7 Billy Coghill – Student Outreach Through an Informational Video Distributed via Multiple Avenues
SMART Goal:
Generate further understanding and support of OER among PCC students, faculty, and staff through creation and dissemination of a short video (approximately 30 seconds) to be posted on PCC Libraries’ OER LibGuide. Video will be shared during the Spring 2025 semester through QR Code flyers, on campus screens, PCC social media channels, D2L and other school announcements, or other channels deemed appropriate. By reaching out to students on campus and virtually, we can create a comprehensive public awareness campaign that enables us to reach students across multiple settings for increased reach and interactions.
Specific Steps I Can Take:
Creation of video (writing, filming, editing, etc.)
Potential Collaborators & Resources:
- Marketing team at Omaha Public Library (Billy’s workplace) provides filming equipment and access to editing software.
- PCC Libraries provides information on OERs and platform for video (OER LibGuide).
- PCC teams in charge of content on campus video screens and flyer approval.
- PCC social media managers.
- PCC Financial Aide can send in department emails and D2L announcements to students.
Potential Barriers:
- Access to PCC social media.
- Lack of student engagement.
- Technical difficulties preventing access to/playing of video.
Questions/Issues I Need to Resolve:
- What PCC social media or other digital channels can the video be shared on?
- Can we post flyers with QR codes around campus?
- Can we get the video on screens around campus?
- Should there be different versions for campus screens, QR code flyers, and LibGuide embed?
- Need to increase knowledge of video editing software.
- Need to ensure accuracy and proper syncing of captions.
Desired Outcome(s):
- Increased engagement with PCC students on the topic of OER.
- Increased visits to PCC Libraries’ OER LibGuide.
- Increased understanding of OER among PCC students.
- Increased use of OER materials by PCC students, faculty, and staff.
- Video with evergreen qualities that can be used in the long term.
Introduction
The goal of this project is to create an informational video that introduces Pima Community College (PCC) students to Open Educational Resources (OER) and could be distributed through multiple channels, foremost being as an embedded video on the home page of the PCC Library’s OER LibGuide. Further avenues for distribution were determined during the process of the video’s creation, and are detailed in the following section.
The idea for an informational video was inspired by the short videos presented by The Athletic FC, the New York Times’ in-depth sports reporting section’s dedicated professional soccer YouTube channel. The video specifically referenced in the meeting preceding the drafting of this project’s plan can be found here.
Notes on the Process
After discussing and deciding to develop an informational video with Chelsea James, I then approached the Marketing team at my workplace, Omaha Public Library (OPL) in Omaha, Nebraska, to assist with the creation of the video. My initial pitch was to borrow a camera and get access to the video editing software, but to my surprise the head of OPL Marketing was enthusiastic about contributing to the project, believing that there was potential for the promotion of OER in the public library space (OPL projects resulting from this collaboration are yet to be determined at time of writing). After obtaining a local collaborator, I then drafted a script for the video and refined it with Chelsea before preparing for filming.
On the day of filming, OPL’s Marketing Manager, Social Media Manager, and I found a photogenic spot in the stacks at the Library Administration Building to serve as the background and commenced the filming process. After several attempts, as I am not a good speaker when on camera, multiple raw sections were determined to be promising and easily bridged with graphics and editing. Once again, to my surprise, OPL’s Social Media Manager took it upon herself to edit the video, including adding graphics and properly synchronized captions, resulting in a video totaling one minute and twenty seconds in length. Given that the videos this project was modeled after usually clocked in a little over a minute in length, and that speeding up the recording would negatively affect the intelligibility of the audio, the resulting video was adopted as the final version.
After presenting the video to Chelsea and gaining approval, distribution avenues were then considered. In addition to the initial goal of embedding the video into the PCC Library OER LibGuide, the following distribution avenues were identified: video screens on the PCC campus; flyers around campus with QR codes directing viewers to the LibGuide and video; and included as part of financial aid- and library-related announcements within PCC’s D2L learning management system. In addition, future distribution via financial aid-related emails and PCC social media was considered, as it was unable to be arranged during the Spring 2025 semester.
Finally, ways to measure the success of the video’s outreach were identified. The most concrete measurements are the number of views of the embedded video on the OER LibGuide and the number of visits to the LibGuide as a whole, with upward trends on both considered to be indicative of successful outreach. While much more difficult to measure, increased student engagement around OER and increased adoption of OER by PCC faculty would also be considered a matter of success for the video.
Conclusion
This project initially seemed daunting, but thanks to the assistance of the OPL Marketing team and Chelsea, it came together much quicker than anticipated. I believe that the quality of the video speaks to the impact of the contributions and teamwork of a group of people with a diverse range of skills, even and especially those who were not directly involved with PCC. (Rest assured that the OPL staff members who contributed to this project were compensated with doughnuts for their department following the approval of the video.) I believe that the video also has evergreen qualities, meaning that it can be used for the foreseeable future without additional editing, barring any drastic changes to the OER landscape.
While I’m not certain how I could follow up the video, I would gladly participate in PCC’s OER internship again, and I hope to work more frequently and closely with OER in the future. I look forward to future developments in the OER ecosystem, and hope to be able to contribute to OER such as this book in the future as well.
The video is linked below, as the file is too large to embed, for your viewing pleasure.
