University Librarian's Cabinet: Minutes of the October 4, 2005 Meeting
- Present:
- Agnew, Boyle, Fultz, Gaunt, Golden, Mullins (videoconferenced), Puniello, Sewell, Zapcic
- Absent:
- Fetzer
- Guest:
- Eileen Stec
University Librarian's Report – Gaunt
- FASIP packets are due to Old Queens by January 31, 2006. We have received the announcement, the process is the same, have not received all the information.
- VALE Executive Committee met this week and discussed purchasing media through the FMG consortia. Boyle and Gaunt attended a demo at a recent New Jersey Council of University Librarians, Dean, and Library Directors meeting. Cost would be one-time, not a subscription. A bigger issue is the appropriate capabilities for delivery - in the classroom, in libraries, or on demand when the students want to use it. Need to think how we would intend to use and do we have the capability. Not sure all institutions understand the ramifications. Will probably be discussed at the next New Jersey Council meeting on Friday.
- Gaunt attended the President's Annual Address to the University Community on Friday. He mentioned the three reports that recommended the same kinds of things: a task force report on undergraduate education done by Rutgers faculty, staff and students; an analysis of a survey of 8000 citizens undertaken to help us understand how the public views Rutgers; and a professional study of our fund raising capacity. Cabinet should read the Marts & Lundy fundraising report; Gaunt will forward the electronic version to Cabinet. As an interesting sidelight related to the findings, "both Newark and Camden have much less negative internal cultures than the New Brunswick/Piscataway campuses"; obviously that will reflect poorly in fundraising.
- Gaunt, Agnew and Zapcic met with members of SCILS, Sun Microsystems, and Corporation and Foundation Relations last week to discuss the idea of a potential Center of Excellence; interested in doing work with repository; will prepare for teleconference with other Sun representatives to discuss concept further.
- "Transforming Undergraduate Education Report": Gaunt discussed with Cabinet whether there is anything the Libraries should do other than informing staff to read it, and whether the Libraries should write a response to the report. It was decided that the report should be turned over to the Public Services Council and the Planning and Coordinating Committee to draft a response of how it affects the Libraries and the role they see for the Libraries. Faculty might think through what imbedding information competency skills in the curriculum would mean for the Libraries.
Project SAILS Final Report - Stec/Boyle
- Gaunt thanked Stec for coming to Cabinet and her fine work as PI on Project SAILS. During academic year 2005, RUL participated along with twenty-seven other academic institutions in Phase III of the Project for the Standardized Assessment of Information Literacy Skills (Project SAILS). The purpose of Project SAILS has been to develop an instrument for assessment of information literacy skills that is valid and credible to university administrators and other academic personnel. Questions for each skill set were created for different levels of difficulty; the rankings compare cohorts, not individuals. Rutgers students tested were undergraduates over seventeen years old who had earned fewer than twenty-three credits as of the fall 2004. Results from Rutgers students were analyzed and reported for all skill sets except set eight, which had fewer than thirty students tested. The average student at Rutgers performed on all standards at about the same level as the average student from all institutions combined. Gaunt expressed concerns that the schools included in the report were not ARL institutions, which did not allow for peer institutional comparison. Cabinet will investigate other assessment tools, such as ETS, and develop a strategy to help us understand what it means to be part of validity testing for a national tool. Cabinet recommended that the report be shared with those who participated and discussed internally. Stec will send the report out to library faculty for review.
Lines and Recruitment - Gaunt
- As a step toward moving ahead with recruitment, Gaunt distributed an updated list of "RUL Faculty Lines Available as of July 1, 2005" and "Reserve Salary for Reclass/Upgrades/Recruitment" for Cabinet review and discussion. Cabinet decided that we can safely recruit for five tenure-track faculty positions. At a previous Cabinet discussion on lines, five positions were prioritized for recruitment: Humanities Librarian, Instructional Development Librarian, Special Formats Cataloger/Assistant Head of Cataloging, East Asian Librarian, and Social Sciences Data Librarian. Gaunt asked Cabinet to compile a list of reclasses. Cabinet will now work on how to position recruitment; posting cannot be done until we have the working budget; Gaunt asked Cabinet in the next two weeks to compile a list of reclasses and upgrades so impact can be assessed. Agnew and Puniello will work on a draft process to determine how to prioritize and allocate lines and report back to Cabinet in four weeks. Will reassess as of January for further tenure-track faculty recruitment.
Announcments
Puniello
- Attended the New Brunswick Academic Coordinating Council meeting yesterday. They are changing the student identification number to an RU identification number; the process will be done in stages.
Mullins
- Moving ahead with facilities planning. Following the selection of the architectural firm, the facilities planning committee will meet; Mullins will co-chair; Puniello is a member of the committee. The firm will take us through a master plan for the next 10+ years for Dana.
- Gary Roth has been appointed Vice Provost for Academic Programs and Services; met with him yesterday to discuss the library.
- Met with Carol Herring, Vice President, Development and Alumni Relations and President, Rutgers University Foundation.
- Today is the opening of "Ilse Schreiber-Noll 'Beyond Words,'" a reading by poet Galway Kinnell, in the Dana Gallery, Dana Library.
Zapcic
- In October, Gaunt, Zapcic and Orin Puniello will travel to Connecticut to meet with a group of alumni who are planning a reception for Library supporters in the spring.
- Brought to Cabinet's attention the "Explore Rutgers: You Just Might Learn Something" brochure that was produced by University Relations and features the Libraries.
Sewell
- The latest issue of "The Journal of the Rutgers University Libraries" is out and will be available online. About 500 copies have been printed and will be sent to donors.
Gaunt
- Sewell and Gaunt have been discussing the Knowledge Initiative now that Wiley has signed; possible that Wiley will not send a subscription invoice this year; allocation will then be spent on materials.
Boyle
- The President's Annual Address to the University Community was available for viewing in the University Librarian's Conference Room; several Libraries Administration work-study students watched, and were impressed with the President and the way he handled the questions.
- In the process of scheduling a meeting with Judy Cohn and Kerry O'Rourke to carry forward our access agreements.
- Zapcic, Sewell and Boyle worked on a proposal for alumni access to resources/services to submit to Kwi Brennan, who is working with alumni associations.
- OIRT: Setting up a planning committee to select RefWorks and EndNote. Will arrange demos of both products; working with OIRT on a research symposium that we are cosponsoring; librarians will be doing presentations; Directors should think about who should participate from their campus.
- P4P information has been posted on the Libraries web site.
- University Relations has revised its style guide. It can be found at http://ur.rutgers.edu/styleguide/guide.shtml. Will extract things that are important to the Libraries and revise the Libraries style guide.
Fultz
- The BookRoom Implementation Team was nominated by Gaunt for a President's Bridge Award. They will participate in a showcase at the Rutgers Student Center on October 17.