Schedule

12:30pm—4:30pm

Hill Library, 3rd Floor

Preconference: Creating Cross-Disciplinary Platforms for Experiential Learning in the Library

Digital media labs, visualization walls, gaming and virtual reality studios, and makerspaces are more and more ubiquitous in libraries. New types of spaces to support AI and esports are being made more readily available. These high-impact learning spaces are full of potential to connect library users to cross-disciplinary skills using various modes of learning.

This workshop will explore ways faculty and librarians can activate interactive and technology-rich spaces in the library through programming. Get a chance to participate in interactive teaching exercises using the experiential learning spaces in the Hill Library including the Cyma Rubin Visualization Gallery, iPearl Innovation Studio, Makerspace, Gaming and Virtual Reality Studio, and the Special Collections Research Center at the NC State University Libraries. Learn from a panel of NC State University faculty, students, and educational technology leaders and explore innovative models for supporting student success.

We'll highlight creative uses of technologies to support high-impact experiential learning through hands-on activities, demonstrating positive learning impacts, showcasing successful models of student work, and conducting effective user research to continually improve these spaces.

Participants will develop an understanding of successful models of space design and operations, enabling them to integrate high-impact experiential learning spaces and programs into their own libraries.

View full session schedule

12:30pm—4:30pm

Hunt Library, Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor

Preconference: Designing Your Library's Service Offerings, Organization, and Operations

You've done the research. You've planned the innovative spaces. Now comes the hard part: the services and staffing. How do you decide what programs and services you'll offer, how you'll be organized, and how you'll operate?

This interactive pre-conference workshop will provide proven operating model design methodologies, chances to hear from institutions on their lessons learned, and opportunities to put these methodologies into practice in hands-on individual and small group activities.

We'll cover service offerings, designing/redesigning processes and policies, identifying and designing partnerships, forecasting future staffing needs, defining future roles, and creating the right organizational structure to connect those roles and teams.

Participants will come away with an understanding of operating models and the know-how to create one for their library that's as innovative as the spaces you envision — or more!

View full session schedule

Presenters

• Juliette Bianco, Director, Weatherspoon Museum, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
• Jonathan Cain, Associate University Librarian for Research and Learning at Columbia University Libraries
• Elliot Felix, Higher Education Advisory Practice Lead, Buro Happold
• Evey Lennon, Associate Vice Provost and University Librarian for Central Services
• Greg Raschke, Senior Vice Provost and Director of Libraries, NC State University

5pm—6pm

Hill Library, Ask Us Desk, 1st Floor

D. H. Hill Jr. Library Tour

6pm—8pm

Hill Library, North Forum (3rd Floor) (optional tours offered at 5:15pm)

Evening Reception and Conference Kickoff

7:30am—8:30am

Check-in and Breakfast

8:30am—9:30am

Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor, Hunt Library

Welcome and Opening Keynote

Presenters

• Greg Raschke, Senior Vice Provost and Director of Libraries, NC State University
• Rob Dunn, Senior Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Programs and William Neal Reynolds Distinguished Professor of Applied Ecology (Presentation slides)

9:30am—10:45am

Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor, Hunt Library

Places for the People: Community-Connected Libraries

This session provides a wonderful example of today's reimagining of the role of libraries. In this evolving role, they will serve as community hubs and cultural centers that provide architectural, technological, and social infrastructure advancing the intellectual, cultural, social, and economic well-being of their communities. While the libraries being addressed here reflect substantive differences nationally, institutionally, and culturally, the similarities in their commitments to their sense of community mission are significant. Ādisōke is the future shared facility of the Ottawa Public Library and Library and Archives Canada, brought together to create a place for the stories that unite them. The new Charlotte Mecklenburg Library is a place where all people convene and come together, a place where belonging is paramount, and a place where community members bring their resources and minds to connect and drive community change.

Moderator

Tom Hickerson, Designing Libraries Conference Founder

Presenters

• Ādisōke, Ottawa Public Library, Library and Archives Canada (Presentation slides)
  • Sonia Bebbington, Chief Librarian and CEO, Ottawa Public Library
  • Leslie Weir, Librarian and Archivist of Canada, Library and Archives Canada
• Main Library, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library (Presentation slides)
  • Caitlin Moen, Chief Library Services Officer, Charlotte Mecklenburg Library

10:45am—11:00am

Break

11:00am—Noon

Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor, Hunt Library

Innovation Spaces in Libraries

This panel will highlight unique spaces in research libraries and showcase how a thoughtful combination of spaces and programming can nurture innovation and creativity in many forms. Examples include the nexus of Archives and Special Collections and the Text & conText Lab at the University of Pittsburgh, the Center for AI Ethics, Literacy, and Integrity at the University of Calgary, and multiple immersive spaces at NC State University Libraries. Panelists will demonstrate how these spaces can serve as central hubs that enable experimentation, foster connection, promote interdisciplinary collaboration, and inspire new models for teaching and learning.

