ACRL College & Research Libraries News

Association of College & Research Libraries

News from the Field

Mary Ellen Davis

Tuition increase benefits NCSU libraries

North Carolina State Univer- sity’s (NCSU) Board of Trust- ees voted on November 17, 1995, to increase annual stu- dent tuition by $400 for most students. Its action splits the projected $8.2 million in- crease evenly between need- based financial aid and the NCSU Libraries.

The resulting infusion of $4.1 million into the library budget will mean about a 35% increase to its annual state-appropriated budget of $11.6 million. The majority of the funds will go toward the enhancement of the collections, stemming their recent decline in the face of rising inflation and costs. The mon- ies will help restore purchasing power for books to its level in the late 1980s, allow support for new academic programs, and forestall further serials cancellations.

Remaining funds will be used to improve the ease and speed of access to the collections and expand services for the user community. Plans include offering a 24-hour library schedule, an electronic reserves collection for 24- hour availability, a program to improve the information-seeking competencies of students, and an automated system for request and on- campus delivery of articles and books not owned by NCSU. The new monies will also help the NCSU Libraries create a digital library, including the enhancement of electronic collections and networking infrastructure. Service desk hours in the main library and hours of opening in branch libraries will be extended.

“We recognize the hardship that the tuition increase will present for many students,” said vice provost and director of libraries Susan K. Nutter, “but the additional funding will result in significantly improved services and collections for all students and faculty at NC State, which will be of lifelong benefit.”

Collaborative delivery of electronic texts endorsed

Representatives from the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) member institutions (the Big Ten universities and the University of Chicago) launched an effort to develop a collaborative process for the production and networked distribution of electronic texts in the humanities. Their initiative transpired from a meeting sponsored by the CIC library directors and hosted by Indiana University’s Library Elec- tronic Text Resource Ser- vice (LETRS) steering com- mittee last October.

Many of the CIC mem- bers have been deeply in- volved with electronic texts, observed LETRS codirectors Richard Ellis and Mark Day. “This meeting provided the oppor- tunity to discuss how we can move forward as partners in these efforts, thereby providing ac- cess to far more materials than could be made available through individual effort,” said Day.

The first set of proposals “support CIC-wide development of digital collections for use by our scholars and students,” said Roger Clark, director of the CIC, noting that the initiative will enable participating universities to demonstrate the feasibility of seamless access to institutional and consortia resources, and make it easier for all CIC member institutions to acquire and deliver electronic text resources. Elements of the initiative will include: providing networked access to existing electronic text resources within the CIC; defining procedures and policies for adding new resources; identifying and employing text markup conventions and standards; sharing expertise across the CIC; and collaboration in developing an abstract model and communications protocols for text searching and retrieval.

Alabama governor meets students digitally

In November the Honorable Fob James, governor of Alabama, met with an information policy class of students at the University of Alabama School of Library and Information Studies (SLIS) in Tuscaloosa. What makes this event noteworthy is that neither the governor nor half of the students were in Tuscaloosa at the time. The class is taught via the Intercampus Interactive Telecommunications System (ITS), a two-way compressed video system with sites throughout Alabama. Students at sites in Atmore, Gadsden, Birmingham, and Tuscaloosa meet weekly for the class. The governor participated from the Project OnRamp site in the Alabama State House in Montgomery.

Ron Doctor facilitates a discussion between his library science students and the governor of Alabama via an Interactive Telecommunications System at the University of Alabama.

SLIS dean Philip Turner said, “This connection is an example of the real power of digital technologies. The capacity to enrich our curriculum is limited only by our imagination.’’

New ACRL discussion group formed

Based on a recommendation from ACRL President Patricia Senn Breivik, ACRL has established the Alliances for New Directions in Teaching/ Learning Discussion Group. The first meeting was held at the ALA Annual Conference in Chicago on June 26, 1995. The group was formed as a response to several national initiatives focusing on the increased use and integration of information technology into the teaching/learning process. Those initiatives include Educom’s National Learning Infrastructure Initiative (NLII), the American Association of Higher Education’s Teaching and Learning Roundtables, and the Coalition for Networked Information’s New Learning Communities program. Breivik stated, “We believe that the potential impact of these efforts on the future of higher education and academic libraries is so great as to warrant strategic coordination among librarians’ efforts” (Cognotes, June 25, 1995).

The article also says that the group will facilitate the evolution of strategic efforts in this area, which ties in well with both ACRL’s new Strategic Plan and ALA’s Goal 2000, according to ACRL executive director Althea Jenkins.

