University Librarian's Cabinet: Minutes of January 7, 2003 Meeting

Present:

Agnew, Boyle, Fultz, Gaunt, Golden, Puniello, Soong, Toyama

Absent:

Mullins, Sewell

University Librarian's Report – Gaunt

• The University Librarian met with the consultants hired by President McCormick to review institutional organization and relationships. The Libraries interact with all units and offices of the university, so this was an excellent opportunity to discuss our place in the university. The consultant noted that he had heard excellent reports about the Libraries from those already interviewed. The interviews should be completed by the end of January.
• The upcoming Deans Council meeting will include discussions with President McCormick on the status of the Health Commissions recommendations and on other issues important to the deans, and with Dr. Harold Paz, Robert Wood Johnson Medical School on the organization of the school and areas for collaboration.
• The VALE Users' Conference is scheduled for January 8 at the Busch Student Center and a very large number of librarians will be attending. Anne Lipow is the keynote speaker and there will be many interesting breakout sessions. Rutgers librarians are encouraged to attend.
• The University Librarian will be attending the Governor's Workforce Summit being held later this month. This is an opportunity to hear about the issues related to the future New Jersey workforce that will assist the Libraries in examining roles we may be able to play as the major public research library in New Jersey or within VALE.
• The presidential briefing paper for President McCormick noting our major accomplishments and challenges will be sent this week.

Report on the ReCAP Meeting on Artifactual Repositories – Gaunt

• RUL was invited to attend The Research Collections and Preservation Consortium, Inc. (ReCAP) Colloquium on Artifactual Repositories, which was held at Princeton University on December 17-18, 2003. Funded by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the facility, located at Princeton University, is a repository of artifactual collections. ReCAP members include Princeton University, New York Public Library, and Columbia University. In addition to RUL, attendees included Princeton University, City University of New York, JSTOR, Harvard University, CLIR, Loyola-Notre Dame Library, Inc., Columbia University Libraries, Yale University Library, Columbia University, Cornell University, Swarthmore College, Johns Hopkins University Libraries, and the New York Public Library. Agenda items included an overview of the planning grant objectives, a report on the preliminary findings of ReCAP collection analysis, JSTOR's initiatives to archive paper, a CLIR presentation on strategizing for artifactual repositories, a discussion of repository issues, a ReCAP model for a trusted artifactual repository focus group discussion, and next steps. The colloquium was held in connection with the Mellon grant to explore the idea of the ReCAP facility potentially being a local repository for print copies of the JSTOR journals. Some of the issues regarding repositories are the number needed, geographical location, security, facilities costs, and dark archive vs. accessible archive. CLIR is to release a report this year on strategies for management of repositories and parameters.

Recon Update on Status and Needs – Agnew

• Resulting from the Middle States review of Rutgers University, which identified the retrospective conversion of RUL collections as an issue, Agnew submitted a proposal for Cabinet discussion for a four-year project to complete retrospective conversion of the RUL collections. Project will benefit arts and humanities as well as the Libraries. Cabinet agreed with the proposal and would like to make this a top priority special request for funding for the new administration over a three-year period. Financial support for the project will come from fundraising and monies received from the University. Whether we can start in the next fiscal year with monies we already have will be determined.

RLG/OCLC Review – Agnew/Boyle

• Cabinet discussed the final reports from the RLG/OCLC Reference and Interlibrary Loan Work Group and the OCLC RLIN Technical Services Evaluation Working Group. Cabinet agreed that the organizations provide important services for us, we need to have both available, and we need to exploit the special features each has to offer. It was agreed to accept the recommendations of the RLG/OCLC report and work with OCLC to reconcile our records in WorldCat. Agnew distributed an update of next steps, which proposed that we always keep RLIN and OCLC up to date and develop a strategy to update every two months. Agreed that keeping RLIN and OCLC databases synchronized is a priority.

Administrative Policy on Confidentiality of Records – Boyle

• Discussed the proposed statement on "The Confidentiality of Library Records," which resulted from a written request following the Privacy in Cyberspace teleconference. The statement clarifies steps that should be taken in the event the library personnel are presented with a subpoena or other court order. Library personnel must keep in mind that they are not being asked to be lawyers but to refer requests to the Office of University Counsel. It was agreed that the Access Services Policy Memo #3: Library Circulation Records: Definition and Confidentiality should be updated to include the new information resulting from the Public Access to Government Records Law. Practical steps for staff, which was an addendum to the policy, will remain and be amended as needed.

