Washington, D.C.
October 16-18, 1996
Report on Association Activities
OSC Partners with CNI to Track Consortia
Directory of E-Journals Tracks Explosive Growth in Internet Publishing
Strategy Adopted to Address Government Information in E-Formats
ARL Board Encourages Ongoing Discussions on Intellectual Property with the Higher Education and Scholarly Society Communities
ARL Publishes Copyright & NII, Resources for the Library and Education Community
AAU/ARL Rethink Strategy to Promote Electronic Scholarly Publishing
NAILDD Implementation of ILL Protocol Expands to Europe, Australia
ARL, CNI Support NINCH
Deborah Jakubs Appointed VPO to Develop Global Resources Program
ARL Collaborates with MLA, AHA on Preservation Issues
Diversity Program Redefined; DeEtta Jones Appointed Program Officer
OMS Launches New Information Service: Transforming Libraries
Developing Indicators for Academic Library Performance, 2nd edition Issued
Timothy Jewell Appointed VPO to Assess Measures of Library Spending on E-Resources
ARL Web Page Expanded
NEH Funds New Phase of NRMM Project
VPO Opportunities Identified
1. Scholarly Communication and Information Policies (Objective 1)
ARL Objective 1: To understand, contribute to, and improve the system of scholarly communication and the communication and information policies that affect the availability and usefulness of research resources.
1.1 Office of Scholarly Communication
1.1.1 Scholarly Communication Committee
1.1.2 Firm Subscription Prices Working Group
1.2 Federal Relations and Information Policy Development
1.2.1 Committee on Information Policies
1.3 Intellectual Property and Copyright Issues
1.3.1 Working Group on Copyright Issues
1.4 AAU/ARL Action Agenda
1.4.1 AAU/ARL Research Libraries Steering Committee
2. Access and Technology (Objectives 2 and 5)
ARL Objective 2: To make access to research resources more efficient and effective.
ARL Objective 5: To assist member libraries to exploit technology in fulfillment of their mission and assess the impact of educational technologies on scholarly communication and on the role of research libraries.
2.1 Access and Technology
2.1.1 Committee on Access to Information Resources
2.1.2 Work Group on Scientific and Technical Information
2.2 Coalition for Networked Information
2.2.1 Steering Committee for the Coalition
2.3 HEIRAlliance
3. Collection and Preservation (Objectives 3 and 4)
ARL Objective 3: To support member libraries’ efforts to develop and maintain research collections, both individually and in the aggregate.
ARL Objective 4: To support member libraries’ efforts to preserve research collections, both individually and in the aggregate.
3.1 Collection Services
3.1.1 Committee on Research Collections
3.1.2 Committee on Preservation of Research Library Materials
4. Staffing and Management (Objectives 6 and 7)
ARL Objective 6: To identify on an ongoing basis the capabilities and characteristics required for research library personnel to best serve their constituencies, and to assist member libraries and educational programs in the recruitment, development and effective use of staff.
ARL Objective 7: To assist member libraries in augmenting their management capabilities.
4.1 Diversity Program
4.1.1 Committee on Diversity
4.2 Office of Management Services
4.2.1 OMS Organizational Development
4.2.2 OMS Information Services Program
4.2.3 OMS Training and Staff Development Program
4.2.4 Committee on the Management of Research Library Resources
5. Performance Measures (Objective 8)
ARL Objective 8: To describe and measure the performance of research libraries and their contributions to teaching, research, scholarship, and community service.
5.1 Statistics and Measurements Program
5.1.1 Committee on Statistics and Measurements
6.1 Governance
Status Report on Committees and Selected Advisory and Project Groups
6.2 Communications and External Relations
6.2.1 ARL Publications Program
6.2.2 Electronic Communications and Technology
6.3 Membership Meetings
6.4 International Relations
6.5 General Administration
7.1 Office of Research and Development
Summary of Grant Funded Activities: May 1996 - September 1996
7.1.1 ARL Visiting Program Officer Program
The objective of the Office of Scholarly Communication (OSC) is to maintain and improve scholars’ access to information. OSC undertakes activities to understand and influence the forces affecting the production, dissemination, and use of scholarly and scientific information. The Office seeks to promote innovative, creative, and alternative ways of sharing scholarly findings, particularly through championing new and evolving electronic methods of recording and disseminating academic and research scholarship.
The Office also maintains a continuing educational outreach to the scholarly community in order to encourage a shared “information conscience” among all participants in the scholarly publishing chain: academics, librarians, and information producers. The activities of this office build on the results of the ARL Serials Prices Project as well as interest and research ongoing in the profession. The capability is advanced and OSC receives guidance through the work of the ARL Committee on Scholarly Communication.
Initially created as the Office of Scientific and Academic Publishing, the capability was renamed in spring 1996. Mary Case became Director of the Office of Scholarly Communication on June 1.
Activities between June and October 1996 have included participation in the process to redefine a proposal for collective action by the AAU and ARL in support of electronic scholarly publishing, planning for the evolution of the Directory of Electronic Journals, and beginning the process for collaborative projects with the AAUP, AHA, CNI, and COSLA.
AAU/ARL Research Libraries Project. At its April 15 meeting, the AAU/ARL Research Libraries Steering Committee concluded that the Electronic Scholarly Publishing (ESP) Program, proposed by the AAU/ARL Intellectual Property Task Force, although descriptive of what universities should be doing, was not the kind of collective action the Steering Committee was seeking. The ESP replicated current activities rather than advancing or complementing these efforts. The Steering Committee discussed revisiting a definition of collective action in the context of other discussions underway within AAU about higher education’s need for expanded network capacity. These discussions have resulted in the development of a new proposal, the International Scholars Academic Network (IScAN).
Drafted by a Working Group of the ARL Board with the help of Paul Peters, Executive Director of CNI, IScAN is currently being developed at Board direction for broad discussion by the membership at the October meeting. The OSC is participating in this development process. (See Section 1.4)
Networked Information Consortia. OSC will co-sponsor a website with CNI and, tentatively, the Chief Officers of State Library Agencies (COSLA) that will facilitate access to and analysis of information about networked information resources and service consortia. Also under discussion are plans for the three organizations to co-sponsor a program, “Networked Information Consortia: Strategies, Models, Projects,” to be held in conjunction with the Spring 1997 CNI Task Force meeting. This program will address the management issues involved in creating, funding, and maintaining consortial networks.
The Future of the Scholarly Monograph. ARL will co-sponsor with AAUP and ACLS, and perhaps others, a symposium on the future of the scholarly monograph. A program planning committee is in the process of being appointed. The program will be held in June or July 1997.
Endangered Monograph Project. OSC is working with the American Historical Association to develop a proposal for a project on the endangered monograph. A project outline will be available for discussion by the Scholarly Communications Committee at the October meeting.
Program on Licensing. OSC is developing a program on licensing to be held in San Francisco on December 8 and 9, 1996. The program will be held in conjunction with the CNI Fall Task Force meeting.
ARL Directory of Electronic Journals, Newsletters, and Academic Discussion Lists. This project advances electronic/Internet publishing of journals and has become the standard reference book in its area. The e-journal/newsletter directory has experienced enormous growth. The listings in the sixth annual edition, published in 1996, increased 150% over the fifth edition.
The increase is attributable primarily to two factors. First, Netscape offers an exciting and easy way to present non-textual materials, such as images, and is widely available to producers and readers, as well. More individuals and small organizations have been attracted to the e-medium for serial publications. Second, print publishers’ prototype projects for e-versions of their current journals are beginning to come online. The entire journals lists of a handful of publishers are now or shortly will be available through the WWW.
The majority of the actual research and keying for the e-journals sections is carried out by three interns from the Library and Information Science Program at Catholic University: Jennifer Page, Colleen Keller, and Ann Doty. The project is directed by Dru Mogge, Electronic Services Coordinator.
An abbreviated version of the Directory will be available on the Web this fall. Discussions are underway to revise the Directory for next year with a view toward producing a full Internet version. In addition, a large marketing campaign has been undertaken to increase sales of this year’s edition. A brochure was designed to promote the Directory beyond the research library market.
This committee was established in February 1991 by the ARL Board of Directors to help the Association understand, contribute to, and improve the system of scholarly communication. The committee is charged to monitor developments, determine critical issues requiring ARL attention, inform members, and design strategic responses that can serve to influence the future of scholarly communication. The Committee also advises and guides the ARL staff on matters regarding the plans and strategies of the Office of Scholarly Communication.
Between the May and October 1996 ARL meetings, the committee has worked primarily to respond to the IScAN proposal and to provide advice and assistance to the new director for the Office of Scholarly Communication.
Members:
Joe Boisse (1994-1996)
Scott Bennett (1996-1998)
Susan Brynteson (1996-1998)
Eileen Hitchingham (1996-1998)
Margot Montgomery (1995-1997)
Carole Moore (1995-1997)
Carlton Rochell (1995-1997)
Elaine Sloan, Chair (1996-1997)
Staff Liaison: Mary Case
To assist in efforts to obtaining firm serial subscription prices in a timely fashion, the Board approved formation of a working group under the aegis of the Scholarly Communications Committee. The group consists of volunteers who offered their services to ARL to work on this issue. Its objectives are to 1) establish a process of identifying firm price requirements by ARL libraries, and 2) establish a dialogue with the vending and publishing community to attain prices for the subscription year by August or September of the previous calendar year. While actively sponsoring publisher and vendor meetings in its early years, for 1996, it is expected to monitor developments in a low-key activity mode.
Members:
Tony Angiletta
Robert Holley
Scott Bennett
Paula Kaufman
Sue Martin
Dale Canelas
Charles Miller
Lois Ann Colaianni
Emily Mobley
Merrily Taylor
Sheila Creth
Jim Neal
Fred Friend
Barbara Smith
Paul Gherman
Graham Hill
Carla Stoffle
Sharon Hogan
Staff Liaison: Mary Case
The Federal Relations and Information Policy Program is designed to: monitor activities resulting from legislative, regulatory, or operating practices of international and domestic government agencies and other relevant bodies on matters of concern to research libraries; prepare analyses of and responses to federal information policies; influence federal action on issues related to research libraries; examine issues of importance to the development of research libraries; and develop ARL positions on issues that reflect the needs and interests of its members. This capability is governed by the ARL Information Policies Committee. The ARL Working Group on Copyright Issues plays an advisory role with regard to Copyright and Intellectual Property Issues.
The Federal Relations Notebook (ARL/FRN) is now available via the World Wide Web at http://www.arl.org/info/ frn/info.html. Ann Doty, Research Assistant, reconfigured the Notebook for the Web during the summer months. ARL/FRN is intended to help ARL members keep abreast of the legislative landscape, as well as the rapidly changing issues, players, legislative vehicles, and priorities within the U.S. and Canadian federal governments. The ARL/FRN also provides a framework for the Federal Relations E-news distributed to the ARL Directors by the Executive Director. These monthly Federal Relations E-news are written by Prue Adler and edited by Patricia Brennan and they complement occasional action alerts to members on different topics.
Summary of Activities
The priorities of the capability are:
•copyright and intellectual property issues;
•government information issues;
•telecommunications, networking, and digital library issues; and
•other issues of importance to research libraries such as appropriations of selected federal agencies.
