ACRL College & Research Libraries News

College & Research Libraries News

ACRL’s New Task Forces

Carla J. Stoffle ACRL President University of Wisconsin-Parkside

Planning for the next decade, including a review of the structure of ACRL to improve planning, was a major focus for the Association during 1982. This planning focus continues in 1983 with an emphasis on specific association and professional concerns identified by the Ad Hoc Activity Model Committee. Building on the committee's recommendations I have appointed seven membership task forces charged with developing recommendations for achieving objectives specified by the "Activity Model” (C&RL News‚ May 1982, pp. 164-69).

These task forces began their work at the San Antonio Midwinter meeting last month. The areas that the task forces dealt with include: 1) academic library statistics; 2) research priorities for academic librarianship; 3) library performance measures; 4) communication between academic libraries and library educators; 5) academic libraries and higher education; 6) improving the function of new ACRL committee members and chairs; and 7) the relationship between ACRL, other ALA divisions, and the Association itself. These are listed below along with the chairs of each task force.

The work of these task forces should enable ACRL to serve its members more effectively and enhance the development of academic libraries. To keep ACRL members informed of the Association’s planning process, C&RL News will carry reports of the work of the seven task forces. Should you have a special interest in the work of a task force, please contact the chair of that group.

ACRL Task Force on Library Statistics

Purpose: To define the statistical needs of academic libraries; to examine whether or how those needs are not currently being met; to suggest ways ACRL could aid academic librarians and the profession by generating and/ or disseminating these statistics and the concomitant costs of each.

Tasks: Determine how academic libraries and ACRL staff use statistics and what statistics are needed. Determine whether the ACRL 100 Libraries Survey might be used to gather this information.

Examine existing statistical sources and determine how well they are meeting the needs of academic libraries, especially college and community college libraries. Address the following questions: Do the present surveys ask the right questions? If not. what other statistics do libraries want collected?

College & Research Libraries News (ISSN 0099-0086) is published by the Association of College and Research Libraries, a division of the American Library Association, as 11 monthly (combining July-August) issues, at 50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611. Annual subscription: $10. Single copies and back issues: $3.50 each. Second-class postage paid for at Chicago, Illinois, and at additional mailing offices.

Editor: George M. Eberhart, ACRL/ALA, 50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611; (312) 944-6780. President, ACRL: Carla J. Stoffle. Executive Director, ACRL: Julie Carroll Virgo.

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A partial list of the services indexing or abstracting the contents of C&RL News includes: Current Contents: Social & Behavioral Sciences; Current Index to Journals in Education; Information Science Abstracts; Library & Information Science Abstracts; Library Literature; and Social Sciences Citation Index.

To the postmaster: Please send undeliverable copies to ACRL, 50 E. Huron St., Chicago, IL 60611.

® American Library Association 1983. All material in this journal subject to copyright by the American Library Association may be photocopied for the noncommercial purpose of scientific or educational advancement.

Address the question: Should ACRL collect data or manipulate existing data?

Determine whether any statistical project should be designed to compare library statistics with the ACRL standards for libraries.

Determine ways in which new technology could be used to cost-effectively gather, store, and disseminate statistics.

Suggest further action in the area of statistics for ACRL and prepare budgets as appropriate.

Continue to maintain liaison with the ALA Office for Research on its proposed national system for data collection and with the ACRL Performance Measures Task Force.

Keep the ALA Library Administration and Management Association/Library Organization and Management Section informed.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Annual Conference, 1983.

Chair: George M. Bailey, Associate Director of Libraries, The Claremont Colleges, 800 Dartmouth St., Claremont, CA 91711.

ACRL Task Force on the Research Needs of Academic and Research Libraries

Purpose: To develop recommendations of appropriate mechanisms within ACRL by which the Association can establish and maintain on a continuing basis a short agenda of research priorities for academic and research libraries and to recommend the means by which these priorities may be made known to key funding entities.

Tasks: Use the report of the Ad Hoc Committee on a National Research Agenda as an example of the kind of research agenda to be developed.

Determine whether the agenda should be developed by the Planning Committee or some other standing committee.

Devise ways in which other library organizations, such as the Association of Research Libraries, the Music Library Association, ARLIS/NA, the Council on Library Resources, and others, can provide input for the agenda.

Develop a list of key funding agencies to be approached and suggest ways in which ACRL can communicate with them about research needs.

Examine whether a standing committee is needed to carry out this function in the future or make recommendations on how it can be carried out.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Annual Conference, 1983.

Chair: Jo Harrar, Director. University Libraries. University of Maryland at College Park. College Park. MD 20742.

ACRL Task Force on Performance Measures

Purpose: To determine whether ACRL should undertake to develop performance measures for academic libraries and, if so. to develop a plan of action for so doing for consideration by the ACRL Board.

Tasks: Review the literature of performance measures. Evaluate the usefulness of existing performance measures manuals for their applicability to academic libraries.

Develop recommendations on what action ACRL should take in the area of performance measures (a workshop, preconference, manual, research project, etc.). Write a proposal in support of this recommendation.

Decide whether the proposal can be carried out by ACRL members (and what administrative structure should be set up to do so) or if it should be contracted out to a consulting firm having experience in this area.

Establish a budget for the project proposed.

Solicit opinion from the academic library community on such a project.

Report to: The ACRL Board on the progress of the committee after the San Antonio Midwinter Meeting and at the Los Angeles Annual Conference with a draft report submitted to the ACRL Board in advance of the 1984 Midwinter Meeting and a final report submitted by the 1984 Dallas Annual Conference.

