Whether teaching an occasional course at DePaul while working full time in another profession, carrying a full load of nine courses per academic year, or spreading the course load among several Chicago area universities, adjunct faculty face a unique set of challenges in using the libraries at DePaul. In addition to navigating the complexities of library systems and processes (e.g., how to place materials on reserve, request research materials, or use inter library loan) it can be tricky to find ways to build relationships with reference librarians and course instruction specialists when not on campus regularly.
Some adjunct and part-time faculty may not be aware that DePaul University Libraries are eager to reach out to all facultypart-time, adjunct, and tenure-trackand strive to make our full range of services available to all of our instructors (and we hope to make these services easy to navigate along the way).
For those adjunct and part-time faculty who have shied away from using DePaul University Libraries services, this article is for you!
Library Primer for All Faculty
Subject Specialists
Every university department and program at DePaul is assigned a subject specialist or library liaison. These subject specialists can offer assistance on a research project or with classes, or order materials you want the library to purchase. Library subject specialists are delighted to work with faculty to make the library be of service to you, your department, and your students. As an example, adjunct history faculty member Chris Stacey met earlier this year with a library subject specialist to better understand how to create a neighborhood project for his Chicago history course. Through these conversations, students learned about how to locate library materials on local neighborhood histories, data and statistics, to either write a paper or build a website.
We would be happy to provide a library services orientation for any group of adjuncts at the departmental or college level. Please contact the liaison assigned to your subject area about any library resources and services we can provide.
Instruction Sessions
Librarians are available to provide library research instruction for your courses, including integrated course-specific instruction, research guides and handouts, and online workshops and instructional Web pages.
Leah Lopez, an adjunct faculty member who started teaching at DePaul in 2002, has taught for English, Writing, Rhetoric, and Discourse Department, and more recently, the Honors Program where she teaches Honors Rhetoric. She has used Library Instruction services every quarter. “For courses that specifically require research, I utilize the library database workshops and instruction from the librarians. Along with that, I have a library day where I let the students research their topics during class time. I generally brief the reference librarians about the topics and it’s always interesting to watch the students navigate the library.” Similarly, adjunct professor Allan Johnston, author of Tasks of Survival (1996) and of Northport (2010), has taught writing and literature courses at DePaul since 1996. Given the complexities and constant changes that can be magnified when working part time and sometimes at more than one institution Johnston is grateful for DePaul University Libraries’ course instruction services, and finds that he — no less than his students “always learns new things!” On the service’s utility for his students Johnston remarked: “I have a lot of students who start off by thinking all you need to do is Google and you have all you need for your research paper. The database workshop-library sessions tend to clear that misconception up.”
Faculty members may contact Heather Jagman, Library Instruction Coordinator, to arrange a session with a librarian. If your class meets at the Loop campus, you may also contact Jessica Guthrie, Assistant Coordinator for Instruction and Online Learning.
Course Reserves
The library will pull the material and scan it for e-reserves or put it on library reserve at the campus you indicate. The reserves contact for your school or department will be in touch if we need anything from you. We’ll also make separate reading lists for different sections of the same course, or for cross-listed courses that you don’t want bundled together. If you have any questions about entering requests for a course, view our course reserves procedures or get in touch with your reserves contact.
Our goal is to help teachers help students. As Leah Lopez reflected “Watching students navigate the physical library, always proves interesting as very few of them have ever utilized reference books or microforms. I’m not sure why, but I’m always delighted when they discover the wondrous inter-library loan or that the reference librarians are there to help specifically with finding sources (librarians aren’t there just to shush them!).”