Copyright and Intellectual Property
(See Section 1.3)
Government Information Dissemination. Several Congressional initiatives are underway to reconceptualize access to government information. ARL staff met with Congressional and Executive Branch staff to discuss these proposals. ARL, with others in the library community, has responded to numerous GPO proposals, including the Government Printing Office Transition Plan. Prue Adler, as a member of the Advisory Committee, assisted the GPO on how the agency could move to a more electronically-based program. With others in the library community, ARL responded to the GPO plan and participated in numerous discussions with members of the executive and legislative branches regarding changes to Title 44.
On May 1, several ARL directors and government information specialists participated in a strategic planning session on government information issues, with a particular focus on electronic information. An ARL Strategic Plan on Government Information was drafted and reviewed by the Information Policies Committee. The ARL Board of Directors approved the plan at the July 1996 meeting of the Board of Directors. The four-point plan focuses on education, data gathering, continued political advocacy and policy leadership, and the initiation of pilot projects and collaboration with others in the development of new models. The Plan is available via the World Wide Web at http://www.arl.org/info/frn/gov/stratplan2.html.
Influencing Agency Information Programs. ARL continues to collaborate with others in the public interest community and with agencies in implementing the Government Information Locator Service (GILS) proposal. GILS provides a framework and common approach for federal agencies to make their information resources publicly available. ARL staff worked with NTIS on implementing their dissemination program, with a particular focus on depository library issues. NITS has proposed a pilot project for 20 federal depository libraries to receive NTIS resources electronically.
ARL GIS Literacy Project. The project seeks to educate librarians and users about GIS as well as to develop GIS capabilities in research libraries. Background materials related to this project are now available on the ARL website, including a database of all project participants. The number of libraries participating in the ARL Project continues to grow.
Prue Adler participates in numerous discussions and conferences related to the development of a national spatial data standard and issues relating to access to GIS resources. The increasing reliance upon GIS by multiple communities including government agencies and members of the academic and research communities indicate the need for research librarians to be well situated to provide access to the growing array of digital cartographic and spatial information. Prue Adler is a member of the Board of the National Center for Geographic Information and Analysis (NCGIA), an NSF-sponsored consortium.
Telecommunications. With the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, ARL’s focus in this area now includes working with agencies to implement NII programs, responding to NII proposals, and collaborating with others in the education, library, and public interest communities to promote common positions.
ARL continues to participate in the challenge to provisions included in the Telecommunications Act of 1996, those provisions regarding restrictive access to selected information resources. ARL actively opposed provisions included in Title V, the Communications Decency Act (CDA), of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 that sought to prohibit access to indecent or patently offensive materials via the Internet. These provisions would impose fines and criminal penalties for transmitting and/or providing access to these resources. ARL, as a member of the Citizens Internet Empowerment Coalition (CIEC), is challenging the CDA in court. Several courts have ruled that provisions in the CDA are unconstitutional and overly broad. These cases are slated to be heard by the Supreme Court.
ARL reviewed and endorsed ALA filings before the Federal Communications Commission on discounted rates for schools and libraries.
Networking and Digital Libraries. ARL staff worked with agencies in designing and proposing network applications programs, such as the NASA Information Infrastructure Technology and Applications Program, the NSF/ARPA/NASA digital library initiative (DLI), and the NTIA TIIAP program. This included working with staff of Appropriations Committees in support of these programs. Prue Adler participated in the EOSDIS Users Report, an evaluation of user information needs for global change data; in Project Alexandria, an NSF/ARPA/NASA Digital Library Initiative; in meetings of the High Performance Computing Coalition regarding continued support for HPCC programs; and participated in NSF network-related efforts.
ARL staff participated in follow-up discussions to the conference Monterey 1995, “Higher Education and the NII–from Vision to Reality.” The conference explored the steps required over the next few years to turn the potential of the advanced information infrastructure into a reality for higher education. FARNET, CNI, and others have sponsored several sessions focused on next generation networks. Duane Webster, Prue Adler, and Paul Peters have participated in these discussions.
Given the early departure by Congress, it was unable to complete action on many appropriations bills. ARL staff have worked in support of selected agencies’ FY 1997 appropriations, including those of the Library of Congress, GPO, NEH, NTIA, NSF, and the Department of Education. A comprehensive spending bill, which has passed the House and is under consideration in the Senate, includes FY 1997 funds for all those remaining agencies, such as NEH, to avert another federal government shutdown.
LC/GPO. ARL, ALA, and AALL submitted statements to the House and Senate Appropriations Committees on behalf of the Library of Congress and the Government Printing Office FY 1997 budget requests. ARL continues to be very active on this appropriations bill to ensure that needed funds are available to both agencies.
National Endowment for the Humanities. FY 1997 appropriations for NEH have not been completed. Letters and calls from ARL directors have been very helpful in the House and Senate deliberations on the NEH budget.
National Telecommunications Information Administration, Department of Commerce. TIIAP faced significant hurdles in the Senate appropriations discussions. ARL’s efforts focused on increasing the Senate TIIAP figures at least to match the higher House figure. The NTIA/TIIAP is a program that supports library, education, non-profit, and state and local government information technology projects.
National Science Foundation. ARL worked with others in the higher education community in support of the NSF FY 1997 budget request, with a particular focus on the CISE programs and reauthorization of the agency. ARL, as a member of the Consortium of Social Science Associations, submitted a statement in support of the FY 1997 NSF budget request. ARL is now a member of the Science Coalition and the Coalition for National Science Funding (CNSF).
HEA. ARL worked with a coalition of higher education groups and associations in support of HEA Title VI FY 1997 appropriations before the House and Senate.
Non-Profit Advocacy. ARL joined a coalition of over 800 non-profit groups to oppose language in appropriations bills that would severely restrict the ability of non-profits to work with others in the executive and congressional branches of government. Activities such as filing the amicus brief on the Texaco decision would be prohibited if such provisions were enacted.
At the Committee’s meeting in October 1995, members discussed FY96 priorities and requested that staff continue to focus on and respond to these ongoing issues, including: copyright and intellectual property; government information dissemination programs with the understanding that an investment in maintaining more government information in the public domain will, in the long-term, have an impact on ARL’s needed investment in copyright and intellectual property; telecommunications and networking issues, with a particular focus on digital library applications; and support of agency programs that are of direct importance to research libraries, including those that promote digitizing research library resources.
1996 Agenda of Issues:
•Advise on the development of ARL positions
•Monitor and assess other government policies that may have an impact on research libraries
•Advise on efforts to strengthen ARL’s capability to communicate with policymakers
Meetings planned in 1996: Meeting in conjunction with the ARL membership meetings in May and October 1996. Telephone consultations and e-mail conferences will continue as needed.
Members:
Jerry Campbell(1996-1998)
Sheila Creth(1996-1998)
Kenneth Frazier (1996-1998)
Fred Heath(1994-1996)
Ernie Ingles(1995-1997)
Paula Kaufman(1996-1998)
Gerald Lowell(1995-1997)
Susan K. Martin(1995-1997)
Tom Shaughnessy (1994-1996)
Robert Wedgeworth (1996-1998)
James F. Williams(1995-1997)
James Neal, Chair (1995-1996)
Staff Liaison: Prue Adler
The ARL Board of Directors has identified intellectual property and copyright as a defining set of issues for the future of scholarly communication. All programs were urged to identify ways to advance the ARL agenda in these areas. As a result, many programs contributed to recent activities.
Last fall and winter, the ARL Working Group on Copyright developed a set of strategies for expanded research library leadership and impact on proposed copyright legislation. The following strategies were reviewed by the ARL membership and changes were proposed and incorporated to produce the following list.
Implement tactics to slow down the legislative process so that key issues can be identified and debated, including use of institutional legislative liaisons
Advocate for appropriate change or improvements in the current copyright law
Affirm and articulate our intellectual property principles as well as important professional tenets in such areas as intellectual freedom and privacy
Evaluate the proposed legislation against these principles to identify key conflicts and gaps
Identify and resolve critical philosophical and practical differences and varied interpretations in our own community
Propose new or alternative legislative language which addresses the needs of the scholarly and higher education communities
Shape specific programs of library service that maximize the value for readers of the fair use and other limitations on copyright provided by the law
Improve understanding of the international dimensions of the issues
Expand awareness of the increased legal vulnerability for libraries and parent institutions under the proposed legislation
Expand coalition building with the higher education, not-for-profit and technology communities
Launch an effective and broad-based education and advocacy program on our campuses and in our regions
During the May 1996 Membership meeting in Vancouver, the ARL Working Group on Copyright and the Board reviewed a number of issues related to copyright.
With regard to the legislation, the Working Group acknowledged the need for a strenuous, rigorous response given the speed at which the legislation is scheduled to move through both Houses of Congress. The Working Group also acknowledged the need to engage the higher education community and decided that ARL’s priority agenda should be: fair use, online liability, preservation, and distance education.
The Working Group reviewed the March draft of the CONFU electronic reserves guidelines as well as membership responses to them, and the draft CCUMC multimedia guidelines. The Working Group recommended that ARL not endorse the multimedia guidelines and recommended that a letter be sent to CCUMC explaining ARL’s reasons for lack of support. The working group also recommended that ARL not sign on to the electronic reserve guidelines, noting both practical and political concerns with the current draft. The Working Group also asked for guidance from the Board about the guidelines process overall and ARL’s association with them.
During the Business Meeting, Jim Neal, Chair of the Information Policies Committee, reported on the Working Group’s discussions. In response to the report, the membership adopted a resolution articulating ARL concerns that “readers be able to exercise with vigor their fair use rights provided under the U.S. Constitution and that readers be able to rely on third parties such as libraries in the exercise of their rights.”
Based on all the membership discussions during the Vancouver meeting, the Board revisited efforts to draft fair use guidelines in the CONFU process. They acknowledged that, while guidelines are useful as aids in interpreting the law as it applies to various activities within libraries, they should not reflect a narrow interpretation of the law. The Board discussed comments by Susan Kornfield, attorney for the MDS, who outlined for the membership the way guidelines can be and have been misinterpreted by the Association of American Publishers (AAP) in recent litigation.
The Board acknowledged the need for continued discussion and development of understandings with the user and creator communities about managing and using electronic information in ways that are within the spirit of the law and preserve users’ fair use rights. The Board decided that it was not in ARL member libraries’ best interests to sign onto electronic reserve guidelines at this point. ARL’s position on the electronic reserves guidelines was communicated to the CONFU participants. This was communicated back to the membership in July, as well. A letter was also sent to CCUMC outlining ARL’s reasons for lack of support on the multimedia guidelines.
The Board also asked for ARL staff to arrange a discussion among members of the higher education and scholarly community to come together to discuss these issues.
On July 30, 1996, the ARL Board of Directors hosted a discussion of current issues in copyright and intellectual property as they relate to scholarly communication. Participants reviewed the state of current developments and their potential impact on the scholarly process. Of particular concern to all attending the meeting is the future of fair use in the electronic environment and the feasibility of arriving at mutual understandings within the higher education and scholarly community for the management and use of intellectual property. The participants acknowledged that the meeting was beneficial to all involved in that it provided a forum for developing understandings and for exchanging perspectives among the representatives of key constituencies. Follow-up meetings are planned for fall and will be hosted by the National Humanities Alliance.
A summary of the discussion and the themes emerging from the meeting was distributed to the ARL membership in August.
