An Anthropologist in the Library: The U. of Rochester Takes a Close Look at Students in the Stacks
This excellent article by Scott Carlson, in the Chronicle, may require subscription, a Web pass, and/or registration for access:
"This has forced us all to abandon our preconceptions of what college is like now," says Susan Gibbons, an associate dean at Rochester's library who helped lead the study, which has gained some attention from institutions around the world. Other libraries, including ones as near as Syracuse University and as far away as the University of Queensland, in Australia, are considering hiring anthropologists to conduct similar studies.When Ms. Foster, Ms. Gibbons, and other librarians set out to study undergraduates, they came up with a guiding question for their research: "What happens when a professor assigns a paper to a student?"
"It's a black box, and we wanted to look into that box," Ms. Gibbons says. "Beyond that we had no agenda."
Armed with munchies and $5 bills as enticements, they went out to find students who would tell them about life as an undergrad.
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