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Library Committee Meeting
September 19, 2000


Present: Robinson, Deyton, Duckett, Hansen, Howell, Leatherman, Morgan, and Thompson. Dewey and Mitchell represented the University Libraries.

Robinson gave a brief welcoming comment and said a little bit about his background and interests. Each of the Committee members present introduced themselves and shared brief thoughts about library issues and concerns.

Most of the meeting was devoted to remarks by Barbara Dewey, Dean of Libraries. [I have placed an * next to items that the Committee may wish to examine during the year. These are Robinson notes and corrections and additions are solicited.]

Dewey began with a discussion of the nature of her administrative relationships. She was hired by a provost who is no longer here and is working with an interim provost. Much may depend on experience and attitude of the new provost toward library services and collections. The relationship between the Dean and the President is not yet clear and the President's vision of the proper role of the University Libraries is also unclear. *One would hope that the President's goal to transform the University into a "top 25" institution would mean that the University Libraries ought to also be in the "top 25." This would mean a substantial increase in funding for the Libraries. *Some concern was expressed that campus and system administration may not understand that without appropriate content information technology may achieve little. *Library advocates will also need to work vigorously against the notion that faculty and student information needs may be met by the Internet at minimal cost.

*Discussion of administrative relationships led to consideration of an integrated library system for the three University of Tennessee sites. If the University now includes Memphis Health Center, the Space Institute, and the Knoxville campus, should the University Libraries now include all three sites? Should not faculty of "one university" have easy, convenient access to information resources at any of these sites? Will campus "streamlining" mean a reorganization of Libraries into one unit so that, for example, the head of the Health Center Library will report to Dean Dewey? Might some financial resources now dedicated to Knoxville library services and collections be diverted to Memphis, for example? There are a variety of substantial issues that should be addressed, especially if the Senate is to adequately represent the library needs of those outside Knoxville.

Dewey stressed the importance of collaboration with these libraries and the Law Library (which is separate from the University Libraries) to strengthen campus access to a variety of services and collections. Resource sharing will be especially important in the future. *Dewey hopes to collaborate with any campus unit that has collections to insure that faculty and students are aware of local resources and are able to use them effectively.

Insuring that all University graduates are skilled in identifying, retrieving, and evaluating information is of special concern to Dewey. Library Faculty have a major role to play in working with faculty and students to insure that they are critical consumers of information, particularly that found on the Internet. Ethical issues also need to be stressed, including the nature of copyright and the appropriate use of another's intellectual property. Students need to be persuaded to use the best sources, including traditional print ones, and not just those that are convenient on the Internet. Dewey hopes to be able to work with faculty to make library collections more visible and increase student use.

Although fairly new, the Hodges facility is now full and library materials must be stored off site. As the collections continue to expand, storage problems will need to be dealt with in a manner that insures that users will still have reasonably convenient access to stored materials. The Hoskins facility also has some physical problems that require attention.

The role of the University Libraries in supporting research and development activity will receive more attention. Dewey hopes to work more closely with researchers and research units to insure that needed information and data resources are available to support research initiatives.

Before the meeting closed, there were a few additional questions and comments. There was some concern about print periodicals in storage. It would be better if faculty had desktop access to digital copies of these periodicals. Dewey agreed, but noted that funding and licensing issues created some problems.

Concern was also expressed about the crisis in serial price increases and the role of the University and the University Libraries in actively working to deal with this problem. Dewey said that the Libraries would continue to offer programs dealing with these issues.

Finally, concerns were again raised about how the "one campus, three sites" reality might impact the administrative organization of the libraries and its funding.

Because of a lack of time, Robinson asked those present to consider how to best conduct the work of the Committee. We could divide into subcommittees to consider particulars or we could continue to meet as a committee of the whole. We will discuss this at our October meeting.

Robinson announced that the November meeting (date and time not yet set) will focus on library support for DE initiatives, including the New College. To what degree will these students have access to needed library collections and services? What kind of access to library collections and services is needed to support University students enrolled in DE courses? Will the Libraries receive additional funding to support these services?


Library Committee Meeting
October 25, 2000


The Faculty Senate Library Committee met on 25 October in room 605 Hodges Library from 2.00 until 3.05 p.m. Members able to attend were: Deyton, Duckett, Hall, Hansen, Howell, Morgan, Thompson, and Robinson. Dewey, Mitchell, and Phillips represented the University Libraries.

