CAPAL-ACBES 25 Presentations

at the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto. His PhD project, Lii Lozh di Kaastor (The Beaver Lodge), is a co-created archival project that involves the creation of an interactive digital atlas of queer knowledge with Two-Spirit Elders, Knowledge Keepers, and Scholars on Turtle Island. The corresponding thesis is a guide and example of how to build Indigenous and Queer stories into traditional archival practice through a methodology inspired by our relationship with beavers—tearing down trees and rebuilding the environment. This metaphor of the beaver is used to think through how to build relationally, taking into account the environmental requirements while imagining a future that is enriched with environmental regeneration, even in this online environment. This envisioned future is one that weaves together Indigenous Data Sovereignty and Western archival practice.

and recognize the critical role that diverse, interdisciplinary teams play in creating effective solutions to complex problems. I am now a student working in an academic library and I am constantly surprised at how this same perspective can be applied to the problems and projects I have come across in academic librarianship.
In this presentation, I will first discuss my experience as an engineering student and why I ended up pursuing a degree in library and information science. I was drawn to systems design engineering specifically for its interdisciplinary nature because I have always been curious about a wide range of topics – from math and science to politics and music. Finding a program that saw value in bringing diverse disciplines together allowed me to gain experience in user experience design, accessibility studies, software development, user research, project management, and many other disciplines. Throughout my degree, I learned to understand the iterative design process and consider the complex systems that form our world.
Towards the end of my degree, I developed an interest in the organization of information and discovered a passion for research. I decided to pursue a degree in library and information science and realized that academic librarianship offered a place where my technical background, love of research, and passion for making information accessible all converged. Now, I am a student working with e-resources and carrying out a research project exploring the experiences of librarians who work with comic and graphic novel collections. Through my work and research, I have been able to learn from the experiences of many academic librarians and begin to appreciate the different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives each person brings to the profession while developing my understanding of the field.
This presentation will explore my experiences and introduce participants to the ways that systems thinking, interdisciplinarity, and the iterative engineering design process can be applied to understanding academic librarianship and finding value in the unique experiences and perspectives individuals bring to the profession.

/ Nord: Réseau canadien de conservation partagée des documents imprimés mission is to protect, preserve, and provide fair access to Canada’s scholarly and cultural records while ensuring responsible and sustainable collection management. This session will spotlight this new Canadian national shared print network highlighting recent successes around cooperation and shared stewardship to safeguard critical academic and historical materials with the aim of long-term preservation. This initiative ensures that Canadian institutions remain resilient, forward-thinking, and committed to preserving our nation’s intellectual and cultural legacy for future generations.

as a system of systems and recognize the critical role that diverse, interdisciplinary teams play in creating effective solutions to complex problems. I am now a student working in an academic library and I am constantly surprised at how this same perspective can be applied to the problems and projects I have come across in academic librarianship.
In this presentation, I will first discuss my experience as an engineering student and why I ended up pursuing a degree in library and information science. I was drawn to systems design engineering specifically for its interdisciplinary nature because I have always been curious about a wide range of topics – from math and science to politics and music. Finding a program that saw value in bringing diverse disciplines together allowed me to gain experience in user experience design, accessibility studies, software development, user research, project management, and many other disciplines. Throughout my degree, I learned to understand the iterative design process and consider the complex systems that form our world.
Towards the end of my degree, I developed an interest in the organization of information and discovered a passion for research. I decided to pursue a degree in library and information science and realized that academic librarianship offered a place where my technical background, love of research, and passion for making information accessible all converged. Now, I am a student working with e-resources and carrying out a research project exploring the experiences of librarians who work with comic and graphic novel collections. Through my work and research, I have been able to learn from the experiences of many academic librarians and begin to appreciate the different backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives each person brings to the profession while developing my understanding of the field.
This presentation will explore my experiences and introduce participants to the ways that systems thinking, interdisciplinarity, and the iterative engineering design process can be applied to understanding academic librarianship and finding value in the unique experiences and perspectives individuals bring to the profession.

