September 26, 2013 Meeting of Library Faculty Meeting

Call to Order

 

• Adoption of the Agenda – John Wilkin
• Approval of Minutes – John Wilkin
• Introductions – John Wilkin
• Report of the University Librarian (15 min – John Wilkin)
• Executive Committee Report (10 min – Bill Mischo)

 

Discussion Topics:

• Ithaka Survey Discussion (15 minutes – Jen-chien Yu)

 

Lightning Rounds (5 minutes):

• Research Showcase (Dan Tracy)
• RPC update (Jennifer Teper)

 

New Business

 

Announcements

 

Adjournment

Call to Order

Adoption of the Agenda

 

Approval of Minutes

The minutes were approved with a motion by Mary Laskowski and seconded by Becky Smith.  All approved.

 

Introductions – John Wilkin read off the names of various faculty hired in the past year and they stood. These included Laila Hussein Moustafa, Middle East and North African Studies Librarian in the International and Area Studies Library; Kelly McCusker, Behavioral Sciences Librarian in the Social Sciences, Health and Education Library; Dan Tracy, Visiting Librarian for Library and Information Science and Research Support Services; Henry Hebert, Rare Book Conservator; Kelly Trei, Biosciences Librarian at Grainger and, of course, John Wilkin, new Dean of Libraries.

 

Report of the University Librarian (John Wilkin)

John first thanked all for the warm welcome he has received and mentioned how impressed he is with us and the people and resources here.  He commented on the great tours he has had and again thanked everyone for the warm support.

 

Research Data Services (RDS).  The support for RDS, which was awarded prior to John’s arrival, was a joint proposal with CITES and OVCR and libraries to support data curation.  As part of this, the Library received funding for several positions, for collaboration with CITES, and for infrastructure support.  He hopes to provide update reports in future meetings.

 

Hiring Plan. Everything was resolved yesterday afternoon.  Provost Adesida supported the hiring plan in full.  This included all eleven Academic Professional (AP) positions and all the proposed faculty positions.  The Library Executive Committee (EC) discussed and approved search committees and a priority for searching for the AP positions. Nancy O’Brien is coordinating the process with Beth Woodard, Staff Development and Training Librarian.  Three of the AP positions are related to research data services, as well as a faculty position, Director of RDS.  That position was approved the first week that John was here.  Other faculty positions include: a Social Sciences Research Services Librarian, an Archivist for the Sousa Archives and Center for American Music, a Metadata Librarian, an International Reference Librarian, and a History Librarian and Interim Head of the History, Philosophy and Newspaper Library. EC will begin the process of appointing search committees and will prioritize searches.  The next hiring plan goes forward in February, with news forthcoming.

 

Strategic Planning Retreat.  At this retreat Chancellor Wise discussed the plan, which is significantly driven by the Future Excellence Reports.  Chancellor Wise covered three of the six themes in the report, which are:  economic development in the community (to foster development in Champaign-Urbana); global engagement; and diversity.  It is important for so many reasons and improves us as an organization and to help face challenges.

 

Council of Deans Meeting.  There is a new schedule and format for the meetings in recognition of the many new deans.  They are alternating between formal and informal meetings, including introductory sessions for new deans, with topics such as setting priorities, hiring and retention of faculty, and budgeting.

 

• There was a discussion of the intensified focus on cluster hires, with an acknowledgment that not as much has happened with cluster hires as the Provost would have liked.  The Provost is encouraging connections between various units. John would love to see us capitalize on the themes and cluster hires in the future and to consider teaching faculty and their work in conjunction with our work.  What might we do to support those activities?
• There will be a new Associate Provost for Faculty Development, which will focus on a number of faculty-related initiatives, including support for pre-tenure and mid-career faculty.
• There was nothing new to report on new dean searches, although there are openings. More information will be coming.
• Budget: The deficits on campus are declining significantly.  Overall costs are decreasing faster than costs are increasing.  In general, the leadership was hopeful about the budget.
• The council also spent time focusing on advancement. The new Vice Chancellor for Institutional Advancement, Dan Peterson has done a lot of preliminary work to establish a campaign and an intensified focus on undergraduate education and transformation.  Charles Tucker will be holding some discussions on undergraduate education and Sue Searing will be involved with them.