THE NOVEMBER MEETING WILL BE IN SAME LOCATION FROM 1.00 UNTIL 2.00 ON 28 NOVEMBER. WE WILL CONSIDER LIBRARY SUPPORT FOR DE PROGRAMS.
  1. Robinson expressed some concern about finding a time where more members could attend. Hall suggested that members be asked again to suggest available times and others agreed that this would be useful now that the semester has settled down. Hall also asked about the frequency of meetings. Robinson said that the Committee would meet monthly and this seemed reasonable to those attending.

  2. There were no corrections or additions to the minutes of the September meeting.

  3. Robinson distributed a handout on similarities and differences between Committee members and Library Representatives. If you would like a copy, please let him know. The meeting focused on two important questions: (1) To what degree does the Library Representative program reduce or minimize the need for the Committee? and (2) Should the committee have any direct relationship with the library representatives?

    Linda Phillips, who is responsible for the Libraries' Library Representative Program, spoke first. She noted that no library can develop and maintain a comprehensive collection by itself, but that information technology and collaborative initiatives lead to a situation where UT faculty may have access to comprehensive collections in the near future. In the past, much of the attention of Library Representatives has focused on inadequate financial resources which have led to inadequate local collections. While resources remain a problem, faculty are likely to have access to more resources than in the past because of collaborative purchasing, resource-sharing, and digital resources.

    Phillips briefly reviewed the responsibilities of Library Representatives with some emphasis on collection development issues and the importance of communication between the Libraries and the several academic units. It is essential that the Libraries maintain links with each academic unit to insure that the Libraries are informed of unit changes likely to affect needed collections and that the units are informed of library problems and policies. She argued that Library Representatives tend to deal with local library issues while the Committee would deal with broader ones, those with a campus-wide impact.

    Dewey spoke to the importance of having the Committee consider broad policy issues such as the future of scholarly communication, including the periodical pricing crisis, how the Libraries might benefit from a major fund-raising initiative, how to insure that enthusiasm for information technology includes concern for intellectual content as well as hardware and software, and how to insure that the Libraries were an integral part of the new priorities developed by central administration. She noted that a Top 25 University would need to have a Top 25 university library system.

    Both Phillips and Dewey were concerned with how the Library Representative Program might be more effective. With reduced departmental allocations and the increased role of library faculty in developing collections, the role of the Representative in coordinating unit collection development has diminished and may be seen as relatively unimportant by some. There was some discussion of whether or not it would be useful to recreate a Library Representative's Council to provide a focused outlet for the Representatives. Robinson responded that such a group would seem to minimize the need for the Committee. Phillips and Dewey said that the Committee was needed to deal with broad policy matters and represent the campus as a whole. It appears unlikely that a Library Representative's Council will be created.

    Thompson and Dewey spoke about the need to have Representatives to facilitate communication between academic units and the Libraries. The twice each year meetings for the Representatives, with much time given to announcements by Libraries' administrators, may not be as important as in the past since this information can easily be shared via email.

    After further discussion, the Committee agreed that the Library Representative Program does NOT reduce or minimize the need for a Faculty Senate Library Committee. The Committee also agreed that it would be useful for the Committee to have a direct relationship with the Library Representatives. To begin this relationship, the Committee Chair will speak briefly at the Fall Representative's Meeting about the role of the Committee and encourage representatives to contact the Committee with broader problems or concerns.

  4. There was a brief discussion of scholarly communication concerns and the role of the faculty in encouraging research publication in affordable periodicals. This is an important concern and a Committee meeting in spring will be devoted to this topic.

  5. There was brief discussion of budget issues with some emphasis on the cost of periodicals, including new, more convenient digital versions available at the faculty desktop. Collaborative or co-operative purchasing may allow the Libraries to purchase more titles at a better price.

Please contact Robinson if you have any questions or comments about any of the above.


Library Committee Meeting
November 28, 2000


The Faculty Senate Library Committee met on 28 November in room 605 Hodges Library from 1.00 until 2.00. Members able to attend were: Hansen, Henry, Howell, Leatherman, Robinson, and Thompson. Dewey and Cassado represented the University Libraries.

