Friday 15 October 2010

Tailoring services to meet the needs of the current iGeneration of students

Examples of the current pace of change and why we need to be aware of changing expectations of our current students.
Time taken to reach 50 million users:
Radio, 35 years
Telephone 23 yrs
TV 20 yrs
www. 10 yrs
iPod 4 yrs
YouTube 1yr

MISO survey. Perceptions of students, faculty and staff of views of library and computing services. Been carried out since 2005 across different institutions.

Summary of results:

Most frequently used services:
Course management system
Wireless access

Most important:
Network speed
Network stability
Email
Wireless
Virus protection
Public computers
Course management system

Highest satisfaction:
Library borrowing
Library circulation
Library reference

(highest satisfaction was dominated by library services)

Only 4 items poor satisfaction:
Wireless availability
Network speed
Network reliability
Wireless reliability

Trends
What's becoming more important:
Wireless access
Digital image collections
Course management system
Quiet workspace in the library
Borrowing laptops

Becoming less important:
Library web site (because can get to resources without going through it?)
Helpdesk ( fewer problems or solving them themselves?)
Campus computing labs (because own more laptops?)
Residence phone service ( because all have mobiles)

increasing satisfaction:
Input into decisions
Status information about problems
Wireless availability

Decreasing satisfaction:
Network performance
Campus computing labs

Cross over.
Helpdesk going down in importance but computing website going up. About to cross. All about self service and students preferring to search for solutions rather than come to hands on, busy helpdesk. Want to be empowered rather than helped.

Campus computing labs going down in importance, computing in the library remaining high. Increasing gap. Value of library as key place for students. Much rather do computing in library than in commuter labs.

In summary, what students seem to be saying is Give me the tools, and let me get on with it.
But, infrastructure must be up to it. Always on. Fast.
Give them space, especially in libraries
Give them tools and services that they need in a easy to use way

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Particularly interested in the point referring to the fact that students are less interested in using computers in small labs around campus and much more interested in using computers in library spaces.
Outside of teaching sessions, our open access rooms are seriously under used, whilst the IC (and the other library spaces) continue to be full for most of the busier times of the year.

I was also interested to see borrowing laptops on the list of what's becoming more important to students as this is something that we are about to look at.

Dan C