Reviewed and responded to the Administration- and Congressional-recommended revisions to the 1976 Copyright Act and related NII efforts
Developed strategies in response to specific legislative proposals, such as the NII Copyright Protection Act, the Copyright Term Extension bill, the Omnibus Patent Act of 1996, and the Database Investment and Intellectual Property Antipiracy Act of 1996
Provided background information to the membership on new copyright proposals and progress with development of fair use guidelines
Organized and published a second briefing packet, Copyright and the NII: Resources for the Library and Education Community, focused on pending legislation
Distributed regular updates via the Federal Relations monthly e-notes
Shared Legal Capability for Intellectual Property. ARL is collaborating very closely with others in the library community on copyright and NII issues through the formation of the Shared Legal Capability (SLC).
Five library associations (ALA, AALL, ARL, MLA, and SLA) are members of the SLC. Members of the SLC met with members of the Administration and congressional staff to discuss many proposed changes to the Copyright Act.
The SLC is participating in negotiations with other interested stakeholders on copyright term extension legislation. The Register of Copyright is the facilitator of these negotiations.
The SLC submitted statements to the House and Senate regarding H.R. 2441 and S. 1284, the NII Copyright Protection Act of 1995. Members of the SLC and the Digital Future Coalition drafted six alternative legislative proposals for H.R. 2441 and S. 1282. These include issues relating to browsing, fair use, preservation, first sale, distance education, and copyright management information.
The SLC is participating in the negotiations with online service providers and content owners on online service liability issues. Rep. Goodlatte (R-VA) has convened these sessions to try and find common ground among these stakeholders. Arnie Lutzker, attorney with Fish and Richardson and SLC legal counsel, is representing the SLC in these discussions.
The SLC, with the Association of American Publishers and the National Humanities Alliance, sent a joint letter to the Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee expressing serious reservations with the PTO reform legislation. Provisions that would have decoupled the Copyright Office from the Library of Congress were subsequently deleted. The Washington Post noted this “formidable alliance” in both a story and editorial on this issue.
Members of SLC agreed to explore the development of “best practices” issue briefs in selected areas, such as e-reserves, ILL, and licensing.
Prue Adler and Duane Webster are the ARL representatives to the SLC.
Intellectual Property and NII. During the last six months, ARL staff have been extremely active in intellectual property and copyright debates and discussions. Members of the copyright team have made numerous presentations on these issues. In addition, ARL staff conducted numerous visits to House and Senate offices to discuss H.R. 2441, H.R. 989, the legislation seeking to extend copyright term, S. 1961, the Omnibus Patent Act of 1996, and H.R. 3531, legislation seeking to extend new intellectual property protections to databases.
With others in the public and private sectors, ARL formed the Digital Future Coalition (DFC). This Coalition is comprised of a diverse constituency of library, education, legal, scholarly, consumer, public interest, hardware and software manufacturers, and telecommunications providers, each of which has concerns regarding both the White Paper produced by the Administration and with provisions in H.R. 2441 and S. 1284. The DFC was formed to provide constructive alternative proposals to the White Paper and the legislation. Prue Adler is the ARL representative to DFC. The DFC has:
Submitted testimony to both the House and Senate on H.R. 2441 and S. 1284;
Conducted numerous visits to meet with Members of Congress, Congressional staff, and senior members of the Administration on these issues;
Sponsored a technology briefing for Senate staff;
Developed alternative proposals to those included in the legislation;
Launched a campaign focused on the international dimensions of the NII bills and particularly the activities of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO);
Commenced a public awareness campaign regarding the critical importance of this legislation; and
Worked to change and/or delete a provision in the Omnibus Patent Act that would make ephemeral legal “copies,” thus changing current law and presenting serious liability issues for all network service providers.
ARL is participating in another copyright-related coalition, the Ad Hoc Copyright Coalition, comprised of private sector online service provider companies. This Coalition shares many of the same concerns as the SLC and the DFC and is primarily focused on network liability issues and the expansion of selected copyright owner’s rights.
See Section 6.4, International Relations, for a report on International Federation of Library Associations meeting. Discussions were held on copyright issues.
Conference on Fair Use. The Conference on Fair Use (CONFU) has met almost monthly for the past two years to develop guidelines for fair uses of copyrighted works by and in libraries and educational settings. ARL has been represented by Mary Jackson. Over 60 library associations, copyright holder groups, scholarly societies, and user groups attend the meetings regularly. The last CONFU meeting is scheduled for November 25, 1996, with the final report of the Conference being issued by the Patent & Trademark Office prior to the start of the December WIPO Diplomatic Conference in Geneva.
•Electronic Reserves: At the plenary CONFU meeting on September 6, 1996, participants agreed that consensus could not be reached on the March 1996 draft of the electronic reserve guidelines. Both AAP and SPA issued statements noting their inability to endorse the draft. Several library associations, including ARL, also expressed serious reservations on the draft.
•Distance Learning: The Working Group has finalized language on live, interactive programs and asynchronous taped programs for later transmission. They are now drafting language for computer network (Web) delivery of live interactive distance learning programs. Copies of draft guidelines will be circulated to ARL members when the Working Group issues the call for comment. As of mid-September, participants are optimistic that consensus can be reached on fair use guidelines for distance learning.
•Digital Images: Over 20 ARL members responded to the call for comment on the August 1996 draft guidelines for digital images. Concerns centered around four areas: the apparent balance favoring copyright holders, especially their economic rights; the unreasonable burden of record keeping and compliance placed on libraries; a further narrowing of the fair use principle; and new restrictive technical and workflow requirements. Some participants are optimistic that consensus can be reached on the digital images guidelines by mid-November.
•Interlibrary Loan: Earlier this year, members of the ILL Working Group reached unanimous consensus that it was premature to develop guidelines for digital transmission of digital documents. However, copyright holders pressed to explore the possibility of developing guidelines for digital transmission (e.g. fax, Ariel) of print documents. The library and user community responded to the AAP document articulating why they could not accept the restrictions proposed by AAP. It appears unlikely that new fair use guidelines for ILL will be developed within the CONFU setting.
•Multimedia: In a separate but parallel process, the Consortium of College and University Media Centers (CCUMC) has completed work on fair use guidelines for educational multimedia and has begun the endorsement process. ARL sent a letter to CCUMC in July outlining reasons not to endorse. As of mid-September, 15 endorsements have been received, primarily from organizations representing copyright holder interests such as AAP and SPA. Receiving a favorable response from Bruce Lehman, the CCUMC committee intends to include the multimedia guidelines in an appropriate Judiciary Committee report.
MDS Decision and Fair Use. ARL closely monitored reaction to a fair use decision passed down by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals, on February 12. The court held that an off-campus, for-profit photocopy shop may, as a matter of fair use, make coursepacks that include substantial portions of copyright-protected books and sell them to students (Princeton University Press v. Michigan Document Services, Inc.). On April 9, 1996, the judges of the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals voted to rehear this case en banc. The effect of that vote is to vacate the previous decision from the Sixth Circuit, leaving in force the injunction issued by the District Court. Based on membership discussion in Vancouver in May, ARL with ALA sent a letter to the Court noting that issues regarding fair use as detailed in amicus briefs before the Court in support of MDS are of extreme importance to members of the library community.
Copyright Education Initiative. The H.W. Wilson Foundation awarded ARL funding to develop an educational initiative on copyright compliance that includes funding to sponsor a series of workshops for librarians who have a training or spokesperson role in copyright compliance. Two workshops were conducted in the last half of 1996.
For the U.S. audience, “Copyright and Libraries: A Leadership Workshop” was held in Seattle, WA (September 19-20). The needs of institutions governed by Canadian copyright law will be addressed in “Copyright in Canada,” to be held in Ottawa, Ontario (October 3-4). ARL collaborated with the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) in the design of the workshop and it is co-sponsored by ARL, CARL, and the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada.
Copyright Publications. In May, ARL published Copyright and the NII: Resources for the Library and Education Community. This briefing packet was designed to assist libraries and educators understand and become aware of the current copyright legislative reform and to encourage involvement in the debate. To date, over 800 copies have been distributed. Segments of the publication are also available on the ARL server.
In preparation for the ARL Copyright Workshop in Seattle, ARL staff prepared A Copyright Handbook: An ARL Compilation of Key Resources for Librarians. This publication contains a range of materials designed to acquaint librarians with copyright and its application in the library. This publication will be revised in the fall of 1996 and made available for purchase.
A draft pamphlet on licensing electronic resources has been prepared and is available for review. It outlines strategic and practical considerations before signing electronic resource agreements or contracts. Karen Hersey, Intellectual Property Counsel, MIT, assisted ARL in the preparation of this document.
The ARL Focus Flyer on Copyright has been available since 1994 and is continuously updated. Most recently it was distributed at the ARL copyright workshop in Seattle and at the IFLA conference in Beijing. It was also available at a Copyright Conferences held at the University of Tennessee in September, in Bangkok in October.
Copyright materials are continuously being added to the ARL website and links are also in place to other relevant copyright and intellectual property sites.
At the request of the ARL Board of Directors, the Working Group on Copyright Issues was asked to continue to coordinate ARL activities on intellectual property and copyright issues. The Committee is comprised of members from four standing committees of the Association and the Executive Committee. Members of the Group serve as liaisons to their respective committees on these issues.
Members:
Scott Bennett(Scholarly Communication)
Betty Bengtson(Board, AAU/ARL Steering)
Nancy Cline(Board)
Ken Frazier(Information Policies)
Ernie Ingles(Information Policies)
Paula Kaufman(Information Policies)
Peter Lyman(At Large)
Susan Nutter(At Large)
Martin Runkle(Preservation)
George Shipman(Access)
Elaine Sloan(Scholarly Communication, AAU/ARL Steering)
Robert Wedgeworth(Information Policies, AAU/ARL Steering)
Jim Neal, Chair(Board, Information Policies)
Staff Liaison:
Duane Webster
Staff Resources:
Prue Adler
Mary Jackson
Patricia Brennan
AAU/ARL Steering Committee Activities The spring 1996 meeting of the AAU/ARL Research Libraries Steering Committee led to a significant turning point in the way the two organizations are addressing their shared agenda. At that meeting, the Steering Committee decided to reconsider the collective action it desired to promote electronic scholarly communication, to endorse the Global Resources Program, and to consider coordinating its agenda with that of the AAU Committee on Information Technology’s. Subsequently, the Steering Committee co-chairs, Myles Brand and Jerry Campbell, decided that a new committee structure should be developed. The Intellectual Property Task Force was concluded with thanks for its significant contributions. The future of the Steering Committee itself is still unresolved, pending the AAU and ARL discussions this fall.
The following review presents the status of the major topics emerging from the spring steering committee discussion.
With the decision that the “call for proposals” for discreet ESP projects was not the kind of collective action that they were seeking, the Steering Committee discussed revisiting a definition of collective action for electronic scholarly publishing in the context of other discussions underway within AAU about higher education’s need for expanded network capacity. There was also a preliminary discussion of a consortial structure to provide a stable base of support for electronic scholarly publishing.
