CLIC Committees 2014-15

Welcome back! It's a new school year, and CLIC Committees are beginning to reconvene this week.

2014-15 CLIC Acquisitions Committee

2014-15 CLIC Cataloging Committee

CLIC Chair Camp 2014

Steve Waage hosted CLIC's annual Chair Camp today and updated the committee chairs on current procedures.

Our thanks to all member library staff who serve on CLIC committees and COIs.  Your participation is crucial to CLIC's success!

2014 Authority Control Workshop

Photos from CLIC's 2014 Authority Control Workshop, hosted at St. Kate's Library on January 9.

CLIC Board appoints Implementation Team

Newly- appointed by the CLIC Board, the Implementation Team has already started to work on their charge of coordinating the implementation of CLIC's library services platform (LSP).

Implementation Team members (left to right around the table): Rhonda Gilbraith, Greg Argo, Jon Neilson, Steve Waage, Ruth Dukelow, Mike Bloomberg, Nate Farley, Dani Roach, and Amy Shaw.

In addition to working on the deliverables section of the license, the Team is planning a Kick-Off Event in January for CLIC member library staffs to learn about the 18-month phased-in deployment of the LSP components.

Watch the CLIC Blog, clic-announce list, and CLIC's Facebook page for further developments.

CLIC ILL visits Minitex

On July 30, the CLIC Interlibrary Loan Committee visited Minitex and MLAC to see the delivery center and the underground storage caverns. [Thanks to Dixie Ohlander for photos and captions!]

The beautiful reception desk right inside the main doors of Minitex.

A quick shot of one of the office areas where many of our Minitex colleagues hang out.

We found the Augsburg fish! She sits atop the CLIC Fishmobile in the processing area. Each CLIC library has its very own fish.

This Happy Book decorates a Delivery sign (maybe she is looking forward to a ride on the conveyor belt?).

Conveyor belt in materials' processing area. How many bins have been shuttled back and forth over the years?

This is where library materials are processed before they are sent out to the many libraries in the Minitex network. As has been tradition in resource sharing, more than one computer system is used. At Minitex, they use a whopping total of FIVE systems!

CLIC ILL Minitex-MLAC Tour: Truck ramp going into storage caverns. It's only 82 feet down!

Cavern shelving unit. Only 18 feet high!

CLIC Hosts Vendor Demos and Webinars

The CLIC Board and Task Force have invited two vendors, ExLibris and OCLC, to present two-day demonstrations of their systems. The ExLibris Alma demos were held on May 6 and  May 7, 2013. The OCLC Worldshare demos will be held on Wednesday, June 5 and Thursday, June 6, 2013. CLIC has also invited two vendors to present webinars on their company's future directions: ProQuest Intota on June 17, and Innovative Interfaces, Inc., on June 18.

Attendance is limited to CLIC member library staff only. Member library staff are welcome to attend any of the sessions.  Sessions will be recorded for member library staff who are unable to attend. The demonstrations at each session will be based on the scenarios and other input provided by the CLIC Committees and COIs. Please note that the vendors will demonstrate their systems only, and pricing will not be discussed during the sessions.

The schedule for the OCLC WorldShare demo is:

Wednesday, June 5, Woulfe Alumni Hall (north), UST, 9:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. General Demonstration 1

This session will cover a higher-level look at system design and how it functions. We have asked the vendors to tell about their company's vision of the future of library services, what makes their product distinct, and what opportunities their system has for consortia. The vendor will demonstrate general features: Administrative functionality (including authorizations, log-ins, system support, customer support, development schedule, training), the migration and implementation process, and a general overview of the system's architecture. 

Wednesday, June 5, Woulfe Alumni Hall (north), UST, 1:00 pm – 3:30 p.m. Collections and Resource Management

In this session, vendors are asked to do a live demonstration of their system’s collections and resource management features: Acquisitions, Metadata / Cataloging, Digital collections/repositories, Serials, E-resources, and license manager/ERMs.

Thursday, June 6, Woulfe Alumni Hall (north), UST, 9:00 a.m. – 11:30 a.m. Circulation and Resource Sharing

In this session, vendors are asked to do a live demonstration of their system’s Circulation and Resource Sharing features: Circulation, Reserves, ILL and Resource Sharing, Inventory, and Patron Records and Privacy.

Thursday, June 6, Woulfe Alumni Hall (north), UST, 1:00 pm – 3:30 p.m. General Demonstration 2

In this final session, vendors are asked to demonstrate a variety of general features: Discovery, Mobile, Link resolver, A-to-Z lists, statistics and reporting, interoperability with other systems, and other system features which the vendor did not cover in earlier sessions. This time will also be used for a general wrap up and final questions.

