Great points Stacey, I have been a distance ed student for many years and would have benefited from better virtual reference service than I have experienced personally. I think you are right on point that there are benefits for Virtual Referencing however face to face is sometimes still the best avenue and that as you say they can work to ‘complement’ each other. As a full-time worker it’s very difficult for me to access a face to face reference service as most of my study is completed in the evenings after hours. I think there is room for improvement and online support services have come a long way from when I first started study at university many years ago.