Enhancing Research in the Classroom: Agribusiness Marketing, TELR and University Libraries Collaborate
Neal Hooker, professor in Agricultural, Environmental, and Development Economics, was looking for an innovative way to present research material in his Principles of Agribusiness Marketing course. He found a solution through the University Libraries' Course Enhancement Grant, which funds collaborations between instructors and University librarians.
After receiving the Course Enhancement Grant, Hooker began a collaboration to incorporate multiple marketing and product label databases into his course. Hooker's goal was to "encourage students to learn about resources that they would use in the job market."
Involved with the collaboration were Business librarian Charles Popovich, Agricultural librarian Eboni Francis, TELR eLearning Consultant Valerie Rake, and graduate assistant Christopher Shanahan. The librarians granted access to these databases for students in the course, while Valerie Rake linked these resources onto the Carmen class website. Popovich, Francis, and Rake were also available to Hooker and his students for necessary technical advice in using these resources.
The product label databases allowed students to look at products from all over the world and research their product labels, as well as the marketing strategies used by these products. Hooker gives the example of a green tea product released in China and England for which labels and marketing information are available in these databases.
Students used these resources to complete multiple assignments throughout the quarter, but their main objective was a group project to evaluate the current marketing strategy of a product and its competitors. At the end of the quarter they gave a presentation on a particular aspect—such as pricing, promotion, product reformulation, or a combination of each—that could be improved. Hooker felt that these group projects encourage collaboration in research, which is frequently required in the workplace.
Hooker feels what really made this class special compared to previous classes was the "true integration of the electronic resources and the requirement to use them, as well as the integration of the product label databases within the course." Hooker also notes that this is one of the first times students have had access to these resources in a classroom environment.
The availability of these research tools was particularly beneficial to the students because it "allowed for more international product examples, more resources, and a richer sense of real-world and real-time applications."
Course Enhancement Grants
The objective of the Course Enhancement Grant program is to "encourage faculty to incorporate University Libraries' resources (e.g. electronic journals, e-books, digital video databases, etc.) into existing courses." Grants are awarded for fall, winter and spring quarters. For more information or to apply, go to http://library.osu.edu/sites/outreach/cegrfp.htm.
Article by Sam Eilerman