Leah GiarritanoOctober 1, 2011LIS506LECElectronic Listserv Monitoring Assignment

Audience

For this assignment I chose to monitor the ISLMANET-L listserv, an electronic

discussion list co-owned by the Illinois School Library Media Association (ISLMA)

and the Early Childhood and Parenting Collaborative (ECAP) at the University of

Illinois. ISLMANET-L provides a forum for school library media specialists and

others interested in Illinois school library media programs to share ideas, resources,

problems and solutions. Based on my observations, this listserv achieves its goal of

uniting those interested in issues relating to the function of school library media

specialists in Illinois. This is a heavily utilized listserv that successfully provides its

users an outlet to bounce ideas off one another, collaborate and brainstorm on

important issues impacting school libraries and to discuss methods to solve

important problems faced by libraries across Illinois.

Logistics

I subscribed to ISLMANET-L in September 2010. However, due to time constraints

and the overwhelming volume of emails from the listserv, I had not been actively

monitoring communications for the past nine months. This project gave me a

renewed sense of focus and interest in the listserv. For the past four weeks I have

been enthusiastically involved in reading the communications from the ISLMANET-

L listserv.

ISLMANET-L is quite intuitive to utilize. Subscribing to the listserv is a simple

process that requires registering your email address by sending an email to

LISTSERV@LISTSERV.ILLINOIS.EDU with a blank subject line and “Subscribe

ISLMANET-L” with your first and last name in the body of the email. The rules and

protocols outlined in the introductory email were straightforward and easy to

follow.

To my knowledge, there is no digest feature for this particular listserv. Therefore, I

receive a minimum of 20-30 emails per day from ISLMANET-L, some of which are

responses to previous topics and others of which relate to new and varied topics.

For this limited period of four weeks I was able to manage the volume of the emails.

However, in general this is an excessive amount of email for me to keep up with

each day from just one listserv. I am able to manage this a bit by focusing on the

communications that are the most interesting and relevant to me, as identified in

the subject line of the email. While receiving communications in a digest form would

ease the overwhelming volume of emails, it might prove cumbersome when trying

to focus on particular areas of interest, as it would require scrolling through the

entire email to glean the most pertinent dialogue.

Ambience

The feel of ISLMANET-L is very down-to-earth, productive and casual. Members are

comfortable turning to one another for help with the simplest to the most complex

issues. It is clear that everyone is friendly and eager to help by providing advice,

suggestions and ideas. There is no pretense to the communications; most of them

are straightforward. This listserv feels like a group of co-workers all looking out for

the best interests of one another, willing to offer a helping hand whenever needed.

From requesting book titles based on descriptions that a student has provided to

looking for technical guidance regarding the use of Seamonkey, no question is too

big or small, and it is rare for one to go unanswered. This is truly a collaborative

group of professionals guiding and supporting one another based on their shared

passion for school libraries.

Archives

ISLMANET-L has a powerful tool to search archives. Because I haven’t accessed the

archives in the past, I was required to register myself and submit a special password

specifically for viewing the archives. Once I received a confirmation email and

clicked on the link I was allowed access to search the archives. There are many

options when performing an archive search that allow you to really focus in on the

topic of interest, including the following functions (all of which provide a

hyperlinked explanation to help perform the most effective search): narrow

selection, lists per page, search for string, search for substring, subject contains,

author’s address, date parameters, sort by preference and hits per page. This

dynamic functionality allows for a very specific, tailored search that, in my case,

successfully pulled up helpful and accurate results each time I performed a query.

For my first search, I was looking for information on banned book week. I typed

“banned book week” into the “search for string” option and came up with four

communications on this topic. Curious about school libraries for the youngest of

students, I typed “K-2 libraries” into the “subject contains” option and narrowed my

search further to focus on correspondence over the past month using the date

parameter options. This yielded seven emails from the month of September on K-2

libraries. Overall, I found the archive search function very intuitive to use and the

results extremely helpful. I will definitely keep this resource in mind the next time I

have a specific inquiry into which I need insight.

Topic of interest to subscribers

There has been much recent discussion about eReaders on the ISLMANET-L listserv.

A librarian posed an initial question about eReaders on Tuesday, September 27. This

librarian received a technology grant for her library media center and wanted to

purchase eReaders for her K-5 library. She was looking for guidance regarding

usage, storage and successful/not so successful experiences. The first response,

which came within ten minutes, suggested that licensing could be the most difficult

issue with eReaders because the rules keep changing. Each Kindle owned by a

school should be attached to a separate account, which is extremely challenging for

schools. However, there can be multiple Nooks attached to a single account, and

Barnes & Noble has hinted at an upcoming school management system for Nooks.

Other responses echoed those same concerns regarding licensing issues and the

resultant challenges provided for librarians. Yet another media specialist offered

congratulations on the grant and directed the original inquirer to a post by Buffy

Hamilton on The Unquiet Librarian website about the issues she had with Amazon

Kindle Education. There was some additional banter by multiple subscribers about

the features of Nooks versus Kindles and what makes one more attractive than the

other (larger screens, ease of use, pricing, no visible web browser preventing

content from getting “accidentally” added). Overall, it was a very fruitful discussion

on the topic that, surely, provided the original librarian with helpful insight as she

prepared to purchase her first eReaders.

Other aspects of the listserv monitoring experience

In my opinion, it seems that all users, new and returning, are treated equally and

with respect. Because there are so many subscribers who are only active when they

have a topic to discuss or want to respond to a thread, I don’t think anyone would

notice whether or not there was a new member on this listserv. At this point, I

haven’t witnessed any flames or issues of miscommunication; everyone seems very

cordial and respectful of one another. I volunteered to run the parent-led library

volunteer group at my daughters’ small, private Montessori school (Infant-6th

grade). It is undergoing an expansion, and the school directors would like to

automate the library. I was asked to investigate different types of software we could

use to make the library more user-friendly and accessible. I received six responses

with extremely helpful suggestions and recommendations for specific software

packages that I should evaluate. It was an extremely rewarding and fruitful inquiry.

Listserv subscription evaluation

As a GSLIS student, I would definitely continue subscribing to ISLMANET-L. It is a

fantastic way to make connections with other librarians in Illinois and to stay

current on important and practical issues surrounding the profession. The only

challenge is the volume of emails produced from this listserv. However, simply

examining the subject line of the emails makes it easy to weed out the topics that are

most relevant to me and to get rid of the others that are not. As an LIS professional I

would continue my subscription to this listserv because it provides an excellent

resource for tapping into the thoughts and opinions of colleagues (especially when

one might be the only librarian at a school who needs another opinion) and learning

best practices around the state. I would recommend ISLMANET-L to anyone

involved in the field of school librarianship in the state of Illinois.

A great idea discussed on ISLMANET-L was the creation of an after-school librarian

class called “Future Librarians of America” for 5th-8th graders. Similar to a student

advisory group, students would provide input on book selection, offer book reviews,

assist in organizing and repairing books and help to coordinate the school’s book

fair. This idea could spark a lot of interest in the community and foster additional

excitement about the library for students.