090205+Minutes


 * LMDC Winter Meeting**
 * Feb 5-6, 2009**

1:00 Welcome from Myra Van Vactor.
 * Thursday, February 5, 2009**

Quick overview of Elluminate by Cable Green, Myra Van Vactor

Introductions: Andrew Hersh-Tudor, Wenatchee; Carmen Robinson for Jon Kerr, Lower Columbia; Darcy Dauble, Walla Walla; Donna Campbell, Columbia Basin; Jane Blume, Bellingham; Janine Odlevak, Spokane; Jeanne Leader, Everett; Joan Weber, Yakima; Laura Brener, IC, Lower Columbia; Linda Lambert, Whatcom; Michaela Murphy, South Puget Sound; Michelle Bagley, Clark; Mindy Coslor, Skagit; Monica Luce, Highline; Sarah Leadley, Cascadia; Sharon Simes, North Seattle; Stan Horton, Grays Harbor; Sue Gallaway, Centralia; Sue Schub, Bates; Tamera Hanken, Tacoma; Tim Fuhrman, Big Bend. FYI, some people are at the Association meeting today.


 * Minutes:** Jane Blume moved to accept the minutes. Jeanne Leader seconded. Unanimously accepted. Clarification of minutes: Jane and Jeanne early in minutes volunteered to work on integrating the mission into the bylaws. Tim Fuhrman clarified that the executive board will do it. So Jane and Jeanne did not need to do any action.


 * Treasurer’s Report, Myra on behalf of Mary Carr** (who is at The Association Meeting). Sue motioned to accept, Lauri Kram seconded. 17 vote to accept, no nays.


 * IC, Laura Brener**. There has been a lot of discussion on budget, as well as regular committee and council reports. Jane gave the report from LMDC and issues that are important to LMDC (such as IRIS and virtual reference). We had a demo from Cable on Elluminate, and the rest was budget. Mindy: could we have a handout summary of issues in the future? Laura will provide one in the future.

An Elluminate aside: documents can be shared with others through the Elluminate interface.

Discussion about the issues and information that we could share. Discussion of level of detail to include: we need to include info on what the 4-years have that we don’t with a description and example.
 * Cable Green, question about what resources fall under each of the categories we’ve identified in the digital resources request.** Cable would like examples of databases and titles that we would purchase if we did have the digital resources. Jeanne shared the earlier doc with Cable, who published it into the Elluminate slides. Several commented that we can also identify some well-known journal titles to include as examples with the databases.

__Some important bills that they’re tracking:__ · House Higher Ed Committee: Walter, Scroggins, and Green. They presented on the strategic technology plan. For example, the 24x7 reference service is a good example of consortial activity resulting in substantial cost savings, which was also quickly bought and deployed. Carlyle was able to talk up library resources (he’s an advocate for library funds). The committee is now in touch with Senate Higher Ed to try to get time for similar presentation. Cable always talks about library resources as part of the technology ask. · The K-20 budget was cut in govenor’s budget. Senate bill 5256 wants to cut it also. They are trying to get that back and protect it. Mike Scroggins is spearheading that. This is a top budget priority for all of higher ed. The implications might be negligible; will reduce fund reserve but won’t degrade immediate services. · HB1025 (with a companion bill in Senate). Bill says that it will require textbook information to be provided four weeks before start of school. Another federal bill trumps this; Cable says federal bill is better. There are suggested amendments for the state bill which include shared information, online textbooks, and library involvement. The bill will be stop-gap because it will be trumped by the federal. · HB1946. Rep Carlisle, says should expand the educational technology conversation to all of public higher ed in WA. First part, technology task force across the system, include universities; how to share technology, administration, library systems, etc. Second part: everyone will use same online learning systems. This will probably be struck from the bill and a new version will come out. Budget deficit: will be looking for efficiencies and savings in shared buying across the system. Universities do not like this bill. Clarification: this is not a SBCTC bill. Cable thinks that a task force will come out of this bill. · Website to track bills: http://www.sbctc.ctc.edu/college/l_index.aspx
 * State Board Report, Cable Green**.

