COMMLISS Minutes
Sept 4
Present: Lori Carroll, JoAnn Jacoby,Brant Houston, Katie Newman, Lisa Romero, Sue Searing,
Linda Smith
After introductions, we reviewed several data charts (see attached):
From the 2006 and 2007 head counts maintained by the Social Sciences Division Libraries we
noted that LIS usage has been low (averaging about 2-3 people per hour over each monthly
range); the COMM numbers rose from a mean of about 6-7 people per hour in 2006 to 11-13
during the Fall and Spring 2007 semesters.
We also studied relationship charts that were generated from the 2006 survey of the faculty.
The faculty were asked, “Which libraries do you consider to be your primary libraries”. They
could choose as many as they liked; most chose 4-5. The relationship charts, one for LIS and
one for COMM, showed how many respondents chose one of those libraries, AND some other.
We noted the LIS library patrons are more diverse than COMM, since they chose more libraries.
In addition to LIS they use (in order of the number using the other library):
Main Stacks
Reference / Unde
rgrad
Engineering / Education & Social Sciences
Biology / Agriculture / Rare Book Room / English / Applied Health Sciences / Comm / Business
The patrons of COMM also use:
Main Stacks
Undergrad / Education & Social Sciences
Reference
History / English
Finally, we reviewed a chart from 2006 usage data that showed the number of web transactions
graphed against the number of circulation transactions*. Libraries that show a lot of circulation
transactions were interpreted to have more foot-traffic; those with more activity on their website
were taken to indicate more “virtual” activity. Comparing the placement of COMM and LIS on
the chart, it would appear that LIS has more virtual activity, while COMM shows activity that is in
line with that of several other small traditional UI libraries such as geology, math, physics. It
should be noted that some libraries “promote” the use of their website as a portal more than
others do.
*Web transactions are hits or views of any of the library's web pages; Googlebots, robots, spiders,
etc. are weeded out and only counts greater than 5 are included to minimize other anomolies.
Circulation transactions are circulation events by "happening location;" all charges, renewals, and
discharges from the circulation desk of that Library, including reserves transactions.
Next, Lisa and Sue reviewed the clientele, subject coverage, challenges, vision, and work in
progress for their libraries. Please see attached documents for specifics.
Communication Library (Lisa Romero):
Overview:
 Has lost personnel in both staff and students; currently 1 librarian, 1.5 FTE staff, and
1875 hrs student assistance.
 College of Media has recently changed from a 2-jr (Jr/Sr) college to three years (added
Sophomores 2 years ago)
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Instruction is in the building, and classes go until 9 PM on weekdays.
Head count in the library and in-class library teaching sessions have gone up
significantly due to these curricular changes
Many of the College of Media faculty have joint appts in GSLIS
Would like to move older journals to STX or Oak Street
Need to keep some print newspapers, due to journalism program. History, Philosophy &
Newspaper library has minimal print newpaper coverage; language libraries have osem
international newspapers.
Have several special collections
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Vision:
 Sees the library as a resource center for the College.
 Needs to increase staff and students in order to stay open the hours needed, and to
provide needed services.
 Will likely add several collections – Cinema Studies; Speech Communication. It would
fall within the scope of the library to add several subject areas that are currently in LIS:
Internet research; Publishing; Book Arts.
Work in Progress:
 Proposal has been drafted to move Speech Comm to COMM
 Recently a LIS staff member has joined COMM half-time
Library Science Library (Sue Searing):
Overview
 Onsite usage has been low for several years
 This year both staff and student time and money has been reduced, forcing difficult
decisions in service and hours
 In order to provide service to the growing population of LEEP students (many of whom
are not frequently on campus) the library has aggressively pursued more and more
digital resources. Journals are now available predominantly digitally; books and
reference materials are increasingly becoming more available, too.
 Most LIS users predominantly use the services and collections of the LIS library
remotely.
 GSLIS has become more and more interdisciplinary, making it increasingly less feasible
to provide for all their needs in one library
 The librarian offers 3x/week office hours in LIS – and has been given an office in a hightraffic area
 During the development of the New Services Models process, several merger proposals
have been entertained (Education & Social Sciences Library; Communication). But in
either case, better service would not likely result for either set of patrons since merging
would result in decreasing the browsing print collection for all involved. It seems the
solution does not lie in aggregating the LIS collection with another collection.
 Instead, it seems the best model for LIS to follow is that of virtual librarianship. We have
several examples of how this has already been done:
o Biotech – no collection; never had a physical library; just offer services
o Women & Gender Studies; Labor – collection dispersed into relevant libraries;
collection development continued by librarian; librarian’s main office located in
the ESSL.
o Landscape Architecture & Urban Planning – merged collection and librarian into
another library, which had space for the collection
 It is likely that LIS will follow a model similar to that of WGS / