The Nuts and Bolts of Supporting Change and Transformation for Research Librarians

Libraries have a rich tradition of providing services and support to researchers. In recent years, changing technology, evolving research methods and requirements, and the transforming landscape of scholarly communication have revealed a need for libraries to actively engage scholars and participate in the entire research lifecycle. As liaison and subject librarian roles shift to a more holistic and engagement-focused model, it is important that libraries provide them with the tools and resources to develop new skills. This paper will focus on three ways in which the North Carolina State University Libraries created and supported relevant training and opportunities for research librarians to gain the expertise necessary to embrace new roles and deeper collaboration across the research enterprise. Examples include the Data and Visualization Institute for Librarians, the Visualization Discussion Series, and the Research Data Committee. Through these examples, we will share ideas for creating peer-to-peer learning opportunities, explore some of the skills necessary for increased engagement, and provide insights into the challenges and opportunities related to supporting and developing new skills for librarians

Aligning Collections With Emerging Needs in Research Informatics

Some of the North Carolina State University (NCSU) Libraries’ largest investments are in collections, digital library development, and technology‐rich collaborative spaces. The goal of the NCSU Libraries Fellows Program initiative, Aligning Collections with Emerging Needs in Research Informatics, is to ensure these areas leverage one another to the benefit of our users in support of emerging research informatics needs through licensing and acquisition of new data sources, as well as leveraging the capabilities of new high‐tech library spaces. Over its two years, this initiative seeks to address and mainstream subject specialists’ and selectors’ consideration of high‐tech research informatics needs of users. Early accomplishments of the initiative include content mining agreements, increased awareness of scholarly APIs, and an ontology to describe research informatics. Ongoing work includes an investigation of relevant collections, licensing terms, and the landscape of the current marketplace; an environmental scan of NCSU research and teaching contexts that would benefit from greater availability of content as data for computational purposes; how‐to documentation and training for more technologically sophisticated uses of existing resources; negotiations of select licenses to allow for more flexibility of content use; and revision of our website to promote the research informatics capacities of the Libraries’ collections to our users