| USMAI Consortium of Libraries |
| University System of Maryland and Affiliated Institutions |
Present: Alice Bahr (Salisbury), Richard Bradberry (BBS), Barbara Gontrum (UMLaw), MJ Tooey (HSHSL), David Gillespie (Frostburg), Charles Lowry (UMCP), Stephen Miller (UMUC), Deborah Nolan (Towson), Jeffery Hutson (UB), Larry Wilt (UMBC), Celia Rabinowitz (St. Mary's), Carlen Ruschoff (ITD)
The meeting was called to order by Rabinowitz.
TOPIC: Meeting Minutes
Leader: Rabinowitz
Outcome: The minutes for the February 22, 2008 CLD meeting were approved.
TOPIC: 2008-2009 Meeting Dates & Locations
Leader: Rabinowitz
The June 19, 2008 meeting location to be announced. The IVN room is not available.
The following meeting dates have been scheduled in the IVN room at the UMBC Tech Center:
2008: May 15, July 17, Aug. 21, Sept. 18, Oct. 16, Nov. 20, Dec. 18;
2009: Jan. 15, Feb. 19, March 19, April 16, May 21, June 18
Dates for which IVN will not be needed will be relocated to the Albert O. Kuhn Library at UMBC.
Action: Rabinowitz will ask Library Directors to notify her of their interest in attending meetings via IVN no later than the Monday prior to the meeting scheduled.
TOPIC: Chair report and Task and Study Group Reports
Leader: Rabinowitz
Prework: Minutes from March 20 CLD Exec Meeting
Rabinowitz reported that the Executive Committee reviewed the Shady Grove
Study Group Report, the Web Presence Study Group Report and the Serial Records Study Group and made decisions regarding the recommendations. The decisions are recorded in the minutes of the March 20 CLD Executive Committee meeting. Rabinowitz has been in touch with each of the chairs to explain the CLD decisions for each recommendation. The decisions have also been e-mailed to Stew Edelstein and the Shady Grove librarians. Rabinowitz commended the work of each group and emphasized that it is important not to lose any forward momentum with each of these initiatives.
1. Shady Grove Study Group Report.
The Executive Committee concentrated on the short term recommendations in the report. The fundamental principle underlying the Executive Committee decisions is that there is an expectation that the SG librarians are to take the initiative to lead and coordinate services for Shady Grove students and faculty with the home campuses. In terms of bibliographic instruction, the Shady Grove librarians should ascertain the instructional support that is available from each home campus and be able to connect to the tools that are available at the home campuses. In addition, it is important that the Shady Grove librarians coordinate the training that is needed for students with the home campuses. It is not the intention of the CLD to raise the overall priority of bibliographic instruction at Shady Grove. Ultimately, a close working relationship must be established so that there is triangular communication between the teaching faculty, the liaisons at the home campus and the Shady Grove librarians. Rabinowitz pointed out that this model will also be a good service model for Hagerstown. Tooey announced that the CLD’s efforts to make services at Shady Grove as seamless as possible will be a key message that Tooey and Lowry will deliver to the Provosts at the meeting scheduled for April 17.
Action: Each Director with a course at Shady Grove will share the above discussion with their staff so that there is an understanding that collaborative relationships will be established.
2. Web Presence Study Group.Report.
At the March meeting, the CLD Executive Committee commended the Web Presence Study Group for an excellent report. The Committee requested that the Study group expand the criteria in the report so that it could be used to evaluate discovery tools. The study group provided a follow-up report for CLD review. One member noted that the cost of maintenance should be considered when evaluating the costs of the system. It was noted that the Study Group will not be the same group that will evaluate discovery tools.
Action: Under Purchase and Implementation (bullet 5) text was changed to: What is the cost for implementation and maintenance including human resources, hardware, etc. Under Navigation and Discovery (bullet 5) text was changed to: Integration of discovery of library resources with discovery of materials on the open Web.
Action: Rabinowitz will convey the changes to the study group.
3. Serial Record Study Group Report. Studies. At the March 20 Executive Committee meeting, it was decided to ask the CPC to consider a path that will require minimal effort for the maximum impact to cope with the legacy serial records. Rabinowitz discussed the request with the chairs. The CLD needs information on the level of effort needed for this project, or at least the parts of it which are most do-able.
Other topics: Rabinowitz announced that work on patron privacy is ongoing with the RSTG group.
TOPIC: CALD Representation and Annual Meeting
Leader: Rabinowitz/LaBash
There are now 2 reps on CALD instead of 3. The meetings are once each month. Deborah Nolan volunteered to serve.