THE NEXT MEETING WILL BE ON 26 FEBRUARY IN THE SAME LOCATION FROM 3.30 UNTIL 5.00. THIS IS TIME RESERVED FOR FACULTY SENATE SO THAT WE HOPE THAT MORE MEMBERS WILL BE ABLE TO ATTEND. WE WILL COMPLETE WORK ON LIBRARY SERVICES AND COLLECTIONS FOR DISTANCE EDUCATION AND BEGIN TO CONSIDER RESOURCE SHARING ISSUES.

  1. Robinson briefly introduced the subject of library resources and collections for distance education and shared a brief handout on a few assumptions and goals for discussion. He also introduced Margaret Cassado who is the librarian responsible for outreach services. The handout content appears below.


    Distance Education and University Library Services

    Assumptions:

    1. The several departments and schools at the University will offer substantially more distance education courses in the future to audiences within the state and outside it.

    2. Use of a major research library is an important part of a quality undergraduate education and is even more important in graduate education. Students need access to a wide range of resources including both print and digital. Students also need access to experienced reference librarians who can provide instruction in the most efficient and effective ways to identify and retrieve information.

    3. In most cases, local libraries and the resources available via the Internet will not provide distance education students with the wide variety of resources needed to support high quality education. Without access to the collections and services available through the University Libraries, distance education students will have an education that is inferior to that on the Knoxville campus.

    Goals:

    1. The University Libraries need to review their public service programs to insure that collections and services are available and visible to those who teach distance education courses and the students enrolled in these courses. This may require increased staffing and increased funding. Serving distance education students should be an integral part of the libraries' services.

    2. Campus administration should recognize that access to library collections and services is an integral part of any distance education initiative, including the "New College." Funding for library support of distance education should be an integral part of distance education planning.

    3. In some metropolitan areas, such as Nashville, Memphis, and Chattanooga, the University Libraries should investigate opportunities for working with area research libraries to create arrangements so that UT distance education students might have access to local collections and services.


  2. Dewey shared some of her thoughts on these issues. She noted the increasingly blurred line between serving students on the Knoxville campus and those off-campus. For example, access to digital collections, including databases, is increasingly available to students wherever they live. Distance education students benefit from digital collections that are available any time, anywhere. There have been some technical problems, but these are being solved. Licensing issues are a continuing concern since licensing often limits access or requires substantial payment for broad access.

    The geography of Tennessee is also a problem since university libraries are often located at some distance from each other. Tennessee also lacks the tradition of state-wide library cooperation, including resource-sharing, found in several other states. There is increased cooperation between the Tennessee Board of Regents institutions and UT. Distance education students may have access to a TBR borrower's card and use the TBR collections nearby. There appear to be more opportunities for cooperation between Tennessee universities and Dewy is involved in initiatives likely to help Knoxville and distance education students in the future.

    It is likely that as distance education grows, the University Libraries will need to devote more staff and budget to services for this audience. Service will need to be more seamless.

  3. Cassado introduced herself as the Off-campus Services Librarian and described the activities involved in serving distance education students as well as Knoxville students who find themselves at some distance from the University. The latter would include "stranded" UT MS and Ph.D students who are working on their thesis or dissertation research while at some distance from the campus. Ordinarily, Cassado focuses on groups of students rather than individuals. Orientation, reference and document delivery services are provided. Library items requested by students are delivered by UPS. Students pay return costs. Students with barcoded ID cards are added to the Libraries' data base which allows them to use the digital sources limited to the UT community. Some video conferencing experiments were done with distance students, but that did not prove popular. Distance students are not charged for copying articles or parts of books needed for course assignments.

    Cassado noted that some faculty change the requirements of distance education courses to minimize the need for library use. This is done with course packs and the use of a text book instead of reserve readings. Assignments may not require the use of a research library. She does send letters to those teaching distance education courses informing them of library services available to distance students and directing them to the Off-Campus Library Services WWW site . AOL Instant Messaging is also available.

    The Off-Campus Services Librarian is funded by the campus outreach unit and not the University Libraries. Dewey is taking steps to make this position a permanent part of the Library Faculty.

    Cassado noted that accreditation standards, such as those of the Southern Association, require equivalent services for on- and off-campus students.

    Questions focused on several concerns. The Libraries will provide services to distance students taking one course and not a program IF that student is issued an ID and can be added to the Libraries's user database. This is important because licensing restrictions on some popular data bases limit use to UT students and faculty with a utk.edu address. There have been some problems with ID and IP addresses in the past, but these seem to have been solved. Faculty with concerns should contact the Library Dean's Office.