__The Technology plan__ is available at [|http://techplan.sbctc.edu]. It’s done and printed. If you’d like physical copies, email Cable with how many you’d like, your name and address. All presidents, commission, and councils will have physical copies.

We are sharing the big ideas in tech plan: we’re behind where the universities are for digital library resources and integrated library systems. All students in all colleges should have access. We talk about efficiency through single, centrally-funded solutions. We also talk about cost savings (group buys, transaction costs), value-added purchases. We recommended a P-20 conversation. That bill is out there, though the conversations will start in the K-20 spaces.

__Work completed__: The 24x7 Virtual Reference. Elluminate use is up. Joined the Community College Consortia for Open Educational Resource (CCCOER) and funded a project with them.

__WA Online Technology Fee__ to students has been greatly reduced. It is now $4 per user per quarter, unlimited use (it used to be $8 per credit). WA Online facilitates through “pooled enrollment.” Tuition and FTE stay with the enrolling college. The teaching college gets $50 per credit hr per student from the enrolling college. WA Online doesn’t get any money from fees.

WAOnline has 100 courses open. We are talking to the Gates foundation, talking about redesigning courses with teams of faculty, including librarians. The idea is to apply creative commons licensing and open them up; that’s what Gates will be working on.

Comment from Darcy: there are worries about time, salaries, and other issues around open content resources. Cable: to evaluate and vet the instructional resource takes time and effort. We’ve heard some ideas circulating nationally; one idea is the open textbook project by CCCOER. They use rigorous methodology and pre-screen textbooks for CTC national community. It’s still an issue.

__Budget Update__: there’s no money and the budget getting worse. SBCTC stays on topic: we’re the answer. With tuition increases, there’s an estimated cut of 4.3%. It’s going to be bigger. One estimate is 6%. It’s all conjecture. The next forecast is in March.

__Online Learning Growth:__ We typically see around 15% growth, but we’ve seen 26% growth. It is stressing parts of our colleges. It’s doubled between 04 and 08. 45% all grads earn 15 or more credits online. Community and technical colleges teach 80% of all online students in the state. There are 83K students who attend classes ONLY online.

__SBCTC News Links__ is now on as blog and rss feed (instead of email). [|http://sbctcnewslinks.blogspot.com], [] Myra: I’d like to recognize how much work Cable has been doing in the background for and in behalf of LMDC.

Discussion including impacts, both now and anticipated.
 * Coping with budget cuts in the library, Myra.**


 * eLearning Council, Sue Gallaway**. ELearning has several goals, many of which are library related. See their wiki: http://wadlc.wikispaces.com/Library+Resources. Goals include: IRIS, exploring content repositories for library resources, working with Angel to add participatory and social networking features, researching how other institutions are incorporating library services into online classes, and promoting and integrating 24/7 virtual reference. Do we have questions about the goals? Jeanne: I have a question about customizing IRIS. Tom/Michelle: Kitty’s making some last edits. Tom will report back where they are on the project.

Sue: should we go system-wide with a part of IRIS? Myra: We need to research how other institutions are integrating library services; the library doesn’t always know. Sue/Myra: we’ll need to develop survey, maybe, with some core questions.

Darcy: a survey for best practices is good idea. Schools are implementing Angel already. I think it’s imperative that they get into the training on teaching faculty how to develop courses. It needs to include the library. A barrier is that it’s difficult/impossible to see people’s online curriculum. We’ve been trying to get in as a guest. The template for other resources is really ugly (which has implications for libraries). We need to get in and change that template early on. Sue: excellent point, Darcy. Content repositories are for objects to be stored that can be accessed by all courses. We could create a portal to IRIS or library resources, then tell faculty that they can just point to and pull it in. We need to work with eLearning directors to collaborate and make things happen. Conversations about making these kinds of links mandatory. Jane: is there an easy way to incorporate QuestionPoint into Angel? Maybe the Quidget? Sue: don’t know, but of interest to the eLearning folks.