 

Open Access to Research Articles Act. The previous Biss Bill (discussed in earlier faculty meetings) is now the recently passed Open Access to Research Articles Act.  Sarah Shreeves has done some really good work on preparing a fact sheet for campus that has been shared around the state.  John mentioned that they have been mobilizing using that information, including with the senate, and with the other campuses (Springfield, etc.). He believes it is misnamed because the law is not just about research articles.  The law is very different than the proposed Biss bill. EC will charge a task force to figure out what the implications are of the law for open access mandates to public universities and what it will mean for us at the Library, specifically with regard to operationalizing work mandated by the law. The goal is to have a strong sense of the Library implications prior to work being done by the rest of the campus, which begins in January. Sarah Shreeves will chair the task force.

 

Library Planning Working Session on Priorities [previously Retreat]: Rather than a Library planning retreat this year, we will be holding a working session on a number of priorities on January 10. John and Beth Woodard are meeting to discuss the agenda. The working session will not be about strategic planning, as it was in the past.

 

John mentioned that in coming meetings and at the retreat he will talk more about his priorities, shared resources, and our leadership role and in making them work for us such as with sharing research data.  He reiterated that we have a great institution in resources, collections, and technology and we should be playing a role in shared resources.

 

Executive Committee Report (Bill Mischo)

Bill reminded everyone of the members of the newly elected executive committee:  John Wilkin, chair; Bill Mischo, vice chair, John Wagstaff, secretary, Tim Cole, Mary Laskowski, Nancy O’Brien, Carissa Phillips, Chris Prom, and Jennifer Hain Teper.  He emphasized the mission and role of EC—that it is a shared governance role and encouraged all to contact EC members with issues, concerns, or questions.  The committee serves at the Library faculty’s discretion and it is EC’s role to move the Library forward to benefit our users and the Library, in general. He also encouraged everyone to look at the agendas and minutes, which are posted on the EC website [http://www.library.illinois.edu/committee/exec/charge.html].  Please review them and ask questions.

 

There have been two meetings since the last faculty meeting.  EC spent a great deal of time discussing the faculty hiring plan and are thrilled it was approved. They have already assigned search committees for 8 of the AP searches. Nancy and Beth Woodard are contacting people to see if they will serve.  They also looked at other issues connected with searches.  They want to be more nimble in fulfilling research programmer positions, some which are for grant positions.  There have been several cases when groups have been given the money from an agency but they are delayed months due to the long hiring process and can’t start their project without the research programmer. EC is looking at a more generic job description so they can start the process early, when the grant goes through so they can get the paperwork and job descriptions done quickly.

 

Bill also mentioned that they had been involved in the Biss bill (Open Access to Research Articles Act) with the three campus committees, the senate and the task force.

 

In response to a question of whether the Library has the money for the searches, Bill responded that it does and at the last EC meeting they discussed this and the need to expend all the money that has been allocated, without overspending it (particularly for AP and faculty positions). He said that it is important for us to press forward on these searches so that we don’t lose the money.

 

John Wilkin added his praise for Susan Edwards for bridging the gap between Rod Allen and Greg Knott, the new Assistant Dean for Business Operations and getting him up to speed and moving quickly.

Discussion Topic: Ithaka Survey Discussion (Jen-chien Yu)

 

Jen-chien, Coordinator for Library Assessment, presented a PDF summary [http://www.library.illinois.edu/assessment/ithakasurvey/UIUCSummary.pdf that captured some of the highlights of the results of the Ithaka Survey that was distributed to faculty in Spring, 2013. This survey looked at key statistics from UIUC faculty, as well as a national comparison.  She had previously sent out the charts and reports and was interested in any discussion or questions of the report or results.