    Dewey added that the TBR university libraries are very much interested in closer relationships with the UT Libraries. A union catalog or some similar central database of holdings is needed. A state wide delivery system would also make a substantial difference. The Libraries now have a dedicated delivery system with the University of Kentucky and the Vanderbilt University Libraries using UPS. Reciprocal borrowing arrangements should allow local pickup and delivery of requested items. Such arrangements would benefit students and faculty at UT, and may allow DE students to secure needed material from a more convenient local library. Resource-sharing issues will be covered in much more detail in a future Committee meeting.

    There was some concern about the cost of providing library services to distance education, especially the added cost of photoduplication and materials delivery in addition to the staff costs (one professional and two graduate assistants). Providing library services for DE students should be more expensive than providing the same service for on-campus students. Perhaps distance education students should be charged a fee (a library fee?) to compensate for these additional costs. Dewey replied that the Libraries were developing cost models that should clearly indicate how much it costs to serve the DE student. Another remarked that if few DE students utilize library services then the additional cost may not matter so much.

    Dewey felt that it was particularly important that the Libraries be informed of new DE initiatives so that they can work with faculty and students to insure that needed library resources are visible and available when needed. She has some concerns about the likely impact of the New College initiative and the degree to which these students should have access to quality library services and collections.

    Some comments were made on the difficulty of DE teachers dealing with the Evening School and Distance Education on a variety of issues. Since both these units are now part of the Outreach unit, it is hoped that squabbles and turf issues can be eliminated.

    Relating both to services for distance education and resource sharing in general was the fear that resources traditionally available to on-campus users might not be available in the future if they are loaned elsewhere. Service to off-campus users might also deplete scarce resources needed to serve those on-campus.

  4. At this point, it was time for the meeting to adjourn. Robinson asked those present to consider further the issues raised this day. At the next meeting, he will propose a resolution for Senate consideration based on the assumptions and goals mentioned in the discussion vehicle above. Please review this and be prepared to react to a resolution based upon it at our next meeting.

The meeting was adjourned at 2.00.


Library Committee Meeting
February 27, 2001


The Faculty Senate Library Committee met on 27 February in the 6th floor Hodges Library Conference Room from 1.00 until 2.00. Dennis Deyton, Kermit Duckett, Marion Hansen, Bob Henry, Don Leatherman, Wesley Morgan, Bill Robinson, and Dixie Thompson were present. Barbara Dewey, Dean of Libraries, and David Atkins, Head of Inter-Library Services, were also present.
  1. The first order of business was the discussion and approval of bylaws changes affecting the Committee. After a brief discussion, the following bylaws were approved. These have been sent to the Faculty Senate Bylaws Committee.

    K. Library Committee. Membership shall consist of one faculty representative from each college or school except the College of Arts and Sciences which will be represented by three representatives (one from each of the major divisions of the College). One student representative may be appointed by the Graduate Student Association and one by the Undergraduate Academic Council. Ex-officio members shall be the Dean of Libraries and the Associate Dean.

    The Committee works with the Dean of Libraries to insure that library services and collections meet the teaching, research, and public service needs of the University community. There is particular interest in library policies and procedures that facilitate use of resources.

  2. We next examined the draft resolution on the need for campus support for the University Libraries. While there was general agreement on the importance of preparing such a resolution for Senate adoption, there was some concern about the wording of (2) which read "Additional funding be made available so that the University Libraries may take advantage of the many opportunities for strengthening collections and services and become one of the top 25 libraries in the U.S." Some members were uneasy about the top 25 phrase and the metrics that might be used to rank academic research libraries. Since (1) also deals with funding, Robinson agreed to rework these parts of the resolution for discussion at the next meeting. It was also suggested that the action part of the resolution might more strongly focus on how the Libraries' services and collections must receive more funding and attention if the University is to move forward.

  3. Barbara Dewey announced that the Libraries had received supplemental funding for the current FY to help meet the problems with serials price inflation. While the funds received did not match the 10 percent serials inflation figure, they will make a substantial difference. Serials price inflation is expected to be about 10 percent in the next FY too. This means that the Libraries will need to receive another 10 percent increase next year just to maintain the present serials collection.

