June 21, 2010 Meeting of Administrative Council

1)      Print Retention – Tom Teper

2)      Communicating Problems and Issues – Paula Kaufman

3)      Renewal Limits for Faculty – Scott Walter

4)      Role of the Library Public Workstation – Beth Sandore (see attachment for more information)

Paula Kaufman, chair, Tony Hynes, Lura Joseph (for Tina Chrzastowski and Greg Youngen), Mary Laskowski, Nancy O’Brien (for Lisa Romero), Beth Sandore, Scott Schwartz, Marek Sroka, Bruce Swann, Tom Teper, Scott Walter, David Ward

1.    Print Retention – Tom Teper

Tom would like to see us establish a policy as to how many print copies we will keep. Tom will create a clear policy for the Library to use that will include exceptions for Rare Books, etc. Tom will send out the policy for input.

2.    Communicating Problems and Issues – Paula Kaufman

Paula would like to encourage unit heads to share more with her and the AULs. They would like to learn about issues in the units before they become urgent. They would also like to hear about good things that are going on. There are many different communication venues in the Library. By using these, we can all help each other identify solutions.

3.    Renewal Limits for Faculty – Scott Walter

There was a complaint from a faculty member that he has to physically bring in his books after 10 renewals-approximately every three year. Scott checked with several other libraries and found we are middle-of-the-road. Some libraries allow unlimited renewals while others aren’t as lenient as us. The Committee agreed that 10 renewals are sufficient. Scott will make sure the Senate on the Library Committee is aware of the policy and the policy will stand as it is.

4.    Role of the Library Public Workstation – Beth Sandore

The use of academic library public workstations is becoming increasingly complex. Students, staff, faculty and the broader public who frequent research libraries like ours utilize these workstations for business, learning, research, and social networking purposes. Three interesting points stand out as a result of the demands placed on public computing: 1) The desire to make the “desktop” look consistent for students across campus units and functions; 2) The demand for units to offer specialized software services on these public workstations to support specific needs (like auto-save to avoid losing a term paper). 3) The increase in unacceptable network behavior incidents that are particularly troublesome in an unauthenticated public environment such as that supported by the Library.

Recently the IT Prioritization and Review Working Group (ITPRWG) reviewed and acted upon a request from the Undergraduate Library to help students avoid losing term papers which they edit using applications like MS-Word on loaner laptops or UGL public workstations. It is difficult for the Library to provide more specific technology support options such as saving papers for students due to the fact that they do not authenticate to the campus network when they commence a working session on a public workstation. Although the ITPRWG and UGL were able to arrive at an interim solution, the group identified public workstation authentication as a point that needs a thoughtful Library-wide conversation, and potentially a different perspective given the increased variety of computing applications that are utilized in public areas. ITPRWG will undoubtedly be asked to return to this issue in future work requests. The ITPRWG would benefit from a Library-wide perspective on access and audience with public computing in the Library.  What should our next steps be?

The committee feels there are Intellectual Freedom Issues at stake. Public access is critical. It might be best to give each user the choice of not authenticating and having basic services, or authenticating and having additional services.

5.    Announcements

Scott confirmed that Nancy, Pat Allen, Bruce, Marek, Tim Cole, and Kathleen Kern would be meeting soon to discuss the fall hours.

Beth reported that almost all of the email migration has been completed. The calendar migration won’t happen until early in July. Most issues have been resolved, but CITES is still working on a few things.