

Next steps

The final work of the task force was to propose new project work based on our identified priorities and principles. The task force will share a list of recommended projects with library administration, who will start the hard work of evaluating these projects and identifying staff to undertake them. In the meantime, we hope the report will offer immediate guidance to staff for considerations they should be taking in different areas of their work, as well as serving as a model for future documents that guide our efforts.

Assessment

Library study space design: Intentional, inclusive, flexible

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In the Assessment & User Experience department, one of our ongoing tasks is to gather and review patron feedback in order to identify problems and suggest improvements. While the libraries offer a wide variety of services to our patrons, one of the biggest and trickiest areas to get right is the design of our physical spaces. Typically inhabited by students, our library study spaces come in a variety of sizes and shapes and are distributed somewhat haphazardly throughout our buildings. How can we design our study spaces to meet the needs of our patrons? When we have study spaces with different features, how can we let our patrons know about them?

These questions and the need for a deeper assessment of library study space design inspired the formation of a small team – the Spaces With Intentional Furniture Team (or SWIFT). This team was charged with identifying best practices in study space furniture arrangement, as well as making recommendations on opportunities for improvements to existing spaces and outreach efforts. The team reviewed and summarized relevant literature on library study space design in report (public version now available). In this post, we will share a few of the most surprising and valuable suggestions from our literature review.

Increase privacy in large, open spaces

Some of the floors in our library buildings have large, open study spaces that can accommodate a large number of patrons. Because study space is limited, we are highly motivated to make the most of the space we have. The way a space is designed, however, influences how comfortable patrons feel spending a lot of time in the space.

With large open spaces, the topic of privacy came up across several different studies. In this context, privacy relates to both to visibility in a space and to the ability to make noise without being overheard. Even when policies allow for noise in a space, a lack of privacy can make students nervous to go ahead and be noisy. For spaces where silence is the norm, a lack of privacy can make patrons feel on display and especially nervous about any movements or sound they might make.

The literature suggests that there are ways to improve privacy in open spaces. For group spaces, placing dividers or partitions between group table arrangements may both offer privacy and provide useful amenities, like writeable surfaces. For quiet spaces, privacy can be improved by varying the type and height of furniture and by turning furniture in different directions so individuals are not facing each other. Seating density should also be restricted in quiet spaces.

Isolate noisy zones from quiet zones

Controlling noise is a common topic in the literature. Libraries are some of the only spaces on campus that offer a quiet study environment, but the need for quiet spaces needs to be balanced with the need to engage in the increasingly collaborative work required by modern classes. Libraries are often in central locations on campus and offer prime real estate for groups to meet in between or after classes. How to provide enough quiet space for people who need to work without distractions while still accommodating group work and socializing?

Once strategy is to make sure that people feel comfortable with making noise in spaces where it is encouraged. Libraries can position noisy spaces to take advantage of other sources of noise to provide some noise “cover” – for example,  a staff service desk, copy machines, elevators, and meeting rooms.  Quiet spaces should be isolated from these sources of noise, perhaps by placing them on separate floors. Stacks can also help separate spaces, as books provide some sound absorption, and the visual obstruction reduces visual distractions for students studying quietly.

Reservable private study rooms meet several needs

Sometimes, enforcing noise policies to keep spaces quiet only solves part of the problem. Quiet study spaces reduce distractions caused by noise, but students can be sensitive to other kinds of distractions – visual distractions, strong or chemical smells, etc. For students needing spaces completely free of distractions, libraries might consider creating reservable rooms available for individual study.

This kind of service is useful for more than low-distraction study needs. Making exceptions for pandemics, libraries often employ a first-come, first-served approach to seats in study spaces. Patrons with mobility issues or limited time to study would benefit greatly from being able to reserve a study space in advance. Identifying reservable study spaces for individuals, either within a larger study space or as part of a set of reservable private rooms, might meet a variety of currently unmet needs.

Physical spaces need web presences

As SWIFT begins to think about recommendations, we know we have to address our outreach around spaces. Patrons currently have few options for learning about our spaces. We have some signage in our buildings to identify different noise policies, and we have a few websites that give a basic overview of the spaces, but patrons are often reduced to simply performing exhaustive circuits around the buildings to discover all that we have available. More likely, students find a few of our spaces either by chance or by word of mouth, and if those spaces don’t meet their needs, they may not return.

One detailed review (Brunskill, 2020) offers very explicit guidance on the design of websites to support patrons with disabilities. As is commonly true, improvements that support one group of patrons often improve services for all patrons. Prominently sharing the following information about physical spaces will better support all patrons looking to find their space in the libraries:

  • details about navigating physical spaces (maps, floorplans, photos)
  • sensory information for spaces (noise, privacy, lighting, chemical sensitivity)
  • physical building accessibility
  • parking/transportation information
  • disability services contact (with name, contact form)
  • assistive technologies hardware and equipment
  • any accessibility problems with spaces

Next steps

Throughout our literature review, we saw the same advice over and over again: patrons need variety. There is no one-size-fits-all solution to patron needs. Luckily, at Duke we have several library buildings and many many study spaces. With some careful planning, we should be able to take an intentional approach to our space design in order to better accommodate the needs of our patrons. The libraries have new groups tasked with acting on these and related recommendations, and while it may take some time, our goal is to create a shared understanding of the best practices for library study space design.

