April 21, 2008 Meeting of Administrative Council

1. Status of the Survey Libraries
2. Student Wage Allocation
3. Discontinuation of the Current Contents Alert Service
4. CAMELS
5. Announcements

Scott Walter, chair, Tina Chrzastowski, Tony Hynes, Scott Schwartz (for Bill Maher), Sue Searing, Mary Stuart, Tom Teper, , David Ward, Karen Wei, Lynn Wiley, Greg Youngen; Visitor: Rod Allen; Recording: Kim Matherly

1.      Status of the Survey Libraries

The Governor proposed that the surveys move to the University. This hasn’t been approved yet, so we don’t know what form it will take. The survey staff are not civil service. Campus is working to figure out how to deal with an influx of approximately 500 employees, if the proposal is approved. There are libraries in the surveys, but we don’t know how the collections or employees will be handled. If it’s approved the transition may not happen until after July1. The Library is working with the Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Research on issues related to the Survey libraries.

2.      Student Wage Allocation

Rod Allen and Scott Walter provided an overview of the student wage allocation process. Some have questioned what appeared to be an across the board cut following the submission of detailed requests. Rod and Scott explained that the Budget Group applied similar reductions across units as part of a preliminary wage allocation prepared based on multiple requests from units for some idea of the resources that may be available to them. The final FY09 student wage budget cannot be completed until more is known about the FY09 Library Budget. Budget Group will make use of the detailed requests, along with other data, to make final allocations as soon as possible. The 10 – 20% reductions from FY08 found in the preliminary allocation represents the most conservative information that Budget Group felt comfortable disseminating given the many unknowns still remaining in the FY09 Budget picture.

3.      Discontinuation of the Current Contents Alert Service

Library Collections is cancelling Current Contents (CC). Everyone who is currently receiving email updates from CC will be sent an email instructing them how to move their searches to Web of Science (WOS). The WOS searches will actually cover more content.  There are about 600 persons who are affected.  We hope to get the email out to people by May 31st; CC will be cancelled as of July 1, 2008.

4.      CAMELS

CAMELS has been disbanded. Since Katie Dorsey has come to Acquisitions she has been learning reserves along with other duties. She will work with a five person team under the direction of Mary Laskowski to handle cyclical reserves. Mary Laskowski’s team is moving to Main and her team will cross-train to learn additional skills within the Technical Services Division. A special thanks to Sandy Wolf for her amazing leadership of CAMELS.

The one remaining cyclical work is the end of the academic year shelving onslaught. Reshelving will be opened to all Library Staff on a volunteer basis. There will be training for this and a pizza party for the volunteers to celebrate their work. Katie will assess the value of this event and report back to Lynn Wiley.

5.      Announcements

Chrzastowski – the LIBQUAL Survey was completed on April 15. There were 824 respondents (about 200 more than in 2001). We have been contacted by ARL to pilot a LIBQUAL survey but have decided not to. We may opt to participate at another time as the new “LibQUAL Lite” is supposed to be shorter and easier to take.  We received over 300 survey comments, and these are now up on the web site for everyone to view: www.library.uiuc.edu/libqual

Sandore – CAPT has been discussing its future:

·    the ambiguous nature of how CAPT works to policy in regards to access

·    their interface with AC on issues that com to them first

·    establishing periodic reporting to faculty and AC

·    getting the policies on the Library websites better organized

Searing – what are the plans for assessment post-New Service Models (NSM)?

The final report of the Budget Group Plus went out. There will be a Library Forum on April 25 from 1:00-2:00pm in 66 Library. Robert Slater is putting the finishing touches on the NSM website and making the document available.