Myra: how do we go about working with the council given these goals? Jane’s comment is noted about incorporating QP into Angel templates. Discussion about learning repositories and linking them to Angel. Quick poll: 1/3 using other products.

Michelle: Sue is going to talk with eLearning about these issues.


 * Information Literacy, LSTA grant, Lynn Kanne**. The grant became official at the end of January. Activities are defined only for the first year although it’s a multi-year project. Lynn is at Seattle Central and Wai-Fong is fiscal agent. Information is posted on the old wiki, and new information continues to be posted.

There will be an Authentic Assessment Workshop on Feb 27 to continue work, get people started, or have people explore new activities. There will be Spring grant projects will be completed by June 10. A summer workshop will be announced. The summer workshop will be more focused on Developmental Education.

A Research Committee for Dev Ed/Basic studies is being assembled by Deb. They will develop measures for library contributions to student success and retention. They will come up with measures for effectiveness of integrating information literacy into the curriculum. The hope is that many colleges will get involved in assessment work and apply these assessment models.

We are still looking for a librarian to be on the steering committee for the grant.


 * Breakout into groups to work on the Strategic Plan.** Report back tomorrow.

Attending: Ahniwa Ferrari, WA State Library; Andrew Hersh-Tudor, Wenatchee; Carmen Robinson, Lower Columbia; Darcy Dauble, Walla Walla; Donna Campbell, Columbia Basin; Eric Palo, Renton; Jane Blume, Bellingham; Jeanne Leader, Everett; Jennifer Dysart, Green River; Joan Weber, Yakima; Jonathan Betz-Zall, CLAMS; Laura Brener, IC, Lower Columbia; Lauri Kram, Edmonds; Mary Ann Goodwin, Spokane Falls; Michaela Murphy, South Puget Sound; Mindy Cosler, Skagit; Monica Luce, Highline; Myra Van Vactor, Bellevue; Sarah Leadley, Cascadia; Sharon Simes, North Seattle; Stan Horton, Grays Harbor; Sue Gallaway, Centralia; Sue Schub, Bates; Tamera Hanken, Tacoma; Tim Fuhrman, Big Bend; Tom Moran, Shoreline.
 * Friday, February 6, 2009**


 * Report from breakout rooms**. Myra: we would like to have agreement on goals and objectives that we’ll work on the remainder of this year and next year.

__Group 1, Goal I.__ Jeanne Leader reporting. Goal 1. We agreed on the listed goals and objectives, but looked at the actions. IA. Reconfigure the $10 million; ask Cable about legislative timelines; use subcommittees to rework as necessary, and get that puppy done! IB. We had a good discussion about teaching and learning. IB1. Develop common talking points. Check the language in the action statement (should it include chancellor? Myra: several colleges have chancellors). We need to develop a new elevator speech, which means another subcommittee (sorry guys!). IB2. We need to document and disseminate success. Write an executive summary and gather good stories from colleges. We need to update the Council of Basic Skills. We want to ask Mindy to help with the draft. How can we get this noticed in different ways? Ideas: Camtasia video, podcasts. We can ask for LSTA grant funds to support this effort. We can have something done for the spring meetings of the councils! Discussion: we have enough people and support to get something done, but we need to decide on what story we want to tell. Myra: tell the story of production of different work by different colleges. IB3. We need to delay this until 0910; there are lots of questions, especially due to travel. We can partner with eLearning. What funding is available? Does it have LSTA grant potential? We need to plan for a workshop that can be delivered virtually. Should we focus on Open Source as a topic? Open Source would be one of the topics. Darcy: use open source as one of the options within a general topic of resource-based instruction and role of librarians. Jeanne, Myra: also focus on object repositories. Myra: librarians should be involved in the object repository discussion on our campuses.