IScAN: Encouraged by the continuing interest in the Steering Committee for some form of collective action to foster electronic scholarly publishing, the ARL Board formed a Working Group (Jerry Campbell, Chair, Nancy Eaton, Jim Neal, and Barbara von Wahlde) to develop a discussion document to help define possible collective actions, taking into account both content- and conduit-related issues in electronic scholarly publishing. With the help of Paul Peters, Executive Director of CNI, a draft document on an International Scholars Academic Network (IScAN) was developed, discussed by the ARL Board, and distributed to all directors of ARL libraries. Response to the proposal was sought from the ARL membership prior to the July ARL Board meeting. While comments on the details of the proposal were mixed, most respondents were in favor of some collective action to facilitate electronic scholarly publishing. As a result, the Board requested that Paul Peters and Mary Case, Director of ARL’s Office of Scholarly Communication, develop further the IScAN concept, including an analysis of possible business models, for the purpose of broad discussion by the membership at the October meeting.
As one step in the development process, the Board recommended the convening of a focus group of individuals or organizations currently involved in electronic publishing projects. The intent of such a meeting was to explore the perspective of those actively engaged in creating value in the networked environment on the IScAN concept and to determine if, from that vantage point, there are goals that could be accomplished through collective action that are difficult to achieve individually or competitively in the current environment. The IScAN Forum was held in the ARL Conference Room on September 16.
Another strategy in the development of IScAN was the preparation of profiles of such organizations as ASCAP, BMI, and the NCAA. Information regarding the organization and functioning of these entities that promote both cooperation and competition should be constructive as possible business models for IScAN.
An updated report and set of materials will be made available to members and discussed at the October ARL membership business meeting.
Also at the April AAU meeting, the AAU Committee on Information Technology proposed a discussion for AAU presidents and chancellors this October to address the shortcomings of the Internet status quo and to discuss a proposal for collective action to establish a new network to better serve the needs of higher education. The AAU/ARL Steering Committee acknowledged the similarity of this agenda to its own and proposed a joint program for the AAU October meeting. A planning meeting including representatives of AAU, AAU’s Committee on Information Technology, and ARL met in Chicago in July to begin discussions on the October AAU program. Nancy Eaton, Robert Wedgeworth, and Duane Webster represented ARL at this meeting. The AAU program in mid-October will include a program on the digital environment: Robert Wedgeworth was invited to discuss digital intellectual property management and Paul Peters was invited to discuss forces shaping the evolution of the digital environment.
In April, the proposal for a Global Resources Program was endorsed in principle by the Steering Committee that indicated its commitment to recommend that AAU Presidents and Chancellors provide some level of funding to implement the program. The Steering Committee had received a draft report prepared by the ARL Research Collections Committee (Tactical Plan for the AAU/ARL Global Resources Program) and a proposal for a process of consultation with chief academic officers and scholarly/area studies societies to secure agreement on both the Global Resources Plan and on the financial strategy for pursuing it. The tactical plan outlines the vision of a network-based, distributed collection of global information resources for North American teaching and research as well as the benefits it will provide in improved access to global resources. In May, the ARL Research Collections Committee discussed implementation of the plan and the ARL membership was briefed on the plan during the business meeting.
In September, AAU and ARL staff met at The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to discuss plans for the Global Resources Program. On the basis of that conversation, ARL was encouraged to submit a proposal for funding to support the program over three years. The elements of the proposal will be based to a significant degree on the ideas outlined in the Tactical Plan and the experience of the three AAU/ARL Global Resources Demonstration Projects. See Section 3.1.1 of this report for a description of the key elements of the Global Resources Program; see below for a status report on the demonstration projects.
A key goal of the AAU/ARL common action agenda is to improve access to international research resources. Three demonstration projects, focusing on materials from Latin America, Japan, and Germany, form the first phase of a network-based, distributed program for the coordinated acquisition of and access to foreign materials, the Global Resources Program. The ARL Research Collections Committee provides overall guidance for these projects.
The project seeks to expand the range of materials available to Latin Americanist students and scholars, to restructure access to these materials through distributed, cooperative collection development based on new uses of technology, and to assist libraries in containing costs. Start-up funding for the project came from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and thirty-five participating ARL libraries. In October 1995, the Mellon Foundation awarded ARL a grant for $125,000 for the second phase of the project. Mark Grover, Latin American Studies Bibliographer at Brigham Young University Library, will conclude his assignment as Project Coordinator in December 1996. An Advisory Committee, chaired by Deborah Jakubs of Duke University, oversees the implementation of the Latin Americanist Research Resources Pilot Project. Ms. Jakubs can be contacted at jakubs@acpub.duke.edu.
The original project activities focused on three categories of Argentine and Mexican resources: serials, government documents, and the publications of non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Progress in all three areas has been significant, and the Advisory Committee is planning for the next phase of the project.
An easily accessible Internet database hosted by the University of Texas Latin American Network Information Center (UT-LANIC) offers tables-of-contents for approximately 300 academic journals from Argentina and Mexico. A pilot interlibrary loan service, designed jointly by UT-LANIC and OCLC, is now operational, and will streamline the process of obtaining articles that are included in the table-of-contents database. The ILL enhancement allows users searching the database to submit an online ILL request for an article to their home institution’s PRISM ILL Review File. All 35 ARL libraries participating in the AAU/ARL Latin Americanist Research Resources Project are automatically included in this new service. The URL for the pilot ILL service is: http://lanic.utexas.edu/project/arl/arl.html.
The project improves access to Latin American government documents primarily through electronic technology. Presidential messages from Argentina and Mexico have been digitized, and the process of scanning and indexing the complete files of these documents is expected to be completed by December 1996. The work is being completed by Preservation Resources, and the images will be available on UT-LANIC. This part of the project brings together into a single online collection documents that were supplied by several ARL libraries.
The participating libraries have also assumed collecting and cataloging responsibilities for publications of Argentina and Mexican non-governmental organizations, research institutes, and other non-commercial producers of research reports and discussion papers.
In March 1996, a questionnaire was sent to the Latin American bibliographers at participating libraries seeking their feedback on the project activities and advice on next steps. A meeting of the project bibliographers held during the conference of the Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials (SALALM) in June 1996 also provided helpful feedback. The Advisory Committee has reviewed the information gathered and has recommended several new activities for the project. They include:
•expanding the table-of-contents database by including coverage for serials volumes from 1990 forward;
•recommending that each participating library cancel a project journal from among those that are widely held, and accept responsibility for a new title;
•adding a monographic component to the project, in which participating libraries will be asked to reallocate a percentage of their Latin American monographic budgets to focus on an area of particular strength;
•building partnerships with Latin American libraries, research institutes, and book dealers;
•creating a set of five working groups, each made up of bibliographers from libraries participating in the project, to collaborate on developing the next steps for: serials; monographs; NGOs; government publications; and partnering.
In addition, as a complement to the first phase of the project, the University of Florida and the University of California at Berkeley are designing institutional studies that will examine the effects of distributed, cooperative projects on the internal structures of research libraries.
The primary goals of the German Demonstration Project are (1) to ensure effective and timely access to and delivery of German language research materials through electronic resource sharing and improved interlibrary document delivery services, and 2) to test linking between North American and German libraries to expand access to specialized research resources. This is a cooperative effort among research institutions in the United States, Germany, and Canada with strong German library collections and an institutional commitment to research in German history and political science. For more information on the project, contact Sarah Thomas of Cornell, set9@cornell.edu.
The project has four specific activities:
•to cooperate with the Deutsche Bibliothek and German government agencies in locating and/or encouraging the development of digital versions of federal government documents;
•to collaborate with German research libraries to test network access to regional government documents;
•to develop complementary systems for cataloging;
•to identify serials published in Germany that are critical for furthering scholarship but not widely held in North America, and devise effective document delivery strategies.
The German Demonstration Project now has twenty-two participating libraries. The project is coordinated by a Working Group co-chaired by Winston Tabb of the Library of Congress and Sarah Thomas of Cornell.
The Library of Congress (LC) has made special arrangements so libraries in the project will have access to the cataloging records prepared by the Deutsche Bibliothek through files mounted at LC. Access to these records is available to participants on a subscription basis via Z39.50. The Universitaetsbibliothek in Goettingen has mounted an Internet-accessible test file of regional government documents.
Top priority at present is to obtain funding to enable the participants to undertake cooperative activities, such as developing a common serials list, analyzing methods for increasing North American coverage of German monographs in political science and history, and stimulating the development of digital documents by German agencies and making them easily available. This would reduce the need for print archival holdings in ARL libraries. The Working Group has already made some progress in this area through discussions held in June 1996 with Elmar Mittler, librarian of the University of Goettingen Library, and other German librarians at the Deutscher Bibliothekartag.
The Japan Journal Access Project, which originally began as the Japanese Scientific and Technical Information Project, seeks to improve access to Japanese journal literature across all disciplines. Broadening of the scope of the project was facilitated by the interest and support of the National Coordinating Committee on Japanese Library Resources. The coordination of the Japan Journal Access Project has been shared by Don Simpson of the Center for Research Libraries and Dorothy Gregor, consultant to ARL. For more information on the project, contact Dorothy Gregor dgregor@library.berkeley.edu.
The Japan Journal Access Project has thus far focused primarily on gaining access to Japanese journals available from Japan. This focus will continue, but the Project is also being expanded to include improving access to Japanese language journals available from U.S. sources. The Serials Subcommittee of the National Coordinating Committee on Japanese Library Resources (NCC), which has been asked to draft a workplan for the Project, met in September to outline a plan for review by Japanese studies librarians and ARL directors. The following is an outline of the proposed components of an expanded Project.
Access to Japanese Journals Available in the U.S.
•Collaborative Collection Development: Distributed Approach
Using the Union List of Japanese Serials compiled by Mihoko Miki (UCLA) and Yasuko Makino (Columbia) as a base list, project participants will identify responsibilities for the ongoing maintenance of important titles in hopes of reallocating funds from duplicated titles to titles not currently available in the U.S. The Union List will be updated and made available over the Web.
•Collaborative Collection Development: Center for Research Libraries
The Center for Research Libraries (CRL) is currently developing a plan for an East Asian Area Studies Program. The Serials Subcommittee proposes including some less used but nonetheless important Japanese titles in the Program, noting that the Center already has a significant number of Japanese journals and newspapers.
•Web-based Access to Document Delivery for Japanese Journals
Several services, e.g., CARL Uncover, JICST, and Interlingua provide document delivery for Japanese journal articles. Web links with descriptions of the services for users can be provided on the Project’s Web page at OSU http://pears.lib.ohio-state.edu/.
•Retrospective Conversion
The NCC is completing a survey of progress made in the retrospective conversion of Japanese collections in the U.S. Several of the largest ARL libraries have not yet converted their serial holdings; some targeted recon may be necessary in order to gain better access to titles held by those libraries.
Access to Japanese Journals and Journal Articles from Japanese Sources
•National Diet Library’s Zasshi kiji sakuin
The Zasshi kiji sakuin is an important journal index produced by the National Diet Library (NDL). At the beginning 1996 NDL ceased paper publication and switched to an expensive CD-ROM. U.S. Japanese studies librarians have been pressuring the NDL to make the index available over the Internet. In early August 1996, Japan’s National Center for Science Information Systems (NACSIS), a government-supported bibliographic utility providing bibliographic and interlibrary loan/document delivery/e-text access for Japanese academic and research libraries, began including the index among its files available for foreign access. Although the costs of accessing the NACSIS system over the Internet are not particularly high, problems of payment mechanisms and hours of access remain and will be a continuing focus of the Japan Project and the NCC. It is important to note that NACSIS also houses a union catalog of the holdings of the Japanese national universities and a large number of other academic libraries.
