Public Services Working Group Meeting: January 19, 2012

Conference Call

Members attending: Jane Currie, Chair, (LUC) Susan Franzen (ICC); Sandra Fritz (ISL); Andrew Lenaghan (JOL); Matthew Rutherford (NBY); Bruce Stoffel (ISU)

Members absent: April Levy (COL); Sean McCarthy (IIA); Marianne Ryan (NWU)

CARLI staff attending: Jennifer Masciadrelli, Elizabeth Clarage

Minute-taker: Matt Rutherford

Decisions

The December minutes were approved.

Announcements

For the CSU event:

• Susan reported on facilities and logistics. She received a copy of the catering menu from CSU and said that the best option probably is box lunches chosen by the registrants. Elizabeth suggested that registrants specify vegetarian/non-vegetarian rather than specific sandwich preferences. Elizabeth said we should find out how far in advance of the event the caterer will need a count of registrants. Susan said she will talk to CSU to determine this information. Jane said we should also gather other logistics information for distribution to registrants, such as driving and public transit directions, parking details, a site map, and details on overnight stays. Susan said she would start gathering this information from CSU.
• Jane turned the group’s attention to the email submitted in advance by Marianne, in which she reported on the status of her conversations about the CSU program with Fatemeh Asadi, CSU’s Director. Fatemeh proposed a change to the program in which the breakout sessions be shortened to 20-25 minutes in order to allow registrants to attend more sessions.
• The group agreed that shortened sessions would curtail the informal conversations that are often one of the most valued aspects of these events. Marianne will ask Fatemeh to commit to the schedule that has already been developed with 45-minute breakout sessions.
• The group agreed to delay the “save the date” announcement until we are confident that we have the speakers and program set for the day. Elizabeth and Jen agreed that March 1st is a reasonable deadline by which these major elements of the program need to be agreed upon.
• Jane asked Bruce and Elizabeth if they were able to review the “generic checklist” document on the wiki about these events. Bruce said he looked at it and it looks like a good start. Elizabeth said she will look at it before the next PSWG meeting. Jane asked Bruce, Susan, and Marianne to use the generic template to begin customizing a worksheet for the CSU event.

Collections Working Group (CWG)/PSWG combination meeting:

• Jane thanked Andrew for Joliet Junior College’s agreement to host the joint CWG/PSWG event. Andrew said that JOL is looking forward to hosting the meeting. Andrew reported that over the last few weeks the joint group has focused on location selection and is now turning to date and topic selection. Andrew said that the working group’s consensus was around the large theme of faculty instruction. Jane suggested that the PSWG perspective on this topic would be how libraries educate faculty about the services we provide. Elizabeth added that the CWG understands how collections and services are blended and that many of the event topics would speak to both. Andrew asked if any members had reactions or additions to the event topic suggestions circulated earlier via email by Matt. Andrew and Matt spoke to the need of the joint group for topic and speaker suggestions from members of CWG and PSWG. Elizabeth clarified that the joint group’s hope was that enough suggestions could be generated from members of CWG and PSWG to build the program; if not, suggestions would be solicited from the broader CARLI membership. Andrew stated in order to keep costs down, the joint group is hoping to find speakers from Illinois.
• Bruce said he would be interested in models of how faculty are/are not involved in collection development decisions. Andrew said this could make an interesting panel topic. Susan suggested that weeding would be an interesting topic. How do librarians solicit/receive input from faculty on what should be discarded? Susan said she would like to see shared space ideas discussed. Bruce suggested electronic reserves. Jane remarked that that would be interesting because it gets into copyright issues. Susan asked what CWG meant by the topic suggestion of embedded librarians. Andrew said that he didn’t know but would find out.
• Jane asked Matt if he had reviewed the Kristin Anthony article, “"Reconnecting the Disconnects: Library Outreach to Faculty as Addressed in the Literature." College & Undergraduate Libraries 17.1 (2010): 79-92. Matt said he hadn’t received it via ILL yet but would look at it for more speaker possibilities.
• Jane said that she is eager to hear how the joint group continues its planning and urged Andrew and Matt to speak up if more volunteers from PSWG are needed to help with the planning. Jane also asked Andrew and Matt to explore the idea of a shared Wiki space for CWG and PSWG.

Tasks Assigned:

• Susan will ask CSU how far in advance the caterer needs a count of registrants for box lunches. She will begin gathering other facilities and logistics information from CSU, such as directions, site map, parking, and overnight stay details.
• Jane will draft a reply to Marianne’s email asking Marianne to express the group’s concern to Fatemeh about the shortened breakout sessions, noting previous participants’ appreciation of the informal conversations that longer breakouts sessions engender. Jane will ask Marianne to try to get Fatemeh to commit to the 45-minute breakout session schedule that has already been developed. Jane also will inform Marianne of the group’s lack of clarity around CSU’s expectations of the group for program development and will ask Marianne to inform Fatemeh that major elements of the program must be set by March 1st in order for the event to proceed.
• Elizabeth will review the PSWG Open House Generic Checklist for accuracy.
• Bruce, Susan, and Marianne will create a CSU Event checklist from the Generic Checklist and will begin to customize it for CSU.
• Andrew and Matt will ask what CWG means by the “embedded librarian” topic for the joint event.
• Matt will review the article by Kristin Anthony for speaker and topic ideas for the joint event.
• Andrew and Matt will explore the possibility of a Wiki space shared between CWG and PSWG.
• (Group) Continue to think of and suggest speaker and topic ideas for the joint program with CWG and send them to Andrew and Matt.

Meeting Dates and Deadlines

The next working group meeting is scheduled for 1 p.m., Thursday, February 16th. This will be a meeting via teleconferencing service.