  4. Outreach has retained a consultant who has looked at a variety of service issues including library support for DE students. It seems likely that the report will include a strong recommendation for funding to provide these library services. This may help in budget negotiations for the 01/02 FY.

  5. The rest of the meeting was devoted to a discussion of resource-sharing. Robinson had prepared a brief introduction to some of the issues that might be considered. The text of that introduction appears immediately below.

At our next meeting, we will begin to discuss resource-sharing. Here I will limit "resource-sharing" to providing access to material not owned or leased. Traditional resource-sharing focused on inter-library loan which required a willing lender. Usually, resource-sharing requires some sort of quid pro quo, i.e. I'll lend to you if you will lend to me.

While there is much that may be said, I would like to make five points:
  1. The UT Libraries should be funded at a level to allow for developing and maintaining a core collection; that is a collection that will meet most (say 80 percent) faculty and student needs. No research library, no matter how well funded, can meet every need. Still, the local collection should contain enough of the standard items so that teaching and general research needs are normally met. Resource-sharing should provide the advanced student and faculty member with with items that are specialized and used infrequently. Resource-sharing should not substitute for inadequate local funding, although it may somewhat reduce its impact. RESOURCE-SHARING MAKES A GOOD LOCAL COLLECTION BETTER. WE CANNOT ASSUME THAT ANOTHER INSTITUTION WILL DEVELOP A COLLECTION FOR OUR USE.

  2. Resource-sharing must be based upon equity; that is borrowing and lending should be balanced enough so that no collection is disadvantaged by being a "net lender." This means that resource-sharing will sometimes involve some discomfort. An item that you would like to have today may be on loan to someone at another institution. Resource-sharing agreements need to be equitable for both borrowers and lenders. ARE RESOURCE-SHARING ARRANGEMENTS EQUITABLE?

  3. Resource-sharing should facilitate teaching and research by bringing people and materials together as easily as possible. Policies and procedures should be simple and straight-forward. In some cases, it may be easier to bring the researcher to a distant collection than to bring parts of that collection to our campus. Intellectual and physical access to collections is especially important. How easy will it be for local users to identify useful items and retrieve them from distant collections? How long will it take? What conditions are placed upon use? ARE RESOURCE-SHARING ARRANGEMENTS USER-FRIENDLY?

  4. Information technology has dramatically expanded the range of materials available to local users, often without mediation by the University Libraries. A growing number of collections are available to users in digital formats via the Internet. To what degree should the library promote or assist faculty in the identification and use of such resources? Will these resources substitute for traditional resource-sharing such as ILL? WILL THE INTERNET AND FULL-TEXT DATA BASES, FOR EXAMPLE, REDUCE THE NEED FOR TRADITIONAL RESOURCE-SHARING INITIATIVES?

  5. There is still no free lunch. There are benefits and costs to resource-sharing. We need to be aware of both. For example, money spent to be a member of the Center for Research Libraries (where collections of less frequently used items are developed and made available for use) is money that cannot be used to subscribe to a periodical or purchase a monograph. DO THE BENEFITS OF RESOURCE-SHARING OUTWEIGH THE COSTS?

David Atkins, Head of Inter-Library Services, responded to these points while providing a thoughtful and most interesting introduction to resource-sharing at UT. In introducing David, Dewey noted that our ILS unit is one of the most innovative and effective in the country.

While we have a strong local collection, no collection can truly be comprehensive today. The UT Libraries have strong partners in Vanderbilt and Kentucky. IRIS is a union catalog that allows members of the three universities to quickly discover what is held at each institution. Some cooperative collection development has begun with some emphasis on foreign language materials. This means that each library agrees to focus on some defined collecting areas which will then be available to the others. Overlap for expensive, and perhaps infrequently used material, may be eliminated. Expedited services are provided by each library so that borrowers receive needed items quickly. One day courier service is available. A larger version of IRIS, called KUDZU, is being developed and it will include several more southeastern university libraries. This will substantially expand the number and variety of resources available to faculty at each participating university. Eventually, KUDZU will replace IRIS. There will be a virtual union catalog, i.e. there will be one search interface which will search several different catalogs at once (rather like Dogpile on the Internet). While no cooperative collection development is presently being considered, that is likely in the longer run.