Announcements:

Soong:

• In advance of the 2003 ALA Midwinter Meeting, which will be held in Philadelphia from January 24-29, 2003, Soong alerted Cabinet to the Rutgers University Policy on Usage of Fifteen-Passenger Vans. The policy, which can be found at http://www.rci.rutgers.edu/~procure/vans.html, outlines regulations on occupancy limits on all twelve-passenger and fifteen-passenger vans owned, leased, and rented in Rutgers' name for any university sponsored program or event. In light of these regulations and the safety issues surrounding these vans, attendees going to the ALA meeting should think about car pooling or going by train.

Golden:

• John Gibson, Robeson Instructional Technologist, developed an interactive CDROM on setting up a computer for remote access to the RULS databases. It will be announced at the Access Services meeting on Thursday and copies of the CDs will be sent to Judy Gardner next week.
• The Paul Robeson Library received a gift of approximately 140 books about Disney and his films including books on animation and auction catalogs. Most of these are not owned by RUL and will be cataloged this spring.
• Katie Anderson is the new Supervisor in Access Services. She comes to Rutgers from Bloomberg Financial Services in Princeton and begins work here on Monday January 13, 2003.

Toyama:

• Congratulations to New Brunswick librarian Lourdes Vazquez, poet and writer. Lourdes is the recipient of the prestigious international literary award "concurso de cuentos de Juan Rulfo," one of seven or eight distinguished international awards given for literary works in Spanish literature in countries including Spain, Mexico, Venezuela, Cuba and France. Lourdes' short story, entitled "La estatuilla," was entered into the competition under the category of "Literate World." 7,272 writers competed for the award.

Agnew:

• Judit Hajnal Ward will be joining the Acquisitions Department as Acquisitions Associate on January 13, 2003. Her primary responsibilities will include ordering foreign, out-of-print, and specialized materials for the Rutgers University libraries' collections. Judit has worked in libraries in Europe, Canada, and the United States. She has broad experience with the publishing industry, having worked for a publishing house and as an editor of a scholarly journal. She has developed web pages for teaching and research, and she is currently teaching English as a Second Language classes online. She is technically adept and experienced with all of the standard MS applications.
• Catherine Pecoraro will be joining the Acquisitions Department as Digital Resources Coordinator on January 21. Currently, Cathy coordinates the receiving operation for serials at the Library of Science and Medicine, which functions as the receiving location for all of the New Brunswick science libraries. She has solid experience with scholarly journals and their complexities, and she has established working relationships with the many vendors and publishers of these materials. In her new capacity, Cathy will continue to work with many of these same suppliers. She also has exceptional public service experience, which will complement her daily interactions with librarians, staff, and patrons as Digital Resources Coordinator.

Boyle:

• We have received an invitation to join the Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, Inc. (PALCI) – the first library outside Pennsylvania to be invited. As a first step in assessing the feasibility of this new partnership, we have agreed to participate in a pilot project during the coming spring semester that will let us try out and assess the PALCI statewide borrowing program. PALCI libraries have built a virtual union catalog and provide direct patron requesting using URSA software. The catalog provides access to about 24 million volumes in 30 libraries, including Penn State, Pitt, and Temple. The URSA software supports borrowing of returnables between libraries as a circulation function in a way similar to the Rutgers Delivery System. Libraries using the service report that their users love it, primarily for the speed of delivery. Additional information is available on the PALCI website at http://www.lehigh.edu/~inpalci/. Our participation is being planned by a group that includes Susan Beck,Natalie Borisovets, Judy Gardner, Ann Montanaro, Julie Still, Farideh Tehrani, Ann Watkins, Myoung Wilson, and Jeanne Boyle.

Puniello:

• The first part of Phase I of D21 construction starts on January 8 with the move of the Access Services Department down to the lower level. The front desk remains operational until construction starts in March.
• The Art Library Space Planning Committee made its recommendations to Gaunt. They include:
  • The creation of an instructional facility
  • Turning the seminar room into a smart classroom
  • Creating two group study rooms
  • Create exhibition areas
  • Create more space for the above by having retrospective conversion of the card catalog and the use of compact shelving
  • Additional comfortable seating throughout the library
  • Photocopy service enhancements