New Research Support Models支援大學研究新模式

The 10th Annual Library Leadership InstitutePreserving our Past: Creating our FutureHong Kong. 16-20 March 2012.

J. Trzeciak

Outline

• Background information

• The opportunity that presented itself

• The development of a solution

• Feedback and future directions

Background

• Libraries at McMaster “island unto themselves”

• Virtually no involvement in research

• Librarians “generalists”, not actively engaged on campus or the profession

• Some involvement in teaching but limited to very traditional “BI”

• Library largely viewed as a book warehouse

The Opportunity• In 2007 – acquired Holocaust collection (Brisebois

collection)

• Largest of its kind in any North American library

• Resistance movement, underground literature, concentration camps, anti-Semitism, and propaganda during the Second World War

• Nearly 2,000 letters from or to prisoners in Dachau, Buchenwald and Auschwitz.

• In several cases there are 20 letters or more written by the same prisoner

The Opportunity• In 2008 – Gift from Madeleine and Monte Levy

• Virtual Museum of the Holocaust and Resistance

• First “virtual naming”

• Gift would subsidize:

• Digitization

• Website/Educational Materials

• Outreach

• New collections

• Staffing

The Opportunity

•Also funded annual events

The Opportunity

• Subsequent gift (Schreiber) now also funding annual speaker series

The Process• McMaster joined CLIR postdoctoral research

fellowship program

• What is CLIR? (www.clir.org)

• Council on Library and Information Resources

• “forges strategies to enhance research, teaching, and learning environments in collaboration with libraries, cultural institutions, and communities of higher learning.”

The Process

• “CLIR promotes forward-looking collaborative solutions that transcend disciplinary, institutional, professional, and geographic boundaries in support of the public good”

The Process• Postdoctoral Fellowship in Academic

Libraries•“prepares a new generation of librarians and scholars for work at the intersections of scholarship, teaching and librarianship in the emerging research environment…”

•“work on projects that forge, renovate, and strengthen connections between academic library collections and their users”

•libraries benefit from the expertise of accomplished scholars …and provide insight into the future of scholarship.

The Process

• First postdoc: Holocaust Historian (Dr. Noah Shenker)

•Partially funded by

•Levy Donation

•Faculty of Humanities

•Faculty of Social Sciences

•University Library

The Process• Postdoc would:

•Develop Virtual Museum•Teach one course in History (Humanities)•Teach one course in Religious Studies (Social Sciences)•Provide community outreach•Work with publishers•Work with donors•Work with library staff•Work with campus community

The Process

•Postdoc would:•Participate in virtual meetings with other CLIR fellows

•Participate in physical meetings with other CLIR fellows

•Mentor incoming CLIR fellows

The Process• Became a model for other similar postdoc

positions

• Now also have postdocs in•Engineering (Gaming)

•Science (Psychology)

•Science (Geography and Earth Sciences)

•Science (Geography and Earth Sciences)

•Humanities (Classics)

•Business (Information Systems)

Next Steps

• Sloan Foundation grant application

ExerciseDiscuss among yourselves opportunities that each of you have at your institution to become more involved in research support.

What are some of the new initiatives you might implement?

How will you garner support?

Who are your primary partners in these new initiatives?

How will you measure their success?