Checking In: Slowing Down and Doing Less to Empower Students

Abstract

Penn State's President Bendapudi has said, "We can do anything, but we can't do everything." Taking this sentiment and a culture of care for our student employees in mind, I threw out my carefully curated training guide for the year in lieu of slowing down and checking in with my student employees to assess their capacity. This poster explores the power of developing training around “check-ins” with student employees at bi-weekly training meetings, and empowering students to choose future projects and training topics based on their interests and mental load availability. The results of this simple practice of “check-ins” helped build relationships and foster a supportive environment for library student employees to grow in their roles as Peer Research Consultants. How to build “check-ins” into your training, build a program based on student need and input, and reflections on the process will be discussed.