Additionally, the NCC is developing a grant proposal to provide training for librarians and end users in the use of NACSIS files and information for search and display using vernacular script. Although NACSIS can be a major resource for U.S. users, work remains to be done before the system will be widely available in the U.S.
•Japanese Sci-Tech Literature
In accordance with the early emphasis of the Japan project on the sci-tech literature of Japan, the project has arranged for a September meeting of a staff member from Engineering Index (EI) with NACSIS staff in Tokyo. EI is interested in expanding its Japanese sci-tech coverage, but there are barriers of costs, language and culture to surmount. The outcome of this initial meeting will be reported at a later date.
The AAU/ARL Research Libraries Steering Committee played an active role in the integration of the separate initiatives and their ramifications for the way universities conduct their business. The Committee will not meet during the next AAU meeting scheduled for October 20-22 in Los Angeles. Both organizations are reviewing appropriate actions to advance the shared agenda of the two organizations; the future of the steering committee will be determined this fall and winter.
Members:
AAU
Myles Brand, Indiana, Co-chair
Donald Langenburg, Maryland
Robert McPherson, Michigan State
Robert Pritchard, Toronto
Harold Shapiro, Princeton
ARL
Jerry Campbell, Southern California, Co-chair
Betty Bengtson, Washington
Susan Nutter, North Carolina State
Elaine Sloan, Columbia
Robert Wedgworth, Illinois
Staff Liaisons:
John Vaughn, AAU
Duane Webster, ARL
(See also Sections 2.2 Coalition for Networked Information and 2.3 HEIRAlliance)
NAILDD Project. A centerpiece of the ARL Access capability is the North American Interlibrary Loan and Document Delivery (NAILDD) Project. The NAILDD Project was established in 1993 by ARL to promote developments that maximize access to research resources while minimizing the costs associated with such activities. The operating philosophy is to seek practical and creative technical developments that enable libraries to improve mediated ILL/DD services, and to introduce unmediated services in a networked environment. The strategy is to seek actions on the part of private sector developers that will respond to the priority needs of the library community.
NAILDD on the WWW. ARL’s Access and Technology Program has a home page on the ARL website where current information on the NAILDD Project is posted. Regular features include a status report as well as a list of members of the DIG and IPIG. See http://www.arl.org/access/access.shtml.
Collaboration with the Private Sector: the DIG. The Developers/Implementors Group (DIG) was formed to accelerate collaboration between libraries and a broad constituency of private sector players to advance the NAILDD Project’s priority technical developments. Now representing 50 organizations, the DIG continues to serve as a source of information and a forum for the major players in ILL/DD services. In the last year, standards remained the main focus of the NAILDD project work with the DIG
IPIG. The ILL Protocol Implementors Group (IPIG) was formed as a subset of the DIG to facilitate the use of the international ILL standard (ISO 10160 & 10161) by U.S. vendors and service providers. The Protocol is the international standard for communicating interlibrary loan requests. It is widely used in Canada, but, until last year, the only U.S. implementation of the Protocol was TRLN’s Document Delivery Project.
The IPIG was formed in late 1995 to identify ways in which the Protocol can be more widely implemented in the U.S. Seventeen organizations committed to implement the Protocol by participating in the IPIG. OCLC was the first to make the Protocol testbed available, and other IPIG members have been actively working with OCLC in early testing. Mary Jackson visited The Library Corporation in late spring to review progress on their Protocol-based ILL management system. Mark Wilson of The Library Corporation completed the encoding of all the Protocol messages and has opened a second IPIG testbed. Transmission of test messages by several IPIG participants, including DRA, has led to lively discussions on the IPIG listserv, and raised additional issues on which consensus needs to be reached. In addition, CISTI and The Library Corporation are collaborating to develop a method to permit two different encoding methods to exchange messages.
Expanding the DIG & IPIG beyond North America. The NAILDD Project received strong expressions of interest from organizations in Australia and Europe to expand the DIG and the IPIG to involve all organizations and libraries developing ILL projects or using the Protocol. In late June, Mary Jackson attended a meeting of the European Forum for Implementors of Library Automation (EFILA). Several EFILA participants are implementing either the Z39.50 Item Order extension or portions of the ILL Protocol. Discussions at the meeting confirmed the international interest of the work of the DIG and IPIG. As a result, both NAILDD groups are expanding to include key organizations from Britain and Australia with others expected.
NAILDD Project Meetings at ALA. The NAILDD Project continues to hold meetings the Friday before ALA conferences. The morning Directors Forum on Managing ILL/DD Operations provides an opportunity for directors and senior staff in research, academic, and public libraries to engage in discussions with developers of ILL/DD products and services. The afternoon DIG meeting brings together members to review the status of efforts to realize the Project’s three technical priorities.
Highlights of the meetings in July in New York City included reports from five DIG members and a presentation by the University of Arizona on its internal efforts to improve ILL/DD. DIG participants identified a range of new short-term goals for the project to consider. The next NAILDD Project meetings will be held on February 14, 1997 in Washington, DC.
AAU/ARL Demonstration Projects for Global Research Resources. The Access capability and the NAILDD Project advise on access and delivery issues that emerge in the AAU/ARL foreign publications demonstration projects. Since last fall, this included, with support from OCLC, developing a standards-based approach to streamline user-initiated ILL requests and services from the database for the Latin Americanist Project.
The University of Texas Latin American Network Information Center (UT-LANIC) hosts the electronic database of tables of contents of 300 academic and research periodicals from Argentina and Mexico. In order to facilitate user-generated electronic ordering of articles highlighted in the UT-LANIC database, OCLC agreed to participate in a pilot project to build a link between UT-LANIC and Prism ILL. In May, a report on the UT-LANIC implementation was made to a joint meeting of the ARL committees on Collections and Access to Information Resources. The service is now operational and while the use is light, it has identified a range of technical, policy, and internal workflow issues that need to be addressed as part of ongoing evaluation.
ILL/DD Performance Measures Study. The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation awarded ARL a grant to measure the performance of interlibrary loan and document delivery services in research and academic libraries. The two-year study, undertaken in collaboration with the Council on Library Resources (CLR), will expand the earlier ARL/RLG ILL cost study by measuring fill rate, turnaround time, user satisfaction, as well as costs. In late spring, Dr. Michael McPherson resigned as study consultant due to his appointment as President of Macalestar College. Dr. Bruce Kingma, University at Albany, accepted the invitation to serve in this role. Dr. Martin Cummings, CLR, continues to serve as study consultant.
Phase One of the study concluded this summer after site visits to six libraries that reported high or low cost from the original cost study. A report based on the site visits and new data submitted will seek to identify any characteristics that may contribute to their costs. Phase Two is underway. The Greater Midwest Research Library Consortium (GMRLC) tested the revised cost data instrument during the spring, and the instrument was revised based on comments of GMRLC participants. In July, an invitation to participate in the new performance measures study was issued to all directors of ARL libraries and over 80 responded affirmatively. During the fall, participants will gather data on general characteristics of ILL/DD units, costs, fill rates, turnaround time, and user satisfaction. Academic libraries are represented in the study by libraries part of the Oberlin Group. In September, Oberlin libraries were invited to participate and a similarly high level of participation is expected.
FedEx: NAILDD negotiated an agreement with Federal Express for two-day shipments of ILL materials for ARL member libraries. Nearly 30 members are now shipping and receiving ILL materials via the two-day delivery. In January of this year, FedEx extended the discounted rates to all types of library-related material (circulation material, returns to book-jobbers, administrative materials, etc.). FedEx also signed agreements with AMIGOS and RLG and notified ARL that they do not plan to enter into other new agreements until the current agreements are in place long enough to evaluate them.
Copyright. The Access capability also contributes to ARL’s initiatives associated with copyright and intellectual property. Since May 1996, this included:
participation in the monthly Conference on Fair Use (CONFU) to develop guidelines for ILL/DD, electronic reserves in the NII; and
organization of a Copyright & Libraries Leadership Workshop for the U.S. in September 1996, and one for Canadian institutions in October 1996. (See Section 1.3 Intellectual Property and Copyright Issues for a fuller description.)
Economics of Information Conference: Challenging Marketplace Solutions. ARL collaborated with the SUNY University Center Libraries, the Council on Library Resources, the National Association of State Universities and Land Grant Colleges, and the Coalition for Networked Information to conduct a national conference on issues related to the development of the knowledge infrastructure and the consequent economic impact on higher education. The conference proceedings, The Economics of Information in the Networked Environment, edited by Meredith Butler and Bruce Kingma, the University of Albany, was published by ARL in June. For more information, see http://www.arl.org/access/access.shtml.
A National Initiative on Networked Cultural Heritage: ARL has joined the National Initiative on Networked Cultural Heritage to give research libraries an active voice in an important new coalition. ARL’s initial year of funding was provided by a grant from the Delmas Foundation. NINCH was formed out of a collaborative project of the American Council of Learned Societies, the Coalition for Networked Information, and the Getty Information Institute. It seeks to draw together a broad coalition of arts, humanities and social science organizations to assure the fullest possible participation of the cultural sector in the new digitally networked environment. To date, 22 organizations have joined.
In the spring of 1996, David Green was appointed Executive Director; his office is hosted by the Coalition for Networked Information. Dr. Green met with the ARL Board in July and will brief ARL directors on the new initiative during the October 16 meeting of the ARL Committee on Access to Information Resources.
NINCH has a homepage on the WWW: http://www-ninch.cni.org/.
The ARL Committee on Access to Information Resources is established to help the Association make access to research information resources more effective. In order to maintain and improve access to research information resources, ARL will undertake activities to strengthen bibliographic, abstracting and indexing tools, user access, and physical and electronic access to information.
The Committee is charged to monitor developments, determine critical issues requiring ARL attention, inform members, and design strategic responses to influence the access to research information resources. The Committee also advises and guides the ARL staff on matters regarding the plans and strategies of the ARL program capability on Access and Technology.
The current Committee focuses on an agenda in support of resource sharing in an electronic environment. Issues identified as key to this agenda are reconceptualization of ILL in an electronic environment and articulation of the principles and values that support resource sharing among research libraries.
Promote and support NAILDD to advance priority technical developments
Monitor the Network Information Resources and Discovery initiative underway within the Coalition for Networked Information
Contribute to AAU-ARL initiatives that demonstrate and evaluate the concept of a distributed, multi-institutional research library collection that is linked together and made accessible to users via networked services
Members:
Pamela Andr� (1995-1997)
Meredith Butler (1994-1996)
Ellen Hoffman(1996-1998)
C. Lee Jones (1994-1996)
Paul Mosher (1996-1998)
Michael Ridley(1996-1998)
Marianne Scott (1995-1997)
George Shipman (1995-1997)
GladysAnn Wells(1996-1998)
Karin Wittenborg (1994-1996)
Shirley Baker, Chair(1995-1996)
Winston Tabb, Library of Congress Liaison
Mary Jackson, Access & Delivery Services Consultant
Staff Liaison: Jaia Barrett
The Work Group was formed in 1991 to follow up the report of the 1991 ARL Task Force on a National Plan for Science and Technology Information Needs. The Work Group monitors STI developments and functions as an advisor to the Board for shaping ARL activities in this area.
