CARLDIG-South, a special-interest group of the California Academic & Research Libraries (CARL) association, is a group of like-minded librarians engaged in reference services both in-person and in the digital landscape. Since the beginnings of librarianship, reference services have and continue to be essential library research service. CARLDIG-South members support the growth and evolution of this service, including provision of effective professional development.  This year, CARLDIG-S supported the development of a new CARL interest group, Academic Librarians’ Interest Group North (ALIGN).

CARLDIG-S and ALIGN are dedicated to sharing the on-going evolution of reference services with the larger membership by developing and offering workshops where members can learn from their peers. For example, at last year’s CARLDIG-S workshop Hacking Reference: Engaging the Whole Student, librarians from academic and public libraries shared their experiences and work through the construct of reference services that resulted in adding value to their institutions and enriching the lives of their users.

For its 2016 CARL Showcase, CARLDIG-S will invite speakers from their fall 2015 program, Reference Rising: Problem-solving Challenges and Opportunities in Reference Programming, to discuss successes in developing new reference programs, including problem-solving solutions used to implement new reference initiatives.

The recently constituted ALIGN plans its inaugural event for November 2015—a tour of the recently renovated McHenry Library at UC Santa Cruz, accompanied by presentations on library space planning and implementation. ALIGN will be able to report at the 2016 IG Showcase on its November tour and presentations, and to speak to its broad brief for academic librarians in the North.

Teaming up in this way, CARLDIG-S and ALIGN hope to inspire librarians to continue finding ways to articulate the value of reference and user services by responding to the needs of our users.

Presented by:

Kenneth Lyons, UC Santa Cruz

Lettycia Terrones, CSU Fullerton