__Group 2, Goal II.__ Andrew Hersh-Tudor reporting. We had lots of discussion. Objective IIA and actions work very well. We have some language suggestions and questions in notes (slide 59). IIB2. Maybe the action is really “come together as an LMDC consortium”? IIB3. Does this really need to be included? Do we need funding to sustain this? We could leverage this activity to demonstrate value of consortial relationships to our campuses. Should there be a IIB4? Create a consortial model that we can turn to as opportunities arise so that we don’t need to re-invent consortiums. We would need system librarian who can do that kind of work. IIC. How realistic is this objective? What does it mean? Would it mean CTC college foundations coming together to do something for the system? Perhaps it is more than just funding, such as creative ways to involve the community or pursue other kinds of partnerships. Stan: has anyone ever heard of foundations partnering with each other? No one answered. Is there a group or state foundation group? Discussion. Mindy: the outreach group meets and many are foundation leaders. We can find out. Sharon: foundations are pulled in many different directions. Are we talking about individual colleges’ fundraising groups? Mindy: foundations are set up with local businesses, local folks. I don’t know how much presidents will want to share; they think of foundation as local funding source. Sharon: At North, Seattle, our foundation is thinking about the library, but their main concern is scholarships. Stan: that’s the point; system can’t dictate to a local foundation. However, we can look at system goals and suggest how they could participate. The presidents will need convincing. Lauri: has eLearning council identified partners? Can we collaborate? Darcy: In respect to partnerships, we have partnered with outside research entity. It’s a grant, and we will publish and disseminate information in partnership with the group. We’re also working work with the water resources center. Myra: We’ll move IIC1 into next year, 0910.

__Group 3, Goal III.__ Tom Moran reporting. Tom: We re-wrote IIIA1, see Slide 60. We also re-wrote IIIA2. Maybe should collapse these goals into group 1’s goal about open learning resources. IIIB: Actions 1-3 are very similar and could be collapsed into one item. IIIB4 is almost same as IA2. We discussed the action items and how to deal with them. There are 16 action items which is quite a few. We think we should collapse them more into a much more focused plan. Sue: a lot of our discussion revolved around IIIA2. What it meant, what training librarians need to understand the role they can play in terms of faculty. It also related directly to my earlier request for feedback about the library resource workgroup of eLC (that Michelle volunteered to work on with me and the eLC group). Lauri: we had some disagreement on who’s taking the lead. Myra: what’s the timeline this year? Tom: we didn’t discuss timeline. Myra: Can the executive board edit this document and email it to group for approval? Nothing is cast in stone; we want to use it for this year and share with IC and other councils. By spring LMDC should have finalized version that we can share publicly. General agreement. Myra will take the document to executive board.

Trainings have been done, and the public libraries also attended. There were two sequential trainings and four sessions. About 50 people attended. They are archived and available for viewing. [], []
 * QuestionPoint, Ahniwa Ferrari, WSL.** Most CTCs are up and running with QuestionPoint. There have been lots of questions which we have been trying to answer. We’re a bit overwhelmed with the volume. If you haven’t heard an answer to a question, please resend it. The admins have been added to a private listserv, but there’s also a general listserv: Ask Wa.

Most libraries are set up. Everyone but Clark opted in. Katy Dichter at Green River is the most enthusiastic of anyone I’ve heard from, but people are finding that it’s not as scary as they thought it would be.

There is a steering committee that has two people CTCs (Mary Ann Goodwin and Tim Fuhrman). Please contact them with concerns!

Feedback from people about the service: Darcy: the librarians were skeptical, but they are now enthusiastic. Mindy: Skagit was excited about first questions, but were nervous also. Tom: Shoreline is almost ready to go live. Stan: Grays Harbor is straggler; we said would participate but haven’t done anything. Lauri: Edmonds getting ready to go live on March 3. Jane: We’re having trouble with IT dept getting a link page up. Carmen: we’re going live on Saturday and looking forward to it. Jeanne: we’re getting the background in place and getting ready to go live! Eric: We had our first question just one minute ago. Sarah: our students love it.