 

She also asked, after seeing the summary, data, or participating in the open forums and discussions,

1. If there is an area of work or committee where we could take the data and facilitate the work?
2. If we think there is a need for the library to participate again in three years, as they do nationally?

 

She showed examples of ideas of how to use the data for projects.  With support from the Business Office she was able to hire a summer graduate hourly student who prepared the data for customized data analysis.  For example, Figure 3 of the report shows Research Services Support.  If a particular academic department would like to see how their department responded to that question, Jen-chien could analyze that for that college/department.  She mentioned that at UIUC, 50% of the faculty wanted resources available on line.  She worked with one library faculty member to examine responses from her college – and her faculty responded very differently to the Research Services Support questions.

 

In addition to customizing an analysis for a particular department, she can run it by type of user (age of faculty member, etc.).  She suggested that the data could be used to get a sense of an environmental scan or for a pre-research for your own survey.  For example, if you were interested in ebooks and faculty attitudes and whether younger faculty were more open to this, she could run that using the Faculty Survey data.

 

In response to a question about mapping this survey to older surveys, Jen mentioned that it could be mapped to surveys that were done for the New Service Models a few years ago, which mapped to the divisions, social sciences, engineering, humanities…  She can code Faculty Survey data and map to those surveys.

 

After a question about whether there is a similar survey that includes data from students and student types (international, distance, minority) Jen responded that Ithaka is designing a complementary survey and that Lisa Hinchliffe is part of that advisory group for Ithaka.  Lisa said that two surveys are being developed: one for undergraduates and one for graduates.  Although there will be some common questions, there will be some branching because grad students have different roles, (TA, RA, GA etc.) and undergrads might have other life issues.  Lisa is serving on the development committee so let her know any suggestions she can pass on.

 

Sue Searing offered a suggestion pertaining to Jen’s question of whether to repeat this in three years.  She suggested that perhaps we may not want to do this particular survey, but something that will capture what we do want to survey again to see trends in the issues and data. Bill Mischo mentioned that he and Sarah Shreeves are on a campus committee that is looking at identifying campus research and collaborations.  In the Visioning Future Excellence plan there is an element of the need for campus-wide information research.  A committee was appointed to look at development (software packages).  A final report came out and they will be involved in this process and a service trial.

 

Becky Smith mentioned that right now there really is no place to track the assessment of the impact of faculty work. Desk Tracker has categories for research assistance, but there seems to be a need to discuss where we could add our interactions with assessing the impact of faculty work.  Bill Mischo added that there are lots more questions about assessing the impact of faculty members’ work and that we are being asked to look up H indexes for faculty (measure of a faculty member’s work and publishing), although there are other measures too.  Sarah Shreeves alerted us to the fact that she was made aware of a National Science Foundation (NSF) call for a proposal that indicates that only researchers with an H index above a certain level can apply.

 

If you have any questions or comments or are interested in having a customized analysis done, please contact Jen-chien.

 

Lightning Rounds

Research Showcase (Dan Tracy)

• Dan provided a reminder and a few updates about the Library Research Showcase that is coming up.  Proposals are due October 4, at 5 p.m. and should be emailed to Dan.  The presentation guidelines and form are available on the Research and Publications Committee (RPC) website [http://www.library.illinois.edu/committee/rpc/showcase/index.html].  The RPC can also help to market it too.  In addition to lightning talks and poster sessions, there is also now a technology demo category.  The committee is looking at anything that demonstrates or shows research impact, not just mainline LIS but fields and subfields as well.  The work could be in-process or completed. The committee will have a fast turn around and will let people know if their proposal is accepted by October 11 for a presentation date of November 19.  The tentative schedule is:
  • 12:30-1:30PM: Lunch and poster session/tech demos. Main library third floor corridor and nearby conference rooms.
  • 1:30-3PM: Lightning talks: International and Area Studies Library Reading Room. Overflow with streaming video in 323c.
  • 3-4PM: Optional additional time for posters contingent on need.
    • The posters and lightning talks will be filmed and added to the IDEALS repository, although an individual can opt out.
    • Sue Searing added that she has been going to the GSLIS showcases and has presented there.  She said that it is so much fun to see what people are doing.  It is exciting and stimulating and she added her encouragement for participation.

