8:30 a.m. -9:15 a.m. Vendor Updates

9:15 a.m. -10:15 a.m. (Hybrid Session)  Papers Session, theme: Publishing, Metrics, Data management, and Digitization

• From Seed to Paper: Mapping the Journal Landscape of Plant and Crop Breeding, 2016–2025                              Yaoguang Li (yaoguang.li@uconn.edu)
• The Practices and Costs of Agricultural Data Management and Sharing                                                                              Isaac Wink (isaac.wink@uky.edu) and Leslie Delserone (ldelserone2@unl.edu)
• New Farmers of America - Part of America's Past                                                                                                                    Netta Cox (nscox1@ncat.edu)

10:15 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. Break and meet with vendors

10:30 a.m. -11:30 a.m. (Hybrid Session) Instruction Interest Group session                                                                                   

Helen Bischoff, Moderator & Ashley Orehek Rossi, Online Moderator

Framing Harmful Environmental Effects of Generative Artificial Intelligence Literacy Instruction To Reach Instructors and Students

Alex Wieker, Plant Sciences Librarian University of Minnesota

This presentation examines my approach to instructional requests regarding generative AI’s environmental impact. While many patrons seek tools to support research, these requests often assume a baseline understanding of responsible AI use. In a University of Minnesota College of Food, Agricultural and Natural Resource Sciences course, I led discussions on acceptable AI use and environmental consequences. I discovered engagement increased when I reframed environmental impacts from abstract global metrics to everyday activities and local effects, emphasizing how data centers disproportionately affect communities. This approach helps audiences make more informed, responsible decisions about their generative AI use.

Companion Research: Cultivating Information Literacy Across Source Types

Sarah Drerup, STEM Librarian, University of Kentucky

This presentation introduces the “Companion Research Technique,” an instructional approach inspired by the Indigenous agricultural practice of companion planting. Just as corn, beans, and squash thrive together in a sustainable ecosystem, this framework encourages students to integrate scholarly, government, professional, popular or media sources to build a balanced and credible research foundation. With this metaphor-driven framework, learners understand the research lifecycle and how diverse perspectives connect evidence-based literature to real-world applications. The session highlights how this technique supports information literacy, critical evaluation, and interdisciplinary thinking. Ultimately, this method honors traditional knowledge while equipping learners to navigate today’s complex information environments.

Cultivating Credibility: Teaching Journal Evaluation as an Information Literacy Skill

Karen Burton, Science Librarian, Clemson University

This presentation highlights an instructional shift for teaching information literacy skills for identifying predatory journals. Faced with unsustainable journal assessment requests, the author developed a "Journal Evaluation Workflow.” This decision-tree document helps patrons assess journal legitimacy independently by mirroring professional librarian processes. Published in the institutional repository in 2024, the workflow is available for download and includes tools and clear stop points for evaluation of predatory journals. This approach has successfully reduced the author’s workload while fostering independent learning. This experience illustrates how adapting instructional methods can make librarian workloads more sustainable and foster independent learning for faculty and students.

Out of the Weeds: Using Information Literacy to Help Undergraduates Navigate Agricultural and Environmental Data

Adriana Sisko, Student Engagement Librarian, University of Kentucky

This presentation shares techniques for applying information-literacy concepts in interdisciplinary contexts where agriculture intersects with public health and environment. Students outside of agriculture disciplines sometimes have limited experience conceptualizing food systems as researchable structures shaped by geography, policy, and environmental conditions. For GEO 342: Food, Race & Environment, I developed an approach that teaches students to analyze the relationships among race, space, and food access. Using food access research data alongside cookbooks, oral histories, and environmental justice scholarship, students analyzed the relationships among race, space, and food access. Centering systems thinking supported more nuanced analyses from undergraduates outside of agricultural majors.

Cultivating future researchers: Creating an information literacy curriculum for a new first-year experience course in the College of Food, Agriculture and Nutrition

Molly Bostrom, Biology Librarian, and Kate Peterson, Undergraduate Services Librarian University of Minnesota

This presentation describes how librarians at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities partnered to design core curriculum for a first-year experience course in the College of Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources, piloted in fall 2025. Supporting five course sections on varied topics, we developed lesson plans, active learning activities, and Canvas pre and post assessments. Across 10 sessions, we covered research basics, source evaluation, and research ethics, including AI considerations. This collaborative process highlights librarians as curricular partners and demonstrates iterative development, cross-collaboration, and strategies for scaling instruction to evolving student needs.

Paper Presentation

Information Literacy Approaches for Artificial Intelligence in Library Discovery Tools

Isabella Baxter, Agriculture & Natural Resources Librarian University of Maryland, College Park

This presentation explores information literacy approaches for helping agriculture and natural resources students navigate AI-enhanced discovery tools. Major vendors like Web of Science and Scopus, alongside newer vendors like Elicit, now integrate generative AI to synthesize search results. Because these platforms evolve rapidly, students must learn to evaluate both the retrieved results and the AI-generated summaries. Practical instructional activities used to teach students how to locate information with AI features while critically assessing accuracy of results and generated syntheses will be shared. These practices consider the breadth of AI-enhanced discovery tools within the fast-paced AI landscape.