Relevant Literature

Furniture Arrangement

Noise Isolation

Private Study Rooms

Websites about Spaces

Assessment

Learning from Our Students

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Every other year, the Duke University Libraries survey our patrons to learn more about their opinions about library spaces, services, and materials. Our biennial satisfaction survey for 2020 targeted our student patrons (both undergraduate and graduate) and covered topics from navigation of our buildings to website features to access to electronic materials.

Earlier this year, the survey was sent to a sample of 4,000 of our undergraduate and graduate students and was also linked from the library homepage for other students to complete. Almost 2,800 students participated in the survey, about half of whom were undergraduates (spread fairly evenly across all four years of study, except for an overrepresentation of first-year students).

While we will spend several more months reviewing the results and identifying opportunities to improve our services, we have completed our initial analysis of both the fixed choice and free text questions. The following high-level takeaways represent the major themes that emerged across the survey responses.

  1. Students feel safe and welcome in our libraries.
  2. Students cherish the support from library and security staff.
  3. Our Top Textbook initiative has had a huge impact on students.
  4. We need better communication of our norms and enforcement of our policies.
  5. Individuals and small groups have trouble locating private places to work.
  6. Students want better lighting and access to greenery and outdoor spaces.

1. Students feel safe and welcome in our libraries.

This year, we asked students how much they agree with the following statement: “I feel safe from discrimination, harassment, and emotional and physical harm at… Duke University/Duke Libraries.”

The results show that for Duke University, 90% of students at least somewhat agree. For Duke Libraries, 95% of students at least somewhat agree with the statement, and 83% strongly agree. (Note: we asked a similar question in 2018 and saw a similar pattern, but the results aren’t directly comparable because we changed question and the response options.)

Another way we measure how students feel about the library is to ask about their agreement with an additional statement: “For me, the library is a welcoming place.”

Student agreement with this statement was quite high, especially among international and graduate students.

A quote from a response to one of our free-text questions nicely captures some of these reflections from students:

“I generally feel safe and included at the Duke libraries – I particularly like the diverse/inclusive the art installations in the front entrance and at the back of the first floor. These make me feel more included and I wish there were more of them!”

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

2. Students cherish the support from library and security staff.

Our survey didn’t specifically ask students if they are satisfied with library staff. This message, however, came through loud and clear in our qualitative comments.

After asking students about whether they feel safe at Duke and at Duke Libraries, we offered them the opportunity to explain with a free-text question (“Please describe your response and your experience with the Duke University Libraries in this context.”).  Of the 260 responses to this question that mentioned library staff, 246 responses (or 95%) were compliments of the staff.

“I appreciate that the Duke Librarians, more than anyone else, go out of their way to make visible their commitment to allyship and inclusivity.”

“Duke libraries staff are extremely kind and caring. They have not judged me for who I am or what I need help with.”

“Everyone I’ve interacted with at the Library has been absolutely wonderful – from folks at the reference desk to the Center for Data and Visualization Sciences staff.”

Other questions were phrased to encourage critiques or requests, but even those questions included staff compliments.

“Keep hiring helpful and kind staff.”

“Great staff! I’ve always found everyone at Duke Libraries very friendly and helpful whenever I run into a library problem I can’t figure out.”

Our Libraries have several groups of staff that interact directly and regularly with our students. We were delighted to see that an important part of our staff family, the security guards, were complimented very explicitly by survey participants.

“The ample lighting and security presence makes me feel that I can be at Duke even when it is late.”

“I feel very safe at the Library knowing that there is always a guard making his/her way around the library and looking out for students. It has been one of my favorite places to work in the University.”

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

  • Began work on improvements to security guard training to emphasize the impact of smiling and greetings on student feelings of safety and welcome
  • Provided optional buttons to all staff: pronouns, the trans flag and the LGBTQ flag with the DUL reading devil overlay
  • Encouraged staff to attend Ally/PRIDE trainings and then display their certifications on their staff directory pages
  • Shared DUL User Service Philosophy with all new DUL staff and students

3. Our Top Textbook initiative has had a huge impact on students.

The Libraries currently make textbooks available for short-term loan for the top 100 courses each semester (by enrollment). When asked about services that are important to them, 39% of undergraduates* list this “Top Textbooks” program as important, which means the service ranks right below core library services like ePrint, reservable rooms, and drop-in assistance at a service desk.

“I often take out textbooks for classes on reserve, have taken out a few books, and often study there.”

Furthermore, perhaps thanks to increased marketing efforts following our 2018 survey, only 7% of undergraduates report that they are unaware of the service. About 52% of undergraduates have given some response about how well it meets their needs, suggesting they have some experience using the service.