Status as of September 1996:
The Group met at the May 1996 ARL Membership Meeting in Vancouver, BC, to share reports on STI developments. The discussions were enriched with reports from colleagues representing CARL libraries, and with the participation of invited guest Aldyth Holmes, Director of Publishing for CISTI.
Also in Vancouver, Work Group Chair Marilyn Sharrow convened a luncheon program for ARL and CARL delegates on international library and publishing developments. The Work Group on STI’s special guest, Ms. Holmes, presented a report on an international view of electronic publishing in the sciences. Also on the program was a report from Leo Voogt, Director General of IFLA, on the future direction of this international organization.
Work Group meetings are planned in conjunction with the ARL Membership Meetings, supplemented with occasional e-list communications. The group functions as an informal communications and response network. The next meeting will take place October 16.
Members:
Pamela Andr�
Betty G. Bengtson
Joe Boisse
C. Lee Jones
Margot Montgomery
Susan K. Nutter
Marilyn J. Sharrow, Chair
Staff Liaison: Jaia Barrett
CNI is an organization for institutions concerned with realizing the promise of high performance networks and computers for the advancement of scholarship and the enrichment of intellectual productivity. The Coalition was formed in 1990 by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), Educom, and CAUSE. The Coalition pursues its mission through the aid of its membership, a 200 plus task force made up of higher education institutions, publishers, network service providers, computer hardware, software, and systems companies, library networks and organizations, and public and state libraries.
Facilitate the transition to networked scholarly communication and publishing.
Networks and networked information resources and services enable entirely new modes of communication and publishing that will transform scholarship for the better, but they must also perform all the functions required by the scholarly communication and publishing process
Identify and describe the functions performed by the key stakeholders (e.g., publishers and librarians) in the value-chain of relationships that link creators and users of scholarly information
Analyze and disseminate what those stakeholders think about possible future changes in their roles and costs
Guide the development of institutional policies and services regarding the acquisition of, access to, and preservation of Federal information
Stimulate the enrichment of subject access to networked information resources and services
Promote institutional readiness and professional development, and faster cross-sector perspectives, communication, and collaboration. Institutional readiness factors need to be addressed and the perspectives and skills of information professionals need to be developed before the promise of networks and networked information can be fully realized. Partnership relationships among different types of institutions and information professionals are key to realizing this promise.
Identify and offer guidance on enterprise-wide networked information issues in four areas: hardware and software infrastructures; budgets; policies and practices; and, managing staff and facility
Develop a methodology for assessing the impacts and value of networks and networked information resources and services in academic settings
Provide opportunities for teams made up of different types of information professionals (e.g., librarians and information technologists) to learn how to work together effectively
Provide guidance to collaborative teams of faculty, librarians, information technologists, students, and others who are implementing teaching and learning programs with a networked information component
The requirements of the scholarly communications and publishing process and the needs and capacities of creators and users of scholarly works must be brought to bear upon the digital library research and development process.
Strengthen the foundation of research on and development of networked information discovery and retrieval technologies and services
Promote the development of metadata schemes, practices, and systems that enable cross-disciplinary access to networked information resources and services
Cost centers and measures in the networked information value-chain. Produce a white paper on the “life cycle” of the scholarly communication and publishing system that, among other things, identifies the cost centers that are expected to change most significantly and proposes ways to measure those changes over time
Produce a white paper on developing and managing Federal information resources and services in a networked environment.
Convene an invitational workshop for developers of Internet sites designed to facilitate subject access resulting in a list of best practices to guide the efforts of prospective developers of such sites.
Develop case studies of how enterprise-wide issues are manifesting themselves at a dozen or so institutions, profiling how those institutions are framing and addressing those issues, and suggesting how other institutions can assess their own needs and formulate their own strategies in this area.
Implement a field-test of McClure and Lopata’s Assessing the Academic Networked Environment: Strategies and Options by two groups of six research and non-research institutions, resulting in a handbook (made available on the Web as well as in print) to guide the assessment efforts of other institutions
Convene open registration workshops and campus or regional workshops that bring institutional teams of librarians and information technologists together to assist them with developing collaborative projects.
Convene a workshop for newly formed teams, a half-day pre-conference for librarians at the ACRL National Conference, and assist the development of a website on this topic.
Produce a white paper that establishes a theoretical framework for considering the relationship between metadata structures and content, the organization of network objects, and networked information discovery and retrieval within a distributed environment.
Convene an invitational workshop to promote convergence among alternative approaches to describing images and image-bases in networked environments, and formulate a strategy for developing widely accepted and used metadata standards to facilitate the planning of image creation and conversion projects and to enable the discovery of existing images that can be used in research, teaching, and learning activities.
Convene a fall and spring Task Force meeting to bring together representatives for a comprehensive update on critical issues and to provide an opportunity not only for representatives to receive briefings on current network topics, but to learn about specific networked information projects, and to provide suggestions on directions for Coalition initiatives:
•Fall Task Force Meeting: December 6-7, 1996, San Francisco, California
•Spring Task Force Meeting: April 1-2, 1997, Washington, D.C.
Co-sponsor with CAUSE regional conferences to provide affordable, high-quality professional development programs on networked information topics to a wide range of information professionals:
•Roanoke, Virginia: September 11-13, 1996, Virginia Tech
•Newark, Delaware: May 21-23, 1997, University of Delaware
•London, England: June 1997, Joint Information Systems Committee, British Library, UKOLN
Organize special events to foster partnerships among Coalition members, frame critical issues, analyze important trends, synthesize progress made on key initiatives, and disseminate the lessons and experiences of various project.
Sponsorships.
•Citizens Internet Empowerment Coalition
•The Commission on Preservation and Access
•Consortium for the Computer Interchange of Museum Information (CIMI)
•The Internet Society
•National Humanities Alliance (NHA)
•National Initiative for a Networked Cultural Heritage (NINCH)
As part of the governance structure of the Coalition for Networked Information, each of the three founding organizations (ARL, CAUSE, EDUCOM) has three seats on the CNI Steering Committee. ARL representatives to the committee have been given staggered terms to achieve consistency with other ARL Committee assignments. The members of the committee meet with the ARL Board to review communication and advisory processes between ARL and CNI.
The ARL Board meets regularly with Paul Peters to discuss the Coalition’s program priorities. On each occasion, the Board has recognized the extraordinary success of the CNI program and the importance of the Coalition for institutions of higher education. In May, the Board met with ARL’s representatives to the CNI Steering Committee to review CNI program priorities. In July 1996, the Board reviewed a positive report from the representatives and reaffirmed its endorsement for another three-year term for the Coalition.
The Coalition Steering Committee meets in conjunction with CNI.
Members:
David Bishop (1995-1998)
Sheila Creth (1994-1997)
Sharon Hogan (1996-1999)
Staff Liaison: Duane Webster
In May 1991, the ARL Board received an invitation from CAUSE and EDUCOM to form an alliance to identify cooperative ventures in information resources management. The Higher Education Information Resources Alliance (HEIRAlliance) was approved in concept by all three boards as a device to further project-based cooperation.
The Board approved an initial phase of The HEIRAlliance Report, covering information technology and information resources targeted at chief executives and academic officers in the 3,000 academic institutions in the U.S. and Canada.
The initial product of this alliance is a series of four-page briefing papers now titled “Executive Outlook on…” (previously titled, “What Presidents Need to Know”). The reports are usually the work of teams that consist of library directors, heads of information technology, and presidents.
In July 1996, a briefing paper in the series was prepared and distributed. HEIRAlliance Executive Strategies Report #7 was Executive Outlook on… the Transformation of Higher Education.
The full series of HEIRAlliance reports is available through the CAUSE office in Boulder, Colorado, or through the ARL or CAUSE gophers.
The topic for the next report has been discussed but not determined. Options considered are: intellectual property, economics of information, cost centers and measures, digital library innovations, and licensing (READI project).
Staff Liaison: Duane Webster
This capability addresses the broad issues facing research libraries in the areas of collection management and preservation. The work of two ARL committees is covered by this capability: Research Collections, and Preservation of Research Library Materials.
ARL’s collection development efforts are directed toward the program objective of supporting member libraries’ efforts to develop and maintain research collections, both individually and in the aggregate. Strategies to accomplish the objective include: efforts toward improving the structures and processes needed for effective cooperative collection development programs; promotion of needed government and foundation support for collections of national importance in the United States and Canada; provision of collection management consulting through the Collection Analysis Program; and development and operation of collection management training programs.
ARL’s preservation efforts support the strategic program objective of promoting and coordinating member libraries programs to preserve their collections. Strategies in pursuit of this objective include: advocacy for strengthening and encouraging broad-based participation in national preservation efforts in the U.S. and Canada; support for development of preservation programs within member libraries; support for effective bibliographic control of preservation-related records; strengthening copyright legislation to support preservation activities in the electronic environment; encouragement for development of preservation information resources; and monitoring technological developments that may have an impact on preservation goals.
Many of the activities related to this capability are closely connected to other program capabilities or supported by grants, and therefore, several projects are described in other sections. (See especially Section 1.4 AAU-ARL Action Agenda and Section 7 Research and Development.)
The primary focus of the Committee on Research Collections continues to be the collaborative relationship with AAU through the three demonstration projects and the development of the AAU/ARL Global Resources Program.
The Tactical Plan for the AAU/ARL Global Resources Program, which was endorsed by both ARL and AAU earlier this year, has been further developed into a proto-proposal for funding. ARL was encouraged, after a meeting at the Mellon Foundation in early September, to submit the proposal for consideration at their December 1996 board meeting. The proposal builds on the ideas in the Tactical Plan and the lessons of the three demonstration projects, as well as incorporating other elements that support a larger Global Resources Program. Examples of these are:
a clearinghouse function for ARL to gather and disseminate information on national and international projects of relevance to the provision of global resources;
an active outreach program to faculty and scholarly associations, in collaboration with the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), both through campus visits and a series of symposia at scholarly conferences;
the identification of “lead institutions” that have linkages to universities, libraries, and research institutes abroad and are committed to building strong collections of materials from a country or set of countries and to assisting users in securing access to resources in all formats;
partnerships with other library organizations, such as the Center for Research Libraries (CRL), and the Council on Library Resources/Commission on Preservation and Access (CLR/CPA); and
extensive use of the World Wide Web to publicize collecting strengths, links among institutions internationally, and formal programs of resource-sharing.
At least two other world areas will develop projects such as those designed in the three original demonstration projects. The Global Resources Program will be managed by a full-time Program Coordinator for an initial three-year period, beginning in January 1997.
At the May 1996 committee meeting, the global resources initiative of the Center for Research Libraries (CRL) was discussed. It was decided that ARL should join CRL as a co-sponsor of a foreign newspaper symposium being organized by CRL to take place in the spring of 1997.
The Committee continues to explore the topic of electronic information resources and to develop innovative approaches and structures aimed at sharing these resources. A discussion paper on this topic has been distributed to the committee.
Developmental priorities, 1996-98:
Continue to evaluate and expand the three demonstration projects.
Scale up from the three demonstration projects to a distributed Global Resources Program for North American libraries. One of the first steps will be to develop plans for projects covering other world regions.
Build partnerships with scholarly associations and engage the scholarly community in shaping the Global Resources Program. The immediate strategy is to hold, beginning in early 1997, a series of symposia focused on global resources at meetings of scholarly associations. These will be sponsored jointly by ARL, ACLS, CRL and LC.
