April 12, 2017 Meeting of Library Faculty Meeting

1.    Call to Order
 
2.    Standing Items:

2.1    Adoption of the agenda – Bill Mischo
2.2    Approval of the Minutes of the March 2017 Faculty Meeting
2.3    Report of the University Librarian (15 minutes – Bill Mischo)
2.4    Executive Committee Report and Discussion (15 minutes – Nancy O’Brien)

3.    Discussion Topics

3.1    Library Residency Program Discussion on Mentoring Ideas (15 minutes –Lori Mestre)

4.    Lightning Talk
 
4.1    Preservation Services Update (10 minutes – Jennifer Teper)
4.2    Ithaka Graduate Student Survey Analysis Update (10 minutes – Jen-chien Yu, Kelli Trei, Jamie Carlstone)
 
5.    New Business
 
6.    Announcements
 
7.    Adjournment

1.    Call to Order –Bill Mischo called the meeting to order at 3:08

2.    Standing Items:

2.1    Adoption of the agenda – Adopted as distributed

2.2    Approval of the Minutes of the March 2017 Faculty Meeting –approved as distributed.

2.3    Report of the University Librarian (15 minutes – Bill Mischo)

Budget—in last meeting we talked about the budget reduction. There is a strict order to document and campus requirement is pretty clear that we are preparing for 3% cuts. We are looking at the operation money of $600,000 to cut. The cuts may include tech services, research funds and administrative funds. Since we have cut administrative funds last time, this time it is less but still there are some things we could cut.

We have not had a collection budget increase for last two years, and this is the third year without increase and we have 4.5% inflation rate. So we are looking at serial funds and doing cancelations of inactive journals.

We should make efforts to try to reallocate our funds and to find money where we can. Campus is setting aside an initiatives pool to fund units that need assistance. The Library is planning to apply for $1-1.2 million for collections over a three-year period. There is only $10-12 million in this pool and we will be competing against many other initiatives. Library budget cuts can affect all campus units, so we can ask for support.

In the budget process, a lot people were involved and made good efforts.

Cindy Ingold asked what units were involved, Bill replied IT and Archives, among other units.

Greg Knott: we used cash from the Google Project, so as not to tap operation funds.

BM: academic pool is shrinking. UIC is taking cuts from both their collection budget and their operational budget.

2.4    Executive Committee Report and Discussion (15 minutes – Nancy O’Brien)

EC has met three times since the March faculty meeting.

EC meeting summary:

EC began an initial review of requests for 13 Academic Professional positions, making some recommendations for filling positions, and will continue to review those in conjunction with faculty position requests which are due May 15.  Due to the budget situation, delays may occur in reviewing and hiring approved positions.

The interim report from the Humanities and Interdisciplinary Scholars Collaboratory Strategy and Planning Group was accepted and an extension for the final report to May 15 was approved.

Paper preparers and external reviewers were recommended for promotion and/or tenure cases.

A proposal for a revised charge for a working group was discussed and the proposed charge was recommended as a working plan rather than a replacement of the original charge. (Working Group on Grants, Outreach and Training)

Budget issues were discussed at each meeting and, as indicated by the Dean and the AULs, a combination of cuts from central Library operations and the broader Library will occur.

Mary Laskowski was asked to work with the chairs of the Promotion and Tenure Advisory Committee and the Faculty Review Committee to revise the annual calendar for promotion and tenure review.   There was some confusion this year because the calendar had been revised to move certain activities earlier in the calendar, but other activities were not adjusted accordingly.

Nancy O’Brien: Due to budget situation, we may delay the process for new position requests.

BM added: Council of Deans. COD had several meetings, and main topic is budget. No one knows anything about the current status. President tried to work with legislature and pledged to use graduation metrics to demonstrate accountability.

BM also brought attention to the iSchool’s “information management” program.  This year, there are 40 students, more than 75% of them are international students. This is set as a self-support program which means there is no tuition waiver. For now iSchool has not given permission to offer GA allocation to these students. There will be 110 students in this program next year and 600 students in regular program.

3.    Discussion Topics

3.1    Library Residency Program Discussion on Mentoring Ideas (15 minutes –Lori Mestre)

See attached PowerPoint.

Background: The Residency Program Implementation Group was charged in the fall to implement a residency program, to provide guidance as the program develops. Dean Wilkin has committed some unrestricted donor funds for this. The four positions we will be offering are for African American Studies, Data Analytics and Visualization, Digital Humanities Pedagogy, and Digital Preservation. On the residency web page, there is also an overview of the program including general thoughts for year 1 and 2.

Planning to date:  The Residency Program Implementation Group is beginning to develop a mentoring program and training for the residents. The deadline for application is April 17, and so far there are 61 applicants.

The committee had an open discussion with interested individuals who had some previous mentoring/residency experiences and gathered some of their ideas. Some ideas included: using the mentoring map available from the National Center for Faculty Development and Diversity; once a month lunches; visits to other institutions, as a cohort;being on a committee; even shopping trips together, etc.