While this program seems to have had success for outreach and use, students still have some unmet needs in this area. When we ask about the services we should be expanding, just over 50% of undergraduates report that expansions to the textbook program would improve their experience a lot.

“Have more copies of textbooks (I really do enjoy the ones they do have – thanks!!).”

“In a perfect world, the Library [would have] multiple copies of most of the textbooks used by professors. While the inventory of books is huge, the library is missing the ones we actually use in the Econ department.”

* – Note: this question was only shown to students who selected our main West and East Campus libraries as their primary libraries, which comprises only about 92% of undergraduates who identified a primary library.

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

  • Increased outreach around this program by targeting faculty teaching supported courses and asking them to advertise program in syllabi
  • Increased physical signage about program around library buildings
  • Note: result of marketing efforts was 150% increase in use of program between spring 2019 and fall 2019

4. We need better communication of our norms and enforcement of our policies.

Unfortunately, students do also experience frustrations in our spaces. One example is the navigation of our spaces, especially the three connected West Campus libraries: Rubenstein, Perkins, and Bostock. On this survey, we asked if students feel confident locating a print book in the library. This question received the second lowest average agreement score of the options presented, for both undergraduates and graduates. Overall, about 23% of students lack confidence in their ability to locate a print book.

As you might expect when a large group of people shares a limited resource, students often struggle to negotiate the use of our study spaces. One area of great importance for effective studying is noise level. Some prefer absolute quiet, some prefer a low-level murmur, and others need to be able to converse freely with friends and project teammates. The Libraries have established noise norms for the various study zones in our libraries, but survey comments suggest that these norms are unclear or not always followed.

“[The Libraries should] separate talking zone and quiet zone more precisely. Someone may chat in considerate quiet zone for a long time, which is annoying.”

Furthermore, over the course of the last few years, we have seen a growth in reports of social groups that “take over” spaces and violate, especially, the noise norms of those spaces. While this stresses already taxed resources by using up seats in study spaces for social activities, it is also regularly mentioned as behavior that harms the welcoming and inclusive atmosphere of the library.

“Do away with the ‘assigned’ seating based on group membership!”

“I feel like groups of people frequent the library and there is no space for inclusion or initiatives to get people going to the library that look like me.”

“I don’t know how this would be done, but I would feel more comfortable in the libraries if undergraduate students didn’t claim and allocate spaces for themselves according to their social groups. As a graduate student of color, I don’t feel comfortable in those spaces.

“I think having the library as ‘satellite sections’ for some Greek organizations can make the library feel daunting. If there is a way to do away with this that would be great.”

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

Along with the previously mentioned diversity and inclusion activities, the Libraries are exploring ways of improving the communication of norms and enforcing policies.

  • Began working with Dean of Students Sue Wasiolek and other Student Affairs administrators to address the issues students experience in the Libraries
  • Developed and distributed new signage around finding books in the library, including instructions about how to read a Library of Congress call number
  • Initiated a redesign of our noise norm signage
  • Proposed new furniture arrangements for large, quiet study spaces that discourage conversation and group congregation
  • Began work on improvements to security guard training to empower them to identify and address policy violations and promote a more inclusive environment

5. Individuals and small groups have trouble locating private places to work.

Identifying the best furniture for different study spaces is a constant challenge. On this survey, we asked students about expanded services that improve their experience of the library. Out of 18 options covering furniture, spaces, and other services, the top request for both undergraduate and graduate students was individual desks, with 64% of students responding that they would improve the library experience “a lot.”

“I think some more individual study spaces would be very welcome. I prefer to work on the fourth floor because the desks with dividers are very useful in separating you from others so that you can concentrate on your work and not be bothered by anyone. There are few spaces like this, except for study rooms. Perhaps some more desks with dividers or separate spaces for individual work can help people to have a safe space where they will be free from others attempting to make them feel unsafe.”

Some students report frustration that resources like individual desks aren’t always being used as efficiently as possible. While the Libraries have a policy that belongings should not be used to “reserve” a study space for longer than 15 minutes, this policy is difficult to enforce, leading to spaces that are unusable for long periods of time.

“More individual study rooms and carrels. More seating in general. Somehow stop people from reserving carrels and tables by leaving their belongings there while being away for long periods of time. (Sometimes I am looking for an individual place to sit and it seems like half of the carrels have just belongings left there.) The reservable study rooms seem to all get booked quickly during the finals period, which is disappointing because they are very good to use for working on group final projects.”

Private spaces like  group study rooms and interview rooms are extremely popular among students, consistently ranking in the top 5 for important services and the bottom 5 for how well services are meeting students’ needs, as well as being highly ranked among services that should be expanded. As with desk space, these resources can be informally reserved by leaving belongings in an empty room, leading to frustration when a group needing study space cannot find an empty room. Policies like limits on the amount of time a group can reserve a room and a requirement that rooms be used for group work (or interviews) attempt to make sure these rooms serve their intended purpose, but it is very difficult to enforce those policies.