Members:
Betty Bengston(1996-98)
Claude Bonnelly(1995-97)
Joe A. Hewitt(1994-96)
Robert Miller(1995-97)
William G. Potter(1994-96)
Donald Simpson(1992-97)
George Terry(1995-97)
Barbara von Wahlde(1996-98)
Dale B. Canelas, Chair(1993-96)
Winston Tabb, Library of Congress Liaison
Staff Liaison: Deborah Jakubs
The Preservation Committee has developed a new five-year preservation action plan. The plan focuses on activities that complement ARL’s capacities, support the broader mission of member libraries, and acknowledge current trends and issues in North American research libraries. The Committee completed work on the ARL preservation action plan in May 1995, and the ARL Board endorsed the plan at its July 25, 1995 meeting. The focus of 1996 discussions is the development of an implementation plan.
The plan lists an array of ongoing ARL preservation program strategies and identifies six new preservation initiatives. These center on strengthening copyright legislation to support preservation activities in the electronic environment, investigating the feasibility of establishing a national coordinated serials preservation project, developing cost models for preservation decision making, and advancing preservation related digitizing projects, standards, and science research.
The Committee also coordinated ARL’s response to the CPA/RLG Task Force on Archiving of Digital Information. A one-day meeting to discuss and prepare the response was conducted at ARL in June. CPA graciously funded the meeting. The 1996/97 priority for the Preservation Committee will be issues of digital archiving and especially maintenance of university-generated digital archives. At its October meeting, the Preservation Committee plans to refine the proposed plan of action for ARL in the digital preservation arena.
Members of the Preservation Committee have also been participating in discussions with the MLA and other scholarly societies about the issues involved in the preservation of primary records. At ARL’s suggestion, a meeting was held at the Modern Language Association in New York on December 15, 1995 to discuss the implications for preservation raised in the MLA Statement on the Significance of Primary Records. The purpose of the meeting was to determine collaborative strategies and to plan next steps. It was agreed that MLA and ARL should create a joint working group to pursue the statement’s recommendations and an action agenda for education, preservation, and lobbying. A follow-up meeting was held on March 18, 1996, at which the American Historical Association joined MLA and ARL in sponsoring the joint working group. Another meeting including representatives from several interested scholarly societies, the Society of American Archivists, and ARL was held on September 12 in Washington. This group will serve as a steering committee for future action. This meeting confirmed the organizations’ desire to work together on these issues and resulted in two short-term tasks: the creation of a background document describing the progress made in preservation over the past 10-15 years (this will be coordinated by ARL); and the creation of a document identifying the intellectual issues that still face us regarding preservation. A meeting to review these documents and determine next steps is planned for late February in the ARL Office.
Members:
David Kohl (1995-97)
Martin Runkle (1994-96)
Barbara J. Smith (1996-98)
William Walker (1996-98)
Meredith Butler, Chair (1995-97)
Diane Kresh, Library of Congress Liaison
Jan Merrill-Oldham, Harvard (Consultant)
Staff Liaison: Mary Case
ARL is charged by its membership to identify on an ongoing basis the capabilities and characteristics required for research library personnel to serve their constituencies, and to assist member libraries and educational programs in the recruitment, development and effective use of staff (ARL Strategic Objective 6). In pursuing this objective, the membership recognized the importance of both a diverse workforce and an environment open and welcoming to diversity, and established an ongoing capability.
The purpose of this capability is to support and extend efforts within member institutions to promote and develop workforces that are representative of a diverse population and to foster workplace environments where all employees are valued for their uniqueness and personal contributions. These efforts include the recruitment and retention of library personnel from a variety of backgrounds, particularly those from groups traditionally underrepresented in the academic library workforce, and the development of a climate in the workplace that supports and encourages library personnel to recognize and value their similarities and differences.
Over the course of the last five years, the program evolved into its current organizational configuration from a two-part portfolio: a Diversity Program and a Minority Recruitment and Retention Program. The Diversity Program provided information and consulting services to individual libraries on issues surrounding work relationships in libraries, while considering the impact of diversity on library services, interaction with library issues, and the development of collections. The Recruitment and Retention Program focused on developing workplace climates that value diversity but was distinct in seeking alliances external to ARL and member libraries to increase the visibility of research libraries as a desirable career opportunity. For example, the program established a working relationship with leadership in ALISE, the Association of Library and Information Science Educators. In 1995, responding to a recommendation from the incumbent Program Officer, the two programs were merged, and in 1996 the Diversity Program adopted a revised charge to reflect its new standing. The Program operates as a part of the ARL Executive Office with support, advice, and encouragement available from the Diversity Committee.
The ARL Diversity Program assists libraries in addressing a multitude of diversity-related issues. Its primary concern is the development of workplace climates that welcome, develop, foster, and support diversity. The Program seeks to develop an awareness of human differences that leads to value of and respect for these distinctions. The Program examines issues surrounding work relationships in libraries, while considering the impact of diversity on library services, interactions with library users, and the development of collections. A broad definition of diversity is explored in all seminars and is not limited to racial or ethnic diversity as the only human qualities that make people different, unique, the same, and similar. In addition to diversity, ARL focuses on activities to support and extend local efforts to recruit minorities for careers in research libraries.
To meet the Program’s goals, the Program Officer for Diversity provides staff development seminars, presentations, and on-site, e-mail, and telephone consultation; facilitates staff discussions; conducts research via reviews of the literature and site visits to institutions; prepares articles and publications to share the findings from the program; seeks to identify strategies for adaptation by libraries and library schools; identifies issues and strategies relating to diversity and promotes them within ARL as well as to other national library-affiliated groups; and fosters partnerships on behalf of ARL with natural allies in the profession.
The period between the last ARL Membership Meeting in May 1996 and this Fall 1996 Membership Meeting marks a transition period for the Diversity Program. In this period a search for a new Program Officer for Diversity was conducted. Wide interest was shown in this position and many qualified candidates appeared in the pool. Following a rigorous review of applications and interviews with five highly qualified individuals, an appointment was made in September 1996. The new Program Officer for Diversity will be Ms. DeEtta Jones, currently Director of the Human Rights Office for the city of Fort Collins, CO, and formerly Coordinator for Multicultural Training and Leadership Development at Colorado State University. She will join ARL at the end of this calendar year.
In addition, the ARL Board approved a revision of the Diversity Committee name and charge as requested by that committee. The new name of the committee is the Diversity Committee. (See 4.1.1 for the revised charge.) How these changes are reflected in Program activities will be the subject of planning discussions at the Committee’s October meeting.
On July 7, 1996, Kriza Jennings, ARL Diversity Consultant, conducted the “Implementing Post-Master’s Residency Programs” seminar. The success of this program is the basis for repeating it this fall. Planning began for this and another fall 1996 seminar: “Post-Master’s Residency Programs” (9/26/96); and “Promoting Careers in Library and Information Science Professions” (9/30-10/1/96).
Preliminary discussions were held with the ARL Publications/Communications staff in regards to producing a publication that will describe ARL’s findings from the site visits and consultations relating to the Partnerships Program. The decision was made to wait for the new Program Officer to be in place before moving forward on this initiative.
Toni Olshen, York University and Visiting Program Officer for Diversity in 1995-96, was named consultant to the Diversity Committee. Ms. Olshen provides expertise and research experience on the subject of diversity in Canadian libraries and will advise the Committee on how the ARL program can be adapted to fit Canadian settings. Kriza Jennings and Toni Olshen will make consultation visits to York University and the University of Guelph at the end of November.
In September, DeEtta Jones was named ARL Program Officer for Diversity. Ms. Jones brings expertise in diversity and minority recruitment and retention areas from Colorado State University. She will begin her tenure with ARL in December 1996. As mentioned above, Toni Olshen was named Consultant to the ARL Diversity Committee. Kriza Jennings, who resigned June 30 as Program Officer for Diversity and Minority Recruitment and Retention, was contracted to serve as Diversity Consultant for ARL until the new Program Officer is in place. In this role, Ms. Jennings has consulted for several ARL institutions and is a co-facilitator of the Fall Seminars. Ms. Jones will be attending one of those seminars as an introduction to the program.
Highlights of the period May 1996 - September 1996
•Five seminars were offered:
*May 2-3, 1996: “The Role of Assessment in Advancing Diversity for Libraries”
*July 9, 1996: “Implementing Post-Master’s Residency Programs”
*September 26, 1996: “Post-Master’s Residency Programs”
*September 30-October 1, 1996: “Promoting Careers in Library and Information Science Professions,” to be held at ALA Headquarters, Chicago, IL
*November 7-8, 1996: “The Role of Assessment in Advancing Diversity for Libraries”
A representative from Pennsylvania State University, where an extensive climate assessment on diversity has just been completed, will be a guest presenter at the November seminar. Other seminar co-facilitators are drawn from ARL libraries.
•Meeting held with the AAUP (American Association of University Presses) in New York during which Kriza Jennings, former Program Officer, shared ARL findings on the subject of diversity. AAUP’s program initiatives were discussed, and suggestions were made for other activities that might be pursued.
•Meeting with Ms. Patricia Reichler, Project Director for the Diversity Governance Project of the National League of Cities. Ms. Reichler was a presenter at the October 1995 ARL program. She discussed NLC’s findings and initiatives in the area of diversity. An invitation was extended for Ms. Reichler to meet with the ARL Diversity Committee at a future committee meeting to explore collaborative efforts and to share more about NLC’s findings in the University and Colleges Governance section of the Association’s membership.
•Ms. Jennings attended the NCLIS meeting held in May and worked with a group assigned to discuss services to diverse communities and data collection to benchmark the progress in libraries.
•Drexel University College of Information Studies meeting with Kriza Jennings to explore diversity strategies that could be considered for minority recruitment in the library science program, and to develop the initiatives to be addressed in Drexel’s grant from the Kellogg Foundation on redesigning the professional school curriculum.
•On June 4, Kriza Jennings and Toni Olshen presented a workshop at the Ninth Annual Conference on Race & Ethnicity in American Higher Education held in San Antonio entitled “A Diversity Program to Create an Environment that Values Difference and Supports Learning, Research, and Teaching: The ARL Eight-Component Model.”
•At the ALA Annual Conference, New York July 1996. Kriza Jennings presented ARL’s findings from the six years of site visits at an ACRL Racial and Ethnic Diversity Committee program, “Advancing Diversity in the 1990s: Assessments and Strategies.”
•Kriza Jennings, Diversity Consultant, is working with Rutgers University Library to develop a new model for diversity consulting. This model involves having the consultant spend time on-site in the role of internal consultant. This semi-staff position allows increased contact with the staff and the administration and this contact assists the creation of strategies for integrating diversity with the Library’s reorganization effort.
Other on-site Consultations, Presentations, Facilitated Discussions
*University of Victoria, British Columbia
*Fairfax County Regional Library, VA
*Cleveland Area Metropolitan Library System (CAMLS), Ohio
*Oberlin College, OH
*Central Rappahonock Regional Library, VA
*Ohio Library Council (OCLC) Annual Conference, OH
*The Johns Hopkins University Libraries, MD
*Enoch Pratt Public Library, MD
*Cleveland Heights-University Heights Public Library, OH
The ARL Committee on Diversity is charged to provide oversight for the shaping and review of this capability and to provide leadership in the development of programming on the topic of diversity in the workplace. The Committee serves in an advisory capacity to the ARL Diversity Officer.