Joan K. Lippincott, assistant executive director of the Coalition for Networked Information, was elected chair of the group and Timothy F. Richards, director of library and informa- tion technology services at the University of Michigan-Dearborn, was elected vice-chair.

At the initial meeting of the group, participants described their involvement in various na- tional initiatives, discussed the purpose of the discussion group, and suggested ideas for its meet- ing at the ALA Midwinter Meet- ing in San Antonio, 8:00–9:00 a.m., January 22, in the Conven- tion Center, Room 201. Librar- ians who have participated in any of the national initiatives mentioned above are encouraged to contact Joan Lippincott (joan@cni.org) if they would like to describe their institution’s involvement at the Midwinter session.

“Every Librarian a Leader” program planned for New York

ACRL’s 1996 President’s program will offer attendees a three-day seminar and comprehensive leadership workbook. The program will consist of four modules over the three-day period, July 6–8, 1996, during the ALA Annual Conference in New York: the keynote address will focus on why librarians must be leaders on their campuses and how they can begin the process of cultivating more inclusive leadership skills; “New Perspectives for Creative Strategies” will examine ways to improve communication skills and develop creative problem-solving approaches; nine ACRL programs will address specific leadership themes; and “Assessing Your Style” will offer a hands- on session to review conference experiences and share thoughts about leadership opportunities. Participants will be asked to complete a leadership self-assessment survey.

“The program will involve interactive formats to train academic librarians in leadership skills and influence public policy both within their colleges and universities and in the broader arena in dealing with other professionals, professional organizations, and public policy agencies,” said ACRL President Patricia Senn Breivik. “The library profession is changing rapidly as higher education is demanding greater accountability and responsibility of its librarian faculty and staff,” Breivik explained. “Librarians need to cultivate leadership skills at their academic institutions to play a broader leadership role in the Information Age.”

For more information contact the ACRL office at (800) 545-2433, ext. 3248/2510, or e-mail: althea.jenkins@ala.org or noreen.hale@ala.org.

INSPEC loaded on OCLC's EPIC and FirstSearch

The Institution of Electrical Engineers (IEE), publisher of the INSPEC Database, and OCLC announced that the entire INSPEC Database backfile will be loaded on OCLC’s EPIC and FirstSearch services. More than 2.5 million records dating back to 1969 are included in the backfile. INSPEC abstracts and indexes worldwide literature published in the fields of physics, electrical engineering, and computing and control. It currently includes more than five million records.

Attend IS Web forum in San Antonio

“The World Wide Web As a Teaching Tool” will be the topic of ACRL’s Instruction Section’s discussion forum at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in San Antonio on Sunday, January 21, 4:30–5:30 p.m. The discussion will focus on ways to successfully use the Web as a teaching tool and will be led by Ralph Alberico, Elizabeth Dupuis, and JoAnne Newyear-Ramirez, from the University of Texas at Austin. The discussion leaders will describe how they are using the Web to teach students to find, evaluate, and organize networked information. Participants will have an opportunity to share specific experiences as well as gather techniques and tips to use in instruction sessions at their own institutions.

Columbia's Core goes digital

Columbia’s Core Curriculum, which last year marked its 75th anniversary and is thought to be the country’s oldest continuous Western Civilization Program, has gone digital. A high- quality collection of digital images, available through Columbia’s Home Page on the World Wide Web and the Amiens Project (the name given to a range of multimedia materials developed by Gothic architecture expert professor Stephen Murray), are now part of the Art Humanities course in the Core.

The images were made available digitally through the collaboration of the Art History and Archaeology Department, the Columbia University Libraries, and Academic Information Systems.

Students had previously relied on flat, onedimensional slides in class and trips to the library reserve room to consult a limited number of texts or black-and-white prints; now they can view high-quality images in electronic classrooms and study them via the Web from their dorm rooms or computer labs. Approximately 50 percent of the course’s images—some 500 slides—are already online.

Hillary Ballon, director of the Art Humanities course, noted that one of the most complicated aspects of the project involves digital property issues including obtaining copyrights from slide distributors and museums. “Because we are on the frontier, we are hitting some stumbling blocks in obtaining permission to put images online.”

Third party e-mail available from UnCover

Third Party E-Mail, which allows search results to be sent electronically to third party accounts, is now available from the UnCover Company as part of its Customized Gateway portfolio. Third Party E-Mail enables users to capture an UnCover citation and e-mail it to a personal e- mail address, which can be stored in an UnCover profile or a library-designated mailbox.