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

  • Created and improved documentation of room policies
  • Began work on new signage for group study rooms to reinforce policies and empower students to push back on inappropriate usages of the spaces
  • Made recommendations for new furniture purchases in line with student needs and desires
  • Proposed new furniture arrangements for large, quiet study spaces that discourage conversation and group congregation
  • Proposed new signage and directories throughout the library to make it easier for students to locate study spaces
  • Enhanced the Find Library Spaces portal page to help students identify spaces appropriate for the type of work they need to do

6. Students want better lighting and access to greenery and outdoor spaces.

A final growing trend among students is the request for spaces that take better advantage of nature. In additional to several free-text comments that mentioned outdoor spaces, outdoor library spaces ranked second in the list of requests for expanded services.

“Incorporate more outdoor study spaces around the library and adding more areas to study with lots of windows and natural light.”

“be a space for a spectrum of socialization and quiet studying, with outdoor space and natural lighting (design for wellness)”

“More plants and green space. This is something I would love to help organize and coordinate.”

This single comment seems to capture all major trends we found in our initial analysis:

“Improve signage to reduce the chaotic feel of navigating the library, create a clearer, less confusing, and more welcoming library layout, increase rooms available for reservation for study or meetings, provide more and more comfortable quiet section seating, improve natural lighting, generally improve the library interiors to match the attractiveness of their facades, provide more printers.”

Duke Libraries’ response to this finding:

    • Refreshed paint, lighting, and carpet in key areas of the library
    • Installed new LED lights throughout the building
    • Advocated for more live plants in the building
    • Proposed outdoor spaces for future renovations
    • Enhanced WIFI access on the patio outside Bostock Library

Next Steps

Our biennial satisfaction surveys offer a high-level view of patron satisfaction and give us a lot of actionable information. The surveys can’t answer every question, however, and often don’t provide enough detail to make specific recommendations. Our complete assessment program elaborates on these results with in-depth user studies, feedback from our student advisory boards, focus groups, and other smaller studies. Over the next two years, we will blend these results with additional data, identify and prioritize projects, and make improvements to our spaces and services.

Credit to UC Berkeley Library for the inspiration for this post.

Assessment

Where do patrons get lost? A study of library navigation.

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In the Assessment & User Experience Department, we’re always looking for ways to improve how our patrons experience the libraries’ physical and online spaces. One of our primary ways of learning about our patrons is our biennial user satisfaction survey, which we use to collect opinions from large groups of our patrons about a wide range of issues.

One topic that comes up regularly among our patrons is the navigation of our physical spaces. Like many libraries, our buildings have evolved over time, and that can make navigating our spaces a bit complicated. On Duke’s West Campus, we have three library buildings that are interconnected – Rubenstein Library, Perkins Library, and Bostock Library. Responses and comments on our biennial survey confirm what we hear anecdotally – patrons have trouble navigating these three buildings.

Deep Dive into Navigation Concerns

But how can we follow up on these reports to improve navigation in our spaces? Ideally, we would gather data from a large number of people over a long period of time to find very common and problematic navigation issues. Our biennial survey offers data from a large number of people over time, but it isn’t a great format for gathering detailed data about narrow subjects like navigation.  Conducting an observational study of our spaces would explore navigation directly, but it would only include a small number of people, and the likelihood that we would catch individuals having trouble with navigation is low. We could try conducting ad hoc surveys of patrons in our spaces, but it would be difficult to ensure we are including people who have had navigation trouble, and it may be difficult for patrons to recall their navigation trouble on the spot.

What we needed was a way of capturing common examples of patrons having trouble with navigation. We decided that, instead of asking patrons themselves, our best resource would be library staff. We know that when patrons are lost in our buildings, they may reach out to staff members they see nearby. By surveying staff instead of patrons, we take advantage of staff who know the buildings well and who are commonly in particular areas of the buildings, noticing and offering help to our struggling patrons.

We decided to send a very simple survey to all staff in these library buildings. Staff could fill it out multiple times, and the only two questions were:

  • What is a common question you have helped patrons with?
  • Where are the patrons when they have this question, typically?

We had a great response from staff (72 responses from 36 individuals), and analyzing the responses showed several sources of confusion.

Pie chart showing categories of responses to library navigation survey. 35% of responses reported patrons in the wrong building. 26% reported patrons in the right general area. The rest were split amongst "wrong campus building," "wrong floor", and "can't find books."

Focusing on questions where patrons are in library spaces and not near a help desk, two concerns account for over 60% of reported patron navigation issues:

  • Building confusion
  • Hidden rooms

Trouble Between Buildings

Our three connected library buildings, unfortunately, connect in ways that are not obvious to new visitors. Because buildings only connect on certain levels, it is easy for patrons to be looking for a location on the right floor but the wrong building. By asking staff for specific locations of both patrons and their desired destination, we could compile the most frequent problems that involve being in the wrong building. Unsurprisingly, the locations that cause the most difficulty are our large meeting rooms and classroom spaces, especially those that are not on the ground floor of the buildings.

