University Librarian's Cabinet: Minutes of the June 17, 2003 Meeting

Present:: Agnew, Boyle, Fultz, Gaunt, Sewell, Soong, Toyama, Mullins, Puniello
Videoconference:: Golden
Absent:: Puniello

University Librarian's Report - Gaunt

The University has announced the implementation of an online Absence Record System that will replace the paper Absence Record Cards and is offering training sessions during the summer for those who will be using the new system. The benefits will be that time accrual will automatically be calculated each year depending upon the person's status and any carry over. Individuals will be able to see their record at any time. The downside is that the individuals will not be inputting their own attendance record online, but will be providing the information to a designated unit representative for inputting/review. Once we have attended a training session we will know better how the process will work.

The search committee for the New Brunswick Library Directors is almost set - Gaunt is waiting for one teaching faculty member and one librarian to respond. Lynn Mullins will chair the committee.
Until Samson Soong's position is filled, the budget responsibilities will remain with the University Librarian with Janie Fultz as back up for Nancy Hendrickson. Jeanne Boyle will take on additional responsibilities for personnel. All the details are being worked out now and a formal announcement of specific responsibilities and process for contacting individuals on issues will be forthcoming.
Angel Falcon will be working with the University Librarian over the summer. Two major projects will be to draft an annual report for VALE, and to do a staffing comparative survey for the three campuses based on programs, population served, and workload. Progress reports will be shared with Cabinet and Angel will be attending Cabinet meetings and VALE Executive Committee meetings. Another project, reviewing positions descriptions for AUL for Budget/Personnel in ARL libraries, was also suggested.
University Human Relations will be reviewing a class of positions in the university considered external relations. This review will be similar to the ones undertaken for information technology and business managers. There are only two positions in the Libraries that may fall within this category.

There was good attendance at the recent promotion and tenure workshop. The focus was primarily on promotion to Librarian I, reappointment and tenure actions. There will be another workshop in the fall that focuses on the role of the tenured faculty in the process. Cabinet members were asked to focus attention on mentoring librarians, as we want all of them to succeed. A number of recurring issues were discussed.

Progress on library-wide goals for the current year was reviewed. We have made progress on all fronts and some goals are being discussed at today's meeting-OpenURL. A few goals will be modified-those relating to a server management plan if we purchase the ADIC server for the NJ Digital Highway-as the server can manage many of the functions that would otherwise have to be done manually. We are in excellent shape for the annual report.

Boyle led the discussion of the report by the OpenURL committee that has been working to review our needs (this year's goals) related to available software for an OpenURL solution to link our digital full-text holdings to citations and offer alternative methods for access if we don't own the digital full-text (such as ILL or print copies). The committee did extensive reviewing of the available software, our budget and needs, and made a recommendation to pursue the Ebsco product on a trial basis with the possibility of becoming a development partner over the next year. Cabinet accepted the recommendation, thanked the committee for its good work, and asked Jeanne, Grace, and Gary to oversee the next phases of negotiation/implementation.

Grace gave an excellent overview of the selection of FEDORA as the digital architecture for the next phase of the DLI. FEDORA is open source and is flexible to accommodate all forms of digital objects. The applications are separated from the digital objects themselves that allows changes in the variety of application software to occur without changing the data itself. This is not a turnkey system, but is one that will take considerable in-house work to develop, but the basic structure is what we need. Cornell and University of Virginia jointly developed FEDORA, and a FEDORA federation has been formed recently. Rutgers was asked to join, and Cabinet agreed that it is in our best interest to do so, and the joint development of FEDORA will benefit us.

Cabinet discussed the changing nature of the budget discussions in the state. The Star Ledger has been reporting several scenarios, one of which sounds as though the budget situation may not be as severe as expecte
We are fine tuning the budget numbers in a $150,000 return scenario that would return approximately $90,000 in salary dollars and two open faculty positions that have been reduced to approximately $28,000 each.

Golden:

Vib Bowman's proposal for a book on plagiarism was accepted by Neal-Schuman
Wireless project within Robeson should be completed by start of Fall Semester. The entire library, with the exception of offices and other closed rooms will be wireless.
New apartments are opening three blocks from Campus this fall. They will be the first market priced rentals in Camden in decades. Publicity about the RULS and Community Borrower Cards is planned for tenant availability.
Negotiations are underway for an extension to our contract to provide library services to the Camden County Rowan University Camden Campuses. Next FY will begin the seventh year of our approximately $115,000 annual contract.

Sewell:

Special Collections and University Archives is developing a major, five-year plan. Teams have been formed to reflect different format and functional areas. The process should take 9-12 months.
Sewell and others RUL representatives had a preliminary discussion with Elsevier looking into various options including: subscribing to very limited number of the most used journals within Science Direct; document delivery only from Science Direct database; dropping Science Direct completely and reinstating a very limited number of the most used journals from Elsevier. Talks between Elsevier and NERL also continue with perhaps a two-pronged approach: some members continuing to subscribe to the Science Direct package and the remainder negotiating for other options within a NERL framework.