since at least the 1990s, likely due to a heightened awareness of the impact of historical systems of disenfranchisement and exploitation. Repatriations have been happening in libraries for at least five years now, yet repatriation is rarely framed as a library issue. Using a Western lens, this session discusses a case for repatriation as a library issue, tracing the colonial history of libraries, unpacking three library repatriations (UCLA Library, The British Library, SFU Library), and ending with a discussion of future actions for libraries and library studies programs.

discussed in the edited collection of seven critical essays, Academic Librarianship in Canada: Post-COVID Perspectives in a Neoliberal Era (Litwin Press & Library Juice, 2024). The panelists will discuss the changing dynamics of academic librarianship through the lens of Canadian professionals responding to the corporatization of their scholarly workplaces and the erosion of their communities of practice. The underlying concern is the transformation of academic libraries from sites of collegial scholarly activity into hierarchically led operations driven by values and priorities alien to the academia. Panelists will reflect on the various aspects of this neoliberal turn shaping the political economy of knowledge production and dissemination of information, as well as changes in academic teaching, funding, institutional relationships, and the publishing industry. The unifying theme is the fundamental role of professional academic librarianship in an increasingly techno-global, post-pandemic environment.
The presenters will discuss the tensions between equity of access and subject representation in electronic and print collections, de-professionalization, the ongoing persistence of gender stereotyping of academic librarianship by librarians’ leading professional associations, the lack of recognition for the professional teaching by academic librarians, and the recent, destructive trends in Canada to re-structure academic libraries including the 2021 destructive reorganization at OCADU.
After a brief presentation by each of the panel members, the floor will be opened up for questions and discussion from the audience.

in library leadership roles. This presentation looks at why, and what it takes to be a leader with a disability in libraries based on the leadership experiences of the presenter, an Ontario academic librarian with disabilities. The presentation will set out the ableist and neoliberal underpinnings of our concepts of both workplace success and leadership. It will show how these underpinnings influence our assumptions about workplace performance, about who is considered ‘leadership material’, and about what a leader is and does. These assumptions contain systematic biases that create and perpetuate substantial barriers to leadership positions for disabled librarians. A discussion of the presenter’s leadership experiences will show how these biases and barriers work in practice. It will also show that leadership success for librarians with disabilities often requires passing as able-bodied and ‘overcoming’ disability to conform to mainstream norms, which has personal and health impacts and costs. Finally, the presentation will suggest strategies for moving towards a more inclusive practice of library leadership that considers the structural disadvantage built into our current leadership concepts.

lived experience, and communities. This includes our responsibility to the land we live on, the consequences of climate change on the environment, and how this impacts our communities. Climate change has direct and indirect impacts on our local and international communities from forest fires, floods, toxic water, air pollution, food insecurity, housing, and preventable deaths. Climate justice is deeply connected to work in anti-racism, anti-colonialism, and disability justice. In recent years, there has been a growing focus in academic and public libraries to address climate issues, but many approaches place the responsibility on individual workers and community members to recycle, conserve electricity, and reduce paper use. These approaches fail to address larger systems that contribute to climate injustice, such as the environmental impacts of technology adoption and investments/relationships with fossil fuels or weapons companies. In the same vein, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are often used as a shortcut to sustainability planning, creating a list of boxes to be checked. These checked boxes are then used as tokens of progress that allow us to feel like we are contributing to positive change without critically examining the way our neoliberal institutions are complicit and benefit from climate injustice.
Our presentation aims to critically reflect on neoliberalism within academic library sustainability plans and highlight the need for a multifaceted approach to addressing climate issues, which may include working with local and international communities, engaging in political action, and resisting neoliberal and colonial agendas within our institutions. Our research is informed by our community connections, past work with community services and public libraries, community outreach, and our personal values and commitments. This includes previous experiences with how environmental sustainability policies have created barriers for community members who are disabled, unhoused, and/or do not have access to technology. Our methodology is based on critically analyzing systems of power within libraries and academic institutions using a disability justice and anti-colonial lens. We will discuss the impact of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) on environment sustainability programs in academic libraries.
We invite attendees to critically reflect on how the institutions we work in are actively involved in harming our communities and the environment, while simultaneously placing responsibility on workers and community members to address the very issues they have created. Our presentation will consider how we can attempt to move beyond plans that just “check a box” and towards political actions that can be taken within and outside library institutions in support climate justice.