11:30 a.m. - 12:45 p.m. Lunch with time for Networking. Meeting with Vendors. 

12:45 p.m. -1:45 p.m.  (Hybrid Session) USAIN Business Meeting Agenda TBA

Randa Lopez Morgan and Livia Olsen, Moderators

Jodee Kuden and Emily MacKenzie, Moderators

Before the Internet, there were Extension Factsheets

Gwen Short, Ohio State University

In the spring of 2025, Ohio State - Wooster Library staff physically sorted through 100-plus years of Experiment Station, Extension, and USDA documents. This collection included material from all 50 states and some US territories. This talk will share some lessons learned from planning and completing the project. Beyond the logistics, what we found fascinating were the materials themselves. Since this sorting was often at the document level, we reviewed a century of changes in agricultural research and communication. The talk will also share themes and individual documents that we found noteworthy and unusual.

Essential Databases for Agricultural Research: An Evidence-Based Guide

Chao Cai, Purdue University

Which databases should agricultural libraries subscribe to? This question becomes critical as budgets tighten and database costs rise. We analyzed coverage patterns across ten databases to provide collection development guidance based on actual journal overlap and quality indicators. Our findings show that three databases provide 95% coverage of agricultural literature, with diminishing returns from additional subscriptions. We also identified effective low-cost alternatives: combining MEDLINE, AGRICOLA, and regional databases achieves 68% coverage globally and up to 75% in specific regions. Quality assessment of database-unique content revealed measurable differences in editorial infrastructure and peer review transparency, helping librarians justify subscription decisions with evidence rather than vendor claims alone.

Convert the Reference Collection to an online Collection.

Suzi Teghtmeyer, Michigan State University

Conversion to an online reference collection: The benefits and …benefits

The MSU Libraries has diminished the number of titles in its print reference collection over the last twenty+ years. This is due to multiple reasons, including lack of use, the acquisition of ebooks and databases, and that withdrawn items are not being replaced. In 2024, a survey of MSU reference librarians showed that although many librarians desire a print reference collection, very few recall using it or referring a patron to it in recent memory. This spurred the Head of the Reference and the Reference Collection Manager, myself, to explore a different means of supplying reference resources to patrons. In this presentation, I’ll describe why and how MSU Reference is shifting to a reduced print collection and a growing e-resources based reference collection, while still providing services to the in-person patrons.

2:45 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. Break and meet with vendors; Poster session set-up

3:15- 4:30 p.m. Poster Session (Hybrid Session)      

• Digital Connectivity to Digital Literacy: Meeting Needs in a Changing Landscape                                                            Maggie Albro (malbro@utk.edu), Sreedhar Upendram (supendra@utk.edu), and Isabella Baxter (ibaxter@umd.edu)
• Exploring HathiTrust to Search Agricultural Experiment Station Publications                                                                     Gwen Short (short.67@osu.edu) and Suzanne Reinman (suzanne.reinman@okstate.edu)

• Planting Open Education Partnerships with Extension: Digging a Path Forward                                                              Hillary Fox (hefox@ncsu.edu), Kariah Brust (kariahb@uark.edu), Anita Walz (arwalz@vt.edu), and Inga Haugen (ihaugen@vt.edu)

• Farmer Wellness and Economic Resilience: Lessons in Compassion for Agriculture Librarians                                Madeleine Charney (mcharney@library.umass.edu), Jara Anderson (jbanderson@missouri.edu), Livia Olsen (livia@ksu.edu), Jeanne Pfander (jpfander@arizona.edu), Kendra Spahr (kspahr@ksu.edu) and Heather Shimon (heather.shimon@wisc.edu)

• From Courtrooms to Cotton Fields: Bugs in the Legal System                                                                                          Karen Burton (kbburto@clemson.edu) and Bashira Chowdhury

• The World of Baking in Print: Rare Trade Publications Preserved                                                                                        Livia Olsen (livia@ksu.edu), Alisha Rall (adr7777@ksu.edu), Michelle Turvey-Welch (mturvey@ksu.edu), George Gottschalk (gottschalk@ksu.edu), and Margaret Corby (mcorby@ksu.edu)

• Data Sharing and Preservation Among Agricultural Researchers                                                                                      Leslie Delserone (ldelserone2@unl.edu)

• World Data System: Demonstrating U.S. data leadership on the international Stage                                                      Meredith Goins (mgoins2@utk.edu)

• Early Career Researcher Network                                                                                                                                Meredith Goins (mgoins2@utk.edu)

• Equestrianism and Online Learning: Experiences and Perceptions                                                                                  Erin E. Kerby (ekerb@illinois.edu)

• Creating Information Literacy Workshops for Undergraduate Agriculture Students                                                Wesley Stroud (a.stroud@okstate.edu)

5 p.m. Tours of the Veterinary Medicine Complex Begins