Access Services Interest Group

Hi Travis,

At Iowa State, we have abandoned keys for most of our study rooms: the newest ones don't have lockable doors, using LibCal and Alma was a pain, and students often gave the next group the key without bringing it back to the Circulation desk, which meant they were hard to keep track of anyway. Instead, we have tablets on the doors that indicate who has the room scheduled and when it is next available. The software for the tablet integrates with LibCal and works fine. We could set it to automatically cancel the reservation if a patron doesn't check in, but we haven't had the need to do that yet.  If a patron reports a room conflict, we investigate using LibCal and get the right person in the right room.  The only rooms we do check out keys for are for 2 conference rooms used by library staff until 6pm, so students don't wander in there between meetings.

------------------------------
Cordially,
Dawn Mick
Access Services Department Head
Iowa State University
She/Her/Hers
------------------------------

Thank you so much, Dawn.  

This is great information and will help us make a decision on how to proceed.  I may have follow-up questions on the tablet software in the future if we are able to go that route. 

Travis 

Hi Travis,

At Iowa State, we have abandoned keys for most of our study rooms: the newest ones don't have lockable doors, using LibCal and Alma was a pain, and students often gave the next group the key without bringing it back to the Circulation desk, which meant they were hard to keep track of anyway. Instead, we have tablets on the doors that indicate who has the room scheduled and when it is next available. The software for the tablet integrates with LibCal and works fine. We could set it to automatically cancel the reservation if a patron doesn't check in, but we haven't had the need to do that yet.  If a patron reports a room conflict, we investigate using LibCal and get the right person in the right room.  The only rooms we do check out keys for are for 2 conference rooms used by library staff until 6pm, so students don't wander in there between meetings.

------------------------------
Cordially,
Dawn Mick
Access Services Department Head
Iowa State University
She/Her/Hers
------------------------------

Dawn, that is absolutely fascinating to hear that you have problems with the groups handing off keys! Our library has not yet seen that happen; it's just interesting how different libraries and different student populations can behave so differently. We have about 10 tech-enabled study rooms that require keys and another ~20 or so basic rooms that do not require keys. The unlocked rooms cause the biggest problems for us, because students will use a room without a reservation; then a person with a reservation won't feel comfortable telling them to leave, so they just move into the next room; but then that often disrupts another reservation in that space.

Hi Travis,

At Iowa State, we have abandoned keys for most of our study rooms: the newest ones don't have lockable doors, using LibCal and Alma was a pain, and students often gave the next group the key without bringing it back to the Circulation desk, which meant they were hard to keep track of anyway. Instead, we have tablets on the doors that indicate who has the room scheduled and when it is next available. The software for the tablet integrates with LibCal and works fine. We could set it to automatically cancel the reservation if a patron doesn't check in, but we haven't had the need to do that yet.  If a patron reports a room conflict, we investigate using LibCal and get the right person in the right room.  The only rooms we do check out keys for are for 2 conference rooms used by library staff until 6pm, so students don't wander in there between meetings.

------------------------------
Cordially,
Dawn Mick
Access Services Department Head
Iowa State University
She/Her/Hers

Hi Travis,

At Menlo College we use several different interconnected systems.  Our main schedule is held on our springshare website (but is not LibCal), and has a public facing UI so that anyone can reserve a room themselves from the site.  Then each study room has a QR sign on it that links directly to the public reservation page. so that you can make a room reservation on the fly when you walk into an empty unused study room.  Additionally if you ask at the front desk the front desk worker will reserve the room for you.  We have both lockable rooms and semi-public spaces that can be reserved.   All front desk workers have a key to the room if a room needs to be unlocked.     So we never give keys to the patron reserving the room, we just lock and unlock for them as need be.

To Erin's point about room campers.  We've tried approaching the issue by posting signage, giving orientations, and answering questions about room usage by saying "You are absolutely welcome to use a room without a reservation.  But if someone makes a reservation for that room and they show up we will ask you to leave."  Then we encourage people to make reservations.  And also we tell people with reservations that if someone is in the room to come to the desk and we will ask the room camper to leave for them.  This helps mitigate the problem at least a little bit.  By telling patrons its ok to camp a room if no one is using it, they get less defensive about being asked to leave.  And by setting expectations that we will always enforce the room reservation it also seems to diffuse the situation when we have to ask them nicely to vacate.     Telling the patrons to leave the eviction notice on our shoulders helps people report to us when they need a room and someone is in there.  

