[posted on behalf of Karen Schmidt]
ALCTS CMDS Chief Collection Development Officers
Meeting Minutes
Saturday, July 8, 2000
8:30-11:30 a.m. Sheraton Ballroom X
The meeting was called to order at 8:45 by the chair, Stephen
Bosch. Members introduced themselves.
Announcements:
Mark Sandler (Michigan) announced a corrected schedule for the EEBO (Early
English Books Online) meetings at the conference.
Robert Sewell (Rutgers) made a correction to the minutes of the midwinter
meeting, noting that he had been attributed as introducing the topic of
consolidation of acquisition of electronic resources. He was not in
attendance at the meeting. Karen Schmidt (secretary, Illinois) noted the
change. The minutes were then accepted.
Nominating Committee:
Martha Brogan (Indiana) reported that the Nominating Committee was
recommending appointment of Deborah Jakubs as vice-chair, chair-elect to
follow Schmidt's term. This recommendation was accepted unanimously.
ARL Report:
Jakubs had distributed the official report prior to the meeting. She
emphasized the special collections survey that will be available this year,
and noted a 99% return rate. A symposium on special collections will be
held at Brown University in June 2001. The German Resources Project, led
by Louis Pitschamnn (Wisconsin) has been highly successful and is now
developing subjects beyond German studies. Pitschmann noted that the
project includes collection development, interlibrary loan and several
other components. Ross Atkinson (Cornell) questioned the Japan ILL project
and its apparent one-sided approach. Jakubs discussed how this project is
developing.
CRL Report:
Susan Rabe (CRL) had distributed the official report earlier. William
Schenck (Library of Congress) noted that the lower holdings standards were
based on actual holdings numbers. He asked about expansion of the foreign
dissertation acquisitions. Rabe responded that CRL will continue a
Euro-centric acquisition policy, but is responsive to ILL requests. Ann
Okerson (Yale) asked if the number of discretionary purchase proposals will
be reduced because of fewer dollars. Rabe responded affirmatively. Rabe
confirmed that the acquisitions position would not be filled at this time,
and that the presidency of CRL is expected to be filled in January, 2001.
Library of Congress Report:
Schenck had distributed the official report prior to the meeting. Atkinson
congratulated Schenck on his pending retirement. Schenck reported that a
decision on filling his position after his retirement is under
consideration. It was agreed that the CCDO group should ask LC to fill
this important position. Bosch will write a letter conveying this. The
group expressed its gratitude to Schenck for his many contributions and
accomplishments.
Review of meeting start time:
A question was raised about the 8:30 start time. Is it necessary to start
this early? Assunta Pisani (Stanford) proposed meeting 9:30-11:30. Joyce
Ogburn (Washington) noted that the official ALA time frame would be
9:30-12:30. Atkinson said that it is difficult to leave a meeting at 12:30
and get to a 2:00 meeting in many of our meeting cities. Bosch
acknowledged that the meetings often require 3 hours. Pisani moved that
the meeting time change to 9:00. The motion was defeated. The starting
time remains at 8:30.
Budget Survey:
Sewell reported on the expanded version on the ARL website:
www.arl.org/scomm/lmbs. Historical spreadsheets have been added. Atkinson
noted the value of having this information available and stated his
continued concern that we are all counting things differently. Sewell
asked if anyone is interested in taking over the work of this budget
survey, and it was unanimously agreed that he should continue.
RUSA/MOUSS Interlibrary Loan Committee, co-sponsor program?
Bosch led a discussion of our group co-sponsoring a program at the 2001
annual conference. The program's working titles is Access Anything,
Anytime, Anywhere?: Challenges in Global Resource Sharing. The CCDO group
is amenable to this, and Diane Perushek will clarify procedural issues with
the RUSA committee.
North American Title Count:
Cheryl Kern-Simirenko (Purdue, guest) reported that 55 libraries have
expressed interest in participating and that the group is on target for the
2001 count. The end product will be available either as a CD-ROM or
web-based. The current return rate for the participation survey shows a
lower than average return from ARL libraries. Okerson noted that Yale was
waiting until retrospective conversion was complete. Kern-Simirenko
acknowledged that retrospective conversion issues are the biggest reason
that libraries give for non-participation. Stephen Atkins (Texas A&M)
reported that his library finds the data so useful that they run this every
year as a management tool.