The most common problems seem to happen when patrons leave the first floor while in the wrong building, expecting the buildings to connect on the other floors (or not realizing which building they are in). As you can see from the side-view of our buildings below, the Perkins and Bostock library building have easy connections on all floors, but the Rubenstein Library only connects to Perkins on the first floor. Our survey confirmed that this causes many issues for patrons looking for 2nd floor or Lower Level meeting rooms in Perkins and upper level meeting rooms in Rubenstein.

A diagram showing a side-view of navigation between the three library buildings. Rubenstein and Perkins connect on the first floor. Perkins and Bostock connect on all but the first floor.

While we are still in the process of developing and testing possible solutions, we hope to redesign signage in a way that better signposts when patrons should proceed onward on the current floor and when they should transition up or down.

Trouble on the Same Floor

Our survey suggests, unfortunately, that it is not enough to get patrons to the correct floor. Depending on the route the patron takes, there are still common destinations that are difficult to see from stairwells, elevators, and main hallways. Again, this difficulty tends to arise when patrons are looking for meeting rooms. This makes sense, as events held in our meeting rooms can attract patrons who have not yet been to our buildings.

Staff reports for same-floor confusion focus largely on floors where room entrances are hidden in recesses or around corners and where rooms are spaced apart such that it is hard to simply follow room number signage. As a notable example, the 2nd floor of Perkins Library seems especially confusing to patrons, with many different types of destinations, few of which are visible from main entrances and hallways. In the diagram below, you can see some of the main places patrons get lost, indicating a need for better signage visible from these locations. (Pink question marks indicate the lost patrons. Red arrowheads indicate the desired destinations.)

A floor plan of Perkins 2nd floor, with curved arrows showing reports of patrons who are far away from their desired destination.

As we develop solutions to highlight locations of hidden rooms, we are considering options like large vinyl lettering or perpendicular corridor signs that alert people to rooms around corners.

Final Thoughts

This technique worked really well for this informal study – it gave us a great place to start exploring new design solutions, and we can be more proactive about testing new navigation signage before we make permanent changes. Thanks for your great information, DUL staff!

Assessment, Collections, Projects

Data Sciencing our Journal Subscriptions

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The ongoing tensions between academic institutions and publishers have been escalating the last few months, but those tensions have existed for many years. The term “Big Deal” has been coined to describe a long-standing, industry-wide practice of journal bundling that forces libraries to subscribe to unwanted and unneeded publications rather than paying more for a limited number of individual subscriptions. This is a practice you see in other industries – for example, cable packages that provide hundreds of channels, even if you only want one or two specific channels.

What is especially problematic in higher education is that academics produce and review the content that gets published in the journals (for free), and then the universities have to pay the publishers a subscription fee to access the content. Imagine if YouTube required a subscription fee to watch any videos, including the ones you had posted. It’s a system that makes research harder to access and inhibits global scientific progress, all so publishers can earn an enormous profit margin.

Right now, academic publishing is controlled by five publishers (the “Big Five”) – a monopoly that makes it very difficult for libraries to negotiate better deals. Only very large organizations or consortia, like the University of California, have been able to start pushing back against the system. It will likely take large shake-ups like this for any large changes to take hold, but it in the meantime there may be ways to situate ourselves for making better purchasing decisions.

At Duke, we often review our usage of specific journal titles as we prepare to make purchasing decisions. Usage data comes in a variety of forms, but the most popular are counts of Duke views and downloads that come directly from the publishers and the number of times Duke authors publish in or cite a particular journal. There are many other kinds of data that might be of interest, however, including Duke participation on editorial boards, usage differences across disciplines, and even whether or not the journal is fully open access. Blending various data sources and optimizing the search decisions for a given budget cycle can be overwhelming.

Last fall, Duke University Libraries decided to propose a project for Duke’s Data+ summer program – a summer research experience in data science for undergraduate students. Our project, “Breaking the Bundle: Analyzing Duke’s Journal Subscriptions“, focuses on Duke’s subscriptions to journals published by Elsevier. The program is in its third week, and our team of two incredibly-sharp undergraduates has been hard at work building and blending our datasets. Our goal by the end of summer is to have a proof-of-concept dashboard that lets collection managers adjust the weights of various usage measures to generate an ideal collection of journals for a particular budget.

It is still very early in the process, but the students have been hard at work and have made great progress. We decided it would be best to develop the analysis software and dashboard using R, a statistical computing project with a rich history and many helpful development tools. In addition to publisher-provided views and downloads, the students have been able to use websites and APIs to collect data on journal open access status, editorial boards, numbers of publications, and numbers of citations. All Data+ teams present publicly on the projects twice during the summer, and we hope to schedule a third talk for a library audience before the end of the program on August 2.

Sample R code from the project
Just one of many files of R code generated for the project so far.

We look forward to seeing what the summer will bring! While this project is just one small step, automating the collection and analysis of journal usage will position us well, both for responsible purchases and for a hopefully-changing publishing landscape.

Assessment

Wrangling Messy Data with Airtable

The Assessment & User Experience department at Duke University Libraries keeps the libraries’ physical and virtual spaces responsive to user needs by constantly gathering feedback. In additional to our biennial user satisfaction survey, we run usability tests, hold focus groups, and host meetings of our student advisory boards, all in an effort to keep a finger on the pulse of the DUL patrons.