Moderator

Jill Sexton, Associate Director for Digital & Organizational Strategy, NC State University

Presenters

• Kornelia Tancheva, Dean of Libraries, University of Pittsburgh (Presentation slides)
• Mike Cuales, Director, Digital Media Innovation, Digital Education and Learning Technology, Applications, NC State University (Presentation slides)
• Leeanne Morrow, Associate University Librarian, Student Learning and Engagement, University of Calgary (Presentation slides)

Noon—1pm

Duke Energy Hall and Susan Woodson Plaza (outdoor) Eating Option

Lunch

1pm—1:50pm,
1:50pm—2pm (transition),
2pm—2:50pm

Duke Energy Hall

Think & Do Experiential Learning Sessions will be scattered throughout the 2nd floor of the Hunt Library

Lightning Talks + Think & Do Experiential Learning Session

During the Think & Do Experiential Learning Session, attendees will engage with NC State University Libraries staff and student workers, as well as NC State faculty, to explore the wide range of hands-on, skill-building opportunities the Libraries offers its users, from gaming and esports, to citizen science, to AI, to ar/vr, to special collections.

Moderator

Sandra Varry, Head of Special Collections Research Center, NC State University

Lightning Talks Session A (1pm—1:50pm) (Presentation slides)

• Architectural design for sensory impact: Bobst Library renovations
• A Future for Print in Academic Library Space Planning
• Paddles, Currents, Waves, and Wayfinding: Designing a Circulation Counter and Reference Desk Respectful of Pacific Voyaging
• The Library as a Sanctuary: Should Libraries Be Designed for Mental Wellness
• Exploring XR Technologies In Academic Libraries To Support Education And Research

Lightning Talks Session B (2pm—2:50pm)

• Paris Nanterre, France : translating a library's identity into its spaces, furnishings and graphic choices
• What Happens When the Makerspace Closes: Learning happens at all intersections of the library
• Introducing User-Driven Noise Norms to an Architectural Challenge
• Designing Holistic Libraries: Making Space for Taking Breaks

2:50pm—3pm

Break

3pm—4pm

Designing for Inclusivity and Engagement

This interactive session encourages participants to reimagine library design through the lens of inclusivity and student-centered approaches. Learn about liberatory design practice, design justice and universal design to help identify actionable changes. We will explore case studies and current research, highlighting efforts to create more equitable and welcoming environments in libraries, including small, targeted changes that can significantly impact user experience and space perception.

Moderator

Marian Fragola, Director of Community Engagement, NC State University

Presenters

• Jennifer Nichols, Associate Librarian and Director of CATalyst Studios, University of Arizona Libraries

4pm—5pm

Optional Hunt Library Guided Tours and Esports Deep-Dive

5pm—7pm

Skyline Reading Room, 5th Floor, Hunt Library

Evening Reception

7:30am—8:30am

Breakfast

8:30am—9:45am

Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor, Hunt Library

Designing for Interdisciplinary Research

Enhancing academic research is a principal element of the role played by today’s research libraries. In addressing this role, libraries provide access to information in a multitude of forms, including textual, graphic, audiovisual, statistical, geospatial, and many more. Importantly, libraries are developing an expanded range of services and activities in support of the research lifecycle. These services are often collaborative in approach and interdisciplinary in nature. Designing architectural, programmatic, and social spaces enabling this interdisciplinary collaboration is critical, and this session provides an international perspective on vital aspects of evolving digital scholarship.

Moderator

Tom Hickerson, Designing Libraries Conference Founder

Presenters

• Dan Cohen, Vice Provost for Information Collaboration and Dean, University Library and Professor of History, Northeastern University (Presentation slides)
• Julien Roche, LIBER President, Director of Libraries and Learning Center at University of Lille (Presentation slides)

9:45am—10:00am

Break

10:00am—11:00am

Community-Centered Design: A Current Framing

This session will focus on the evolution of transformed libraries from community-informed to community-centered. Recently completed renovations of the Greenpoint Library and Environmental Education Center and the NC State University Libraries will explore the evolving processes for redesigning libraries, why those processes have emerged, and the potential for community partnered design in further centering libraries within their communities.

Moderator

Patrick Deaton, Associate Director, Learning Spaces and Capital Management, NC State University

Presenters

• Karen Fairbanks, Architect and founding partner, Marble Fairbanks (Presentation slides)
• Greenpoint Library and Environmental Education Center
• Greg Raschke, Senior Vice Provost and Director of Libraries, NC State University (Presentation slides)

11am—noon

Duke Energy Hall, 2nd Floor, Hunt Library

Libraries As Social Infrastructure: Community Building and Student Success

Libraries play an essential role in providing social infrastructure to their communities through services, spaces, and programs that build a sense of belonging, intellectual vitality, and connection. This session will explore several ways that transformed libraries and community spaces advance student and resident persistence, drive success, and promote wellness. Presenters with backgrounds in student services, architecture, and academic libraries will present a combination of large-scale research findings and experience based practices that enhance the role the library plays in providing social infrastructure.

Moderator

Greg Raschke, Director of Libraries, NC State University

Presenters

• Amber Shaverdi Huston, National Association for Campus Activities
• Gretchen Holy, Interiors Leader, Principal, DLR Group
• Alex Valencia, Student Success Librarian, NC State University Libraries (Presentation slides)

1pm—4pm

Duke University Libraries Renovations (Transportation Provided)