Each participant will need a project mentor and the unit head will also have responsibilities to help the resident. It is also anticipated the residents will have 1 or 2 mentors outside of the unit to help them understand the culture of the institution, professional development, research, publishing, and presenting. One suggestion was that two mentors be chosen who will work with all four residents, but individually, rather than as a group. Mestre invited thoughts on whether each resident should have a different mentor.

Other mentoring ideas and residency programs from campus or other institutions were also mentioned, such as the “Mentoring Diverse Faculty Workshop,” and NCSU Fellows. We can also get ideas from the Spectrum Scholars mentoring program and other national programs.

JoAnn Jacoby commented on the significant value of the program. The Implementation Group is dedicated to this program and have identified professional interest, background for mentors, and created a co-mentor program. This will be beneficial for residents in developing skills.

Lori mentioned the training needed also for mentors.

One concern that was raised about the mentoring program is that people are not doing the same thing and some aspects may be left out in the program. Lori replied that the Implementation Group has asked for volunteers to serve as mentors. Bill Mischo added that workshops, and other assigned projects to work on can also help. Nancy O’Brien mentioned the CLIR fellows program, and now we have systemic procedures to draw from. Lori asked if we have documents for that.

Clara Chu asked about annual reports for residents and Nancy O’Brien confirmed that they do report. The Residency Program participants are also included in unit reports.

Beth Namachchivaya mentioned that because residents are visiting faculty, the situation is complicated, although it will be possible to do research. Bill Maher suggested that the mentor not be an untenured faculty as they have pressures for gaining tenure and the time commitment to the program may be considerable.

4.    Lightning Talk

       See attached PowerPoint

4.1   Preservation Services Update (10 minutes – Jennifer Teper)

Jennifer Teper updated the changes in preservation services. In services, some notable changes include AV Media preservation has grown a lot, and Web Archiving and Digital Forensics and those capabilities are expanding and Collections Care is robust. The Digital Content Creation has changed its name to Digitization Services to reflect what it really does. Some space changes include Internet Archive moving to the main Library, and the unit is expanding on the fourth floor. There will be two major locations for the unit: one is in the main Library and the other in Oak Street. The Audiovisual lab is fully operational.

For request of conservation treatment, there is a new form which is simple to fill out.

There will be site visits by the Preservation Services members to different libraries to hold a one hour meetings to learn the needs of the unit.

Nancy O’Brien asked if they take old equipment, like large work stations.

Jennifer answered, they have most of that equipment already.

Lori Mestre suggested – putting the old stuff in a loanable pool.

Kirstin Dougan commented, the equipment in MPAL needs special care and security use of the items.

4.2    Ithaka Graduate Student Survey Analysis Update (10 minutes – Jen-chien Yu, Kelli Trei, Jamie Carlstone)

See attached PowerPoint.

Jen reviewed a brief history of the Ithaka Survey. It was conducted about a year ago from March 16 to April 2, 2016. A pretty good number of responses were collected. And the Survey Analysis group started in spring 2017. Some challenges of the survey include the survey design. One of the frequent comments was that it takes too long to finish (about 40 minutes). The modules and logic of the survey are often confusing. One focus of the Analysis Group was to see if there is a true difference beyond the demographics.

Jen shared some of the key findings in the survey. The Ithaka survey always looks at the roles the library plays as a buyer, repository, learning facilitator or research skill teacher. And the survey shows the role of instructor has room to grow. Jen also compared the differences about role among different groups of Illinois grads, Illinois faculty, and also US faculty and library directors.

Kelli Trei reviewed the findings of the STEM module. One finding is that most of the students look at the new works by the key scholars in the field as the way to keep up with current literature.

Jamie Carlstone discussed the key findings of the international students. About 46% of all graduate students are coming from foreign countries. The group has a 38% response from international students, which is not representative. Among this group, the findings are preliminary. There are some significant differences due to cultural difference.

There is a survey report and Tableau dashboards available to help select certain areas to look at data.

Bill Mischo asked about raw data from the survey and said it is important to get the data on the server.

Jen Yu mentioned the data can be sorted by subject.

5.    New Business

6.    Announcements

Tom Habing mentioned a campus survey on the impact of the expansion and upgrade of campus wireless. This upgrade was conducted in past years and is about to finish this spring/summer.  As part of the upgrade process, the Academic Mobility Advisory Group would like to obtain feedback from campus faculty.  Bill Mischo encouraged everyone to fill out the survey.

Tom Teper mentioned that the AP Promotion and Implementation Team will have an open session on Thursday, April 13 from 2-3pm in 106 Library for anyone who wants a quiet space to work on their CV or wants help with their CV.  It is open to everyone.

7.    Adjournment– meeting adjourned at 4:18pm