Porter ISR

Minutes of the Meeting

Friday, September 23, 2005

Present:  Margaret Aquan-Yuen; Christy Branston; Rachel Caldwell; Helena Calogeridis; Marian Davies; Jane Forgay; Val Huggan (Recorder); Christine     Jewell; Kevin Manuel; Judy McTaggart; Erin Murphy; Mark Aaron Polger; Shabiran Rahman (Facilitator); Carol Steele; Baiba Turner; Marina Wan; Janet Wason

Regrets:   Sandra Keys

1.  IGLOO Project, Lauren Judge, Library Services, The Centre for International Governance Innovation www.cigionline.org

2.  Registration for LINC Sessions, Helena Calogeridis

Helena facilitated the discussion on the current, labour intensive process. Most ISR members agreed that the registration data did not reflect the actual attendance and the collection of this information did not warrant the amount of work associated with it. Apart from exploring an automated registration process with built in reminders, it was suggested that LINC might consider different ways of providing instruction, e.g., "when you need it". The group agreed that Val could stop the manual registration process immediately for the fall 2005.

3.  Approval  of the Minutes of the Meeting of September 9, 2005

The minutes were approved.

4.   Business Arising

Erin mentioned  that Mark Polger’s Psychology Subject Guide includes a link to some nice, especially clear, instructions about “Connection from Home” via the Library proxy server.  This page gives step-by-step instructions, complete with up to date screen shots to illustrate what the remote login process looks like in “New” Library website.

The illustrated instructions may come in handy if you are answering questions about the remote login process at the Information Desk or in reply to e-mail reference queries.

The URL for the page is:  http://www.lib.uwaterloo.ca/discipline/psych/UWACEConnectingFromHome.html

5.   Update from the Department Head (Shabiran Rahman)

Liaison Changes
Jackie Stapleton has taken over the liaison responsibilities of Kinesiology from Carol Stephenson.

Top Level Voice Mail Greeting 
As a result of the suggestions from Porter ISR, all messages coming through 888-4883 or 4883 will go to Circulation. A “live” person will redirect the calls as necessary. This should cut the circulation related questions coming to Porter ISR. We still have to make a decision whether or not to continue with answering questions left on x5763.

Sick Leave (day here and there): Doctor’s Certificate 
Sick leave credits that the library has are much more generous than the University. Statistics show that average number of sick days used by library staff are higher than those within and outside the University.  Please check the minutes of the Managers’ Committee for details.

CISTISource 
Jennifer Haas will work with Wish Leonard to bring in the librarians’ perspective. Christine has volunteered to provide her with the background information.

Administrative Contact for ISR Committees
LINC: Jennifer (Helena is Chair)

Training Committee: Shabiran (Sandra is Chair)

Virtual Reference Implementation Committee: Shabiran  (Doug and Christy are co-chairs)

IRMC 
Jennifer and Shabiran are now on the alias.

Waterloo Unlimited 
Waterloo Unimited students will be in Porter on Wednesday October 19th for one hour. They will work on an assignment, mostly using TRELLIS. Sandra Keys is key contact.

Positions Vacant/ Needed
Managers will be looking at all positions that are currently vacant ,  need to have new positions and/or delete positions. This will be done keeping in mind the Universitiy’s long range planning (e.g. does increasing the number of graduate students on campus have an effect on library staffing?)

I have your suggestions about the vacant bibsearching position, and the temporary contract position of Liaison Librarian for Psychology and Sociology. What do we do with the Liaison for Anthropology has still to be determined. If you have thoughts about positions in other departments, please send them to me.

NON ISR on Info Desks 
Michele has asked that Amy Townsend be added to the alias as she would benefit greatly from the e-mail exchanges. This has been done.

6. Porter ISR webpage (Rachel) 

Rachel asked if staff would keep her updated with information pertaining to the ISR Porter Website, for example conference information.

7. UW Faculty and Porter Library brochure (Judy)

Judy asked for feedback on the draft brochure she had distributed prior to the meeting.  The brochure was originally developed by Davis Librarians and intended for faculty using the Davis Library.  Changes have been made to make the brochure adaptable for use in Porter.  Helena noted that Spanish should be added to her list of   liaison responsibilities. Corrections or changes should be sent to Judy.  A decision still needs to be made on how the brochure will be used.

8.  Desk Staffing (Judy) 

Judy noted the desk statistics form has been revised and will be in use starting next Monday.  The top row will be used to collect "back-up" statistics.  The row previously   used to collect statistics for Government Publications questions has been eliminated.  The G.P. statistics had been recorded separately as a means of monitoring the number of questions being handled at the Information desk following the closure of   the G.P. desk and, also, to determine how many questions were directed to Christy.  After consultation with Christy and Shabiran it was decided it was no longer necessary to keep these separate (the numbers were low and it is unclear whether people were recording the statistics consistently). 

There was discussion about the high level of activity in the Library during the first few days of term and if - in the future we should delay implementing the back-up system for the first week.  Judy noted she had observed that, although there were lots of people in the Library, many appeared to be using the computers to send email, check courses, OSAP, etc. She also commented on the high volume of "Watcard" questions received at the desk (needing to be redirected to Circulation) and noted this is an issue that should be addressed. Is there a more efficient method of dealing with the influx of Watcard registrations during the first week(s) of term?  This could reduce traffic at the Information desk significantly.

Judy noted she will be monitoring the progress of the pilot and asked everyone to continue sending feedback to her.