Recruitment of Subject Specialists (Bosch)
Bosch led a discussion on recruitment of subject specialists in research
libraries. Applicant pools for many libraries are drying up. Shelton
reported that they were not seeing this problem, and that their Southeast
Asian specialist pool was one of the best they had ever had. UCLA did note
that pools for administrative and management positions were slim and that
they would hire people without the MLS and work with the library school on
campus to move these individuals towards the MLS. Brogan reported that
they are in the third year of Mellon funding for apprenticeships. Indiana
has to work with state requirements for the MLS, which has been a stumbling
block in moving forward on this, even with the cooperation of the library
school. Jakubs reported on their success with a post-doctoral program,
where the library works with doctoral students in subject areas and
advances their education in library science. The requirement of the MLS
can be a block to success in this area. If we want people with strong
subject skills, we have to be flexible about our requirements. Pitschmann
reported that UW is hiring people with some class work in
librarianship. The library has noted the lack of training in electronic
resources. Library schools do not seem to be producing people who have
skills in collection development and electronic resources. The question
was raised: if people go to library school on the job, is their resulting
work any better than if they did not go to library school? The answer is
not clear and it is undoubtedly a sensitive issue. John Ingram (Florida)
has successfully hired post-docs without the MLS, though it is a preferred
qualification. It is not always easy to teach people subject matter in
depth, but we can teach collection development and cataloguing. Jim
Cogswell (Minnesota) considers the move towards the requirement of "MLS or
equivalent", with libraries deciding what the equivalent is, to be a
positive response. Okerson raised the issue of foreign nationals who meet
our professional requirements but have visa problems. Pissani and Edward
Shreeves (Iowa) both reported that their institutions will fight for visa
for these librarians. Iowa has had success adding adjunct teaching
assignments to the library position. Jakubs noted that there is a
successful Title VI South Asian consortium that includes UNC, NCSU, Duke
and NC Central. This model of sharing personnel would not work for every
field but has been successful for South Asian studies. Wisconsin tried a
similar proposal but it did not work. Arizona and Arizona State University
do successfully share a Slavic specialist, with the person working a
certain number of hours per month at each institution.
McConsortia (Bosch)
Bosch led a discussion on the issues that are arising with mega-consortial
deals. Has the emergence of giant consortial deals dampened the
effectiveness of smaller, more local negotiating? Does the local
consortium lose its voice? Atkinson noted that the length of time it
takes to negotiate in the larger environment is a drawback. Gay Dannelly
(Ohio State) reminded the group that all of our negotiations are juggling
acts, whether large or small. The question was raised: how can any library
know it is getting the best deal it can if the only deal is a
multi-consortial one? Okerson noted that in some instances small consortia
are asked not to pursue deals. Cynthia Shelton (UCLA) suggested that with
3 to 4 levels of consortia that may be found in a mega-deal, local needs
can easily be lost. It was generally agreed that libraries need to be free
to pursue the best deal they can. Sewell asked how many libraries need to
work through their campus legal counsels for everything. Very few reported
having to do this. Most are able to work with basic licensing agreements
within their own libraries.
Library allocations (Schmidt)
Schmidt reported on the initiative at Illinois where a provost's committee
is examining the library allocation for materials and will be recommending
a new model for distribution. This follows a decade-long search for the
right algorithm to apportion money to disciplines, and to find an
appropriate way to recognize that "history plus increment" does not always
reflect the academic changes that take place on a campus. George Gibbs
(Kansas) reported that 10% was taken from every fund and reapportioned to
reflect changes. Pitschmann said that Wisconsin uses publishing data to
develop the right allocation of money. Shelton stated that UCLA uses
supply and demand factors. Brogan suggested that electronic resources have
to be factored in and that interdisciplinary resources needed to be handled
in a centralized fashion. Barbara Winters (Georgia) reported on a linear
programming model for distributing funds. Jakubs asked if any libraries
have library impact statements for new academic programs. Only a few
reported having these available. Bonnie MacEwan (Pennsylvania State)
reported that there is a system for matching endowments to the library to
support new programs; Sandler reported a similar process at Michigan. The
group expressed interested in having a fllow-up report from Schmidt at the
midwinter meeting.
Maintaining print copies of materials in digital format (Bosch):
Are libraries canceling print subscriptions when there is access to the
digital format? Dannelly reported that all Elsevier and Academic are being
cancelled at Ohio State, with justification required for retaining the
print. Ogburn reported that Washington has targeted areas for
cancellations. Rutgers is looking at the JSTOR titles. Winters said that
Georgia still is looking carefully at archiving before any cancellations
would occur. Shelton reported on a 6 month Mellon grant to test print and
electronic use, which focuses on how faculty react to have print taken
away. Atkinson reported that moving money into a centralized pool and
reducing subject funds has caused subject specialists to look more closely
at their options.
Ave et Vale:
It was noted that the next meeting will see a number of our colleagues
moving on: Gay Dannelly, Bill Schenk, Barbara Winters and Gordon Rowley are
all leaving for other jobs or retirement. The group extended their thanks
and good wishes to them.
Next meeting:
A number of items were suggested for the agenda of the next meeting, which
will be held in Washington, January 13, 2001.
Karen Schmidt
Vice-chair/ secretary
Received on Thu Jan 04 2001 - 13:08:00 EST