Planning for change: A maps and geospatial information services survey

Geospatial services in academic libraries are now common at many institutions, especially in the United States. The challenge now faced by geospatial services providers is to evolve and adapt their skills and service offerings in response to changes in research, teaching, and learning communities. Online survey instruments are a common tool used to assess geospatial user needs; however, they often fall short of anticipating future user needs and in helping geospatial services providers strategically assess the trade-offs between service offerings. This paper reports on a user needs assessment survey with its design aimed to identify user preferences for existing and future geospatial services. Respondents indicated preferences for existing access to GIS software, data discovery, and reference web pages. High priority areas for potential future service offerings included centralizing the acquisition of licensed geospatial data and developing long-term storage and preservation solutions for geospatial data. These findings can inform future outreach events, instructional offerings, maps and geospatial resources, and maps and geospatial information access. We discuss changes implemented following the survey and make recommendations for future assessments.