Measuring the quality of reference services provided by paraprofessionals at an academic library

Abstract

The goals of this research study are: 1) to investigate the level of complexity of chat reference questions; 2) to measure the performance of paraprofessional reference staff based on answer correctness and patron interactions; and 3) to use this data to assess the overall effectiveness of the triage reference-services model currently used by all three campus libraries of MCPHS University. A team of five reference librarians conducted a retrospective two-year evaluation of live-chat reference transactions. The questions' complexity was evaluated using the Reference Effort Assessment Data (READ) scale, while the answer correctness and patron interactions were scored using a rubric. The study provides data in support of the triage reference-services model and evidence that, with proper training, paraprofessional reference assistants can offer high-quality reference services for academic libraries' patrons.