Tag Archives: e-resources

Proposing an online course for NASIG

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Last week, Valerie Bross, co-chair of this year’s NASIG Continuing Education Committee (CEC), asked for proposals for CEC funding for the coming year.  I decided to submit a proposal for creating a pilot online course focusing on best practices and case studies for e-resources management.  I don’t know yet if it will be accepted or if it will emerge with a different focus, but I am excited about the possibility of helping to provide an excellent, inexpensive, dynamic, topically relevant online course for the benefit of NASIG.

The landscape for developing an online course has changed quite drastically in the past few years.  Meredith Farkas and colleagues, rightly famous for their excellent work on the Five Weeks to a Social Library online course, demonstrated emphatically that great value can be provided with little direct cost, using existing tools such as Drupal.  I think this is an exciting time and developing or possibly working on something like this fits well with my ongoing love of teaching.

Proposal for e-resources management course

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One of the things that came up in conversation a few times when I was at NASIG this past weekend was that last year I made a proposal to UIUC GSLIS for a new, advanced course on electronic resources management. My intent in proposing this new course was that an existing course that I taught, Technical Services Functions, would be a prerequisite as would perhaps one or two other existing courses. More than that, however, my goal with this course is to get GSLIS students some much-needed focused exposure to the increasing dominance of e-resources (especially serial e-resources) in libraries of all types. Such a course is, in my view, long overdue. And the students themselves are clamoring for it.

Several people I spoke with at NASIG showed interest in what I had proposed so I have dug the following draft syllabus outline out of my email (thanks, Gmail, for making it so easy). If you have a moment and are interested in this topic, let me know what you think about it, either by commenting on this post or sending me an email.

Electronic Resources Management: A Suggested Course Outline
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I. Definitions and Distinctions
a. What is an e-resource?
b. How does it differ from and how is it similar to other, more traditional library materials?
b. Overlap with integrated library systems work, serials management, acquisitions, collection development, etc.
II. Conceptual Framework
a. Access vs. ownership for libraries
b. Effect of living in an Amazon/Google/iTunes worlds
c. Relevance and authority issues for e-resources vs. other library material
d. Virtual vs. in-person library service
III. Types of E-Resources
a. E-journals
b. Websites
c. E-books
d. Databases
e. Other
IV. Management Challenges
a. Diversity of selection and workflow processes
b. Explosive growth in availability
c. Preservation issues
d. Issues for intellectual access (e.g. website lists or links vs. traditional cataloging vs. other methods for organization)
e. Licensing and copyright
f. Fiscal resources
g. Balancing “traditional” vs. e-content
h. Rapid change and high user demand
i. Evaluation of use vs. cost and other metrics
V. System Tools for Managing E-Resources
a. Locally developed
b. Commercial tools
c. Classes or categories of tools (e.g. OpenURL resolvers vs. ILSs vs. ERMS vs. Other)

The Abbott Report

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I recently read a final report from the task force on the university library at The University of Chicago, written by Andrew Abbott, a professor of sociology there. It is fascinating reading and I hope it will receive widespread attention because it touches upon many issues that large academic and research libraries are facing. The angle at Chicago may be somewhat different than some other places but I think it is broadly illustrative and informative. It is interesting to note Abbott’s discussion on the theory of library research. For example, he boldy states the following:

“There is a good deal of writing about libraries and library knowledge from an informational science (IS) standpoint, but the theory of knowledge it presupposes is rooted, like IS itself, in engineering-based theories of information that turn out to be largely irrelevant to what it is that humanistic research actually produces. And in any case the information science literature arises basically within the professional debates, which to this writer seem driven more by the familiar dynamics of interprofessional competition than by deep thinking about knowledge.” (emphasis mine)

Another highly interesting point made in this report is that research data on library usage at Chicago points to the fact that the dramatically increased availability of e-resources such as e-journals, e-books, and databases has not replaced reliance by Chicago students on traditional library material. As Abbott puts it:

“There is no evidence whatever of substitution of electronic for print resources at the individual level. The two seem synergistic.”

This is great stuff because it flies in the face of assumptions that we too easily make about e-resources vs. print materials. We often assume, in other words, that print resources are less valuable, less often used with the advent of e-resources. Granted, the mix of students and the culture at Chicago may be somewhat unusual, but even so, this conclusion has significant ramifications.

There is more, much more here to enjoy and to stimulate thinking about the role of libraries.

