Participation in a large-scale study to evaluate agricultural research support services

Abstract

During the spring and summer of 2016, we participated in Ithaka S+R’s Research Support Services program, which “is designed to help libraries re-imagine their services for scholars on a discipline-by-discipline basis.” Ithaka S+R is a not-for-profit organization that partners with academic libraries to help them gather evidence, via surveys and other research methods, to improve library services and strategic planning.

Ithaka S+R is currently doing a series of studies to determine researcher support needs in various disciplines, such as religious studies, chemistry, and public health. We participated in their agricultural study, which aimed to learn about agricultural researchers’ research focus, research methods and publishing practices. The data that we collected will be collated with 18 other institutions and will be published in a large report.

In this poster, we will share our experiences participating in this large-scale research project, through working with Ithaka S+R, interviewing participants, coding qualitative data, and analyzing results. We will also share our preliminary findings on agriculture scholars at the University of Minnesota.