Task Force Update

To learn more about the latest next-generation library platform products, CLIC’s ILS Task Force (TF) spent the past several weeks reviewing documentation and meeting with library systems vendors, including Ex Libris Alma, OCLC WorldShare, III Sierra, and ProQuest Intota. The CLIC Committees and COIs have also been busy reviewing information and preparing input for the Task Force to use in drafting CLIC’s Request for Quote & Information (RFQ/I).

The following is CLIC's proposed timeline for selection of a next-generation library platform:

March 2013

TF receives pre-demo input from Committees and COIs.

April 2013

TF drafts and sends out RFQ/I and receives responses from vendors.

CLIC Board and TF meet to determine which vendors to invite for demos.

May-June 2013

Vendor demos are held, open to all staff of CLIC member libraries.

TF receives post-demo input from Committees, COIs, and library staff.

June-July 2013

TF reviews all input from the CLIC community.

TF prepares a report with analysis and recommendations for the CLIC Board.

CLIC Board receives the report at the July Board meeting.

August-October 2013

CLIC Board selects vendor and negotiates agreement.

November 2013 – May 2014 

TF and CLIC Committees work with the vendor to prepare for migration.

June 2014

Migration to new system is completed.

CLIC Circ Committee Tackles Loan Rules

Although the future of our ILS is undecided, the Circulation Committee endeavors to streamline the Loan Rules table (the system rules that control all the circulation of materials).  Since many changes have taken place in the past 10 years, we are determined to make the current list of over 150 rules more manageable and more coordinated instead of super-customized.  

Becky showed a spreadsheet of the rules at this morning’s meeting and talked about different elements of the rules that each school could work on, making minor adjustments to accommodate an existing rule rather than making new ones.  The group will continue to work on this over the next year or so.

LibQUAL+® at Northwestern

The following post is submitted by guest blogger Jessica Nelson Moore from Northwestern College.

In order to assess library service quality, the Berntsen Library at Northwestern College administered the LibQUAL+® survey to NWC’s students and faculty in 2008 and 2012. 

The LibQUAL+® survey assesses library patron’s perceptions of 22 aspects of library service quality, grouped into three major dimensions: Affect of Service, Information Control, and Library as place. 

·         Affect of Service refers to users’ perceptions of the service given by library staff.  Questions include “Employees who understand the needs of their users” and “Giving users individual attention”.
·         Information Control refers to users’ perceptions of access to information.  Questions include “Making electronic resources accessible from my home or office” and “Print and/or electronic journal collections I require for my work”.
·         Library as place refers to users’ perceptions of the library’s environment.  Questions include “Library space that inspires study and learning” and “A comfortable and inviting location”. 

One of the benefits of LibQUAL+® is that it shows not only the perceived level of service for each dimension, but also the desired level of service.  The results show not only how patrons felt about each aspect of the library, but whether or not it was important to them.  For example, in the 2012 survey undergraduates ranked their top five desired (the most important) aspects of library service quality as “Employees who are consistently courteous”, “Employees who deal with users in a caring fashion”, “A library web site enabling me to locate information on my own”,  “Willingness to help users”, and  “Making information easily accessible for independent use”.  Of these top five desired qualities, three were considered by undergraduates to be in the top five areas of highest perceived service quality.  To put it another way, of the top five things that undergraduates think the library is doing well, three of them were in the top five things they most cared about.

Survey results are plotted graphically on a circular chart, referred to as an “Antarctica chart” because of its resemblance to the polar continent.  The yellow band on the chart represents areas where the perceived level of service for that aspect of service was less than the desired level of service.  (A wider yellow space indicates that there is a wider “gap” between the desired level of service and the perceived level of service for those attributes.)  The blue band on the chart represents areas where the perceived level of service was greater than the minimum level of service, i.e., adequate service.  The green on the chart represents areas where the perceived level of service was greater than the desired level of service, i.e., superior service.  Any areas of red on the chart would indicate that the perceived level of service for that area was below the minimum accepted level of service.  

A huge benefit of LibQUAL+® is the comments that survey respondents offer with their response.  About 1/3 of survey respondents left a comment with their survey.  Many of the comments reveal suggestions for specific areas of improvement for the library, such as noise level.  Example: “Once in awhile it is too noisy, but mostly it works great!”  Other comments reveal the aspects that patrons most appreciate about the library, such as reference service.  Example: “The reference librarians at NWC are amazing. Not only are they incredibly helpful, they are also very friendly.”

