To: ARL Directors
From: Duane Webster
Re: E-News for ARL Directors, January 9, 2008
These news notes are organized by the strategic directions identified in the ARL Strategic Plan: Scholarly Communication; Public Policies Affecting Research Libraries; and Library Roles in Research, Teaching, and Learning. In addition, there is an initial section for Governance and Membership Activities and complementary sections on Diversity, Professional Workforce, and Leadership Development; Library Statistics and Assessment; and Other Items of Interest to ARL Directors.
E-News for ARL Directors is a collaboration of ARL program staff, compiled and edited by Duane Webster (duane@arl.org) and Kaylyn Groves (kaylyn@arl.org).
You are encouraged to route the E-News to your staff and others in your institution.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Governance and Membership Activities
1. NASULGC's Peter McPherson to Keynote May ARL Membership Meeting
2. New Chairs Identified for ARL Committees, Working Group, Task Force
Scholarly Communication
3. AAAS Reverses Decision to Pull Science from JSTOR
4. University Presses Band Together to Increase Publishing Capacity
5. Students Recognized as New SPARC Innovators
Public Policies Affecting Research Libraries
6. NIH Public Access Mandate Becomes Law
7. FY 2008 Omnibus Bill Approved by US Congress and Signed into Law
8. New Intellectual Property Legislation Introduced in US House
9. President Bush Signs OPEN Government Legislation
10. Study on Copyright & Creativity Finds Mashups of Hollywood Movies May Not Violate Law
Library Roles in Research, Teaching, and Learning
11. ARL Releases Agenda for Developing E-Science in Research Libraries
12. ACRL Report Identifies Top Ten Assumptions for Future of Academic Libraries & Librarians
13. Horizon Project Wiki Offers Preview of 2008 Report on Emerging Technologies Likely to Impact RTL
14. CNI Update
Library Statistics and Assessment
15. ARL Statistical Surveys and Publications Update
16. ARL to Pilot LibQUAL Lite
17. Issue of portal: Libraries and the Academy Features Assessment
Other Items of Interest to ARL Directors
18. ARL at ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia
19. ARL Publications
20. Transitions
21. Honors
GOVERNANCE AND MEMBERSHIP ACTIVITIES
1. NASULGC's Peter McPherson to Keynote May ARL Membership Meeting
Peter McPherson, President of the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges (NASULGC), will deliver the keynote remarks at the next ARL Membership Meeting, to be held May 21–23. The overall theme of the program is "Institutional Strategies to Support E-Scholarship and Multidisciplinary Research." The meeting will be held in Coral Gables, Florida, with hospitality provided by three ARL member libraries: Florida State University, University of Florida, and University of Miami. For meeting information, contact Jaia Barrett jaia@arl.org.
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2. New Chairs Identified for ARL Committees, Working Group, Task Force
Four groups within ARL's committee structure have new chairs as of January 2008. Sarah Michalak (North Carolina at Chapel Hill) will chair the Public Policies Steering Committee and Barbara Dewey (Tennessee) will chair the Research, Teaching, and Learning Steering Committee. They fill the posts vacated by Winston Tabb (Johns Hopkins) and Betsy Wilson (Washington), who each concluded their three-year terms as chairs of these committees. Jim Neal (Columbia) enters the second year of a three-year term as chair of the Scholarly Communication Steering Committee. In addition, Mary Case (Illinois at Chicago) was named chair of the Working Group on Fair Use and Related Exemptions. She fills the position vacated by Marianne Gaunt (Rutgers). Also, a new Task Force on Digital Repository Issues was formed and it will be chaired by Carole Moore (Toronto). Additional committee, working group, and task force appointments are underway and will be announced next month. For more information, contact Jaia Barrett jaia@arl.org.
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SCHOLARLY COMMUNICATION
3. AAAS Reverses Decision to Pull Science from JSTOR
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) reversed its decision to discontinue supplying new content from the journal Science to JSTOR. The reversal followed a torrent of formal complaints from libraries, led by the early example of David H. Carlson, Dean of Library Services at Southern Illinois University Carbondale.
A brief report on the news is openly accessible from Inside Higher Ed, January 4, 2008, http://insidehighered.com/news/2008/01/04/qt/; a longer article is available to subscribers in the Chronicle of Higher Education, January 4, 2008, http://chronicle.com/daily/2008/01/1099n.htm.
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4. University Presses Band Together to Increase Publishing Capacity
University presses are launching several new collaborative publishing projects with funding from the Mellon Foundation. The projects seek to improve the efficiency of university press publishing by establishing shared capacity for functions such as copyediting, layout, and design. Each collaboration will focus on a different subject area.