__Statewide database licensing__: ProQuest lost rights to Seattle Times to Newsbank. They granted access to World Conflicts Today to compensate. The state library is working for a discounted group buy to Seattle Times, but there is no LSTA funding for it.
 * WA State Library, Ahniwa Ferrari.**

We are planning a databases mini-conference later this year to consider the changing role of subscription databases and provide guidance for the next RFP. Please contact Ahniwa or Will Stuivenga if you’d like to attend. Andrew: what do you mean by changing roles? Ahniwa: Will attended w meeting of someone who predicted that databases will be dead in the next 5-10 years. We think they will continue for academic libraries, but the public libraries are not getting usage to justify the prices. Pricing and usage models will have to change. Andrew: we’ll get state funding just in time for models to change.

__Database trials__: We had trials for 60 products, and didn’t get much response on the surveys. The only CTC that responded was Tacoma. The database trials model will change. Instead of running trials 1-2 times a year with too many vendors, we’ll have 6 trials a year lasting 2 months. We’ll have a handful of competing products each time. We’ll have language trials March-April (Mango, other products including free options.) Jane: that’s great, it’s a great time saver for us. Ahniwa: the public libarires are interested in consumer databases and health databases. Those may be in May-June. Michaela: I suggest that you separate out academic and public databases. I’m less likely to look if there are too many choices not suitable for us. Ahniwa: there will be some months where the trials are of more interest to one or the other. Myra: timing is important. If the new RFP changes vendors away from ProQuest, we need enough advance warning so that we can work it into instruction.

FYI, Seattle Times website offers free access back to 1990. It’s one reason why the public libraries don’t care about losing access.

Discussion. Various suggestions for timing and topics, which Ahniwa noted. In last database trials, we didn’t have enough interest to arrange group purchases. __Wayfinder__: the launch kept getting pushed back, but it is now launched. It’s a beta, soft launch. The URL is washington.worldcat.org for now, but it will move to wayfinder.worlcat.org. There will be a public launch in April. There are quite a few people participating, including 24 of 32 CTCs. Once it’s out of beta, we will work on publicity and press releases.

__Downloadable audio books project__: we are working on it. It’s not fully funded; libraries would have to buy in. We looked at NetLibrary, Overdrive, and Ingram (for publics only). We are developing an RFP for release this month. The survey is still available if you’re interested in participating.

__Virtual Reference__: we are serving 4.5 million public patrons and 200,000 students. FYI, Rand is recovering nicely. Hopefully we’ll have him back at the end of February.


 * Report on Database/Periodical List for Cable.** Monica: Multiple librarians worked on this list (full list available in the recording). Stan: Should we include titles of individual journals? Lauri: we could include the number of fulltext titles plus examples of well-known titles. Monica: that would be easy to add, we have the information in a larger list. Darcy: the list must be understandable by the person who’s presenting. It’s more important to focus on areas that the legislature is already focused on, like science, engineering, and technology. We could point out discipline-specific databases (unlike ProQuest) that are also fulltext (ie CINAHL Plus w/fulltext rather than just CINAHL). Discussion. Monica: these are good comments; we will modify the list and present it back later.

The LC has had a terrible time figuring out new LSTA limitations. It’s definitely messed up travel through the state.
 * Library Commission, Tim Fuhrman**. We met in November at WTBBL, the Washington Talking Book & Braille Library. It’s a great place to visit, tour, and talk about their issues.

The Heritage Center is still being worked on, but it was reported that the space needed for materials was at only 50% of the space needed. They are working on correcting that. There will be no gathering of LSTA ideas this year; our project is taking the lion’s share of the money along with other continuing projects.

The LC has five new council members this year, which is almost 50% turnover: Nancy Bunker from Whitworth representing 4-year academics; Valerie Wondra from Seattle Public representing disadvantaged; Jeff Fitzpatrick from Whatcom County Library System and Priscilla Ives from Spokane County Library District will represent IT; and Barbara Arnett representing special libraries and she works in a law library. The next meeting will be in March in Olympia.

Myra: Who’s doing OneBook grant? Jane, Jennifer, and Lauri will be doing it without the grant, Jeanne will be with a local grant, and Darcy also. Joan will be doing OneBook with Yakima Valley Regional Library.