After the 2008 survey, results were communicated to library staff and other stakeholders such as the campus Assessment Steering Committee.  Changes were made based upon survey feedback, including updating library computers with new software and enhanced printing capabilities, and enhancing study spaces with lighting and electric outlets.  A follow-up focus group was conducted to further understand what students wanted from their library.  The staff of the Berntsen Library is looking forward to analyzing the results of the 2012 survey, especially in comparison to the initial, benchmark survey in 2008.  

CLIC Assessment Workshop Topics Survey

CLIC is hosting a series of mini workshops on assessment in early 2013. The Assessment Program Planning Task Force is in the process of selecting topics for three mini workshops. Your answers on the survey will assist us in developing the workshop agendas. Please respond by Thursday, November 15, 2012.

Go to this link to take the survey: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/8SHZ2SF

For a list of the upcoming workshop dates, please see the Assessment Program Planning Task Force's web page on CLIC Direct at:
http://clic.edu/newclic/dir/asmtplan/asmtplan.asp

If you missed our first program on October 26, A View from the Field: Overview of Recent Assessment Activities in CLIC Libraries, Kick-Off Program for CLIC's Year of Assessment, we are posting summaries of the presentations on CLIC News over the next two weeks.  See http://clic.edu/newclic/dir/asmtplan/asmtplan20121026.asp for links to presentations, summaries, handouts, and resources.

Assessment in Action: Academic Libraries and Student Success – ACRL IMLS Grant Funded Program

The following post is submitted by guest blogger, Terri Fishel, CLIC Board member and Director of the DeWitt Wallace Library at Macalester College, and summarizes her presentation at CLIC's Kick-off Program on October 26.

On Friday, October 26^th, I spoke to those attending the CLIC Kickoff on Assessment about an upcoming grant opportunity.  I currently serve as vice-chair, chair-elect for the ACRL Value of Academic Libraries committee.  The ACRL Value of Academic Libraries is one of three major areas as part of the ACRL Plan for Excellence.

I wanted to talk about the ACRL grant funded by the IMLS because of the opportunities it presents to individual CLIC libraries and their campuses and for us collectively in CLIC.  The focus of this grant is on student learning, both to prove the value that the library has in how we contribute to student learning and to use our assessment methods to work toward improvements in the work we do and outcomes achieved.  This is an opportunity to work closely with partners on your campus who are outside of the library.  If you haven’t already started to work with your institutional research colleagues, or have the attention of your campus committee for assessment or the committee that is perhaps working on student learning outcomes, this is your opportunity.  Assessment on your campus might be under the committee that oversees the accreditation process.  At the session last Friday, only a few attendees were familiar with members of their campus who managed their campus learning assessment program.  A very few CLIC institutions had librarians who served on campus committees that worked on student learning outcomes. So this grant also provides an opportunity to get to know members of your campus assessment team. You can read more about the grant here (Assessment in Action), but briefly, each participating institution will identify a team, consisting of a librarian and at least two additional team members as determined by the campus (e.g., faculty member, student affairs representative, institutional researchers, or academic administrator). 

Please consider applying and start now to prepare your strategy for campus involvement. Institutions need to apply individually, but as a cohort, if more than one CLIC institution is accepted, we will be able to collectively build on the work of each other and within CLIC if we can have multiple institutions, it provides opportunities to collaborate and reinforce with our administrations the value that we bring to our campuses.  It is also an opportunity to contribute to the broader audience of academic libraries and share our progress and stories of success.

You have time between now and January when the instructions for applications will be made available to do some background reading.  If you haven’t already perused:

• Value of Academic Libraries blog

• Connect, Collaborate and Communicate  - pdf of a white paper produced after the first summit 

• Value of Academic Libraries – ACRL statement of purpose

• Standards for Libraries in Higher Education - sample outcomes along with performance indicators and measures - valuable tool if you’re hoping to demonstrate to campus administrators your value and how your work influences student learning outcomes

These resources may help you to clearly articulate the value of the library in demonstrating: 

• your programs help students succeed which improves retention which helps the bottom line as far as college finances

• your programs contribute to positive experiences students have at your institution

• your programs provide positive experiences for students which helps make them supportive alums who contribute back to the college

• and most importantly, your programs provide them with the critical thinking skills that help them success in college and beyond as lifelong learners

Consider also the important role you play in the lives of students who are employees in your library.  We shouldn’t underestimate the important aspect of this activity in the lives of the students on our campuses.

