1. Announcements
2. Find Databases Task Force (transfer from Endeavor to III)
3. Update on statistics sampling training sessions
4. R&OC Web site - Policies Page content
5. Update on online reference statistics reporting system
6. Transitions/Year review
   

Present: Mihoko Hosoi (Co-chair and minutes), Ida Martinez (Co-chair), Jean Callihan, Virginia Cole, Beth Katzoff, Jim Morris-Knower, Jill Powell, Pat Schafer (PSEC liaison); Maureen Morris (guest)

Announcements

EBSCO Academic Search Premier (ASP) database—Trial is still on. The Database Review Committee will probably make the decision involving ProQuest Research Library (RL) and this database by the end of August. Mihoko will prepare and share a list of e-journals that will get affected if we switch to EBSCO ASP from ProQuest RL with reference staff and selectors.

New Reference & Outreach Committee Liaison to the Public Services Executive Committee (PSEC): Kornelia Tancheva—Kornelia will assume her new role as the Collections, Reference, Instruction and Outreach (CRIO) Director effective July 1, 2006, and will also become a member of PSEC and its liaison to the Reference & Outreach Committee.

Find Databases Task Force

Our committee has been charged by PSEC to work with the new Find Databases Task Force (currently Thad Dickinson and Kizer Walker are the members), which is tasked to 1) define the term “databases”; 2) create a list of about 300 databases to be included in the new III Find Databases (Kornelia’s current list includes 486 databases, selected from the current 1,200 included in Find Databases); 3) and recommend policies for new resource addition. The new task force will report to our committee, and Virginia Cole will serve on the task force from the committee. Other members may be asked to join the task force effective July 1.

Find Databases: Transfer from Endeavor to III (Maureen Morris)

Maureen demonstrated the current status of the Find Databases project (technical side). The switch over from Endeavor to III will take place sometime around June 29, and the initial contents will include the 486 databases selected by Kornelia. The contents will eventually be adjusted by the new Find Databases Task Force, which will de-select some of the databases to limit the total number to about 300. The participants briefly discussed the search result screen, e.g., preference of clear display, brief description (full-text, Cornell only, etc.), listing technical information toward the bottom, etc. Maureen will send the test link to the public services mailing list to obtain feedback from wider public services community. This project will also be discussed at the July Reference & Outreach forum.

Reference & Outreach Committee Website—Policies Page Content

We will need to start populating the FAQ area, focusing on the common questions that we have so far received. For example, some people have asked if the new sampling method is meant to be supplementary to the existing methods, or if it’s going to replace the methods that are currently used. Any issues identified through the process will be addressed and it is difficult to say how long this new system will continue at this point. The data obtained through sampling is expected to be different from manual counts as the 12 weeks of sampling are meant to achieve overall data accuracy and consistency at CUL. Observing the sampling weeks is an expectation for all CUL units although it is acceptable to continue counting the number of questions everyday in addition to sampling data. CUL will report the number obtained via sampling. Ida will send the frequently asked questions to the committee members, and also investigate if a sub link can be added to the FAQ site.

Reference Statistics Training: Update

Training sessions for reference staff were successful. Eight people attended the Mann Library session taught by Jill and Jim, and 10 people attended the Olin Library session taught by Beth and Ida. Some tricky questions include: 1) location/map questions that involve outside library locations (maybe they are reference?); 2) initial communication mode vs. response mode; 3) questions that were followed up later; 4) “push reference” where reference staff initiated the reference transaction.

Regarding the mode (initial vs. response), Linda Miller has asked the question to the ARL contact and is waiting to hear back. Ida will send the list of questions asked to ARL to the committee. Measuring outreach activities is another topic that will be discussed over the 2006-2007 timeframe, and the need to capture outreach activities in statistics has been discussed at PSEC. Ida will communicate with ILR library reference staff to let them know that “push reference” will be discussed in conjunction with the outreach statistics. Virginia will visit Geneva for the training. Next training sessions will be for non-reference staff: June 7 (Wed) 10am at Olin 106 and June 9 (Fri) 2:30pm at Mann 2nd floor assembly area.

Online Reference Statistics Reporting System: Update

Gaby Castro Gessner, Ida Martinez, and Linda Miller met with Paul Houle and the computer science student (Ron) to discuss the online statistics reporting system update. The library representatives presented some ideas for revisions, and the student categorized them into three groups based on difficulty. The initial screen includes “location” which is a required selection, and also sub-location (e.g. circulation desk) and staff information (e.g. reference specialist) which are optional. Off-desk needs to be indicated on the “New Transactions” screen. A request has been submitted to automatically select the time category (e.g. >15 minutes) from the actual minutes (e.g. 18 minutes), although this type of enhancement is considered to be somewhat complicated.

Transition / Year Review

Each committee member has submitted 2-paragraph comments related to committee activities/achievements for 2005/2006 to Pat who consolidated all comments to create a bulleted list for the committee. Any additional comments can be sent to Pat by the end of June, and she will submit the complied list to PSEC. Beth, Jean, Mihoko, and Pat (liaison) will be “retiring” from the committee, and new members will be selected by PSEC. Recommendations can be sent to Pat. Ida will set up the July committee meeting and the open forum based on continuing members’ and Kornelia’s schedule.

Next meeting is scheduled for July 26, 10:30am - 12:00noon, Olin 106