IU Indy: Keep Reading Jags

Situation

In response to a call from the chancellor that literally everyone on campus should be contributing toward increased recruitment yield, the Dean for the Library approached us and asked how she and her team could be involved. They are relatively unique in that, while they do serve all students on campus, they don't teach students the way the individual schools do and their impact is markedly different.

Solution

We quickly identified two opportunities for which the library staff are uniquely equipped. Most obviously, a library is full of books! And students read! Or at least they used to... We discussed how after high school, reading for pleasure drops off dramatically. This is largely our fault on campus because we give students so much mandatory reading and homework that they just don't have time to read for pleasure; the opportunity cost is high though, especially considering the outsized benefits that students accrue just from reading more.

The other opportunity is closely related: While the Campus Center is considered the heart of campus because it serves as a versatile gathering place for so many groups, the library truly is also an important student center, the other heart of campus, because it's more than just a gathering place for study groups. There are countless spaces and opportunities for students to spend more time in the library.

We realized that the library has the advantage of exposure to student groups. Because the campus is so large Admissions ran several orientation tour variations, but all of them featured a stop at the library. We decided to adjust significantly the script for that brief stop. Before, staff would highlight all the things students can do at the library. Now we developed a bookmark that described these things, and then spent less time talking about the features of the library so we could talk about the importance of continuing to read for fun.

Having that information on a bookmark meant that we could spend less time talking about it, especially since we gave students a reason to keep the bookmark: On the other side, we put together a "staff picks" list of favorite books to read for fun. These are always a hit! Everyone wants great book recommendations. More ingeniously though, we procured a grant to pick up copies of each of the staff pick books, and as part of the tour we offered a book of each student's choosing from the list for them to take and keep, to read at their leisure and then keep or pass on when they were finished. We mailed students who had registered for Orientation a letter inviting them to the library during their visit to campus to pick up a book.

The overarching message was twofold: Don't stop reading for fun, and spend more time in the library!

Success

This project was successful in so many ways! By incorporating the Keep Reading Jags into the program as part of the orientation tour, we were giving students another reason to "stay" in love with the campus, a direct response to improving yield and combatting melt. By highlighting better all the uses for the library, we were supporting students and contributing to improved retention rates. Plus, the use of a grant to fund copies of the books turned into an important connection with the community and we began to develop plans for student discussions centered around the optional readings.

Some of that was immediately obvious and highly visible:

• Students were more engaged with the library staff than they had previously been.

• Parents were often as excited as the students.

• The library staff became more enthusiastic as they reflected the growing energy of the groups.

• Tour guides began to see the library as a highlight of the tour and a "can't-miss" stop.

It was especially rewarding to see students lingering after the brief presentation during the tour to "shop the books" and browse the library further.

We saw additional success as well! Students would stop by the library to "redeem the coupon" we had sent them outside of the scheduled tour at the end of the day or even on a subsequent visit to campus if they had not had time to stop during Orientation. This might be one of the first instances of someone going out of their way to add a trip to the library to their campus tour! This is the whole point of the initiative--these students would not have come to the library otherwise!

The program proved to be so popular that we expanded it the year immediately following to the tour route for all prospective students!