From eSchool News, survey results on digital natives’ technical support needs in a college environment. Their findings? Perhaps counter-intuitively, digital natives need more IT support than they are getting. Only 4 in 10 said they’re getting adequate support. Is this a gap that academic libraries can help to fill through troubleshooting tech classes, basic tech skills tutorials, and even perhaps direct support?
via @buffyjhamilton
April 29th, 2010 at 9:49 am
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April 29th, 2010 at 9:56 am
It would be a great niche for any library to fill! However, as slow as [public] libraries are to adapt to new technologies & attitudes, it might be quite the undertaking to get this rolling in rural/suburban libraries. There are still too many stereotypical librarians resistant to change behind the desks! Additionally, this would add to an already stretched-to-breaking budget for most libraries in the form of additional training for staff. And there may be a greater disconnect between the academic and public libraries than there is now due to training levels and budget constraints preventing them having the same level of training.
Personally, I’d have no problem doing it, in part because I’ve fooled with computers for the last 26 years of my life, and in part because I do all the IT work here and know my way around different software packages & hardware issues as a result. My last blog post underlined my perception of [public] librarians (at least in KY) needing more technical training. I’m not about to declare that I know it all, but I WAS showing some of the presenters stuff that will make their digital lives easier to manage. It is this observation of mine that makes me think it would take a massive training effort to get librarians of all types to the point of being able to provide “digital natives” the level of tech support they need.
April 29th, 2010 at 8:04 pm
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May 1st, 2010 at 9:55 am
In my experience librarians, especially recent grads, are ready and capable to provide tech support. The glacial speed at which we adopt new technologies seems to be more a problem with the turning capacity of our giant bureaucratic ship.
May 14th, 2010 at 2:49 am
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