 

Research and Publications Committee (RPC) update (Jennifer Teper)

Jennifer is the current chair of the RPC.  Other members are Lisa Hinchliffe, Atoma Batoma, Kirstin Dougan, Qiang Jin and the ex officio members are Beth Sandore, Dan Tracy and Beth Woodard.  Jen had previously sent out a libfac message about having new funds since it is a new year.  Last year they spent all their funds and hope to do that this year.  They will send out periodic messages.  She also reminded folks that undergraduate students can also be included in research projects. There was a clarification about the message that Lisa Hinchliffe had previously sent out regarding the lifting of a ban on using undergraduates.  That lifting was for their use in the research board.  There was never a ban on using them in IRBs.  Jim Hahn added that he has frequently used undergraduates and they have been great additions.

 

The RPC is going to be doing a series of brownbags and open forums for people who received past projects.  They will be contacting those individuals to report out on what they did with the funds. She also reminded everyone that there is now a process (implemented by Carissa Phillips) for reporting outcomes from projects.

 

 

              This year the committee is looking at updating the web site, and the web resources and forms.  If there are any particular suggestions please let them know so the process can be more meaningful or easier.

 

Data Information Literacy Symposium (Lisa Hinchliffe and Karen Hogenboom)

This past week four individuals went to a Data Information Literacy Symposium at Purdue University (Lisa, Karen, Christie Wiley and Sarah Williams).  This is a project aimed at defining some competencies for handling (rather than just providing) data from the research side.  The symposium was a capstone of an IMLS (Institute of Museum and Library Services) grant project.  It is based on relationships with faculty and set up with groups and projects in the sciences.  Their next steps are to move it to the social sciences and see if that shift changes anything.  The thought is that it might shift the focus.   There will also be a book coming out pertaining to this and an online toolkit will be created.

 

The User Education Committee and the eResearch Implementation Committee held a pre-meeting to think about what to listen for and come back with, including implementation strategies used.  Lisa gave examples of some of the strategies, such as an embedded Data Services Consultant, training sessions (workshop series, lab meetings, course integrated, online modules, credit courses), and partnerships.  She said her biggest take away was the powerful programs that have been developed through partnerships, and added that we need to think about how to collaborate, especially since there’s lots of curricular material being developed.

 

She also mentioned some of the challenges, including connecting with faculty, developing librarian skills, and scalability.  The two committees will meet to discuss the next steps, the roles and complementary efforts.  They will share more in a brown bag.

 

Beth Woodard asked if there were any solutions offered for one of the challenges of “ramping up skills”.  Lisa mentioned that most are just projects now and they realize it has to be a full library press.

 

New Business – none

Announcements

• Nancy O’Brien, on behalf of Peg Burnette announced that SSHEL (Social Sciences, Health and Education Library) will have an open house on October 24^th.  There will also be food in the Marshall Gallery and John Wilkin will speak. An announcement will be forthcoming.
• Merinda Hensley also announced an open house for the Scholarly Commons that will take place on October 3, 1-5 p.m. that will highlight the services of the Scholarly Commons.
• On October 12, there will be a 50^th Anniversary celebration of University Archives.  There will be food and exhibits in the Marshall Gallery.
• Jim Hahn added that on October 2, beginning at 11:30 in 149b (lower level of the Undergraduate Library) there will be a tech prototyping open house, including demos in visualization and trending services.
• Karen Hogenboom announced the Research Data Service Interest Group is meeting Monday, September 30, from 1-2pm in 323C to talk about the Research Data Service Proposal.
• Jane Block revealed that the long awaited Neoimpressionism Exhibit that she has been working on will open June 15, 2014 in Indianapolis and will run until September 7, 2014.  It debuts first in Brussels this coming February 18, 2014.  Yale will also be publishing the book on this.

 

Adjournment  4:01