These activities can generate a lot of unstructured data! For example, in a typical meeting of our undergraduate advisory board, we might collect feedback from a dozen or more students, generating seven or more pages of notes and covering a range of topics. We review and act upon some of these comments immediately, but others may influence longer-term planning. As library staff, we know how important it is to store information in a way that promotes future access. This year we decided to pilot a new system for storing and describing our unstructured data.

Airtable logoEnter Airtable. If you’re not familiar, Airtable is a cloud-based database solution. Similar to Google Sheets, Airtable lets you enter and share data in your web browser, but it also offers more powerful features for projects that have messy data or interconnected components. There are many Airtable templates to show off the different features, including project trackers, event planners, and even product catalogs.

For our messy data, we built a simple spreadsheet that was general enough to collect data from a variety of sources. We included columns like basic demographics, the feedback provided, the original question or prompt, the date when feedback was provided, and how we collected the feedback. Then we took advantage of Airtable’s special features to create a column for topical tags. One of the column types in Airtable is called “multiple select“, which means you can add multiple tags to a single comment. Other spreadsheets can’t understand a list of tags in a single cell, but Airtable treats each tag separately and allows us to group and filter comments by each individual tag.

a screenshot of an Airtable database with tagged comments

The ability to look at comments across different feedback channels in one central location has enormous potential. Instead of having to hunt through old Word documents or emails, we have a single database that can be searched, sorted, or filtered to explore trends in comments over time. When a question comes up about how patrons feels about a particular service or space, we can compile data much more easily, and we no longer have to rely on our memory of what feedback we’ve received and when.

screenshot of Airtable tutorial instructions

Airtable’s free accounts have a limited number of rows allowed in each database,  but they do offer a discount on paid plans to educational institutions. We’re only just starting to explore the potential of Airtable, but so far we’ve been happy with the ability to collect our messy data in one place and organize comments with tags.

Want to learn more? Take a look at our recent tutorial on using Airtable for coding survey data, originally offered at the Designing For Digital 2019 conference.

Assessment, User Experience

Find your haven at Oasis Perkins

(Thanks to Assessment and User Experience Intern Brenda Yang for this post and for her amazing work on Oasis Perkins!)

What if it was possible to unwind – color, do a jigsaw puzzle, meditate – without leaving the Libraries?

It is at Oasis Perkins! This high-ceilinged refuge is tucked into the fourth floor of Perkins in room 418. It’s a perfect place to escape any finals-related tension palpable in study spaces this time of year.

A floor plan showing the location of Oasis Perkins on the 4th Floor of Perkins LibraryYou’ll find:

  • Yoga mats and meditation cushions
  • A jigsaw puzzle table
  • Coloring books, logic puzzles, and sudoku pages
  • Origami paper and instruction books
  • A quiet nook
  • A white noise machine
  • Plenty of natural light (during the day)
  • And more to explore!

Unlike other fourth floor spaces in Perkins and Bostock meant for silent study, feel free to chat and connect with a friend or strangers, or simply sit and reflect quietly.

How did Oasis Perkins come to be?

A photo of different types of teas from the Tea-laxation event.

One major motivation was direct feedback from students. Comments from our 2018 Student Library Satisfaction Survey made clear that while study spaces at the Duke Libraries are a keystone of many students’ academic lives, it can be a stressful place, especially during the exam season: “I love coming to the library during most of the semester… particularly during finals, there is an overwhelming sense of stress that emanates from the other students at the library.” A few students explicitly requested “a room to relax,” a place to have have a “refreshing study break without leaving the library somehow,” or a “stress-relief room.”

We hope that Oasis Perkins can serve as a dedicated place for students to nurture their well-being, fitting into the ecosystem of Oasis West and Oasis East (which are managed by Duke Wellness). However, Oasis Perkins is located, of course, right inside of Perkins Library – and its doors don’t close.

You’ll also find occasional events hosted in Oasis Perkins, from Koru Meditation classes to “Tea-laxation” events. Check out the Oasis Perkins webpage to stay up to date on events, or be in touch if your organization would like to host a relevant get together in this space!

You can find a smaller space on the second floor at the Prayer and Meditation Room in Perkins 220.

Other Wellness Resources at Duke

For other tips and events to help you end the semester strong, check out the Duke Libraries End of Semester Survival Guide. There are also a number of resources right on Duke’s campus to support your mental health, which include:

Oasis Perkins has existed in its current form for only one short semester! Is there something that could change about the Oasis Perkins that would help you re-charge? Our team at the Libraries would love to make it better for you. Fill out a feedback from in the suggestion box in Oasis Perkins, or reach out to brenda.yang@duke.edu with your comments or suggestions.

Assessment, User Experience

Textbooks and Bean Bags: The 2018 Student Library Satisfaction Survey

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This spring, Duke University Libraries conducted the 2018 biennial user satisfaction survey, a large survey of students and faculty at Duke. The goal of the survey is to gauge overall user satisfaction and to gather specific ideas for improvements to DUL materials, services, and spaces. In this post, we’ll share some of the trends within the student responses.