The first collaborative project was announced at the 2007 convention of the Modern Language Association and will enable five university presses to publish 125 additional books focusing on the English-language literatures of North America, Central America, and the Caribbean. New York University Press is coordinating the project, which includes the presses of Fordham University, Rutgers University, Temple University, and University of Virginia. A similar program in Slavic studies will be jointly managed by the presses of Northwestern University, University of Pittsburgh, and University of Wisconsin. A program focused on ethnomusicology will be created by the presses of Indiana University, Kent State University, and Temple University.
Further description of the collaborative projects appears in Inside Higher Ed, December 28, 2007, http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/12/28/mellon/.
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5. Students Recognized as New SPARC Innovators
SPARC (the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition) has recognized five student leaders as the new SPARC Innovators. Hailed as "Agents of Change," students point to the promise of a more open system for information sharing. See http://www.arl.org/sparc/media/07-1211.html.
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PUBLIC POLICIES AFFECTING RESEARCH LIBRARIES
6. NIH Public Access Mandate Becomes Law
On December 26, President Bush signed the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2007, which includes a provision mandating NIH-funded researchers to deposit peer-reviewed electronic manuscripts in PubMed Central for broad public access. This important shift in policy—from voluntary to mandatory deposit—signaled Congress's strong support for increased public access to federally funded research. For more information, see the Alliance for Taxpayer Access press release http://www.taxpayeraccess.org/media/release07-1226.html.
Also see background and commentary from Peter Suber in the SPARC Open Access Newsletter, January 2008, http://www.arl.org/sparc/publications/an-open-access-mandate-fo.html.
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7. FY 2008 Omnibus Bill Approved by US Congress and Signed into Law
The $555 billion omnibus bill, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2007, was approved by the US Congress on December 19 and signed into law by President Bush. The law includes funding for all domestic programs except the defense. The act includes $144.7 million for the National Endowment for the Humanities. $18.380 million is slated for the Division of Preservation and Access and $1.969 million for the Digital Humanities Initiative. Additional funds to restore services at EPA libraries were also included in the Omnibus bill. With $3 million in earmarked funding, EPA is directed to "restore the network of EPA libraries recently closed or consolidated by the Administration." Following approval of the omnibus legislation, the House adjourned until January 15 and the Senate, although technically in session, will not consider new business until January 22. For more information, contact Prue Adler prue@arl.org.
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8. New Intellectual Property Legislation Introduced in US House
With 11 co-sponsors, Chairman Conyers (D-MI), House Committee on Judiciary introduced H.R. 4279, the Prioritizing Resources and Organization for Intellectual Property Act of 2007, better known as the PRO IP bill. Provisions in the legislation seek to strengthen the civil and criminal laws relating to copyright and trademark infringement, establish a new office in the Office of the President that would coordinate national and international intellectual property enforcement initiatives, and would establish a new intellectual property division within the Department of Justice. So many concerns have been raised about Section 104 of the PRO IP bill, which would significantly increase the amount of statutory damages, that the Copyright Office has been asked to conduct a roundtable to explore this issue. ARL with others in the public and private sectors have written to members of the House Committee on the Judiciary concerning Section 104. For more information, contact Prue Adler prue@arl.org.
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9. President Bush Signs OPEN Government Legislation
On December 31, President Bush signed into law new open government legislation, the Openness Promotes Effectiveness in our National Government Act of 2007. The law updates selected sections of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). Advocates for open government applauded the changes to FOIA especially restoring meaningful deadlines for federal agencies to respond to FOIA requests, imposing consequences on federal agencies for missing FOIA's 20-day statutory deadline, clarifying that FOIA applies to government records held by outside private contractors, and building a system for the public to easily track FOIA requests. For more information, contact Prue Adler prue@arl.org.
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10. Study on Copyright & Creativity Finds Mashups of Hollywood Movies May Not Violate Law
"Recut, Reframe, Recycle: Quoting Copyrighted Material in User-Generated Video," a study by Pat Aufderheide of the American University (AU) Center for Social Media and Peter Jaszi of AU Washington College of Law, shows that many uses of copyrighted material in today's online videos are eligible for fair use consideration. The study points to a wide variety of practices—satire, parody, negative and positive commentary, discussion triggers, illustration, diaries, archiving, and pastiche and collage (remixes and mashups)—all of which could be legal in some circumstances. The report is available via http://www.centerforsocialmedia.org/resources/publications/recut_reframe_recycle/.
