Technology Team Mid-Year Report - February 14, 2000

• Organized a training session on XML, led by Delphine Kahana. The session was videotaped and is available from Media Services.

• Tech team is coordinating purchases from emergency funds set-aside for the NB Libraires -- purchased were a license for the InfoSeek search engine to support Brian Hancock's work with Linux and the purchase of 2 laser printers for LSM. The Tech Team is continuing to collect information on equipment needs throughout NB.

• Held a discussion at the NB Librarians meeting in September on how best to incorporate technology professional development, technology workshops in NB, and the utilization of technology librarians and staff within NB. Although there was interest in having technology continuing education activities as part of the library's existing short research assignment program, it was felt by the coordinating committee that this activity should be examined by the training committee led by Lynn Mullins. For workshops, there were questions on whether intense training is effective and introductory sessions as part of the NBLF meetings was deemed a better option. There was no consensus on the role of technology librarians and staff within NB except that there is a major need for knowledge and skills in these areas.

• Mary and Farideh agreed to be liaisons to the Technology Team from Collection Services and Access Services. Ryan Womack is liaison from Collection Management and Ron Jantz and Jeris are liaisons to the Information Services Group.

• The NB libraries recieved notification that we were identified for priority connection to Internet2, based on input from the technology team and other sources.

• The Technology Team oversaw the purchase of 36 computers for the NB Libraries through the Reinvest in Rutgers program. We also developed a plan for pc distribution based on criteria the team developed which also includes the swapping of other computers within the NB libraries to bring up the level of computing throughout our library buildings.

Other:

The Learning Links grant program is well underway and is in it's second semester in proving support for several Web-CT based classes taught by the Spanish department. With the resignation of Delphine Kahana, Scott Hines and Mike Giarlo have joined Marty Kessleman and Lourdes Vazquez in providing support. This support for the Spanish department has included on the hardware end, the purchase of a hi-end multimedia workstation and various scanners/digitization equipment that can digitize, text, audio and video and serve these as well. We have also purchased 5 other computers in the development of a collaboratory based at the SCC. This collaboratory will be used by instructors and students for group work on Learning Links and similar projects in the future and for small group instruction. We have also been involved in training/assisting instructors with digitizing and WebCT and training the Spanish classes on networked information resources, development of websites using Netscape Composer and with Power Point. An outgrowth of this program is working with the Spanish department in the development of a prototype multimedia journal, Arachne.