Survey methodology

Since 2013, DUL has created custom surveys rather than use generic survey products, allowing us to customize questions to different patron groups and even different parts of the campus libraries system. Developing and analyzing the results of a customized survey, however, is no small feat! The survey is run every two years, in part because the full cycle of survey development, dissemination, analysis, and follow-up takes the entire two years.

The 2018 survey was deployed in January 2018. A sample of students and faculty received personal invitations over email, but the survey was also advertised on the DUL website and open to anyone. We received responses from 2,610 students. We don’t have full demographic information for everyone, but approximately 54% of the students for whom we have demographics were undergraduates. The survey took approximately five to seven minutes to complete.

Two pie charts. One pie chart shows the distribution of the total 2,610 student participants (48% undergraduate, 41% graduate, 12% unknown). The second pie chart shows the distribution of the 2,307 participants that don't include unknown (54% undergraduate, 46% graduate).
After the survey closed, a group of seven staff at DUL divided up approximately 3,600 free-text responses and manually coded them for topic and, where appropriate, whether they were a request for a new service or change in existing policy or a compliment. The survey data have been visualized in a series of public dashboards. To gather additional information about some of the results, the Assessment & User Experience department also hosted several follow-up focus groups with both students and faculty. The focus group results, while not incorporated into the survey dashboards, have been incorporated into summary reports and recommendations.

The good

“I think the library is one of the places of greatest mutual respect on campus. There is less social stratification and freer flow of interaction. I enjoy my time in the library quite a lot.”

The survey included questions that everyone answered and questions that were specific to different libraries. All survey participants identified which library they visited most frequently. For students, 77% selected Perkins & Bostock as their primary libraries. Only 3% (76 students) reported that they don’t physically visit a library.

A bubble chart showing the libraries visited most frequently by students. Perkins & Bostock Libraries are highest with 77%, followed by Lilly Library with 11% and Divinity Library with 6%.

The libraries are considered an important part of the Duke experience by over 80% of participants. Focusing on the students who picked Perkins & Bostock as their primary libraries, we can look at usage of and satisfaction with the library. Of the 1,978 students who responded, over 80% visit Perkins & Bostock at least once a week. And by and large, students are quite satisfied with Perkins & Bostock. Less than 1% of responses fall in the “not satisfied at all” or “not very satisfied” categories, and the vast majority are very satisfied.

Three related bar charts. The first bar chart shows responses to a question asking students to agree that the library is an important part of their experience. 30% of students selected "somewhat agree," and 51% selected "strongly agree." A second chart shows that, for the Perkins & Bostock Libraries, 18% of students visit once a week, 38% visit more than once a week, and 25% visit daily. The third chart shows that for overall satisfaction with Perkins & Bostock, 14% are somewhat satisfied, 65% are very satisfied, and 21% are extremely satisfied.

The Duke University Libraries value diversity of thought, perspective, experience, and background and are actively committed to a culture of inclusion and respect. Beyond gauging user satisfaction, this year we also asked students about their impressions of Duke and DUL as safe spaces. (In the survey, “safe space” was defined as “a place in which people can feel safe from discrimination, harassment, and any other emotional or physical harm.”) We were excited to find that overall students agree that DUL is a safe space (92% respond with “agree” or “strongly agree”), even more than they agree that Duke University as a whole is a safe space (78% response with “agree” or “strongly agree”). Similarly, when asked if the library is a welcoming place, almost 90% agreed. Despite these encouraging numbers, we are committed to continuing to improve in this area wherever we can.

Three related bar charts. The first chart shows that when asked if Duke University is a safe space, 44% somewhat agree and 34% strongly agree. The second chart shows that when asked if the Duke Libraries are a safe space, 32% somewhat agree and 60% strongly agree. The third chart shows that when asked if the library is a welcoming place, 35% somewhat agree and 53% strongly agree.

The So-So

“I use the libraries a lot to study (esp Bostock) with friends, which is both helpful for me academically and comforting for me socially. The libraries fills up pretty often during busy times, so I wonder if more chairs would help accommodate more students (not even more tables, just more seating). Thanks!”

Even though by-and-large students are satisfied with the libraries, they were not afraid to let us know what areas could be improved! They gave us their constructive criticism in a few ways. First, we asked students to offer their opinions on the possibility of expanding different types of library services. Next, we asked how important specific services, materials, and spaces were, as well as how they were meeting the students’ needs. Finally, we gave them the opportunity to offer additional comments about DUL and suggestions on how to make DUL more of a safe space.

When we asked students what services should be expanded, students were most likely to vote for more spaces for individual study, more spaces for collaborative study, and more textbooks to check out. A second tier of requests include better signage, delivery of items between campuses, lockers, and help with digital scholarship.

