Launching an Open Webinar series: From Concept to Execution

Many online librarians face the challenge of scaling instruction to a large population of users. While embedding and asynchronous instruction are two common tactics, a library at a private research university with a large population of online graduate programs tried a different strategy: a series of interdisciplinary open webinars. With only one online librarian, initial efforts to move library instructional programming online had to start small, with a pilot of a single webinar. Student interest and feedback encouraged the library’s citation management team to begin offering more programming online, with a couple of new librarians trying out the webinar format. With the hiring of a second online librarian, the webinar series was finally able to take off and incorporate a variety of librarians across departments. This poster will describe not only the goals behind this webinar series, but also the tools and people needed to make it happen. It will help attendees identify topics suitable for a webinar, how to select dates and times, as well as strategies for encouraging participation from library colleagues who may be new to online learning. Finally, it will provide logistical tips for anyone interested in implementing an online instructional series at their own institution