 * CLAMS, Jonathan Betz-Zall.** The next conference is May 14-15 at Shoreline CC. Cable Green will be speaking. We have a ning page: http://clams-wa.ning.com. We had a discussion about Orbis, that it’s too expensive. Myra: we will join for subscriptions only. Jonathan: CLAMS is interested in collaborative collection development, but we’re not sure how can be done. Our next meeting Feb 23. Myra: any discussion among librarians about LSTA grant activities, strategies for pulling in non-library faculty? Jonathan: we’ve mostly been talking about strategies for implementation—we will encourage more.

Darcy: I’m hearing a disconnect between LMDC and CLAMS’s report. I’m concerned that faculty librarians don’t know the things that we’re working on. Secondly, when talking about the strategic plan, one action was something about making sure that faculty librarians were given adequate preparation and professional development in order to be engaged in the object depository. Is there a concern that our staff isn’t prepared to be participating in these conversations about open-source, resource-based instruction? What does Jonathan think? Jonathan: we will make sure it comes up at annual conference in May. We will see where people are and take an informal inventory to see if people are plugged into the initiatives. Myra suggests for Feb 23 that we have more conversations between librarians, directors! Tom: If Cable’s going to CLAMS, we know he will be talking about open resources.

Aside: Cable rejoined the meeting, small discussion about what titles to include in the database list.

Jonathan: this has been a helpful discussion, I will bring up with the CLAMS board. They’re using Elluminate to meet.


 * NW Academic Librarian Directors Meeting, Mary Ann Goodwin**. The meeting happened, but the turnout was not good because of the travel ban. She shared a document with comments about the meeting. People seemed to think it was ok. The speakers weren’t that impressive. Comments? Darcy: any action items from meeting? Mary Ann: that wasn’t its purpose, it was more to meet with peers, so there were no action items.

Myra: Does LMDC want to contribute for next meeting in 2 years? Mary Ann: we budgeted $1500 this time, but it didn’t all get spent because participation was lighter than expected. Joan motioned that LMDC continue to support the symposium. Mindy seconded. All were in favor with 4 abstaining (Darcy, MaryAnn, Sue Schub, and Laura Brener). Mary Ann: will meet with Michelle and Linda and people from other groups to get people working on the next one. Myra: thanks for working on it and working on our behalf.


 * Committees, Myra.** Discussion of each committee and membership. Discussion of how to get the work in the strategic plan into the committees. Rather than making new committees, we will ask the existing committees to pick up the tasks and decide if more things are needed.


 * Orbis Cascade, Myra**. Myra will contact Greg Doyle about next steps, info. We need 20 members and have 13 committed. These are not final numbers. Myra referred us to the one page document sent to LMDC list.

Aside from Darcy about the importance of protecting resources and delivery—do we need to make a statement to IC about important issues? Myra was the one who suggested it rather than Laura asking for it; general discussion.


 * Use Elluminate for Spring meeting April 23-24?** Myra. We referred to the discussion that happened before 8:00am this morning about Elluminate and how well it works for LMDC meetings. There is value in face-to-face meetings. We should balance the 2? Discussion. Mindy: I’m very visual. I need more documents. It’s too easy to be distracted. I appreciate face-to-face; we should use ITV sometimes. Stan: I need 2 monitors. For new folks, they can’t visualize us and it must be difficult for them. Joan: I agree, I feel badly for new folks. Tim: I suggest every-other. Joan: meet in person in the Spring and Fall, Winter and Summer Elluminate. Discussion about smaller focused meetings via Elluminate. Tim: have Elluminate access during “live” meetings. Cable: there are limitations of hybrid meetings; you must mic the live meeting well. Elluminate works best when everyone has their own computer and can fully participate.

LMDC agreed to use Elluminate for the Spring meeting. If budgets change for the better, we will meet in person. Joan: I need a commitment for Spring for scheduling the room. Consensus: we will release the room and meet via Elluminate.