While pleased by the progress in resource-sharing, some concerns were raised about the difficulty of finding particular issues and articles in serial publications. While union catalogs or online catalogs provide access to titles, they often do not provide access to holdings information so the prospective borrower does not know if a particular item is held or not. Dewey agreed that this was a difficult problem and noted that many university libraries do not have holdings information available through their online catalog. Atkins added that resource-sharing libraries are working on this problem.

Atkins announced that the Libraries were exploring the possibility of purchasing items requested from other institutions when they met certain guidelines. Since requests represent a felt need, it may be more effective to purchase an item rather than borrowing it, especially if it is likely that the item might be borrowed again in the future. It might cost $20.00 to borrow an item and $75.00 to $100.00 to purchase an item and place it on the shelf ready for use so frequency of use is an important consideration.

Atkins also announced that the UT Libraries, contrary to popular expectations, is a NET BORROWER rather than a net lender. This means that the libraries borrow more items from other institutions that we lend. It is clearly not true that other institutions are taking advantage of the Libraries by borrowing far more than they lend. We probably break-even in our borrowing-lending relationship with other academic libraries. As a leading research university, the demand for specialized material seems to be growing substantially. Last year, the Libraries loaned 19,000 items and borrowed 22,000 items. It is important to be seen by peer libraries as balanced, and it might be a good idea to market our lending resources to offset our borrowing and bring the two into balance.

Dewey noted the Libraries were critical in their evaluation of consortia as a resource-sharing alternative. Sometimes, as noted above, cooperative arrangements work well and are cost-effective. In other cases, the Research Library Group, for example, this was not the case and the Libraries are no longer a member.

Dewey alerted the Committee to the increasing demand from other colleges and universities in Tennessee to have access to the digital resources available here. Without full cost-sharing, this would create serious funding problems for our collections. Too, negotiations and legal problems relating to license agreements (and monitoring those agreements) would become more complex and costly. It is likely that additional administrative staff would be required. She hopes that the Tennessee Electronic Library (TEL) will meet this need and reduce pressure on the University Libraries.

Atkins discussed the automation of the Inter-Library Services unit. We now have a paperless inter-library loan environment. Backlog of ILL requests have been reduced to 1-2 days. Submission has become easier and no longer requires a visit to the ILS department during their office hours. Library Express will soon be automated and integrated into the ILL system. He noted that the January ILL requests had increased about 80 percent over those of the same month during the previous year. Since the Libraries have added more full-text databases, this is a notable development since some other academic libraries are reporting reduced circulation and reduced ILL requests. The ILS department will soon begin experimentation with all digital delivery of most ILL requests and hopes to have this implemented in the Fall.
The meeting was adjourned at 2.00. The discussion of inter-library services and resource-sharing will continue at the March meeting.


Library Committee Meeting
March 13, 2001


The Faculty Senate Library Committee met in the Hodges Library 6th floor conference room from 1.00 until 2.00 on the 13th. Duckett, Hovland, Leatherman, Morgan, Robinson, and Thompson were present. David Atkins, Head Inter-Library Services, was our guest resource person. Mitchell (Associate Dean) represented the University Libraries.

Robinson expressed his gratitude for those attending. The resolution is still being revised and will be presented at the April meeting. The Bylaws Committee appears to have accepted the changes that we recommended. Members interested in serving on the Committee next year are encouraged to tell Robinson who will then inform the Committee on Committees. Please consider agenda topics for the new academic year to be briefly discussed at the April meeting.

The focus on the March meeting was to continue our discussion of resource sharing and try to identify concerns that Faculty may have about this important service. Atkins began with a brief summary of the main points covered at the February meeting. The major point was that UT is a net borrower and that ILL is a relatively inexpensive and most useful service. It is most used by graduate students. It costs the borrowing library about $20.00 to borrow an item compared to about $100 to purchase an item and make it shelf-ready. The major goal of the ILL Department is to insure that borrowing and lending are kept in balance. In our case, this will require some increase in lending and ILL is working on that. Atkins hopes that in the future both borrowing and lending will be at a higher, balanced level. Some concern was expressed about libraries that were net lenders and might not wish to continue lending to UT. The ILL Department is working with libraries that might be concerned, although it is important to note that such borrowing and lending takes place within a relatively large system and on this larger level lending and borrowing balance out. Increasingly, the UT libraries rely on reciprocal or consortia agreements that will take care of balance. Obviously, as a state publicly assisted institution, the UT libraries are obligated to share resources with other publicly funded academic libraries within the state.