A stacked bar chart showing the results to a question about the desirability of various specific services. The most desirable service is "more spaces for quiet or individual study," which 88% of responding students said would improve their experience either a little or a lot. Second is "more spaces for collaborative study" with 80% of responding students. Third is "more textbooks to check out for my classes" with 71% of responding students.

Looking at library-specific responses, we can find a bit more detail about these requests. When looking for services that are both important and not meeting students’ needs, we can see that reservable project/study rooms, a variety of seating options,  adequate quiet study space, and textbooks on reserve all appear in the high quadrant for both importance and not meeting students’ needs.

A scatterplot showing that four services are high on importance and on the percentage of students whose needs are not met: adequate quiet study space; variety of seating options; reservable study/project rooms; and print book, textbooks and articles on reserve for classes.

While not every student followed up on these questions with free-text explanations, the analysis of the free-text comments are consistent with these results. Of the 769 student comments that included requests for new services or a change in policy (rather than compliments), the top code was study/research space, which accounts for approximately 12% of the total requests. The second most frequent code was noise (about 9.5% of the requests), clarifying some of the complaints about “adequate quiet study space.” Requests often include a desire for the Libraries’ quiet space policies to be better enforced. The third most frequent code was atmosphere/sense of welcome – e.g., how inviting the library feels, feelings of “stress in the air.” This code was applied to just over 8% of the requests.

A bar chart showing the top 10 topical tags for requests, including study/research space (about 12%), noise (about 9.5%), and atmosphere/sense of welcome (just over 8%)

Security, furniture, advertising, and signage also ranked highly among requests. Students seem especially desirous of “comfortable” seating; write-in comments mention several types of comfortable seating by name, including couches and bean bags.

The Unknown

“Having taken this survey, I have realized that there are many things which the Duke University Libraries offer which I am not currently taking advantage of…”

While student needs and reactions change over time, one thing remains the same: they unknowingly request services we already offer. Sometimes the survey itself alerts students to particular services.

When we ask students how certain services are meeting their needs or which services should be expanded, we offer a choice labelled “I didn’t know the the library provided this.” Here are some of our most pressing “marketing opportunities,” according to the number of people who were unaware of the service.

A dumbbell plot showing the percentage of students who didn't know about a service, split into those who did find the service important to their research, coursework or teaching and those who did not. Regardless of importance, the service with the highest percentage of students who did not know about it was "support for using, analyzing, and visualizing data." Second highest was "self-checkout stations," followed by "scheduled assistance from library staff."

For each service, there are two values – one for the students who marked the service as important and another for those who didn’t. As might be expected, awareness is always lower among students who don’t find the service important, but there are also services that have lower awareness overall. Services like support analyzing data, self-checkout stations, meetings with library staff, and reservable interview rooms may be good candidates for increased marketing. (If you look at the previous scatterplot, you’ll see that reservable interview rooms also had a high value for students whose needs weren’t being met, even though it’s not rated very highly on importance.)

Another good indicator of marketing opportunities is our analysis of the students’ free-text comments. Some of the major requests from students actually match up well with some of our existing but possibly under-advertised services.

We already know that students are always on the lookout for quiet study spaces. This need is especially pronounced for graduate students, who seem to feel outnumbered by undergraduates, who need quiet space for long periods to work on independent research projects, and who don’t always have private office space elsewhere on campus. When we asked students about services they would like us to expand, we offered them the opportunity to comment on “Additional specialized spaces for honors researchers, graduate students, or other student populations.” Out of 281 total comments on additional specialized spaces, 142 (or almost 51%) mentioned graduate students. In analyzing the comments and in follow-up focus groups with graduate students, however, it appears that many are not aware of either one or both of the dedicated graduate student spaces in Perkins Library.

Riess Graduate Student Reading Room

a photo from outside a room, showing 2 large tables with 8 chairs each and outlets along the top. The room has windows along the back wall and a keypad on the door.

The graduate reading room is a shared reading space for graduate students on the 2nd floor of Perkins. It has a key pad entry code that can be obtained from the Library Service Desk. The room is has good natural lighting and is an “absolutely quiet” zone. Some of the requests indicate that students would like more individual desks, however, so some students may be unsatisfied with this as the only dedicated space open to all graduate students.

Graduate Research Commons

a photo of a room with many cubicles and lockers and a few windows in the back

In the spring of 2016, a large room on the second floor of Perkins was converted into the Graduate Research Commons. The space has 27 individual cubicles of two different heights, adjustable sit-stand desks, and dedicated lockers for all users. The room also includes a technology center with an e-Print terminal, a scanner, and a desktop computer with the Adobe software suite.

Unlike the Graduate Reading Room, however, students must apply for access to the Graduate Research Commons. Despite its many features, the space has been underutilized, and it appears that many students are not familiar with it and have never tried to apply for access. A review of this space could reveal ways to market and set policies for the space.

Next Steps

To determine the most needed and feasible improvements for follow-up, the Assessment & User Experience department will host a DUL-wide staff workshop in July to review the results and make specific recommendations to improve the experience of all of our users. Contact us if you would like information more about this workshop.

We look forward to sharing more of our progress on this and other assessment projects for DUL in the future!