University Library Council
Meeting Minutes
Friday, January 27, 2006
10:00-11:30 a.m.

Present: Klumpp (chair), Baughman, Burright, DeWitt, Dix, Francescato, Greer, Lapin, Newhagen. Shih
Absent: Cavaliero, Peres, Ruschoff
Meeting with Council: Charles Lowry, Dean of Libraries
Guests: Anne Turkos, University Archivist; Desider Vikor, Director of Collection Management and Special Collections; Tanner Wray, Director of Public Services; Jennifer Hanna, Library Communications

Topic: New Staff
Introduction of Jill Fosse, successor to Loretta Carstens as Executive Assistant to the Dean and minute taker for ULC meetings.

Topic: Minutes of December 14, 2005
Amendment: Sue Baughman and Sandra Greer were not present at the December meeting.
Outcome: No further discussion. Minutes approved as amended.

Topic: Chair’s Report (Klumpp)

• Projects for the Council for this semester are the library liaison project and a report to the Provost on library resources for new programs. The liaison project begins now, the library resources project will begin at the February meeting (which will actually take place March 3).
• Requested that council members send any changes or updates to the Diversity of Library Needs Across Disciplines Chart directly to him if there were no time for that agenda topic in this meeting.
• Asked members to bring up any issues they notice in their use of the libraries, for possible agenda topics for future meetings.
  • DeWitt asked about Ask Us Now and how it might relate to VBIC. Lowry said that the Libraries are consolidating their chat and e-mail reference service under the Maryland Ask Us Now program. We are a state-wide leader in this effort among academic libraries. A link could be provided from the VBIC page to the Ask Us Now service.
  • Are overdue notices being sent by e-mail? Wray said some kinds of notices are, some not. The library is moving toward total electronic notification.
  • Newhagen asked about the status of Open Access. Klumpp responded:
    • The Senate brought the matter up in late December.
    • The stimulus came from the University of Iowa
    • Klumpp and Lowry will report to the Senate later in the year.
    • There are problems as the whole issue is not well understood as yet.
  • Dewitt asked for a clarification of Open Access. Klumpp responded:
    • The term refers to an NIH requirement that all NIH-funded research should be freely available to everyone six months after publication. Thus the name “open access.” The issues, however, are more numerous, taking us into the areas of placement of faculty work, tenure reviews, pricing for libraries, flexibility with publishers, and several more.

Topic: Report on TERPive (Anne Turkos)
Turkos, the University Archivist, reviewed the report to the Dean on the TERPive pilot study. The study looked at ways to capture electronic documents for a permanent archive, retrievable in whatever the original format, after it was noted that documents and links were disappearing at an alarming rate from websites, as users updated and discarded older versions or obsolete documents. Users were more concerned with deleting “junk” and clearing out servers than with thoughts of preserving the documents for posterity, while the continually evolving technologies were also making already archived documents difficult to retrieve from older formats.

The DSpace software that is already being used for the DRUM project was selected for the trial project and a small number of University documents were archived. The study revealed advantages and disadvantages of using DSpace. Advantages included permanent URLs to simplify search and deep links that ensure permanent retrieval capabilities. Minor problems of loading, display, and naming were encountered but are deemed solvable.

There are several major issues. Some are technical, for example DSpace does not maintain links to external documents or internal links within documents. The question of obsolete file formats has not been resolved. A significant commitment of staffing time is also needed, for preparing and loading documents, discovering where documents reside and persuading departments to have them archived, developing the software and maintaining the system.

Conclusions at the end of the pilot study found that

• an electronic archive is vital for preserving the university’s history of electronic documents created by the University community;
• although DSpace is workable, other software packages should be explored;
• an e-archive needs dedicated archive and staff;
• for an e-archive to be successful, documents must be harvested from all possible corners of the campus and the campus community must be motivated to participate in preservation;
• long-term digital archives cannot be maintained by the libraries without significant support from the University.

• The need for a digital archive separate from DRUM was clarified. DRUM is the repository for completed faculty scholarship, and student research papers and theses only.
• It is important to preserve various versions of a document, following the history of its updates. This is more difficult with electronic documents. The need is illustrated by the Graduate School that no longer longer prints a catalog. The department sends a CD of the catalog to the Archives each year, but that is not as permanent as TERPive. All editions of catalogs are needed, because former students request course descriptions years or decades later.
• Some documents are envisaged as active documents. Departments would link to them so the documents would display as if they were maintained by the department but they would be safely stored in TERPive.
• In defining what constitutes a university document for archiving, the intention is to cast the net very broadly. There is no clear definition yet and establishing one was not part of the pilot project.
• The most frequent requests for archived material include course descriptions, historical facts about the university for website pieces, athletics questions, scanning requests for pictures, information on alumni for development.

Topic: Library Liaison Project (Vikor, Wray, Hanna)
Klumpp introduced a document describing the process for liaison review and asked for Council input and approval.

Discussion focused on the Council’s immediate task to survey departmental liaisons and faculty liaisons, using prepared questions, to determine what liaisons currently do.
Task: Complete the survey by the February meeting.

It was immediately clear that the liaison nomenclature is confusing, since both library faculty and departmental faculty are referred to by the same name.
Task: Devise better terminology. For now, librarians assigned as subject and reference specialists will be called librarian-liaisons and faculty representing various departments and colleges will be referred to as departmental liaisons.

Klumpp will divide up the liaisons among Council members to contact.
Task: Each member is expected to contact a few liaisons from his or her list, enough to get a good sense of what the liaisons do.

Vikor and Wray elucidated the current roles of librarians:

• collection development
• reference
• instruction

Topic: Diversity of Library Needs across Disciplines Chart Discussion
Postponed because time ran out. Please forward revisions to Klumpp.

Next Meeting The February council meeting will be held March 3, at 2:00 p.m.

Meeting adjourned at 11:30.

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