Digital Reference Committee

Minutes, February 5, 2002

Present: Eileen Abels, Julie Arnold, Katalin Ebrani, Lily Griner, Ann Hudak, Neal Kaske, Alesia McManus, Cindy Todd, Lynne Woodruff,

 

Absent: Travis Johnson

 

1) The agenda was changed to accommodate early departures from the meeting. The “Committee Ground Rules” topic was moved to the next meeting. Julie will use the reflector to try to schedule a meeting in March.

 

2) The Committee introduced itself to each other.

 

3) The questions surrounding email policy were discussed. It was decided that the "Ask a Librarian" FAQ should be revised and would reflect priority for the UM user. Alesia McManus will draft a new statement for the "Ask a Librarian" guidelines for users.

 

4) It was agreed that the problem of the increasing burden of email reference on staff in special collections warrants further discussion at the next meeting. This discussion will be based on “human resources” rather than on trying to discourage our email users. Bonnie Jo Dopp, Beth Alvarez, Anne Turkos, and Tom Connors will be invited to this meeting.

 

5) It was also agreed that in order to determine whether there is a problem of demand on reference staff in answering email queries, that all reference librarians will be asked to copy es155@umail.umd.edu with their answers. Cindy Todd will post a message to the reference reflector with this information.

 

6) The issue of opening up “Chat with a Librarian” late nights during the Spring semester was discussed. Staffing considerations will be worked out between Cindy Todd and Julie Arnold.

 

7) The “Chat with a Librarian” pilot project (April 2001 – December 2001) evaluation was shared and discussed. Highlights of the evaluation are as follows:

 

v     The number of “chat” sessions has increased. There were 25 sessions in the Spring semester (only open two months), 50 sessions in the Summer semester, and 150 sessions in the Fall 2001 semester.

 

v     Overall, more than half of the questions received have been reference or research questions. Less than half of the questions received were “directional” or “policy and procedural.”

 

v     Overall, 72% of the questions received have been from University of Maryland students, faculty, staff, or alumni.

 

v     The busiest day of the week for “chat” is Tuesday. The quietest day is Friday. The busiest times for “chat” are 12:00 – 1:00 pm, and 4:00 – 5:00 pm.

 

v     Though the “chat” link is posted on various web pages, 81% of our sessions were referred from the Libraries home page.

 

v     61% of the sessions were 10 minutes or less in length.

 

8) “Chat with a Librarian” will continue as a 4th mode of reference service available to our users from the “Help from Librarians” web page.