Learning Engagement Librarian – Faculty status with multi-year contract opportunities

Consistently recognized by Princeton Review as one of the “Best College Libraries,” The College of Wooster Libraries seeks an innovative and team-oriented Learning Engagement Librarian to develop and lead an agile and comprehensive library instruction program that supports the mission of the Libraries and the curricular goals of the college. The College of Wooster Libraries cultivates an environment where students, faculty, and staff, as a diverse community of learners, discover, create, communicate, and preserve knowledge and insight.

Summary

Reporting to the Librarian of the College, the Learning Engagement Librarian provides leadership in the development of a dynamic information literacy curriculum, incorporating innovative teaching and learning pedagogy in support of our diverse community of learners. The Learning Engagement Librarian designs and integrates accessible virtual and physical learning materials and tools to support the information literacy curriculum and performs regular assessment to ensure the library instruction program supports student success. The Learning Engagement Librarian collaborates with library colleagues on new developments in instructional design and actively contributes to the Libraries’ instruction, research, and outreach programs.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities

• Leads the development of a dynamic and comprehensive information literacy program from First Year Seminar through Senior Independent Study.
• Incorporates current and emerging instructional practices, methodologies, and technologies into library instruction programming.
• Coordinates the Libraries’ instruction program and provides in-depth research assistance for diverse learners including students, faculty, staff and community.
• Supports and develops new library instruction and engagement initiatives, including skill-building and community-building programming, focusing on first-year, transfer, first-generation, and international students.
• Identifies and addresses barriers to use of library collections, services, and spaces.
• Serves as subject liaison librarian to several academic departments partnering with faculty to provide instruction, research support, and collection development.
• Develops, conducts, and assesses library instruction and workshops with a focus on information, digital, data, and research literacies.
• Communicates and promotes new developments and best practices in instructional design, technologies, and assessment.
• Actively builds partnerships across campus to enhance the Libraries’ instruction program and increase student engagement and success.
• Builds relationships with both academic and non-academic units across campus to raise awareness of ways the Libraries can collaborate as an essential partner in facilitating student success and community outreach.
• Works collaboratively to ensure that the College of Wooster Libraries instruction program upholds values of diversity, equity, and inclusion and a commitment to anti-racist and intersectional pedagogy.
• Other duties as assigned

About Us

The College of Wooster is an independent college of the liberal arts and sciences with a commitment to excellence in undergraduate education. We enroll a racially, socioeconomically, and culturally diverse student population of approximately 2,000 undergraduate students, of which 6% identify as Latinx; 9%, as Black/African American; 4%, as Asian; 4%, as multiracial; and 61%, as white. Fifteen percent (15%) of our students are studying on international visas. Twenty-five percent (25%) are Pell-eligible and 11% are first-generation college students. We are interested in hiring faculty who can contribute to the intellectual vibrancy of the community through culturally relevant pedagogy, curricular diversity, intercultural fluency, and a commitment to ensuring equitable outcomes for racially and ethnically minoritized and marginalized student groups.

The College of Wooster Libraries house close to 700,000 book volumes across three facilities: Andrews Library; The Gault Library for Independent Study ; and the Timken Science Library. The Special Collections offer rare materials, first editions, archival materials, and unique collections that preserve social and literary history. In support of the College of Wooster’s focus on liberal inquiry and its signature program, Senior Independent Study, the Libraries foster development of progressively sophisticated research and scholarly communication skills, cultivation of a rich local academic community, and the creation and sharing of new knowledge with communities worldwide. The buildings are alive with research, mentorship, innovation, and collaboration, and are designed to support the dual mission of supporting advanced individual study by students and broad collaboration by all members of the academic community.

The Libraries advance our mission through dynamic and high-quality collections, technologies, learning environments, and services for our campus community. The College of Wooster is a founding member of the Five Colleges of Ohio, a consortium of selective liberal arts colleges. The Five Colleges (The College of Wooster, Denison University, Kenyon College, Oberlin College and Ohio Wesleyan University). The shared library system allows the collections of its member libraries to be readily and quickly available to all the colleges’ users. Membership in OhioLINK enables The College of Wooster Libraries to provide access to over 44 million books, 100+ electronic research databases, 33 million electronic journals and 200,000+ e-books, nearly 85,000 images, videos and sounds and over 100,000 theses and dissertations from Ohio students at 36 Ohio institutions.

The Libraries enjoy strong and unwavering support from the College’s students, faculty, administration and board and are recognized as key to the academic mission of the College. The staff and faculty of the Libraries are respected for their commitment to fostering a community of learners and independent thinkers. Librarians have faculty status and are active participants in faculty governance and campus committees.

Required Knowledge and Skills

• MLS degree from an ALA accredited program or equivalent.
• Demonstrated knowledge of Instructional Design principles either through applied practice, internship, or course work.
• Experience delivering instruction in diverse in-person or virtual learning settings e.g. schools, higher education, non-profit organizations, or corporations.
• Understanding of the ACRL Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education and ability to teach library instruction sessions.
• Experience in creating and implementing virtual and physical learning materials/tools.
• Understanding of assessment tools and techniques.
• Demonstrated commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion.
• Excellent interpersonal, presentation, and communication skills.

Preferred Knowledge and Skills

• Two or more years of experience with instruction in academic libraries.
• Experience providing library reference services and research consultations.
• Experience in conducting assessment or evaluation of a program or initiative.
• Demonstrated ability to build effective partnerships with students, faculty, and staff.
• Experience creating online learning materials such as research guides and tutorials.
• Familiarity with learning management systems such as Moodle, Canvas, Blackboard, etc.

Preferred qualifications are not required. The Libraries are committed to enabling the colleague recruited for this position to develop those skills. Individuals with an interest in the position who meet the required qualifications are strongly encouraged to apply.