Visibility of library on organizational websites

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It has always bothered me when a link to the library of a particular organization is not prominently featured on the home page of its website. This is particularly bothersome for educational institutions given the de facto role of the library as a centerpiece of learning. In fact when I browse the web or go directly to a known institution and do not see a prominent link to the library, this gives me a bad impression of that institution. In a previous job when I was responsible for library websites, the issue of placement for the link to the library was a battle that I had to fight with non-library campus IT folks, and fight fairly aggressively. In the campus website that existed when I came into that position, the link to the library was buried somewhere in a category for Academics, if I recall. Noone could find it. This, in spite of the fact that the library site was one of the most heavily used in the entire campus web structure. Fortunately after a campus website redesign, the link to the library was placed prominently on the home page for the institution.

So it was with a lot of interest that I read Steven Bell’s summary, posted to ACRLog, of a discussion on the COLLIB-L discussion list regarding this issue. One portion of Bell’s post particularly caught my attention:

Tom Kirk, library director at Earlham College, also brought up the value of examining web site data, but made the observation that data alone would hardly yield the information we need about student behavior in using institutional and library web sites. Until we do know more about how students use our web sites, Tom said, we may be unjustified in arguing for what belongs on a home page. As for alternatives, Tom suggested that many of our institutions have specialized portals for communicating with current students and faculty, where a more prominent library link could be placed. He also suggested that having the library under “academics” has “become a de facto standard alternative to a link on the home page?” So if they do move your library link from the home page to academics, don’t take it too badly.

This statement from Tom Kirk frankly astounds me, especially the part about having the library under “academics” being the “de facto standard.” Not true! And even if it is fairly common, I vehemently disagree that we should be satisfied with that! Furthermore, we should and often do have the data to back up the assertion that the link to the library belongs on the institution’s home page. And we should and do have data on how our students are using our sites. I would ask the question, are other campus wide sites being asked to adhere to this same requirement? Maybe, but in many cases, I doubt it, based upon personal experience.

One more point I’d make is that the library is not just for students, it’s for the whole institution including faculty, staff, and alumni. Even more than that, it is for the broader worldwide academic community. In other words, library websites, especially for educational institutions, have a worldwide audience and this is often overlooked. I mention this because one of the arguments I faced when in charge of library websites was to keep the library websites publicly available versus putting them behind a firewall and accessible only via an intranet. The argument for this restriction (made by non-library IT people) was that library resources and information was only for existing students, faculty, and staff, so therefore it needn’t be available to anyone else. Of course this is true when we think of licensed e-resources but this approach would make the library’s online catalog and other freely available resources invisible to anyone else.

I am not arguing that the library website deserves high visibility “just because.” But I find it troubling that the library’s online presence needs to be defended so often, and that there is frequently an assumption that the link to the library should be buried somewhere within an institution’s site.

Course on e-resource management

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Tame The Web: Libraries and Technology: Library Schools Must Teach E-Resource Management (& What Else?)

I couldn’t agree more with the need for library schools to integrate a course on e-resource management into their curriculum. Furthermore, I think it should be a required course. The course I teach at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in their LEEP curriculum, Technical Services Functions (LIS578LE), focuses on e-resources quite a lot. But there is so much ground to cover in the course that it seems that there never is enough time to adequately address this important topic.

Because of that, several months ago I approached the associate dean with a proposal for a new course on e-resource management. She was quite receptive to it and asked me for a formal course outline and a proposed syllabus. Unfortunately I haven’t written that up yet. Any suggestions or thoughts about this would be appreciated.

Updating course on technical services functions

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This past summer I taught LIS578: Technical Services Functions as part of the LEEP (distance education) curriculum at the Graduate School of Library and Information Science at UIUC. I was contacted today to ask if I’d be willing to teach the same course again next summer because students are already requesting it. The official description of this class is as follows:

“Seminar on the principles, problems, trends, and issues of acquiring, identifying, recording, and conserving/preserving materials in all types of libraries and information centers; includes the special problems of serials management; emphasizes service aspects.”

If I decide to accept this offer, a thorough review or shakeup of the syllabus might be in order. While I mull this over I thought I’d post the question here: What significant changes have happened or are happening in technical services functions that a course such as this should incorporate?

Currently the course is divided into the following parts:

  • Acquisitions/Collection Development (2 sessions)
  • Cataloging: An Overview (1 session)
  • Preservation (2 sessions)
  • Serials (2 sessions)

There is also an introductory session at the beginning and a wrapup session at the end. It’s important to note that this is the only course in the GSLIS curriculum that deals in significant way with serial publications. There are other cataloging courses already in the curriculum and that is why I only touch upon that part of technical services in this course.

