Faculty Publications | UW Libraries

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Improving Inclusion with Universal Design in the Academic Library Hiring Process

(ACRL, 2024-07) Manwiller, Katelyn Quirin; Crozier, Heather; Peter, Samantha; Houk, Kathryn; Nielsen, Jordan; Wong-Welch, Jenny

To improve inclusion in academic library hiring practices, we must evaluate and prioritize addressing the barriers that currently exist in the process for LIS workers with marginalized identities. With the prevalence of disability in America, lack of representation in librarianship, and inherently intersectional nature of disability inclusion, it is essential that academic librarianship work to recruit and retain disabled librarians. Disability affects people in a variety of ways. Therefore, there is no one-size-fits-all solution. As a result, broader disability inclusion techniques based on the principles of Universal Design are needed to remove barriers for disabled librarians during the hiring process.

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Moonlighting as a Leader

(Association of College and Research Libraries, 2024-06-01) Smith, Shannon Marie

This chapter discusses the various challenges I have encountered as an early-career librarian working in scholarly communications and presents practical ways to think about these issues. While this chapter is written from my perspective, particularly in drawing upon themes and experiences in scholarly communications and scholarly communication adjacent work, this chapter holds relevant themes for anyone working as a leader without positional authority. It is important for librarians in these situations to recognize that while they may not be able to effect institution-level change, they can open the door for conversations that may not have previously occurred in their respective institutional contexts. They can ask difficult questions with an eye toward finding allies to help answer the questions they are grappling with. Here, for the individual librarian, it can be about doing something rather than expecting themselves to do everything.

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Coffee, Tea, and Accessible Zines: Zine 2024

(University of Wyoming Libraries, 2024-05-02) University of Wyoming Libraries

This zine was created as part of a UW Libraries event for Access UW Day 2024. Participants created their own accessibility focused page using text and image collaging. The zine pages were created by different individuals, representing a small sample of how the UW community views accessibility.

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Open Universal Design for Learning: Working to Make Open Education Resources Equitable and Accessible

(American Library Association, 2024-03-21) Peter, Samantha; Baribeau, Hilary

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is having a larger presence in the pedagogy of librarians who teach information literacy. However, while themes of accessibility have gained strong traction in the conversations around information literacy, the application of accessible pedagogical approaches, such as UDL, has yet to have a large presence in the open educational resource (OER) literature, even though the principles of UDL and open access practices are closely aligned. Applying the principles of UDL to OER in the classroom and in repositories helps to provide a practical example of how the technical and ethical aspects of UDL can work in academic libraries. UDL can be used to drive purposeful work in both open practices and open infrastructures in meaningful ways. All levels of instructional support, from librarians to instructional designers, and repository managers, can begin to take the steps to incorporate the principles of UDL and open education resources and work toward the pedagogical and technical equity that will help to support learners and educators.