lib-ir: experiment in Scholars' Bank

[Carol Hixson <chixson@darkwing.uoregon.edu>]

Joe Janes' talk and some additional reading I've been
doing have got me thinking of ways to maximize
library services and make the library's presence
ubiquitous by making sure that the library is
visible in those places where students already are.
One article that I found thought-provoking was by
Joan Lippincott entitled "Net Generation Students
and Libraries" that is available at:
http://www.educause.edu/NetGenerationStudentsandLibraries/6067

Two sentences from her article got me thinking of
something to try in Scholars' Bank:

"Some libraries are developing mechanisms to link subject pathfinders into 
course management systems for every course at the institution. This useful 
strategy brings the information to the place where students will be 
actively engaged in academic work. "

We already know that Scholars' Bank is being heavily used. Over
4 million hits in the past year. I wanted to see if we could marshal
some of that power (that is surely coming from its accessibility
on the open Web) and draw people into using other library
services.

Here's the experiment: I and one of my staff are adding links
to all Community and Collection pages in Scholars' Bank that will find 
related materials in the library catalog. You can see the pattern
we're following if you look at the first few communities in
Scholars' Bank. We have constructed either a keyword or a
subject search related to the topic of the collection or
community and then pasted that in as a hotlink at the bottom
of the community or collection page.

So, for instance, on the collection page for CultureWork
https://scholarsbank.uoregon.edu/dspace/handle/1794/323
you will see the link at the bottom of the page that reads:

"For more information on the topic of the Arts and society, click
here. "

It's not comprehensive - nor is it intended to be. It's intended
to link our disparate collections in our users' minds - whoever
they might be.

Thoughts? Reactions?

Carol