PORTER ISR

MINUTES OF THE MEETING

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2005

Present:            Margaret Aquan-Yuen (Facilitator), Christy Branston, Rachel Caldwell, Helena Calogeridis, Marian Davies, Alison Hitchens, Josh Hogan, Sandra Keys, Kevin Manuel, Shabiran Rahman, Judy McTaggart (Recorder), Erin Murphy, Carol Steele, Marina Wan, Janet Wason

Regrets:           Jane Forgay, Val Huggan,, Christine Jewell, Mark Polger,, Baiba Turner

Facilitator’s Comments:  Margaret welcomed Josh Hogan to the meeting.  Josh is a student at Resurrection Catholic Secondary School on a co-op placement in ISR until January.

 1.   Approval of Minutes of September 23, 2005:

 The minutes were approved.

2.  Business Arising:

 Item 7, UW Faculty and Porter Library brochure:  Judy noted a decision has not yet been made on how the brochure will be used.  She will keep the Department informed of any new developments.

3.  Update from Department Head:

 Shabiran sent a Department Head’s report prior to the meeting (due to a scheduling conflict she will be late coming to the meeting).  The update follows:

Top Level Voicemail Greeting

X4883 is currently being answered by Annette Dandyk. After hours they receive a recorded message about library hours etc. As of Tuesday October 11th the responsibility of answering will go to Circulation; which means that a live person will be directing the calls most of the time.

As an addition to that Janet and Jackie Stapleton will train all Circulation staff on referring reference questions.

Staffing Issues and Managers’ Meetings

Managers met on Wednesday October 5th to review those gaps in staffing/services throughout the library. Several meetings will be devoted to the staffing in the library so staffing issues are resolved as quickly as possible. I will report to you as soon as I can.

Sick Leave Days

Linda Brogden and Nellie Gomes will come to one of the Managers’ meetings to answer some of the questions the managers had about this. Will keep you posted.

4.  Projects for the Co-Op Intern Jan. 2006 – Aug. 2006 (Christy):

Christy noted that interviewing for the co-op intern for the winter term will begin shortly.  She would like to have a list of projects compiled in advance.  This would help determine specific skill sets that could be focused on during the interviews.  The co-op will be involved with all Reference services the Department provides (information desk, email reference and chat reference). She asked the group for additional ideas and noted that the work did not have to be “project “ specific but could also include something an individual Librarian is working on and needs help with.  The following suggestions were made:

Collections maintenance is an ongoing task

• Help might be needed to research different chat reference systems
• Links to tutorials on the web need to be updated as the current links reflect old pages
• The “At the Info Desk” web page needs to be reorganized
• Assistance with ordering?  (Action: Christy will speak with Shabiran about this possibility)

Christy asked the group to send her any additional ideas. Kevin also commented on his intern experience in the Department.  He appreciates the variety of activities he has been involved in and feels it is good to have a broad range of experience.

5. CNAC (Community Needs Assessment Committee) – Kevin:

 Kevin reported for CNAC.  He noted CNAC is preparing a web survey on Library satisfaction based on a template developed by the Society of College and University Libraries in the U.K.  The survey is scheduled to begin in January.  CNAC would like input from ISR for the content.  What kinds of assessment are needed?  The group agreed that computing services within the Library should definitely be included.  Christy also noted that the current survey on the Library’s site will be taken down in December and suggested it may be good to wait a few months before putting up a new survey.  Kevin will take these suggestions back to CNAC.

Shabiran pointed out that ISR should also brainstorm on assessment needs both in terms of internal workflow and from our user’s perspectives.  This prompted the following suggestions for internal review:

• Our current method of keeping aware of new resources.  Finding time to review the increasing number of new resources and stay on top is difficult.  Christy suggested the Training Committee could target liaison librarians who could do spotlights on new resources in their area.
• The need to assess the different activities being conducted in the Department relative to the mandate of ISR.  Do the activities and time allocation support this mandate?
• Review of the Bibliographic Searching function in the Department.  Shabiran noted she will be following up on a recommendation that came from a review of the Bib Searching team last year.
• An assessment of evaluation and support for Library instruction.
• A survey on service at the Information Desk to help determine whether to continue with the “back-up” service.
• An assessment of staff training for Government Publications.  Christy noted that a survey is planned for January.

 6.  Around the Table:

 Christy reported she is investigating the possibility of having a map or key linked to the location field of the bibliographic record to make it easier to find the location of a book. It was pointed out that the blue “key” for the Library is currently not on the web and should be put there.  Christy will keep the Department updated.

Alison said she hopes to join the e-journals committee. She will also be helping Bethlyn Peters with the training for the new Library Associates.

Helena noted LINC has been quite active and that Kevin has been very involved.  Some of LINC’s activities include:

• Rachel has been developing an International Students webpage.  She will bring it to ISR for feedback
• Sandra is developing a handout for RefWorks.  There will be a general page and a database specific one.  Please let Sandra know of any database specific pages that are needed.  Carol Stephenson has also developed a RefWorks guide for the Optometry page.
• Helena and Sandra will develop a “How to Create a Successful Library Assignment” for Faculty.
• Jane and Helena attended the conference “Fifteen Years After Unification”.

Rachel noted that Library Week is next week and there will be mention of this in the Daily Bulletin and News At Your Library publication.

Marina reported the Chat reference link will come down today.  Also, two presentations of the session “Working on the Web” are scheduled for November and December.  Marina will send details.

Sandra said that a prototype for a direct export link in Trellis to RefWorks should be working within a couple of weeks.

Marian asked about the current status of the RefWorks guide.  It has not been approved yet.  She also thanked Kevin for his assistance and the hiring of a person to help with the merger of the Reference and Abstracts collections.  Ian Spitnik will be helping with this.

Carol said that she will be asking the Librarians for orders. 

Erin asked for clarification on who to call when there are problems with the printers during lunch and after hours.  Shabiran noted we should continue to report these problems to Systems.

Judy noted the problem some students are having with the printers when they try to print from UWAce course pages.  The printing can be extremely slow and can cause long line-ups at the printer.  Systems has indicated the problem is due to the format of the notes put on the site and not the speed of the printers. Shabiran has investigated and found that the format cannot be changed after the notes have been put up.  Further investigation is needed to resolve the problem.  Action:  Shabiran will follow-up on this.