The course objectives I’ve written are as follows:

  1. articulate the particular role that technical services plays in the work of the library as a whole
  2. understand the importance of the interrelationship between technical services and other library components including, but not limited to, public services and systems
  3. discuss the role that technology has played, and will continue to play, in the fulfillment of technical services functions
  4. understand past practices, current reality, and future directions in technical services
  5. appreciate the challenges and opportunities of serials management as an important component of technical services
  6. know where to look in the literature and in other information resources (e.g. websites, discussion lists) to understand issues and resolve problems in technical services work

I haven’t found any good textbook on this broad topic that isn’t already out of date and for that reason, I rely almost solely on a large number of book chapter, journal article, and website readings.

One of the main challenges of this course is that there is so much to cover in so little time. Another challenge is to somehow work in more “hands on” type work even though the course is taught almost entirely from a distance via the Internet. A partial answer to the former challenge would be to separate out the whole serials/e-resources piece and I have already proposed that a new course be defined for this (which I’d love to teach). I just need to flesh out a proposed syllabus and objectives and send them in to GSLIS to be considered. In my view, this is where a huge amount of the action is and it behooves every single student to have some understanding of this rapidly evolving arena before graduation as it is almost certainly going to be a large part of their future jobs.

Lecture @ UIUC GSLIS

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Yesterday I was able to go to UIUC GSLIS at the invitation of Kathie and Bill Henderson to speak to their Technical Services Functions class. (This is the same class that I teach in online form in UIUC GSLIS’s LEEP curriculum.) They’ve invited me every year for the past 14 years. Each time I go, I thoroughly enjoy the time with their students.

The topic of my talk was “The Times, They Are a Changin…or, How to Thrive in an Age of Chaos and Opportunity in Technical Services Librarianship.” What I try to do is give a quick overview of my career path thus far, and then focus on electronic resources as the “hot” area. We usually spend a lot of time talking about user expectations in this era of the Google Mindset, and how libraries are coping with the demand for online full-text while simultaneously struggling to manage the “traditional” collection. I demo’d the ERM system that we developed at Taylor, known as the Taylor Periodical Administration System (TPAS), and also talked quite a bit about OpenURL and metasearching technologies.

There are about 14 students in this class. Some years the students really get into a good discussion, while other times, they seem content just to listen to a lecture. I prefer interaction and was pleased that this year there were a lot of questions. Especially in recent years, students have expressed some apprehension about the future of technical services librarianship, or uncertainty about job prospects in this specialty. This topic came up tangentially in yesterday’s session. One student asked, given what we had been talking about in terms of the predominance of e-resources and vendor tools that libraries are stuck with, what is stopping vendors from selling or marketing directly to researchers? (We had also been talking quite a bit about Google Scholar.) I thought this was an excellent question. It really asks the question, are libraries relevant anymore? Why should libraries assume they are even part of the equation for information consumers? Have libraries given up way too much ground, ground that they can never expect to recover? Very interesting questions. We spoke about the decision made by libraries about 100 years ago to stop trying to do article-level analytics in their cataloging practice, and how that resulted in the whole development of vendor solutions in the form of abstracting and indexing tools. Those tools have then developed into online form in the last 20 years or so, and then have been developed further to provide aggregated full-text content. We have lost control (if we ever had it) of the means of access to our resources.

Overall it was a very stimulating time and I ran out of time trying to cover everything. I wish we had had all day!

The Henderson’s had made lunch and invited Linda Smith, Associate Dean and one of my former professors, to eat with us. It was nice to chat with them about various things. One of the things I noticed this time in my campus visit was that development of various areas of the campus continues at a rapid pace. Some areas are hardly recognizable anymore, they have changed so much since I was a student there.

UIUC GSLIS

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The week before last I made what has now become an annual tradition for the past twelve years or so: a trip back to my alma mater, UIUC GSLIS (the best graduate library school in the country!), to speak to the Hendersons’ Technical Services Functions class. As always, I thoroughly enjoyed talking to the class and the students had very good questions about my topic, which was the opportunities and challenges of handling e-resources. Each year the Henderson’s assign me to be a mentor to one or two of their students in this class. I enjoy that part as well. I cannot say enough about how much I admire and respect Kathryn Luther Henderson and her husband, Bill. They have been my mentors and close friends since my library school days and I am thankful that they include me in their course.

When I first made this new blog public last week, to my surprise, who should pick it up and mention it in LISBlogsource, a blog about library blogs, but a former mentee of mine from this same class. Greg not only co-moderates LISBlogsource but also has his own well-regarded library-related blog, OpenStacks. And, he apparently is an Indiana resident like myself. It’s a small world. I was really pleased to connect with him again.