TOPIC: ITD Update
Time: 20 minutes
Leaders: Ruschoff
Ruschoff is working with the ILS Team and each staff member to develop specific work plans and tasks on which to focus in the coming months. ITD is attempting to record the work on the work plan. Each System Librarian has been asked to ensure that the work they are doing is reflected in the work plan and to keep the status information up-to-date.
In the coming months, ITD’s focus will be on patron privacy, new features in version 17-18, and statistics and reports. Other work that is going forward is the installation of another service pack, the development of new bib loaders, EDI communications for Acquisitions, notices for circulation, and authorities in the OPAC. If ITD is to pursue the recommendation to make Shady Grove a new, separately searchable base, there may have to be a choice between Authorities and the Shady Grove work over the summer. In terms of Rx’s ITD is working on emergency problem reports, routine task requests, and reports requests. Requests that are considered out of scope for now are those that require development or are an ExL enhancement. However, ITD is looking at these on a case by case basis and informing requestors when an Rx will not be addressed. ITD is also beginning to include in their communications with libraries, a deadline for a response so that momentum on given projects is not lost.
Over the past month, the most time-consuming tasks were responses to ILLiad problems and the implementation of the first version 18 service pack.
The ILS staff have spent a great deal of time planning a schedule for patron privacy activities. We have divided the work into three phases. The first phase pulls tasks together around the suppression of the SSN in display and search in the ALEPH circulation module. Each campus must discuss with their staff the following: (1.) Fine and fine collection policies for campus patrons, consortial patrons, and special borrowers. The Libraries should determine policies for fines and work with the Bursar’s office to determine procedures. (2.) Each campus will need to formulate policies and procedures for registering patrons manually. For special borrowers, an ID will need to be determined. (3.) There needs to be a consortium-wide agreement on how to handle duplicate records. There will be duplicate records because patron was keyed into the patron file and later came in via feed, and there will be duplicates because a patron has more than one campus identity. Each campus should be thinking about these issues so that input may be provided to RSTG on the overall policy and procedure for handling duplicate patron records.
Phase II consists of building loaders for five campuses that currently do not have them: Bowie, UB/BL, FU, CS, and MS. Don Spicer kindly placed the topic on the USM ITCC meeting agenda on April 11. There appeared to be some willingness to share scripts to help move the project along. Rabinowitz thanked Spicer for his efforts in assisting the USMAI effort to complete the patron loaders. Phase III of the plan will include purging old data based on RSTG recommendations and scrubbing records, SSN. Phase III is scheduled to begin in the fall and we anticipate that Phase II and III may overlap.
CLD discussed the possible loss of fines, fees and lost materials revenue that is likely to result from the inability to send SSNs to the State for collection. As the loss of revenue may be problematic for some campuses, the CLD wants to consider methods for recovering the SSN at the point of sending to collections.
One of the new features in ALEPH is media booking. Dave Wilt, from College Park has reviewed the documentation and draft a white paper describing how the ExL media booking works and to make some recommendations on the options. That paper will be presented to the campus contacts and ITD will call for volunteers to test the set-up. It appears that the module will not require programming and it is anticipated that the product will be used out of the box with modifications to the tables as specified by each campus. Concern was expressed that campus expectations for performance of this module will not be satisfied by the functionality that it actually delivers; the white paper should help to adjust expectations. Since products like this differ from one another, campuses will need to decide if they can live with the way in which the ALEPH media booking works.
FY09 ExL annual maintenance fees and other payments. Preparations for FY09 have been going on since last August. To verify that we have the right number of licenses, Hans has been monitoring the use of licenses. Based his research, Ruschoff recommends that the number of licenses be reduced. Using FY08 prices, the savings are expected to be around $100,000 per year. On the other hand, ExL has found that USMAI owes $100,000 for a 2002 hold back payment for the development of PPH. One other issue for CLD to consider is whether to remain in a holding pattern with Verde or request our money back. If we ever expect to get money back, USMAI is most likely to get the money back if it is requested before July 1. USMAI could give Verde back for a credit and use that credit for the hold back payment. CLD discussed whether more research is needed to determine if Verde should be pursued. A Motion, to withdraw from the Verde contract and obtain a credit for the product was proposed and passed, with two opposed. Verde may be repurchased in the future.
Electronic resources. Ruschoff will be working with College Park staff to discuss invoicing of and reports for electronic resources. Many CLD Directors have requested more detail in the invoices regarding the titles purchased through the consortium. CP has entered all orders into ALEPH under separate fund lines for each library. Next year, it should be possible for each library to request a report that will reflect payments for each title owned. We will also explore posting titles on the web so that each library will know what has been ordered and the amount paid. College Park Acquisitions is also experimenting with an access data base. Beyond these activities, we are working on adding rights management information to the FindIt menu so that ILL and Public Services staff can easily discover the use rights for the e-resources that have been purchased consortially. One other new procedure in Acquisitions is routine checking of all of e-resources links. We are also making full use of the EBSCO database to obtain information about the availability and correct links to our e-resources.