fueled by a distinctive optimism for working in an interesting field that makes a difference in users’ lives. However, upon reaching a career mid-point, a time often corresponding to mid-life, we may find some of this enthusiasm diminished after encountering the realities of library work while balancing our professional and personal identities. This panel session brings together three academic librarians whose original fabric of connection was library school leading to a lengthy friendship over the course of our careers. Since graduation, we have taken various paths and roles, leading us now in mid-life and mid-career to positions across various levels of hierarchy in our libraries. Building on texts such as ‘Thriving as a Mid-Career Librarian: Identity, Advocacy, and Pathways’, our panel session will consider the opportunities for renewed meaning making in mid-career librarianship following the high-energy early career years. Rather than sinking into a mid-career malaise, we will consider how this time of accumulated perspective, experience, power, and privilege presents a unique opportunity to reframe our perceptions of mid-career librarianship. Some themes that we will consider in this discussion will include reflections on the questions of whether to move up or move on, to relocate or stay put, ‘quiet quitting’, disengagement. We will address the benefits and drawbacks of management roles, alternative leadership opportunities, mentoring and professional associations.
Following a reflective conversation, we will invite the audience to discuss and dream possibilities together about what is needed from our workplaces and our profession more broadly to support the challenges and possibilities of mid-career librarianship. While we all grapple with these challenges individually and privately, by coming together to share our journeys in this panel we can make visible some common threads to identify communal solutions to the questions we encounter as mid-career librarians.

Presentation PDF

of academic librarians typically contains some obligation of service. Service is represented through different mechanisms including committee work, involvement with professional organizations, and union participation. This last category is important: only through engaged participation by members do unions flourish. Service to one’s union can be demanding–what is asked is a high threshold but is there a commensurate reward? For traditional faculty members there exists an algebra known as release time that usually equates components of work to an equivalent of time in the classroom. When the burden of service work needs to be mitigated, release time is there to provide relief. All well and good, but what about librarians, or archivists, for that matter? Do they have mechanisms like release time to allow them to create the space in their schedules to do this service work? How can unions support librarians when librarians do not deliver classes in the same way as faculty thereby any attempts in establishing a one-to-one comparison of time is not just challenging but near impossible.
This paper will present the results of an investigation that looked at every union contract in English speaking Canada to see how, if at all, release time is articulated for librarians in contrast to what is made available for traditional faculty.

their parent institutions by granting access to a vast amount of information resources in support of scholarship, research, digital initiatives, scholarly communication, user experience, online teaching to students and faculties, and community engagement services. In providing these services, Canadian academic libraries rely on collections that have been curated by library professionals guided by collection policies and strategies. However, the representation of equity-deserving groups in Canadian university libraries’ collections remains low (Jennings & Kinzer, 2022; Kandiuk, 2014; Li et al., 2022). The challenge of low representation of equity-deserving groups is compounded by the dominance of whiteness in the collections and the problematic near absence of racial diversity among the staff of Canadian academic libraries. Take together, this means that people from historically underrecognized and unrecognized groups could walk into libraries where the collections do not at all reflect their authentic histories and voices (England, 2023). Additionally, these challenges could impact the extent to which Canadian universities foster intellectual development, mitigate racial prejudice, and facilitate students’ explorations of diverse perspectives through their libraries (Kim & Sin, 2008). My dissertation research uses a qualitative approach to examine different Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Decolonization (EDID) initiatives geared toward increasing the representation of equity-deserving groups in the collections of Canadian university libraries. I collected data through semi-structured interviews with library staff involved in collection management activities and EDID initiatives, and through the analysis of relevant policy documents of selected Canadian university libraries. I analyzed the data using the qualitative content analysis to identify relevant themes on EDID and collection management practices. Findings from this study highlight the roles of policy documents and EDID initiatives on the collections of Canadian academic libraries. Finally, this study highlights the significance of collection management, an often-invisible aspect of library operations, in ensuring that libraries serve their user communities effectively. The findings from this study demonstrate how the “unrecognized voices” of librarians help in navigating the dynamic scholarly communication landscape in meeting the users’ needs within the confines of limited collection budgets.