Chair: Robert W. Burns, Assistant Director, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523.

ACRL Task Force on

Library Schools and Academic Libraries

Purpose: To foster communication between library schools and academic libraries for the mutual benefit of each.

Tasks: Examine current relationships and communication patterns between library school faculty and academic librarians.

Suggest methods to improve communication about needs of academic libraries to library schools and problems and concerns of library school faculty to academic librarians.

PETREL is working on improving this communication between research libraries and library schools. Recommend what role ACRL can play for other types of academic libraries.

Determine how library school faculty participate in ACRL: suggest ways in which ACRL could assist in the teaching process.

Propose ongoing avenues of communication— discussion group, joint standing committee of ACRL and the AALS, etc.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Annual Conference. 1983.

Chair: Cerise Oberman, Head of Reference, Walter Library, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN 55455.

ACRL Task Force on Academic Libraries and Higher Education

Purpose: To examine ways that academic librarians can interpret the role of academic libraries to the higher education community, to enhance the understanding of academic librarians about major issues in higher education, and to make recommendations about what role ACRL sould play in facilitating the integration of academic libraries into the higher education movement.

Tasks: To determine how ACRL can help members learn more about the broader environment— higher education—in which they work. This could be done through CE courses, workshops, publications, etc. Make recommendations as to how this function could be carried out.

To help ACRL communicate the role of libraries and librarians to the rest of the higher education community. The distribution of the publication Library Issues to faculty at a selected number of institutions is one attempt to do this. Suggest other ways in which ACRL can participate in this effort.

To devise ways for ongoing communication and regular interface between librarians and other academic officers. On a national level this can be done by working with national commissions set up to deal with education and with other associations in higher education. Recommend the body within ACRL which should be respoasible for this on an ongoing basis.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Conference, 1983.

Chair: Sharon Rogers, Director of Public Services, Bowling Green University Library, Bowling Green, OH 43403.

ACRL Task Force for Support of New Committee Members and Committee Chairs

Purpose: To devise a means to help ACRL members become more effective committee members and chairs.

Tasks: Develop a program to provide information on current ACRL/ALA processes and useful skills for voluntary organization so as to benefit new committee members and committee chairs.

Examine the need for leadership and group dynamics workshops and a workshop on the mechanics of running meetings, etc., for new officers and committee members and develop such workshops if needed. Make recommendations as to how attendance at such workshops might be encouraged or required.

Develop written materials that may be used by committee members and chairs.

Examine whether a standing committee is needed to carry out this function in the future or make recommendations on how it can be carried out.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Annual Conference, 1983.

Chair: Beverly L. Renford, Reference Librarian, Hershey Medical Center Library, Box 850, Hershey, PA 17033.

ACRL Task Force on ACRL/ALA

Purpose: Examine in which ways ACRL, in cooperation with other membership units, can take a leadership role with ALA as a whole, improve communication among units, and strengthen ALA.

Tasks: Develop concrete suggestions as to how ACRL can better relate to ALA.

Suggest ways in which ACRL can provide leadership, in cooperation with other Divisions, to ALA.

Identify vehicles for communicating with the leadership of other divisions, for example, conference meeting, president’s breakfast, or cocktail party.

Identify ways in which divisions can work effectively together to achieve their shared goals within the framework of ALA.

Report to: The ACRL Board by the second Board meeting at the Los Angeles Annual Conference, 1983.

Chair: Sharon Hogan, Deputy Director, Samuel Paley Library, Temple University, 13th Street and Berks Mall, Philadelphia, PA 19122. ■■

CONSULTANT TRAINING PROGRAM

Applications for the fourth and final group of 15-20 librarians to be admitted to the Academic Library Consultant Training Program are now available from the Association of Research Libraries* Office of Management Studies. The deadline for applications is March 31, 1983, with regional interviews scheduled for May and June. Participants will be chosen by August and will begin their consultant training in the fall. Interested candidates should contact OMS at 1527 New Hampshire Avenue, N.W., Washington, DC 20036, (202) 232-8656, for application forms.

The Consultant Training Program, begun in 1979, prepares selected academic librarians to serve as consultants to libraries conducting selfstudies. It provides opportunities to develop skills in identifying and diagnosing library problems, to study the theory and concepts of library training and consultation, and to increase skills in facilitating groups engaged in problem-solving.

The primary components of the training process are 1) an intensive two-week institute on consultation skills that acquaints candidates with the techniques. strategies, and resources available to them within the program, and 2) a year-long practicum where candidates work with OMS staff members in the conduct of library studies or training programs.

Candidates will be selected on the basis of a written application available from OMS. individual interviews held regionally, and participation in an Assessment Workshop. Selections are made on the basis of the following criteria: five years of successful library operations experience; demonstrated skills in dealing with colleagues, analyzing and solving problems, and making decisions; and demonstrated communication skills, especially openness to new ideas, tolerance for differing viewpoints, and ability to articulate ideas. In addition, the selection committee will consider the candidates’ experience in library self-studies; specialized management training; accomplishment in an area covered by an OMS study; and potential for working within the assisted self-study approach to organizational change and development.

All training is conducted on a complimentary basis, and consultants will be reimbursed for travel and maintenance costs during the 6-12 month training period. It is expected that consultants will devote up to 18 days during 1984 away from their present positions while engaged in a 2-week workshop and in 5-8 days consulting at a library site.

Consultant training is a central part of the fiveyear Academic Library Program (ALP) of the Office of Management Studies. The program is sponsored by ARL, the Council on Library Resources, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The program has the endorsement of ACRL, which is represented on the national ALP Advisory Committee. ■ ■