A Foot in Both Worlds: Current Roles and Challenges of Academic Online Learning Librarians

Crisis Librarianship: An Examination of Online Librarianship Roles in the Wake of the COVID-19 Pandemic

“…These quantitative and qualitative findings support the prior research of Withorn and Willenborg (2020) who identified very similar common online librarianship responsibilities in the workplace prior to the COVID-10 lockdowns. Our participants seemed to embody the “slasher” role as described by Withorn and Willenborg, because all but one participant performed these duties outside of a designated online librarian job title.…”

“…The stress of additional duties, saying “yes” to every request, and lack of equipment and support, combined with perceived lack of support from library administration can lead to burnout for many librarians. Academic librarian burnout was already a well-documented phenomena prior to the COVID-19 pandemic ( Nardine, 2019 ; Wood, Guimaraes, Holm, Hayes, Brooks, 2020 ), however these findings suggest that COVID presented many additional workplace challenges. Our findings demonstrate the resiliency of our participants during a worldwide crisis, but also point to the necessity of managing expectations in the workplace; this issue may be even more important part of librarian work life post-March 2020.…”

“…More recent literature has sought to define the role of online learning librarians and identify best practices for online librarianship. Withorn and Willenborg (2020) identified seven distinct aspects of online librarianship work, including such tasks as creating online content, providing instructional design, being a point of contact (either as a liaison or subject specialist), coordinating online learning tasks, training, and advocacy. Their last distinct job area was called “slasher” and was intended to point out that the online learning tasks are most commonly performed in addition to another defined job position; that is, very few librarians doing this work are 100% devoted to online librarianship as indicated by their job title.…”

“Always at Work”: Canadian Academic Librarian Work During COVID-19

“…This is an inauspicious factor for librarian workloads and well-being, considering Nicholson's (2019) pre-pandemic findings on the growing prominence of just-in-time reference and instruction services in academic libraries. Withorn and Willenborg (2020) conducted interviews before the pandemic with online instructional librarians and found their workload to be high in general due to the dual nature of their job.…”

Digital pedagogies for librarians in higher education: a systematic review of the literature

“…The studies do not relate digital skills to online educational tools and teaching library instruction in a digital environment. The findings in the systematic review conclude that a large majority of studies in higher education libraries have been exploring the pedagogical competencies of academic librarians for many years; however, the intersect with the emergence of technology and the impact on teaching has been minimal (Withorn and Willenborg, 2020).…”