This capability also enhances UnCover’s SUMO (Subsidized UnMediated Ordering) feature, which blocks the ordering of titles owned by the Customized Gateway institution. Libraries can also use SUMO to block ordering of titles with a copyright royalty fee that exceeds a library-specified limit. A library could decide to send citations that are blocked from ordering to its Interlibrary Loan Office via Third Party E-Mail. Contact UnCover for details at (800) 787- 7979 or uncover@carl.org.

Lewis and Clark selects Ameritech

Lewis and Clark Community College in Godfrey, Illinois, has entered into a strategic alliance with Ameritech Library Services to provide information management products including Horizon, NetPublisher, InfoShare, and WebPAC.

Lewis and Clark President Dale Chapman said, “We want to have the most advanced technology in the U.S. As a forward-thinking community college, our vision is to empower students and faculty by integrating technology into the learning process to develop life-long education. Our library will play a key role in making this vision a reality.”

Joint use library approved

A library jointly built and operated by Front Range Community College (FRCC) and the city of Westminster, Colorado, has been approved by both the City Council and the Colorado State Board for Community Colleges and Operations.

The college will contribute nearly three million dollars and the city two million. Construction of the 76,000-square-foot library will be at the west end of the college’s main building. If all goes according to schedule, construction will begin next summer and the library will open by late 1997. According to a report in the Rocky Mountain News, the city’s portion of the library would encompass about 30,000 square feet, but all patrons would be permitted to use the entire library.

According to Warren Taylor, director of the Front Range Community College Library, the city had planned to build a library close to where FRCC was planning to build one. He said it made sense to combine libraries as the joint-use library “will have much more space and the students will get a wider range of ser- vices and opportunities.” Taylor added that there was some cost savings and that more staff would be available than either library could support alone. In addition, the collec- tion would be larger and have a broader range of materials.

Murder mystery raises money at Cal State

More than 200 amateur sleuths attended a mur- der mystery in the California State University, Northridge, Library. The drama of blackmail and murder unfolded throughout the entire library building as guests searched for victims, clues, and suspects in the darkened bookstacks and hallways. Dinner was provided with the ad- mission ticket and the guests enjoyed the en- tertainment as the body count escalated and the red herrings grew more confusing. Many guests found themselves suspects and subject to interrogation or handcuffing. The event, sponsored by the Friends of the Oviatt Library, raised more than $5,800 for the library.

Spaceline: New NLM database offered

SPACELINE, a cooperative ven- ture of the National Library of Medicine (NLM) and the National Aeronautics and Space Adminis- tration (NASA), is a database emcompassing space life sci- ences research.

The database consists of ref- erences to journal articles, tech- nical reports, books, book chap- ters, conference proceedings, meeting abstracts, bibliographies, and audiovisual materials. Sources include NLM databases including MEDLINE journal ar- ticles from 1966 on, and thou- sands of citations from 1961 to the present contributed by NASA.

SPACELINE is available to any- one holding a valid NLM user code. Information about how to gain access to the library’s online network is available from the NLM Public Information Office, e-mail: publicinfo@nlm.nih.gov.

Join the leadership discussion

Keeping with ACRL president Patricia Breivik’s theme, “Every Librarian a Leader,” the ACRL 1996 President’s Program Committee is sponsoring a discussion on opportunities outside of the library available to academic librarians. The discussion will take place during ALA’s Midwinter Meeting in San Antonio on Saturday, January 20, 11:30 a.m.–12:30 p.m.

As Breivik says, “there are people who would argue that unless librarians become be- yond-libraiy-walls leaders, our collective ability to assist people in meeting their information needs will continue to be diminished—that unless librarians become beyond-library-walls leaders, the Information Age will only broaden the gap between haves and have nots.”

The one-hour session will be run as four concurrent poster sessions. Presentations include: Shirley Leung (University of California- Irvine) will discuss the ACE fellowship program; Richard Shaw (Technical College of the Low Country) will discuss involvement in regional accreditations; Maureen Sullivan or Kathryn Deiss will discuss the Association of Research Libraries’ OMS Development Program; and Don Tolliver (Kent State University) will provide an overview of the AAHE Teaching, Learning, Technology Roundtable Initiative. ■

The chief inspector frisks a suspect after the first “murder” in the Oviatt Library at Cal State, Northridge.