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LIBRARY ROLES IN RESEARCH, TEACHING, AND LEARNING
11. ARL Releases Agenda for Developing E-Science in Research Libraries
The ARL Joint Task Force on Library Support for E-Science has released its final report, an "Agenda for Developing E-Science in Research Libraries," which is available on the ARL Web site via http://www.arl.org/rtl/escience/eresource.shtml.
The report states, "E-science has the potential to be transformational within research libraries by impacting their operations, functions, and possibly even their mission. The [task force] focused its attention on the implications of trends in e-science for research libraries, exploring the dimensions that impact collections, services, research infrastructure, and professional development."
The task force concluded that "ARL's engagement in the issues of e-science is best focused on educational and policy roles, while partnering with other relevant organizations to contribute in strategic areas of technology development and new genres of publication. These types of strategic collaborations will also provide opportunities to re-envision the research library's role and contribution as 21st-century science takes shape."
With the support of ARL's three strategic direction steering committees, the recommendations in the report will be incorporated into the annual program planning for the Association to be undertaken by the ARL Board of Directors in February. Background on the task force and ARL's E-science work can be found at http://www.arl.org/rtl/escience/eresource.shtml.
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12. ACRL Report Identifies Top Ten Assumptions for Future of Academic Libraries & Librarians
The 2007 environmental scan by the Research Committee of the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) explores the state of academic and research libraries. A number of ARL library representatives serve on the committee. The report is available at http://www.acrl.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/whitepapers/Environmental_Scan_2.pdf.
This update to the 2003 environmental scan considers major assumptions shaping the practice of academic librarianship, trends that will define the future of academic and research librarianship, and the rapidly changing nature of the research environment. In compiling their report, the Research Committee relied on surveys, face-to-face interviews, a review of the literature, and public vetting of the emerging draft. The report describes emergent issues and concludes with a selective list of pertinent resources.
The committee will solicit librarian reactions during the 2008 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia, 4:00–5:00 p.m., Sunday, January 13, at the Loews Hotel, room Congress C.
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13. Horizon Project Wiki Offers Preview of 2008 Report on Emerging Technologies Likely to Impact RTL
The Horizon Project Advisory Board has made their 2008 Horizon Report workspace publicly available as a wiki where viewers may peruse the draft list of topics, trends, and challenges. Among the topics are webware suites of free productivity software embedded in collaborative workspaces, emerging practices in tagging and sharing of information, harnessing collective intelligence to make accurate predictions about user preferences and behaviors, and open education resources. The wiki is available at http://horizon.nmc.org/wiki/Shortlist_1a.
Key trends highlight social networking tools and the changing nature of scholarly contribution, the implications of globalization, collective intelligence and "mass amateurization," "filtering noise to find the signal," the widening gap between student and faculty perceptions of technology, and blossoming innovation throughout the academy.
Critical challenges address the out-of-sync balance between faculty reward and new forms of scholarship; assessment of new forms of work; significant shifts in scholarship, research, creative expression, and learning; and a growing need for instruction in information, visual, and technological literacies.
The 2008 Horizon Report will be co-published by the New Media Consortium and the EDUCAUSE Learning Initiative on January 18, 2008. The 2007 report is available at http://www.nmc.org/horizon/2007/report/.
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14. CNI Update
The Fall 2007 CNI Task Force Meeting was held in Washington DC on December 10–11; nearly 500 registrants attended over 35 breakout sessions. CNI Executive Director Clifford Lynch delivered the opening plenary address and introduced the 2007–08 CNI Program Plan (http://www.cni.org/program/), and Sir Timothy Berners-Lee presented the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation 2007 Awards for Technology Collaboration. Timo Hannay, Publishing Director of Nature.com at the Nature Publishing Group, delivered the closing plenary address, "Current Experiments & Future Directions in Scholarly Communication." Presentation materials from the meeting are now available at http://www.cni.org/tfms/2007b.fall/, and podcast interviews with selected attendees and speakers are forthcoming. Planning is underway for the Spring 2008 Task Force Meeting, to be held April 7–8, 2008, in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The Third International Digital Curation Conference, "Curating Our Digital Scientific Heritage: A Global Collaborative Challenge," took place on December 12–13 in Washington DC, immediately following the CNI Task Force Meeting. The event was jointly sponsored by the UK Digital Curation Centre, the US National Science Foundation, and CNI. Clifford Lynch delivered the closing plenary address.
An article by Clifford Lynch, "Repatriation, Reconstruction, and Cultural Diplomacy in the Digital World," will appear as the Policy@edu column in EDUCAUSE Review, 43, no. 1 (January/February 2008).
