VCU librarians present cutting-edge sessions at major academic conference
VCU Libraries will be well represented in April at The Association of College & Research Libraries annual conference in Minneapolis. The conference will address current trends and challenges in librarianship. Work prepared by five VCU librarians will be presented in sessions in this well-respected, peer-reviewed event.
Representing nearly 8,500 individuals and libraries, ACRL is the largest division of the American Library Association. It develops programs, products and services to help those working in academic and research libraries learn, innovate and lead within the academic community.
“The ACRL biennial conference is a premier event and extremely competitive,” said Dean of Libraries and University Librarian Irene Herold. “That six of our faculty had accepted proposals speaks to the high quality of work all VCU Libraries faculty contribute to the profession.”
Science and Engineering Research Librarian Julie Arendt presents a poster “Improving Queries to Retrieval-Augmented Generation AI Tools by Inferring the Sources of Bad Results”
Since ChatGPT’s wide release, businesses have rushed into expanding their use of generative artificial intelligence. Information providers, including suppliers of library databases and integrated library systems, are joining the trend, with many products combining the verifiability of direct source access and citation with the conversational answers produced through large language models. Retrieval-augmented generation is a common technique that overlays search results with text extracted and processed through generative artificial intelligence. This poster provides an overview of retrieval-augmented generation and summarizes ways that it can produce errors. Strategies for improving results, based on those error modes are suggested.
Multimedia Teaching & Learning Librarian Oscar Keyes will offer a workshop “What’s really real: Strategies for teaching critical inquiry through the history of synthetic media.”
This interactive workshop is a hands-on primer addressing the problems and possibilities posed by synthetic images created with generative artificial intelligence. The activity focuses on the relationship between photography and reality, engaging participants in critical but creative inquiry by fabricating fake photographs. The session includes information about the history of photographic manipulation, strategies for verifying photographs using research techniques, and critical reflections on the impact of misinformation in our media environment. The facilitator will share resources for reproducing this activity with students and instructors in various educational settings. Participants will learn to critically analyze and verify the authenticity of photographs by employing research techniques and recognizing the ethical implications of manipulation in various contexts, gain an understanding of the history of photographic manipulation and its impact on public perception and apply this knowledge to create and evaluate synthetic images.
Teaching and Learning Librarian Jenny Stout is presenting a poster created with Research and Education Librarian Samantha Guss and a colleague at N.C. State Libraries. The topic is “Toward Positive Retention in Academic Libraries: A Conceptual Framework.”
It’s been nearly 25 years since ACRL and ARL named recruitment and retention of BIPOC librarians a priority for the profession, but the numbers have stagnated or even decreased. One reason for this could be that research on “recruitment and retention” in academic libraries tends to conflate these concepts and focus on recruitment, which can be more easily quantified. As a result, less attention has been paid to defining, measuring, and improving retention. Here, the researchers present a framework to better define the multiple dimensions of retention and how retention is related to organizational culture in academic libraries.
Jacqulyn Williams of VCU Libraries Qatar and an experienced journal editor, will present on a workshop panel. “Yes, You Can! Developing a Scholarly Writing Action Plan for Novice and Underrepresented Authors” addresses the complexities of the scholarly publishing process (i.e, where to publish; the peer review process, and the author’s role in it).
Research productivity and scholarly publishing remain important expectations for career advancement for many librarians. However, the prospect of publishing in LIS scholarly journals can seem daunting and inaccessible. Women and minority faculty in a range of academic disciplines continue to publish at a lower rate. This workshop brings together editors and reviewers from several journals to help under-represented and/or novice librarians seeking greater confidence in their ability to navigate the publishing process. Each participant will leave the workshop with their own scholarly writing action plan.
Dean Irene Herold will be attending the conference along with Erica Brody, Carla-Mae Crookendale and Hope Kelly.
Categories Faculty/Staff, Librarians at Work, News