I can't say this approach has fixed the problem 100%, but we don't seem to be experiencing cascading room camping, even when we are really booked.  Hope these ideas are helpful.

 - Jen Pesek (she/her)

Student Success Librarian

Bowman Library, Menlo College

Dawn, that is absolutely fascinating to hear that you have problems with the groups handing off keys! Our library has not yet seen that happen; it's just interesting how different libraries and different student populations can behave so differently. We have about 10 tech-enabled study rooms that require keys and another ~20 or so basic rooms that do not require keys. The unlocked rooms cause the biggest problems for us, because students will use a room without a reservation; then a person with a reservation won't feel comfortable telling them to leave, so they just move into the next room; but then that often disrupts another reservation in that space.

Hi Travis,

At Menlo College we use several different interconnected systems.  Our main schedule is held on our springshare website (but is not LibCal), and has a public facing UI so that anyone can reserve a room themselves from the site.  Then each study room has a QR sign on it that links directly to the public reservation page. so that you can make a room reservation on the fly when you walk into an empty unused study room.  Additionally if you ask at the front desk the front desk worker will reserve the room for you.  We have both lockable rooms and semi-public spaces that can be reserved.   All front desk workers have a key to the room if a room needs to be unlocked.     So we never give keys to the patron reserving the room, we just lock and unlock for them as need be.

To Erin's point about room campers.  We've tried approaching the issue by posting signage, giving orientations, and answering questions about room usage by saying "You are absolutely welcome to use a room without a reservation.  But if someone makes a reservation for that room and they show up we will ask you to leave."  Then we encourage people to make reservations.  And also we tell people with reservations that if someone is in the room to come to the desk and we will ask the room camper to leave for them.  This helps mitigate the problem at least a little bit.  By telling patrons its ok to camp a room if no one is using it, they get less defensive about being asked to leave.  And by setting expectations that we will always enforce the room reservation it also seems to diffuse the situation when we have to ask them nicely to vacate.     Telling the patrons to leave the eviction notice on our shoulders helps people report to us when they need a room and someone is in there.  

I can't say this approach has fixed the problem 100%, but we don't seem to be experiencing cascading room camping, even when we are really booked.  Hope these ideas are helpful.

 - Jen Pesek (she/her)

Student Success Librarian

Bowman Library, Menlo College

Dawn, that is absolutely fascinating to hear that you have problems with the groups handing off keys! Our library has not yet seen that happen; it's just interesting how different libraries and different student populations can behave so differently. We have about 10 tech-enabled study rooms that require keys and another ~20 or so basic rooms that do not require keys. The unlocked rooms cause the biggest problems for us, because students will use a room without a reservation; then a person with a reservation won't feel comfortable telling them to leave, so they just move into the next room; but then that often disrupts another reservation in that space.

Hi Travis,

At Iowa State, we have abandoned keys for most of our study rooms: the newest ones don't have lockable doors, using LibCal and Alma was a pain, and students often gave the next group the key without bringing it back to the Circulation desk, which meant they were hard to keep track of anyway. Instead, we have tablets on the doors that indicate who has the room scheduled and when it is next available. The software for the tablet integrates with LibCal and works fine. We could set it to automatically cancel the reservation if a patron doesn't check in, but we haven't had the need to do that yet.  If a patron reports a room conflict, we investigate using LibCal and get the right person in the right room.  The only rooms we do check out keys for are for 2 conference rooms used by library staff until 6pm, so students don't wander in there between meetings.

------------------------------
Cordially,
Dawn Mick
Access Services Department Head
Iowa State University
She/Her/Hers

Hi Travis,

At Iowa State, we have abandoned keys for most of our study rooms: the newest ones don't have lockable doors, using LibCal and Alma was a pain, and students often gave the next group the key without bringing it back to the Circulation desk, which meant they were hard to keep track of anyway. Instead, we have tablets on the doors that indicate who has the room scheduled and when it is next available. The software for the tablet integrates with LibCal and works fine. We could set it to automatically cancel the reservation if a patron doesn't check in, but we haven't had the need to do that yet.  If a patron reports a room conflict, we investigate using LibCal and get the right person in the right room.  The only rooms we do check out keys for are for 2 conference rooms used by library staff until 6pm, so students don't wander in there between meetings.

------------------------------
Cordially,
Dawn Mick
Access Services Department Head
Iowa State University
She/Her/Hers
------------------------------