trans and gender diverse patrons in libraries, little scholarship exists on trans and gender diverse library workers. The recently published volume Trans and Gender Diverse Voices in Libraries begins to fill this gap, though is focused specifically on the individual personal experiences of these workers. Using Dean Spade’s concept of administrative violence and the Marxist Autonomist’s definition of immaterial labour, this presentation aims to examine the ways that trans and gender diverse labour in libraries is undervalued and exploited more holistically. Through social reproduction and expectations of “professionalism” that are inherently gendered and classist, trans and gender diverse workers are often expected to assimilate into their workplaces and provide uncompensated, undervalued, and unrecognized emotional labour in order to make their work lives bearable. Further, trans and gender diverse workers are underpaid, overrepresented in lower-level and precarious positions, and report higher instances of adverse workplace experiences. These material conditions have a tangible impact on these workers’ ability to stay employed in the field. By reflecting on my own personal experiences as a trans librarian; synthesizing the lived experiences of other trans and gender diverse library workers; outlining statistics on pay and work experiences; and integrating theory from Marxist and/or trans studies scholars, this session will explicate how libraries use social reproduction to marginalize and enact administrative violence on trans and gender diverse library workers.

of Canadian academic librarians are ambivalent or even negative towards neutrality as a library value. A significant portion of Canadian academic librarians are consciously choosing to embrace non-neutrality in favour of commitments to other values, notably in matters related to equity, diversity, inclusion and accessibility (Jaeger-McEnroe, 2024).
This tendency to move away from neutrality is generally not learned from library science education. Library school, codes of ethics and most LIS literature pose neutrality as a requirement and infrequently question or explore its meaning and implications. If critiques of neutrality are not part of library science curricula, then librarians’ resistance to neutrality must be emerging from alternative sources. Some research suggests that despite it not being a component in library education, many librarians are aware of critical theory, such as feminism, queer theory, critical race theory, and postcolonialism (Schroeder & Hollister, 2014), that could be contributing to their criticality with regards to neutrality.
Whether through community, research, work or lived experiences, librarians are learning to limit neutrality or prioritize other values. This patchwork of experiences from outside of librarianship is adding up to a professional fabric that is more critical of library neutrality than in the past. This community conversation will act as a venue for librarians to share their thoughts and their diverse array of experiences that affect their thinking about library neutrality. What are the competing values we have learned, and what limits does this place on our neutrality? Have our many patchy experiences combined to make a library quilt that is no longer neutral?

the John P. Robarts Research Library, the largest social sciences and humanities library at the University of Toronto, has undergone significant technological and labor transformations. The 1980s and 1990s were particularly notable or technological innovations, such as the transition to an online catalog and the creation of digital collections. However, this period also saw budgetary austerity and labor disruptions as Ontario’s Progressive Conservative government implemented neoliberal policies.
In our current socio-political and technological context of both the disruption of AI and the resurgence of neoliberal policies and budgetary austerity, the examination of the history of Robarts Library during the 1980s and 1990s provides a crucial lens on the relationship between austerity and the adoption and impact of new technologies on the academic library.
Taking the history of Robarts Library as a case study for an academic library during times of austerity and technological upheaval, this research aims to explore past technological shifts, and seeks to understand the social, political, and economic impacts and the factors that influenced these changes. The research methodology includes a comprehensive analysis of interviews from the Robarts Library Oral History Project, materials from the University of Toronto Archives, and extensive historical research. The Robarts Library Oral History Project is a collection of oral history interviews conducted in 2021 with retired librarians, library staff, library administrators and other stakeholders. The interviews offer a range of perspectives and experiences on the forces shaping the library, including
technological developments, demographic changes, and socio-political trends. In addition to the oral history interviews, archival materials offer another rich source of data on the library’s evolution. Themes and questions that emerged in the research include the expansion of job portfolios throughout the 1980s and 1990s leading to increased workload, elimination of jobs and roles, reductions and eliminations of services, and centralization of libraries, services and functions. What was the relationship between the democratization of technology in the library and the elimination and reduction of jobs and services?
This research underscores the importance of historical context in understanding the present moment and shaping the future of academic libraries. The findings aim to provide academic librarians with a deeper appreciation of the historical forces at play and offer insights into this current critical moment.