Conventional wisdom strongly suggests that the increased availability of digital full-text collections will substantially reduce the need for resource-sharing, especially ILL. Atkins reported that this is presently not the case at UT since ILL use has increased substantially. Much more data, information, and knowledge are being produced and more of what is produced is available to users. Atkins said that academic research libraries are "doing more with more." He predicts that demand for ILL will continue in the near future.

Those present were asked to identify Faculty concerns about ILL. These concerns were identified (not ranked):
  1. Time before item in hand
  2. Expense (in old days, departments were charged)
  3. Use conditions by the lending library
  4. Image quality in photoduplicated or faxed items and
  5. Snags associated with bibliographic verification.
Some concern was expressed that some Faculty may not take advantage of ILL services because of negative perceptions from experiences far different from today's service. Mitchell noted that he hears few complaints or concerns about ILL today, and there were more in the past. He also complemented ILL on the fact that it is much more user friendly today. Committee members wondered what ILL might do to share the good news. Atkins noted the ILL WWW site is informative and current. ILL services have been mentioned in recent issues of the Libraries' print newsletter. He also works with UT librarians to insure that they are familiar with present ILL services. He hopes to be able to make a presentation to new graduate students and new faculty in the new academic year. Robinson noted that Committee members should assist in sharing good news about library collections and services, but he was not certain about the best way to do that.

Some questions were raised about the linkage between ILL and selection/collection development, especially batch selection (approval plans and standing orders). This is an important topic that should receive much fuller attention at a future meeting. Robinson noted that the Libraries should provide relatively immediate access to standard works needed for scholarly instruction and research (usually via ownership) and that these represent the "core collection." ILL should provide access to items outside the core.

In closing, Atkins noted that at UT the benefits of resource-sharing far outweighed the liabilities. He also noted that the University Libraries have some special responsibility to lend items to other academic libraries within the state since that is part of our service mission.

Mitchell spoke briefly about some of the issues and concerns related to purchasing collections of items rather than selecting items one at a time. Consortia provide the opportunity to select relatively large collections, i.e. 260 science periodicals in digital editions, as an all or nothing opportunity. Not all items in the collection may be appropriate for UT, but most will be. He also commented on the consortial purchase of 10,000 titles from netLibrary as an example of the need for the Libraries to lead by providing the UT community an opportunity to become familiar with new formats. Given the complexities of licensing and pricing options for many of these products, and rather substantial costs, collection development decisions are much more complex than before.

Mitchell was asked if the University Libraries would provide more collection development emphasis on those subjects identified by campus administration as areas of special emphasis. The Libraries budget for the new academic year will ask for a substantial amount of new money to further develop these areas. Some are not now well developed. Interdisciplinary collection development is also more challenging than development within a single discipline. Robinson expressed some concern, that if new money was not forthcoming, existing monies might be reallocated to these "endorsed" subjects. That would create substantial equity problems, especially for those in the humanities and some softer social sciences.

Mitchell noted that Hodges Library was being rewired. Faculty and students will soon find that access is much improved. If all goes well, Hodges Library will be wireless throughout the building by Fall.


Library Committee Meeting
April 17, 2001


The Faculty Senate Library Committee meet on 17 April from 1:00 until 2:00 in the sixth floor conference room in Hodges Library. Duckett, Hansen, Hovland, Leatherman, Morgan, Robinson, and Thompson were present. Dewey represented the University Libraries.

Robinson welcomed those present and expressed his appreciation for their interest, enthusiasm, and cooperation. This has been a productive year for the Committee and much has been learned about the University Libraries.

Robinson said that he had recommended to the Committee on Committees that those who wished to serve on this Committee next year be reappointed. He has not yet heard about the composition of the Committee for the next academic year.

Robinson presented the Resolution on Library Services and Collections which had been discussed previously. Some changes had been made to make the statement clearer. After further discussion, the resolution was amended to reflect some concern about protecting services and collections for those on campus. The amended resolution was passed unanimously and appears below.


