Dean's Blog Fall AY15

Welcome to our new academic year!  
And, as I have done in past years, I will organize this fall AY ‘15 blog post to update last year’s posts in order to more carefully track progress and completion of our projects.

This time last year we were holding our own with enrollment only slightly lower in some areas; however, this fall we can say that we have a slight increase in our enrollment which is great news. But – like last year – we continue to be busy in IRT/Library Services. And – also as usual – our students continue to use our research resources online and print resources (reserves, circulation and reference) to complete assignments as well as for lifelong learning and information and research for personal needs. 

It goes without saying that this last year was an incredibly busy one for us and each of you contributed immensely to our success! In reviewing last year’s “to do” list here’s where we stand/here’s what you’ve done (in italics.)

• Authentication of all IRT and library public service computers

We spent our first year “authenticated” and – I feel like a six-year-old here – IRT did it “all by ourselves” thanks to Melanie and Marc’s hard work! Both actual and anecdotal data show a decrease in guest/non-ACC student problems as well as access issues in problems in general and printing -although still incredibly high – shows signs of lessening. As of now, all IRT areas are authenticated and the college has chosen to use IRT’s solution in the Highland Accelerator. While I don’t know whether or not we are moving (or will ever move) to a complete profile-driven sign on, having a sign-on at all is critical for the delivery of our resources to our current ACC students, faculty and staff. 

• Completed Elgin – opened Monday, August 26th, 2013

Elgin is open, operating a full year and – at least for the moment - is bug and bat free. Well, not exactly – we’ve had a few bats but not as many as the 16 we had last year! Elgin staff are busy keeping the Elgin wildlife at bay, meeting the needs of Elgin students and working with area high school students who are also ACC students as well as those who want to come to ACC/need orientation to college research and resources. Don’t forget we have a different, temporary model of staffing at Elgin…in that we have a full time Head Librarian but all other librarians are Academic Hourly Librarians. Thanks to the IL team who are organizing a schedule of other fulltime ACC librarians to assist in meeting information literacy needs of Elgin classroom faculty. In addition, thanks to everyone who helped Elgin open with Shelf-a-palooza (sp?) and setting up public service desks, staff interviews and staff training. It takes a village!

• Completed Hays – opened January 13th, 2014

Hays is open, operating ½ of the year and has its own share of critter problems – rattling a few students and staff out there…but enrollment is good and growing! Like Elgin, Hays has a temporary, different model of staffing…with a full time Head Librarian and Academic Hourly Librarians. Thanks again to the IL team who are organizing a schedule of other fulltime ACC librarians to assist in meeting information literacy needs of Hays classroom faculty and staff. More thanks to everyone who helped Hays open with Shelf-a-palooza, setting up public service desks, staff interviews and staff training. It takes more of that village!

• Completed Highland Mall – opened August 25th, 2014

We are open and doing business at Highland. The library is busy and - in the midst of hiring staff - we are helping students, setting up staff training and LS staff are – as with Elgin and Hays – rallying to assist HLC! AND more thanks to the IL team who are organizing a schedule of other fulltime ACC librarians to assist in meeting information literacy needs of HLC classroom faculty and staff. In addition, thanks to everyone who helped HLC open with Shelf-a-palooza (fewer print and more online, though) and setting up public service desks, staff interviews and staff training. It takes yet another village!

• IRT/LS e-device pilot at reference desk with special apps for students

IPADS: After a great pilot, staff continue to use their IPADS to assist students. We also use them at the public service desks for – among other things – textbook day and Q and A and staff training. We will continue to upgrade them as needed. Thanks to Jonathan for his leadership and – of course – Marc the college’s expert on devices - for great work on the pilot and moving the service along. Supporting content includes the excellent IPAD information.
Apps: The app project should be viewed by itself for quality and good press…I hear wonderful things – unsolicited – from students, faculty and staff and a number of departments are requesting discipline-specific apps for their areas…nice and exactly how we want to support ACC’s educational vision. 

• Revising our information literacy program/tutorials

The IL team has accomplished a great deal this year! We have always had award-winning tutorials for students and were among the first institutions to have online interactive, graded content. In updating our tutorials, the IL Team’s goal was to break content apart into discrete units to allow for a wide variety of support for curriculum. These new learning “chunks” continue to assess “audience” progress and the completion of student learning objectives. While the basic tutorial link below sends users to the library tutorial webpage, ACC’s Blackboard pages allow faculty to send students to these chunks of content to meet diverse needs. Their new look is great so visit and take our tutorials for our students and faculty so that you can assist others.
Other great guides designed by librarians (in general, IL Team and SDT) for students, faculty and staff (this last year and over the past few years) include:

• Tech Toolbox– general audience
• Faculty Teaching Toolbox – faculty and staff
• Faculty and the Library Toolbox – faculty and staff
• Student Learning Success Toolbox - students

 
• Dealing with the college's hiring freeze

We continue to deal with the college’s hiring freeze by staffing with hourly employees and moving fulltime staff among locations both temporarily and permanently. The LLT will be reviewing and (possibly) reprioritizing open positions at their next meeting and VP Midgley has stated that we can begin to send positions forward for consideration.  

