SSH Cluster Bibliographers Group Meeting Summary
Present : Adele Barsh, Ken Calkins, Victoria Chu, Harold Colson, Holly Eggleston, Lia Friedman, Tony Harvell, Martha Hruska, Rebecca Hyde, Sanae Isozumi, Elliot Kanter, Karen Lindvall-Larson, Rob Melton, Alanna Aiko Moore, Stacy Nelson, Vickie O’Riordan, Alice Perez, Michael Smith, Berenica Vejvoda
Announcements and Updates: Berenica Vejvoda is SSHL’s new Data Services Librarian. She came to us from the University of Toronto where she worked in Data, Map, and Government Information Services and the Reference Department. She completed her Masters of Information Studies degree at the Faculty of Information Studies at the University of Toronto and has a B.A. in Psychology and a Bachelor of Social Work degree from the University of British Columbia. Europa World of Learning online has been activated. Blackwell Reference Online Linguistics and Language ebook package has been activated. Our Sage “Abstracts” print monies have been transferred to EBSCO for electronic access to the following titles, which have ceased in print: Abstracts in Social Gerentology, Urban Studies Abstracts, Peace Research Abstracts, and Race Relations Abstracts. We have a trial to Gale’s Literary Criticism Online until the end of February. This resource contains approximately 95% of the content of many of the Gale print sets formerly shelved in the SSH Ref Lit section. We have a trial to the U.S. Supreme Court Records and Briefs, as part of a UC-wide trial on behalf of the U.K./U.S. History and Women’s Studies Consortium. Vickie announced that AAL is dismantling the slide collection. In the process, there are a number of interesting unique sets that will be digitized and made available via ARTstor to UCSD: the CineWest collection of local Border Art (2500 items), Dance History, Mary Beebe’s collection of UCSD’s Stuart Collection project works (2100 slides), Illustrated History of the Movies (2200 still images from all nations and time periods), History of Costume, and a collection of urban studies, regional and local photographs. Additionally, in the near future we will be able to access images from other UC collections via ARTstor. Faculty interested in using ARTstor can contact Vickie O’Riordan, or any AAL staff member. Highlights of the Collection Coordinators Group meetings Jan. 8 and Feb. 6: At the Jan.8 Collection Coordinators Group meeting we reviewed the Digital Collections Inventory, drafts of the Offsite Storage Policy, the Donations/Gifts Policy, and the Preferred Journal Policy. We continued discussion of the Blackwell/Elsevier title review process and also agreed to reunite accompanying audio CD’s with the physical volumes, rather than having them housed separately. The Feb. 6 Collection Coordinators Group meeting focused mainly on the Duke E-Books Pilot and the Preferred Journal Format Policy. Duke is in the process of cataloging the e-books and working out various technical issues. The back list will consist of around 320 titles and records are being sent to Ebrary. There will be approximately 120 new titles for 2008. Holly announced that the Ebrary license was just signed and that it was a complicated arrangement between Ebrary, Duke, and YBP. Martha met with the Academic Senate Committee on Library on Feb. 11 to present the gift and remote storage policies. Faculty donations and gifts will be accepted, and the policy clarifies what we are looking for to add to the collections and outlines our role in disposition of the remainder. Collection Managers should, if possible, view the gift donation beforehand to see how much we would likely add to the collection. Facilities will pick up the collection from faculty offices. We will not provide an appraisal estimate and, if possible, we should inquire beforehand whether the gift donation has been appraised. We should not accept gifts that have been appraised at more than $4999 because current tax law requires us to keep all gifts appraised at $5000 or more for three years physically on-site. The offsite storage policy was also approved and faculty generally agreed that even within disciplines such as history, the preferred format is electronic. The group also agreed with the preferred journal format policy, as long as minimum safeguards are in place. In some cases, the electronic version is actually better than the print and may contain color and supplementary material, whereas the print is in black-and-white. Smaller societies are trying to make the switch to e-, and in some cases, Elsevier provides the infrastructure for access and preservation. There are concerns whether, in this case, society publications are still affordable for individual subscriptions vs. institutional access models. Cluster Bibs discussion then turned to vendors or products with “clunky interfaces,” and a number of questions were posed: What vendors or products have clunky interfaces? How do we define this? Should we have a document or list outlining baseline standards or expectations? How should we communicate our wishes to the vendors and let them know that, at the same time, we do not want to pay more for their product or content? Stacy suggested that we collate the “groans” that we have regarding certain vendors and platforms. Martha suggested that CDC could discuss the “clunky interface” issue. Sam suggested that the vendor best practices or baseline standards and expectations information may be buried within Inside CDL. A small task group comprised of Lia, Elliot, and Sam will work to identify existing best practices documentation, create and/or adapt for UCSD purposes, as necessary.
Discussion: Added copies of high use titles We do not have any funds allocated to purchase added copies, formerly the “copyy” fund. At this point SSHL has spent $2890.05 and encumbered an additional $1134.46 on copy 2s – for a total of $4,024.51. This amount will be covered from SSH unallocated reserves. Collection managers should purchase any needed added copies from subject funds and consider purchasing the ebook, if available. Up to now, Sam has been purchasing added copies of high use items across the disciplines. For MMW, with its interdisciplinary focus on Asian Studies, we will need to collaborate more closely with Victoria and Sanae to identify the appropriate funding source for added print or electronic ebooks. Circuit, in particular, may relieve our need for local added copies. Tony reminded the group that Tier 2 commitments for a new resource subscription need a “request for new resource” form and a subject fund. Although billing for Tier 2 resources is via CDL, we need to account for local funding. Finally, Martha introduced the issue of blogs, and especially ones with participation by UCSD faculty, such as Grand Text Auto, co-founded by a member of the Communication Department. This is an example of the transformative communication model and what role could or should the Libraries play in selection and archiving these resources? CDC is looking at web capturing software that is currently being applied to government documents and CDL is building the software. |