It is widely acknowledged that the nature of reference inquiries in academic libraries is evolving, driven by broader shifts in student research behaviours, expectations, and technological changes. The Library Learning Commons at George Brown College is no exception to this trend. Recognizing the importance of adapting to these changes, we sought to hear directly from students to better understand their research needs.
To achieve this, we conducted a student survey and organized focus groups to gain deeper insight into student research processes and support needs. The feedback collected provided valuable perspectives on how students approach research assignments, their experiences with our current reference services, and their preferred methods for seeking research support. Some of the insights gathered were surprising, addressing aspects of our services that we had not originally considered when setting out on this study.
This presentation will share key findings from this research, identifying trends in how students seek help, the barriers they face when accessing reference services, and the implications of these insights for the future of reference services at the George Brown College Library Learning Commons. By centering student voices, we hope to weave together new strategies that ensure reference services remain dynamic, accessible, and responsive to evolving academic needs.

at your postsecondary institution with finding and adopting Open Educational Resources (OER)?
Have you wondered what skills or experiences can be helpful when supporting Open Education initiatives in your library?
Course materials have seen a shift in recent years within academic libraries as publisher and student behavior has changed. At the same time, there has been growth of advocacy, awareness, and institutional support for the use and creation of Open Educational Resources (OER) within higher education. The use of OER can help to address textbook affordability issues experienced by students, support initiatives around equity, diversity, inclusion, and accessibility (EDIA), and be an alternative freely accessible and adaptable course material option for educators interested in developing their own curricular content.
This presentation will highlight an OER finding service model, Open Course Material Matching Service (OCoMMS), based in Libraries and Cultural Resources (LCR) at the University of Calgary that reduces barriers and supports their teaching faculty and instructors discover potential OER for use in their courses or as the foundation for a new OER adaptation. Attendees will learn about what the Open Course Material Matching Service is, the workflows or steps taken following a request, and the staffing model used to support the service.
Tied throughout will be strategies and connections to past experiences and knowledge that has been helpful in navigating the workflows of the OCoMMS service model and consideration of curricular needs and content. Attendees will come away with resources and strategies they may incorporate into their own OER finding service or adapt for library resource adoption services. Attendees will also have the opportunity to share their own practices and experiences that they have utilized for similar purposes in supporting educators with discovering library resources or OER to support learners.

as trivial, social activities, usually performed by women. Building on Gaudet’s (2019) work on visiting as a decolonial research methodology and Bhat’s (2021) perspective on gossip as a form of protection in white-dominated libraries, we advocate for the importance of gossiping and visiting as tools of resistance and solidarity for Black, Indigenous, People of Colour (BIPOC) library workers. Gossiping and visiting interrupt the existing power dynamics, challenging the Eurocentric work culture and empowering BIPOC librarians. It’s important to clarify that gossiping in this context serves a different purpose than speaking negatively about someone behind their back. Gossiping, we argue, is about sharing information, looking out for each other, and demonstrating social support to equity-deserving groups. Similarly, visiting is one way that many communities build and maintain reciprocal relationships. Together, these create networks of information-sharing so that folks can make informed decisions about who to trust, as well as rally together to upset oppressive systems. We believe that the creation of BIPOC affinity groups allows for an important and safe avenue for this sharing of information to take place. Working in predominantly white institutions can be isolating for BIPOC employees, and affinity groups can create a community for gossiping and visiting in ways that may not feel safe amongst white colleagues. However, putting the onus on BIPOC employees to seek out and create their own affinity groups requires additional labor and money. We argue that academic institutions should allocate labour and finances to create BIPOC affinity groups and facilitate gossiping and visiting.
This panel will offer up our own experience developing an affinity group of BIPOC academic librarians in Canada, involving a monthly gathering around a meal and a chance for each member to share frustrations and receive validation from those with similar lived experiences. While this affinity group does not receive any institutional support or funding, we believe it should, as these affinity group meetings have led to tangible changes in our workplaces, fostering a more inclusive and supportive environment. It led to various cross institutional initiatives, such as the joint anti-racism book club and a Community of Practice (CoP), where library workers from each institution can engage in meaningful dialogue and question the status quo. Panelists will discuss these initiatives and share the website they created for the anti-racism book club. Through this panel, audience members will better understand how gossiping and visiting can serve as a bridge to deeper relationships and collective action.