• Assisting Technical Services in transition

We have an open search for the HL for Technical Services (TS) and Automation. We are currently vetting our third round of applicants for consideration and – due to the workload and projects of TS – I named an interim, Toyya Cisneros. Toyya will manage both the Pinnacle Library and Technical Services at the Pinnacle location. 

• An e-reader check out pilot to highlight our 45k e-books with

Devices: After a great pilot, staff chose the new Dell Venue (100+) to check out at Highland. We purchased them when they became available in July and expanded checkout to students will begin in the next few weeks. Following a budget review, we will buy additional Venues for other campuses. Thanks to Jonathan for his leadership and – of course – Marc the college’s expert on devices - for great work on the pilot and moving the service along. Supporting content includes the excellent Tablet information.

• Implementing the college's choices of printing solutions (swipe card with rollout of Highland)

Try as we might, this didn’t happen. We continue to struggle with ways to be efficient, effective and green. The solution that was tested in the Accelerator did NOT meet needs, so it’s back to the drawing board. I will be following our authentication process model for continuing to look at this problem this AY ’15. Watch the skies.  

• Required leadership training for all LS employees who lead others or initiatives (librarians, SLA and LA's as appropriate)

We had our first leadership vs. management training for team leaders and facilitators... but who am I kidding? I can “say” it was last year, but August 20^th barely counts. That being said, the first session (communication) went well and the second date in October is being selected as we speak and the focus will be time management for leaders and time management for managers. We have our second training for SLA’s scheduled for January (and possibly earlier) if we can find a date and the emphasis will be on their roles of coordinating and leading circulation staff and functions. 


STRATEGIC PLANNING
Library Services Ad Hoc Strategic Planning Committee met once last year and will not meet again until after the bond election. Of course, your comment might be – shouldn’t we plan either way? Yes, but we have operating plans for our business continuity and will review both operating plans and any strategic plans once we have a direction on overall college activities. 

When we DO begin our planning process – as I stated last year - all library employees will have the opportunity to provide input through their managers. This input can include but will not be limited to either general information or ideas for campus libraries and – of course – will also include those ongoing projects including college-wide printing issues the e-device pilot and revised information literacy content. The Ad Hoc Committee we also provide general and specific content and will consolidate other input and then post drafts for LS employees to review. As we stated last spring – as a support service – we will have our existing ideas and new ideas, but will also be vetting ideas we will be gathering from college planning content.

ORGANIZATION
We continue to review the Library Services teams, facilitators and stewards and continue to both add and subtract. In addition, IRT has changed (Melanie to IT but still focus on us as well as other responsibilities and Marc Petrick to us) and there has been a committee formed to look at all computer tech support in the college.

For the AY' 15 year, we will continue to have Library Leadership Team meetings in the a.m., some online/Google Hangout and some in person. I’m sure the Head Librarian's meetings will continue, as well as the TLF meetings of Team leaders, Facilitators and Stewards. We will begin to schedule new librarian meetings again as we will have several new librarians and still have a few "Five or Fewer" (years of service) but these won’t happen until we get them hired! These groups continue to use a variety of ways to meet regularly with both in-person and Google Hangout methods. We encourage Library Services groups to explore alternatives to face-to-face only.

Other activities for this year include:

Police training – We will be providing training for police on our services and resources so that they may better support us in their safety and security endeavors. Specifically, we will begin by providing training for them on our e-devices and our collections for them to better understand theft, prevention and recovery issues which include: labeling, electronic designations, costs, acquisitions, our insurance, and our circulation policies and procedures. While this is designed to provide them with information, I will use this opportunity to seek feedback on our policies and procedures – along with working with Risk Management for security and safety report at campuses.

CAT projects – Our collection will be assessed this year – and while it is correct to say we have ongoing assessment, I am interested in: periodicals (print vs. online ;) e-books (do we have a complete LC range of resources?) and standing orders. In addition, we need to review what is being taught where and where target or focused curriculum opportunities in the college so that we may position our materials appropriately. These projects will be overseen by Toyya and Barbara in an ad hoc Collection Assessment Team.
Textbooks – If you stand very quietly and hold your breath, you will hear the Riverside staff exhaling as the textbooks moved to Highland as I promised two years ago. I charged Carrie and Jen to come up with ways to secure the collection at Highland since we had a number of thefts and lo and behold they came up with an attractive and appropriate set of measures to better manage the materials! I think they have a second career in their future. Great job on this!

Finally - I will send out an additional email when all staff are hired and in place for Highland but we are still within the process….one great hire though – and ironically – followed the textbook move…Riverside’s Rhonda…with us for over a decade as an hourly employee will begin a full time LA job at Highland….we just couldn’t let her let go of the textbooks!!!

Again, thanks for all you all do to make this work ….we just keep getting better!