Resolution on Library Services and Collections

Whereas, the University increasingly uses information technology to provide both new and more effective and efficient services to the University community, including distance education,

And whereas, the University Libraries provide rich and varied collections, including on-line databases, personal and specialized assistance from trained information professionals, and instruction in the selection and use of print and digital information,

And whereas, substantial, current library collections and services are an integral part of learning, teaching, and research,

And whereas, the University is moving forward to become one of the top twenty-five research universities in the United States, the University of Tennessee Faculty Senate recommends to the University President, the Board of Trustees, and campus administrators that:
  1. A program be developed to increase funding for the University Libraries to provide services and collections to on-campus students and faculty at a level comparable with the services provided by leading research libraries in peer institutions and

  2. Such funding should also insure that distance education students have access to comparable services and collections as those students attending the Knoxville campus.

16 April 2001



Since there was some interest in resource-sharing among the University libraries in Knoxville, Dewey spoke about cooperation between the Preston Medical Library and the Law Library. A Committee member had wondered why the resources in these libraries were not more visible from the University Libraries WWW site. Dewey began by mentioning that how to create the optimum home page for the Libraries' WWW site was a continuing concern and would continue to receive attention.

Preston Medical Library has a strong, cooperative relationship with the University Libraries although the privatization of the Medical Center has created some problems. Preston uses the same integrated library system found on campus and their holdings may be found in our on-line catalog. Because of licensing agreements, there are problems in providing access to some databases on our campus to medical researchers. In fact, licensing is probably the greatest problem in cooperative relationships. Expanding coverage for desired databases to meet the needs of those off campus would substantially increase costs. Money to pay for this expanded coverage is not present available.

Relationships with the Memphis Health Sciences Library are more complicated. Researchers at Memphis would also like to have access to some of the Knoxville campus databases, but that may require substantial additional funding because of licensing agreements. The University Libraries are working on cooperative resource sharing possibilities and have begun to work with vendors to see if more desirable pricing can be obtained to serve both Memphis and Knoxville. Access to their on-line catalog via a simultaneous search WWW page is under way. Some faculty at the Vet School would benefit from access to the collections at Memphis. One Committee member noted the rumor that the University was considering creating a new College of Public Health and was concerned that the varied collections needed to support such an enterprise were not now available and would be expensive to add to existing collections.

The Law Library relationship is complicated by the fact that they have a wholly different integrated library system. UT Libraries are working on a WWW page that would allow Knoxville users to search all University of Tennessee Libraries at all locations with one search. The site search software is here and the process of implementing the single, simultaneous search has begun. When completed, this will allow the Law Library on-line catalog to be easily searched by anyone from their office or home. The two libraries do have joint licensing agreements except for some legal databases. Dewey fells, and some Committee members agreed, that the Law Library is under utilized by those outside the Law College. She added that nationally some law librarians are concerned that if their library is more visible on campus, it would be overrun by undergraduate students. Dewey did not feel that would be the case here. Leatherman noted that better coordination between the two libraries on purchases of more expensive items, periodicals in particular, would be helpful. Dewey said that she would be working more closely with the Law Librarian in the future and that collection development coordination would be on the agenda.

The library at the Space Institute is unique in that there is no machine-readable catalog for its holdings and there is but one professional librarian. In order to make these items available to researchers on the Knoxville campus, the existing records would need to be made machine-readable. This would be expensive and the University Libraries lack the money to undertake such a project now. However, Dewey hopes to be able to explore possibilities in the future. This access may become more important in the future as some Space Institute faculty assume full-time appointments on the Knoxville campus.

Some concern was expressed that response time in accessing on-line catalogs would decrease as more simultaneous searching of distant catalogs was incorporated. Dewey noted that the Libraries have a new dedicated server for its on-line catalog which is robust so that response time should remain good. Do let her know if response time problems are encountered.

Dewey made a brief presentation on the budget submitted to campus administration. The Libraries' top funding priority is a ten percent increase in the collections budget to counter inflation, especially in the price of periodicals. Endowment funds have enabled the Libraries to add to the number of monographs purchased during the current academic year. An additional one million dollars has been requested to improve both periodical and monograph collections. The University Libraries remain about four million dollars under the annual collection development expenditures of the top 25 academic research libraries.

A question was asked about gifts by the Athletic Department to the University Libraries. Dewey was unaware of any recent gifts. Some Committee members felt that it would be appropriate for the Athletic Department to provide financial support for the Libraries on a continuing basis.

Robinson, in closing the meeting, said that he hoped that our new Provost would be able to meet with the Library Committee in the Fall to discuss his sense of the role of the library in the University and its proper funding.


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