Specific elements of this charge include:
Monitor developments and trends in academic libraries, library education and higher education that could/will impact the ability of ARL Libraries to recruit and retain diverse workforces including programs designed to attract and support individuals from underrepresented groups to the library and information science professions.
Contribute to the development of coordinated and comprehensive planning for U.S., Canadian, and regional diversity initiatives.
Advise in the development and assessment of progress on the plans and strategies of programs promoting diversity in the workplace.
Monitor to ensure that the activities implemented promote the importance of developing library diversity programs and recognize the impact of this climate on the retention of employees from underrepresented groups in research libraries.
Encourage ARL Libraries to recognize their responsibilities in recruiting employees from underrepresented groups as part of a North American agenda through strategic forums at ARL meetings.
Identify ways to promote ARL’s leadership in pursuing the diversity agenda, enabling ARL libraries to attract personnel who value and welcome these programs and who are prepared to engage actively in the development of U.S., Canadian, regional, and local initiatives.
Work with other ARL committees and task forces to develop ARL strategies and to accomplish the goals of ARL pertaining to diversity and the recruitment and retention of employees from underrepresented groups.
Advise the ARL Diversity Officer on program priorities and initiatives.
Support the work of ARL’s diversity program in assisting ARL libraries to develop organizational cultures and workplace climates that welcome, develop, foster, and support diversity.
Develop staff that value diversity.
Promote to ARL members, the consulting programs, seminars, and resource materials developed for the association on minority recruitment, retention and diversity. Encourage member participation so that research libraries will develop each member library’s knowledge and expertise to implement successful programs and strategies that advance diversity in the workplace and the recruitment and retention of employees from underrepresented groups.
Members:
Carol Armstrong(1996-98)
Ernie Ingles(1994-96)
John Haak(1996-98)
Edward Johnson(1996-98)
Charles E. Miller (1994-96)
James F. Williams (1996-98)
Nancy L. Baker, Chair(1996-97)
Staff Liaison: Kathryn Deiss/DeEtta Jones (effective at the end of the 1996 calendar year)
Established to help research and academic libraries develop better ways of managing their human and material resources, the OMS has assisted library leaders in finding more efficient and effective ways of meeting user needs for over 25 years. Several personnel and organizational changes announced in the past nine months herald the beginning of a new period for the OMS. The OMS Diversity Program was combined with the ARL Minority Recruitment Program under the oversight of the ARL Executive Office. Susan Jurow, Director of OMS since 1990, and Kriza Jennings, Program Officer for Diversity and Minority Recruitment, both announced their departure, effective June 1 and June 30, respectively. Maureen Sullivan, long-time OMS Organizational Development Consultant, moved to the Washington, DC area and was able to provide greater support to ARL and OMS operations and programs as the Office braced for the transition. Toward the end of 1995, three performance centers were established under the OMS umbrella to clarify the character and nature of dues investment for each program and the subsidy of OMS fees. The three performance centers are the OMS Organizational Development Program, the OMS Leadership Development Program, and the OMS Information Services Program. Business plans for these centers were developed which chart movement toward balanced budgets and retirement of outstanding negative fund balances over the next five years. During the transition, greater reliance will be placed on OMS-prepared consultants who work under contract with the ARL.
To assist libraries in making the transition from an archival role to that of an information gateway in a period of limited resources and digital transformation, the OMS Organizational Development Program provides a wide range of consulting services, incorporating new research on service delivery and marketing as well as on organizational effectiveness. Using an assisted self-study approach, the OMS Organizational Development Program provides academic and research libraries with programs to develop workable plans for improvement in such areas as public and technical services, planning, team building, and organizational review and design. The OMS provides on-site and telephone consultation, staff training, manuals, and other materials to aid participants in gathering information and in situation analysis.
Activities between May 1996 and October 1996 continue to focus primarily on support for strategic planning efforts and redesigning organizational structure and process.
During this period, projects undertaken included:
Strategic Planning and Planning Retreats. At a time when user demands and expectations are changing, computers and communications technology are redefining library structure and services, and information is being made available in a multiplicity of formats, libraries must consider imaginative and resourceful ways of embracing change without being crushed by it. The Strategic Planning Program is designed to help establish a clearer understanding of the future course a library should take, including priorities, strategies, management philosophy, and ways of meeting new challenges.
Institutions served: Emory University; Harvard Houghton Library; University of Missouri; National Agricultural Library; North Carolina State University; University of Pittsburgh; University of Texas at El Paso.
Organization Review and Design Program and Organizational Rethinking Retreats. The Organizational Review and Design Program has two primary goals: to ensure the optimal use of resources and to create a flexible organizational structure capable of renewing and redirecting itself as needed in the future. During the course of the project, members of the library staff examine the fit of the current structure to current programmatic needs. Careful attention is paid to horizontal and vertical design features, so that the structures developed during the project provide appropriate communication and decision making mechanisms. The process includes participating libraries deploying their own staff to develop new organizational structures.
Institutions served: University of Saskatchewan; University of Minnesota; Washington State University; Clark Art Institute; Emory University; University of Chicago.
Team Building & Retreat Facilitation. Skilled facilitators are available to work with short- and long-term committees, work groups, and library-wide community efforts to build a strong foundation for group effectiveness. Issues such as group development, conflict management, interpersonal relations, idea generation, and process planning are explored. Action planning that supports ongoing efforts is a key component of this program.
Institutions served: Georgetown University Law Center; Pennsylvania State University; University of Guelph; National Agricultural Library.
The OMS Information Services Program gathers, analyzes, and distributes information on contemporary management techniques, conducts surveys and analytical reviews, and answers inquiries on library issues and trends. The overall goals of the program are identifying expertise and encouraging its exchange; promoting experimentation and innovation; and improving performance and facilitating the introduction of change. These are accomplished through an active publication and service program whose principal components are the Systems and Procedures Exchange Center (SPEC), the Transforming Libraries series, the OMS Occasional Papers, and the OMS Conferences Program.
The OMS Information Services Program maintains an active publications program whose principal components are the Systems Procedures Exchange Center (SPEC) and the OMS Occasional Paper Series. Through the OMS Collaborative Research Writing Program, librarians work with OMS staff in joint research and writing projects, which are then published by OMS. Participants and staff work together in survey design, writing, editing, and in seeking management perspectives on current academic concerns.
The Systems and Procedures Exchange Center (SPEC). SPEC Kits organize and collect selected library documents concerning a specific area of library operation. Kits are designed to illustrate the range of current practices in dealing with particular issues. Documents describing both the administrative and operational aspects of the concern are included. While this program was established to exchange useful information for strengthening library operations and programs among ARL members, a number of academic, public, and special libraries worldwide are among the more than 490 SPEC subscribers. In fact, more than 5,000 SPEC Kits are distributed annually.
Increased marketing efforts for the SPEC program are underway; the success of the marketing effort will not be determined until later this year. Because the position of Program Officer for Information Services position was vacant for a large portion of 1994, the program is currently behind in the production of SPEC Kits. This has impacted both distribution and revenue figures due to lack of product. This problem is further exacerbated by the recent problems with late survey responses. Solutions to return the program to an appropriate production schedule include the creation of a new publication subseries entitled Transforming Libraries.
Although email distribution of SPEC Surveys began in early 1995, an email distribution list was created and became operational in June 1996 for one-way communication to the SPEC Liaisons. Considerable time will be saved in distributing surveys and other communications.
Efforts continue on updating and expanding the current SPEC Index. An electronic copy of the records pertaining to the SPEC Kits was obtained from the Education Resources Information Clearinghouse (ERIC) which indexes and abstracts all ARL publications. It is planned that this information will be imported into a separate and searchable electronic database that would also be used as the foundation for a printed subject, title, and author index.
The following SPEC Kits were produced between May 1996 and October 1996:
*215 Library Reorganization and Restructuring, compiled by Joanne D. Eustis and Donald J. Kenney, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
*216 Role of Libraries in Distance Education, compiled by Carolyn Synder, Susan Logue, and Barbara Preece, Southern Illinois University
*217 Transforming Libraries: Issues and Innovations in Electronic Reserves, written by George Soete; Editorial Advisor, Jeff Rosedale
*218 Information Technology Policies, compiled by Shirley Leung and Diane Bisom, University of California, Irvine
SPEC Kits currently in progress are: Library Homepages; Internet Training; Improving the Reshelving Process; Gifts & Exchange Function; Electronic Resource Sharing; Approval Plans Government Documents; and Educational Backgrounds of Systems Librarians.
Future SPEC topics under consideration: Geographic Information Systems (GIS); Staff Development Electronic Text Centers; Remote Storage; and Copyright.
Transforming Libraries Series. SPEC Kit 217 represents the pilot issue of the Transforming Libraries series, ARL’s newest means of publishing information about developments in member libraries and beyond. ARL will publish this subseries of SPEC four times a year, with each volume focusing on a different application or aspect of library technology. As the publication evolves, it will eventually be issued under its own title as a separate publication series.
The purpose of the Transforming Libraries series is to encourage innovative activity in subscriber libraries and to put subscribers in touch with people who are leading technological change in libraries all over North America. The series, edited by George Soete, will focus on how libraries are using technology to transform services and operations. In an attempt to be timely and up-to-date, Transforming Libraries will take a reportorial approach to its topics, seeking out libraries that are trying new applications of technology and bringing to you their experiences while they are still innovative.
One important feature of the Transforming Libraries series will be its presence on the World Wide Web http://www.arl.org/transform/. Each issue will contain a direction to a website, which will be managed by a guest Editorial Advisor. Whereas SPEC Kits provide documentation in print, this site will be a place to find both documentation and links to sites related to the technology featured in the particular issue. It will also be a site where readers can advance their own ideas and reactions.
The initial issue addresses Issues and Innovations in Electronic Reserves. Future topics under consideration for this series include: distance education, geographic information systems (GIS), and licensing. We invite readers and libraries to provide feedback on this series and to inform us of their innovative practices.
OMS Occasional Papers. OP 19 Video Collections and Multimedia in ARL Libraries: Changing Technologies by Kris Brancolini, Indiana University, and Rick Provine, University of Virginia, was published in October; this paper updates SPEC Kit 199 Video Collections and Multimedia in ARL Libraries.
The Occasional Paper, Assisting Support Staff in Lateral Moves to the Public Service Desk, by Jennifer Boettcher and Candice Benefiel, Texas A&M University, is in progress and was presented at a poster session at the ALA National Conference in July. A third OP, Library Systems Security, by Scott Muir, University of Alabama, and Merri Beth Lavagnino, University of Illinois-Urbana, will be underway shortly.
OMS Conferences Program. OMS showcased its programs and services at the ALA LAMA/LITA conference in Pittsburgh.
Careers Resources Website. In January, ARL developed a Career Resources Website that lists job vacancy announcements from ARL member libraries. This service, designed to alert prospective employees to job vacancies and career opportunities within ARL member libraries, provides members with a better forum for advertising their position openings. By September, over 200 job announcements had been posted from a wide array of library service areas. The site also links to other career resource pages. The service was designed and is maintained by Allyn Fitzgerald, Senior Research Analyst. The site address is https://db.arl.org/careers/index.html.
The OMS