Rabinowitz reported that the following titles will be purchased through Central Site funds for all USMAI Libraries: Academic Search Premier, Business Source Premier, Newspapers Package, and WorldCat for a total cost of $599,613.08.
Ruschoff announced that a few campuses are asking if they may make equipment purchases through their own campuses and request reimbursement from USMAI. After some discussion, the consensus was that this method could be one option for libraries.
ITD Staffing—April 14 was the “soft” deadline for applicants for the ALEPH Team Manager position. We did not get a strong pool of applicants. The search committee is considering an extension to the deadline.
The next campus contacts meeting will be on May 5, 2008 at College Park.
Ruschoff, Qi, and Sun will be visiting Salisbury and Eastern Shore on April 23.
Action: Ruschoff will send the directors a list of topics to be discussed on their campus in preparation for the removal of the SSN from patron records.
Action: ITD will consider adding birth date to the matching criteria for patron loaders.
Action: The topic of cross consortial reimbursements for lost and late material will be added to a future CLD agenda.
Action: Ruschoff will discuss the return of Verde to ExLibris and request a credit for the package.
TOPIC: UMUC Overseas Borrowers
Leader: Miller
Miller has been asked by the Senior Vice Provost at UMUC to provide direct borrowing privileges to overseas faculty. UC formerly provided circulation of USMAI materials through librarians stationed overseas. The librarian positions have been lost and now UC is seeking to provide unmediated borrowing to overseas faculty. UC is planning to include the overseas faculty in PeopleSoft and therefore, it is now possible to assign the overseas faculty a barcode. Miller stated that UC has budgeted to accommodate no more than 100 books per year for this program. This is based on 2006 figures of 76 books shipped, the last year that there was significant overseas activity. There are approximately 700 faculty eligible for this program. UC is not planning on mounting a PR program for this service, however, instructions to faculty who borrow will be provided to be sure the borrowers are clear on lending rules. Shipping will be through US postal service to APO addresses only so that materials never leave the US postal system. UC will pay for shipping costs to the overseas patrons and fines for lost materials or for overdue materials in cases in which the overdue was caused by delays in shipping (the UC faculty member would still be responsible for overdue charges the occur because of late returns). In the discussion that followed, the CLD requested that the proposal be clear on UC’s responsibility for overdue fines and lost books. [Note of clarification from Stephen Miller: UC will cover charges for books lost in shipping and will pay fines caused by delays in shipping due to the US Postal Service after consultation with the faculty member. Faculty members will still be responsible for fines due to standard late returns (i.e. the faculty member mailed the book late, and the delay was not caused by shipping) and for materials that were lost by the faculty member not during shipping. UC will mediate between the faculty member and the lending library on fines as needed, as requested by the faculty member or by the lending library] More information is needed regarding shipping times and materials delayed due to shipping, particularly as it relates to recalls, and a 1 year pilot was suggested to gather this information - UC will report back to CLD after 1 year on the program. It was suggested that UC consider in advance the actions that will be taken if this new program creates a demand that is larger than UC's budget.
Action: The UC loader will be adjusted to include overseas faculty and a new pick-up location will be created. The priority level for this work is behind the 5 patron loaders that need to be developed for USMAI campuses.
TOPIC: Local Holdings Records Proposal
Time: 10 minutes
Leaders: Rabinowitz, Ruschoff
Action: Ruschoff will investigate the proposal and assess the level of effort to implement this project.
TOPIC: New Business
Bradberry reported that Bowie's provost has left the university. The President hopes to have a new provost in place by July 2008. Cynthia Coleman has been named as chair of the Dean of Education Search Committee.
Rabinowitz announced that, after three years of lobbying, she believes she has been successful in obtaining funding for a new (previously eliminated) line in the library. The external review of St. Mary's, which took place in the spring has been completed. The College is now awaiting the report of the visiting committee.
Miller informed CLD that the UC Senior Vice Provost will be looking at the Associate Provost for Information and Library Services position created after the departure of Kim Kelley last summer to determine whether to open a search or appoint from within. Miller reported that UC has a hiring freeze in place and budget challenges. And, finally, Li Fu from Indiana has been appointed as the new Digital Services Librarian.
Respectfully Submitted,
Carlen Ruschoff, Recorder
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