Joan Lippincott, CNI Associate Executive Director, will speak at the Fourth Annual ARL Leadership Institute on January 12, and Clifford Lynch will participate in a LITA Top Technology Trends panel on January 13; both events will take place during the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
CNI will issue a call for participation in a workshop on authorship and identity management very shortly; watch CNI-ANNOUNCE or http://www.cni.org/.
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LIBRARY STATISTICS AND ASSESSMENT
15. ARL Statistical Surveys and Publications Update
Status of the ARL statistical surveys and publications is as follows:
ARL Annual Salary Survey 2007–08: Data collection is almost complete. Preliminary tables will be issued in the coming days. Please respond to our queries for clarifying data issues as soon as possible so we can finalize the data collection.
ARL Statistics 2006–07: Libraries have started entering data using the new updated Web interface. The mailing is available on the Web at http://www.arl.org/stats/annualsurveys/arlstats/07statmail.shtml. Discussion regarding the new way of counting serials is available through the Library Assessment Blog at http://libraryassessment.info/?cat=28.
ARL Statistics 2005–06: Publication is in production.
ARL Preservation Statistics 2005–06: Data collection and verification have been completed; publication is in production.
For additional information, contact Martha Kyrillidou martha@arl.org.
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16. ARL to Pilot LibQUAL Lite
Based on evaluations of LibQUAL+® by multiple libraries, this spring ARL will initiate a pilot testing the concept of LibQUAL Lite—a shorter version of the LibQUAL+® survey. The pilot will test whether LibQUAL Lite can provide valid and reliable data for all three dimensions (Affect of Service, Information Control, and Library as Place) and whether it will produce increased response rates. If you would like to participate in the LibQUAL Lite pilot, you may do that in addition to the regular LibQUAL+® survey, which will give you usable data for management purposes while participating in the pilot. Note that LibQUAL Lite will randomly present the full version or the short version of the survey to users during the pilot. For more information, contact Martha Kyrillidou martha@arl.org.
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17. Issue of portal: Libraries and the Academy Features Assessment
The October 2007 issue of portal: Libraries and the Academy features three assessment articles closely related to ARL activities:
"On-Premises Library versus Google-like Information Gateway Usage Patterns: A LibQUAL+® Study," by Bruce Thompson, Martha Kyrillidou, and Colleen Cook, summarizes data provided by almost 300,000 participants in LibQUAL+® 2003, 2004, and 2005.
"The Privatization of Public University Research Libraries," by Brinley Franklin, provides evidence from a survey conducted among ARL libraries. Preliminary findings suggest that public university research libraries may be funded in ways increasingly similar to private university research libraries.
"Evidence-Based Library Management: The Leadership Challenge," by Amos Lakos, based on interviews with over 20 library directors, focuses on the role of leadership in fostering evidence-based decision making in libraries.
The issue is available to subscribers via Project MUSE at http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/portal_libraries_and_the_academy/toc/pla7.4.html.
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OTHER ITEMS OF INTEREST TO ARL DIRECTORS
18. ARL at ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia
ARL, LibQUAL+®, and SPARC are hosting several events at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia in January, including staffing booth #1753 in the Philadelphia Convention Center. For a detailed scheduled, visit http://www.arl.org/events/arlala/.
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19. ARL Publications
ARL: A Bimonthly Report, no. 254 (October 2007)
Features Stanley Wilder on "The ARL Youth Movement: Reshaping the ARL Workforce."
http://www.arl.org/resources/pubs/br/br254.shtml
ARL: A Bimonthly Report, no. 255 (December 2007)
Features Hunter R. Rawlings III keynote address from October 2007 ARL Membership Meeting.
http://www.arl.org/resources/pubs/br/br255.shtml
SPEC Kit 302, Managing Public Computing
Michael Cook and Mark Shelton • November 2007 • ISBN 1-59407-796-7 • 182 pp.
http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/spec302web.pdf
SPEC Kit 303, Library Assessment
Stephanie Wright and Lynda S. White • December 2007 • ISBN 1-59407-795-1 • 194 pp.
http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/spec303web.pdf
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20. Transitions
International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA): Jennefer Nicholson, former Executive Director of the Australian Library and Information Association, was appointed IFLA Secretary General, effective September 6, 2008. She will become Secretary General Designate on June 1 and spend three months working with the outgoing Secretary General, Peter Lor.
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21. Honors
Lynne Brindley, Chief Executive of the British Library, was named a Dame of the British Empire in the New Years Honors for her services to education.
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DEW 1/09/08
Duane Webster
Executive Director
Association of Research Libraries
21 Dupont Circle
Washington DC 20036
v: (202) 296-2296
fax: (202) 872-0884
cell: (202) 251-4431
e-mail: duane@arl.org
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