I recognize that these aren’t your only contributions because we contribute greatly to the work our faculty members do, but in the perspective of keeping the library forefront in the minds of administrators on campus, those are just a few of the points you can think about in developing a frame of reference and a plan for continuous improvement as part of your assessment program focused on student learning.  I hope that you will all consider submitting an application for the Assessment in Action program and hope that we will be able to develop best practices and share our stories of success with a broader audience.

Assessment at Bethel University

The following post is submitted by guest blogger, Michael Mitchell of Bethel University Library, and summarizes his presentation at CLIC's Kick-off Program on October 26.

At the CLIC Assessment: A View from the Field event, I presented the results of an ethnographic study that had been conducted in the Bethel University Library.  Below are some highlights of what we did and our findings from the study.  But first, let me provide a definition of "ethnography," taken from Oxford University Press' Dictionary of Sociology:  Ethnography is"a term usually applied to the acts both of observing directly the behaviour of a social group and producing a written description thereof."

We observe our libraries daily, but our ethnographic study aimed to make a more intentional observation.  We used two complementary tactics for doing this: the first was a series of one-on-one interviews conducted in the Bethel University Library with our users, asking them to tell us: (1) What they were doing in the library, (2) Why they chose the library, and (3) any other information they'd like to provide.   After gathering the data (more than 600 interviews total), we analyzed the responses to come up with themes about our library users and what they valued.   They told us about the benefit of studying in a library that aided their concentration and productivity, and about how valuable it was to have computers and printers available to them.  They also told us to create more group study rooms.

The second part of our study was a "mapping" project that used a seating chart of the Bethel University Library to map out where people were sitting and using computers within the library.  The mapping was done 5 times a day for a full calendar week, and the results were placed into a relational database. By doing this, we were able to see the popular places within our library, the busy and slow times of day, and the spots in which people were likely to be using laptops or  sitting in groups.   We found that the most concentrated spots of our library were our computer labs, and we determined which days were the busiest.  

Some of these results are intuitive, and we probably could've guessed at what most of the findings would be.  The benefit of the ethnographic study, however, is that now we can say those things with certainty; we have data to back up our gut feelings, and that data is much more convincing when talking to outside constituencies.  The results also challenged some of our own assumptions going into the project, showing us that it's important to talk to your users to find out what their actual habits and needs are.  We were constantly forced to think about this data both in a holistic way and on a case-by-case basis to see what future improvements we can make to our space and the services we provide.  

CLIC Libraries Represented at MNIUG

Several staff from CLIC member libraries presented at the MNIUG Conference at St. Olaf on October 23.

Nathan Wunrow and Kate Burke, both from University of St. Thomas, presented "Mobile Libraries: Beyond the plaster / tear down this wall!" The UST Library has reinterpreted the traditional concept of library as "place" by bringing samples of its collection and services to the many social environments of the University community.  The presenters outlined their experience and observations, and they motivated the audience to consider alternative interpretations of library as "place."

Angi Faiks, MaryLou Steiner, and Jack Davidsen, all from Macalester College, presented "Ready for Shelf Ready?" Macalester's DeWitt Wallace Library is in the midst of a pilot project to test complete automation of their acquisition workflow with Ingram from request to the shelf, including order submission to acquisitions, invoicing, cataloging, and physical processing.  The pilot involves coordination between Macalester, Ingram, OCLC, and CLIC to ensure smooth and accurate automated delivery and processing of shelf-ready materials.

Linda Hulbert from University of St. Thomas, Dixie Ohlander from Augsburg College, Earleen Warner from Bethel University, Emily Asch from St. Catherine University, Jennifer Carlson from Concordia University, and Paddy Salzer from University of St. Thomas participated in a panel presentation, "CLICtrek: The Next GENeration: a Consortial Odyssey."  The presenters, who are all members of CLIC's ILS Task Force, discussed their evaluation of eight "next-gen" library systems and the process they used to narrow the field to three contenders.  It was an odyssey!

Congratulations to all presenters for their programs at MNIUG!

More News from Circulation

More news from Circ: Bethel University is opening their DVD, VHS, and CD collections to CLIC holds.

CLIC Chair Camp

The 2012-13 Chairs of CLIC's Operational Committees attended Chair Camp this morning to learn about Chair responsibilities and the new forms. Our thanks to all for volunteering to chair CLIC Operational Committees this year!

Gail Peloquin (ILL), Laura Secord (Serials), Jon Neilson (ASA), Katie Hagen (Acquisitions), Barbara Brokopp (Circ), Mary Lou Steiner (SysOps), Zachary Moss (Reserves), Kathy Lutz (Cataloging), and Donna Nix (OPAC). [Not pictured: Chris Schommer (Digitization).]