August 26, 2005

The Meeting was held via conference call.

Present: Stephanie Atkins (UIUC), Belinda Cheek (North Central College), Jeff Douglas (Knox), Cindy Fuller (Millikin), Kris Hammerstrand (CARLI), Charlotte Johnson (SIUE), Kristen Standaert (IIT),

Excused: Jamie Nelson (Augustana)

After introductions of all members and a brief review of the task before us, members shared ideas for groups of staff or functional areas within CARLI that they felt might need user group support.  The list evolved to include:

• Digital products
• ILCSO Users’ Advisory Group (IUAG)
• IUAG sub-committees and task forces including
  • Acquisitions/Serials
  • Consortial Cataloging and Authority Control
  • Circulation and Universal Borrowing Functionality Task Force
  • End User Instruction Committee
  • OPAC Customization Task Force
• Collection Development
• Electronic Resources
• Reference Services
• Distance Education
• Advocacy (there later seemed to be some consensus that this does not fit with a user group focus and perhaps should be removed from our list)
• Technology/Systems support
• Interlibrary Loan (beyond resource sharing among the ILCSO members)
• Communication within the consortium

There was some discussion of what we mean by a “user group.”  There was some feeling that user groups usually focus on a very specific product or service.  It was also noted that some of the issues we were discussing were much broader in scope and that some might actually encompass a number of different systems or products.  Would “Special Interest Group (SIG)” better describe some of these groups?  Another concern that IUAG has had for some time is the fact that the terms committee, task force, working group, etc. were not always used consistently, at least within ILCSO.  Therefore, it was decided that we need to develop a list of definitions so that we are all clear when we use specific terms.  Charlotte and Belinda agreed to work on a draft of this document prior to the September meeting.

As discussion progressed, the group also described a number of roles or functions that they would expect the committee charged with planning for the user group to fulfill.  This list included:

• Communicate and share ideas with the membership
• Plan events
• Make “best practices” recommendations
• Provide training and education for the users

Other discussion included groups with which our committee might want to consult as we proceed with our work.  This list included groups such as:

• Other ad hoc committees/task forces recently formed by the CARLI Board
• Library Systems
• IOUG
• NILRC/SILRC
• IACRL

There is a CARLI membership meeting planned for October 28 at Prairie State College.  Our committee will have ½ hour on the agenda that day.  At our September 30 meeting we will need to plan how to use that time.  We will need to both inform those in attendance of the work we are doing and seek their input regarding user group needs within the new consortium.

The work of the Vision and Leadership Team (VLT) included looking at the organizational structure of other statewide library consortia.  It was agreed that we should find out whether or not any information regarding those consortia’s user groups was obtained during this process.  Belinda will contact David Carlson to see if there is any such information still available from the work done by the VLT.

It was agreed that prior to our next meeting each member would:

1. Review the documents and web sites provided by Charlotte and Belinda
2. Develop a draft structure/organizational plan for CARLI User Group(s) – it was felt that if we each come with a draft proposal it will give us a better starting point for working on this next piece of our task

Our next meeting will be on Friday, September 30th at the CARLI Office in Champaign.  Belinda will invite CARLI staff members Tom Dorst and Elizabeth Clarage to join us for at least part of the meeting to give further input from the former IDAL and ICCMP perspectives.

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Board

Executive Committee
Finance Committee
Personnel Committee
Products and Services Vetting Committee
Program Planning Committee

Collections Working Group
E-resources Working Group
Preservation Working Group
Public Services Working Group

Digital Collections Users
I-Share Users
I-Share Acquisitions & Serials Team
I-Share Cataloging & Authority Control Team
I-Share Instruction Team
I-Share OPAC Team
I-Share Resource Sharing Team

Illinois Repository Task Force
Image Database Task Force
Learning Objects Task Force
Library Tools Task Force
Seamless Access Task Force
Statewide Serials Collection Task Force