goodinjo's blog

Highlights from ACRL 2013 (Indianapolis)

Here are a few memorable aspects of ACRL 2013:

1) Henry Rollins Keynote – punk rock icon, spoken word artist, amateur archivist Rollins spoke eloquently about the importance of librarians and libraries in helping people discover “the information” they need.

Today’s issue of the Chronicle’s Wired Campus email mentions that Amherst College is starting an open-access, all digital academic press, housed in the library. Here’s a link to the announcement by Amherst’s Librarian, Bryn Geffert.

Bibliographic records for 20,000 additional sound recordings from the Naxos Music Library have recently been added to our online catalog. This brings the total number of Naxos titles in the catalog up to nearly 25,000. However, this is still only a fraction of the over 79,000 CDs that can be discovered by searching the Naxos Music Library site directly. If an Encore search doesn’t reveal a recording of a particular piece of music it is always a good idea to go to the Naxos site and try searching there as well.

Last Friday was Jean Dickman’s 44th anniversary as an employee of Luther College. Please join us in thanking her for her many years of service to the College and its mission.

• History Day – Prof. Wilkie provided a history of Luther’s involvement with History Day and the group discussed possible next steps. Jackie, Rachel and Andi will meet to discuss options.
• Library metrics: Process metrics – next steps include deciding who can contribute what. Project metrics – identifying current projects for routine updates (Ex.

Present: John, Jennifer, Paul, Rachel, Germano, Lindy, Andi, Rebecca, Ryan
Absent: Sasha, Diane

• Database subscription discussion, prompted by IPAL deadline: Ryan and John supplied usage spreadsheets and talking points in advance of the meeting. The group decided to drop our subscriptions to the ACLS ebook collection, Oxford Online Dictionary of National Biography and Naxos Jazz while continuing to subscribe to our other databases. The group discussed possible options for support of the Art and Biology programs.

LIS is pleased to announce the activation of our subscription to the latest JSTOR collection, Arts & Sciences X. This collection will include a minimum of 125 new titles by the end of 2013 and will be especially strong in the areas of Sociology, Education and Business. An overview of Arts & Sciences X can be found at this link: http://about.jstor.org/content-collections/journals-archive-collections/...

Over 100 of the titles in Arts & Sciences X are now available to current Luther students, faculty and staff.

The Pew Research Center has just issued a report, “The Rise of E-Reading”, based on a recent survey of Americans age 16 and older. Not surprisingly, e-reading in general and the use of e-readers in particular is increasing.

One interesting finding is that the average e-book reader has read 24 books in the last year, compared to an average of 15 books for a print-only reader.

Current and recent issues of the New York Times can now be read on a new Color Nook in the library. The Nook is displayed at the Research and Technology Help Desk, except for late in the evening when it will be at the Circulation Desk. Pick it up, find a comfortable chair in the library and return it when you are done. Let us know what you think.

Library Services Minutes
February 20, 2012
Present: Andi, Jennifer, Sasha, John, Rebecca, Ryan, Rachel, Diane, Lindy, Germano

New York Times/Nook – Continued discussion of buying a Color Nook dedicated to displaying the New York Times at the Research Help Desk. Agreed to buy a device and test the concept.

Atomic Learning MLA/APA Citation Modules – After some testing it was agreed to purchase access to these training modules for the rest of the year. Also agreed to see about a free trial of the Online Chicago Manual of Style.