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Meeting Minutes November 13, 2003

2 p.m. in the Haddad Room

A G E N D A

• Model Programs
• Review of Goal 1 and Objectives
• Other

Model Programs

Mark stated that the library members of the Committee met and looked at the awards at the federal level and also at several state awards. The conclusion was that they are very generic or “light weight” awards. They didn’t find any programs we would really want to model ourselves after. The ACRL award seemed the best (Excellence In Academic Libraries). There were no real innovative programs that seemed suitable.

Mark went on to say that even the federal award was amazingly “soft.” All the winners have been public libraries. There isn’t much there for us to learn from. The federal award is open to academic libraries, although none have applied.

Most of the awards were small - $1,500 to $10,000. The money is not necessarily important, but the winning of an award can be used in future fund-raising campaigns.

Review of Goal 1 and Objectives (action 1.1.2)

In the Strategic Plan regarding “Developing & Outcome Assessment,” Mark would like to know what is the impact that the library and library resources has on the SXU campus. Our library survey from last spring is Step 1. Over the next few years we will do more surveys to see if we are improving. What are we doing well? Where do we need to improve? Mark feels these are very basic questions, and he needs this information when dealing with Administration.

Graham asked, “Does assessment take on a life of its own?” Mark replied that it is part of the strategy. But what do we want to assess? How do we go about accomplishing this? We need to be careful how we use the assessment. Graham said we need to define our own objectives.

Mark commented that we would go through specific outcomes again in more detail over the life of the plan.

Graham wanted to know what it meant to have ACRL guidelines as a benchmark. Mark replied that we want so see how we match up again them, i.e., information literacy, faculty status, etc.

Concerning objective 1.2, Nelson said that the electronic version of journals is not always cheaper. Graham pointed out that if we have to cancel a database, we then don’t have a hard copy as backup. Mark agreed, and noted this is a major concern at large, research libraries. It is a lesser problem at small libraries.

Graham said electronic resources are very convenient. Mark pointed out that, due to market demands, electronic costs are generally going up while print, especially journals, is beginning to hold steady.

Dave told the Committee that the electronic resources could be accessed from both campuses. Mark made the comment that all citations are not full-text which many people expect.

Anita pointed out that we do not have a dedicated subject bibliographer. Mark replied that we don’t have that luxury. We are too small of an institution. Anita wanted to know if we should consider this a weakness. Mark said it is a weakness based on size. We need to rely on faculty more.

Other

Mark asked the Committee to go over Goal 1 and 2 for the next meeting.

The next meeting will be December 9, 2003, at 2 p.m. in the Haddad Room.

Meeting adjourned at 3 p.m.

Minutes submitted by: Virginia Preuss

Library Coordinator