General Faculty
C-7 Library Committee

Report of Meeting
2003 November 20

Map Room - Space Issue

The Library is pinched for space; in particular their digitization department - an increasingly important part of the Library's mandate - is suffering from the lack of facilities. The Library's solution is to move the digitization work into the map room and the maps down to the 1st floor. The Library sees this solution as a test case of their space issues and solutions. The Map Room is 7K sq ft not primarily used by students, but it occupies prime space in the library. Last year the PCL sealed a deal to share 16K of its space with the Information School. The long-term plan for the PCL's problems is to build storage facility @ Pickle. Here at the PCL, the Library thinks a digitization center will attract faculty by visibly protecting their materials. On the other hand, Maps would give up significant reader & consultation space, and the space for Microforms will be compressed. Librarians want to reassure us that their commitment to maps will not fade. "We have the best map collection for 1K mi in any direction," one observed The Vice Provost hopes ultimately to move some of the Information School, digital people, all UT conservation people together to Pickle. Some people resist Pickle b/c they think it's a bunch of tin buildings - but someday it will be a major component of campus, and we (the Library) want to get there 1st.

Integrated Library System

The Library is working to buy an "Integrated Library System" - a database - which we don't at present have. The librarians need to research the functional requirements of all areas of the library system. They are now beginning to form committees.

Users will see improvements with the ILS: for example, students could search both digital & hard holdings, which they can't do today. Staff who create digital materials can create catalog entries for their new resources. The library will be able to send out emails for recalls & overdue notices! Will be a "system-wide design" across UT System - including e-reserves & Blackboard & searching the open web.

E-Journals

Cornell, Harvard, and the UC system are in the process of canceling their Elsevier science journals - Elsevier is the main producer of science journals - several hundred at Cornell. UT formed a partnership with 15 other universities in the Texas system to share each other's materials. We pay for 730 journals, but access 1600 journals. As a result of our system-wide arrangement, we have a lot more control over prices, and don’t have to worry about giving up the Elsevier journals.

Submitted by Melanie Ulrich