1 Approach & Preparation

We (Johnna Horton and Jill Holman) had such a good response to our presentation “How does COVID impact our library stats and what can we do about it?” at the MnPALS conference in April 2021 that we decided to develop the Data Literacy Intensive for Librarians to help people implement our recommendations.

It’s no secret that many libraries are facing budget cuts and library staff want to feel more confident advocating for their libraries. We also knew that most of our library staff did not learn about data in school. Ultimately, we were hoping to encourage our libraries to be more proactive in talking about equity initiatives to align with system-level expectations defined in Equity 2030.

We really got excited and started planning in November 2021. Johnna had innovation money in the budget, so we could pay library faculty who weren’t on contract in the summer to attend this online workshop. The plan was to have four live sessions via Zoom on Thursdays in July with the expectation of 2 hours per week for homework.

Outreach

We sent the first invitation with an overview of the intensive on February 8th. Next we did a streak of daily emails calling attention to data topics for Love Data Week (February 14-18, 2022). There were suggested activities each day (eg. look at data for research guides, out-of-the-box Alma analytics reports, Primo sessions, Alma analytics master classes and explore resources in the Data & Libraries guide). The last day also had another invitation to apply for the data intensive. The final invitation went out on March 9th for the March 31st deadline.

UDL and Instructional Design

Also in February, Jill took a short course called Equity and Technology from Dr. Elizabeth Harsma, Instructional Technologist/Designer at Minnesota State University, Mankato. The course covered Digital Access, Accessibility and Equity, Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and Culturally Responsive Teaching. This was great preparation to build our data intensive! Jill followed Harsma’s example to set up the course in D2L Brightspace, the learning management system that all Minnesota State institutions use.

We planned to include UDL principles such as:

• Using templates, examples, vocabulary, and a rubric
• Being flexible about whether they want to work together or alone
• Being mindful that some people have math anxiety and how to support them

Jill added two more principles to that list:

• More opportunities for feedback, reflection, and revision
• More options and flexibility as far as content and format for the assignment

As far as access and accessibility, librarians do have computers and high-speed, reliable internet for their jobs, so we did not have to worry about that. However, Jill had a big realization with accessibility – she always tries to make her materials accessible, but she realized it should be part of the participants’ assignments as well.

As far as equity and culturally responsive teaching, several practices helped here:

• This is project-based learning.
• The connection to the real world is clear. They can use this in their marketing and to talk to their institutions’ administrators.
• The project allows participants to customize to their situation.
• There are multiple means of engagement, representation, and action/expression.
• Choice and flexibility help the participants lead their learning.
• We continue to reflect to be sure outcomes are the same for all participants and see what improvements we might make if we repeat this course in the future.

Building the Course

Next we started building the course in D2L Brightspace. We had six modules:

• Start Here
• Data Literacy
• Library Data
• Equity
• The Project
• Wrap Up

There were a lot of optional resources so participants could choose their own adventure. There were also options for discussion and reflection.

We opened up the course to participants in D2L on June 22nd so they could prepare for our first live session on July 7th.

Participants were required to attend the four live sessions, which focused on activities and discussion that corresponded with the reading and work done as homework. In addition, participants needed to complete the following for the Data Intensive:

• Intake survey and introduction discussion (Start Here module)
• Reflection: Data Literacy (Data Literacy module)
• Reflection: Library Data (Library Data module)
• Reflection: Equity (Equity module)
• Visual aid and video (Project module)
• Final reflection, conclusion survey, and final revisions for visual aids and videos (Wrap Up module)

Participants needed to meet 80% of the requirements to successfully complete the intensive. We did not use points or letter grades, but rather Harsma’s grading scheme:

• Complete
• Resubmit
• Not Yet Complete

Participants

We received fifteen applications for a maximum of 10 spots. Ten enrolled and nine finished. Two were from state universities and the rest were from technical and community colleges. The participants had many competing priorities such as health concerns, other training, travel, and one even left for another job.

Tools We Used

• D2L Brightspace – this was the home for the course
• Zoom – we met live via Zoom web conferencing
• Mediaspace – we created some videos and stored them in Mediaspace
• Quizizz – we used this for some activities (eg. quiz game on data terms)
• Office 365 Whiteboard – each live session finished with an activity where students reflected on:
  • Key Points
  • Favorite Thing I Learned Today
  • Questions I Still Have

All of the applications, other than Quizziz, are enterprise-level and Minnesota State-supported. This allowed for some ease of use due to prior knowledge.