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Library Assessment

This Libguide is a place to aggregate information about library assessment activities and best practices

Assessment Data Collection Methods and Tools

Surveys

Library Research Service, Library User Survey Templates & How-Tos

Pew Research Center for the People & the Press, Questionnaire Design

Focus Groups

University of Washington Libraries, Guide to Moderating Focus Groups

Fern, Edward. Advanced Focus Group Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 2001.

Oringderff, J. (2004) "My Way:” Piloting an Online Focus Group.

Usability

University of Washington Libraries , Usability

MLibrary: University of Michigan, Usability in the Library

Rubin, Jeffery. (2008) Handbook of usability testing how to plan, design, and conduct effective tests. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley Pub.

Observation

Kawulich, B.B. (2005, May). Participant observation as a data collection method, Forum: Qualitative Social Research Sozialforschung (6) 2, Art. 43.

SUMA: A Mobile Space Assessment Toolkit

Transaction Logs

Negrucci, T. & Link, F. (2012). Positive feedback: Using interlibrary loan transaction log data to inform collection development. Proceedings of the Charleston Library Conference.

German, E. & Brett, K. (2013). Understanding user behavior through transaction logs. University of Houston Libraries.

Covey, D.T. (2002, January). Usage and usability assessment: Library practices and concerns. Washington, DC: Council on Library and Information Resources.

Interviews

Hurtado, S. & Dey,E. (2003). Tools for qualitative researchers: Interviews. National Center for Postsecondary Improvement (NCPI), Stanford Institute for Higher Education Research.

Pfatteicher, S.K.A., Bowcock, D., & Kushner, J. (1998, Summer). Program assessment tool kit: A guide to conducting interviews and surveys. Pilot Edition. University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Inqscribe Transcription software

Instruction Assessment

Schilling, Katherine & Rachel Applegate (2012). Best methods for evaluating educational impact: a comparison of the efficacy of commonly used measures of library instruction. Journal of Medical Library Association, 100(4):258-269.

University of Texas. (n.d.). Instructional assessment resources.

Web Analytics

Digital Library Federation Assessment Interest Group Analytics working group (2015). Best Practices for Google Analytics in Digital Libraries.

Fagan, Jody Condit (2014). "The Suitability of Web Analytics Key Performance Indicators in the Academic Library Environment." Journal of Academic Librarianship 40(1): 25-34.

Oxford Internet Institute. TIDSR: Toolkit for the Impact of Digitised Scholarly Resources. Revised July 2013.

Academic Library Assessment Plans