Getting Patrons into the Game: Utilizing 30 Minute Workshops and Theme Weeks to Improve Workshop Attendance

Abstract

Objectives: An academic health sciences library offers a series of workshops throughout the semester for the entire campus community. These workshops are taught on a variety of topics including database searching and RefWorks. They are taught in addition to curriculum-specific instruction by liaison librarians. The workshop planning committee aimed to increase attendance of library workshops. Methods: The workshop planning committee continues to make changes to workshop offerings. Two new changes since the fall of 2009 included offering 30-minute workshops and offering a week of workshops that fit under 1 cohesive theme. Traditionally workshops are taught for an hour, newly developed 30-minute workshops covering technology-specific topics were offered as part of the library's workshop schedule and promoted as "Workshops in 30." Topics covered include "Twitter," "RSS Feeds," and "20 New Technologies in 30 Minutes." Preexisting or newly developed workshops that fit a particular theme were offered together as workshop theme weeks. Theme weeks offered include "Social Networking" and "Google: Beyond Searching." Both 30-minute workshops and theme weeks were publicized via fliers distributed throughout the campus, the library's newsletter, Facebook, and letters sent out to each school on campus promoting the workshop schedule.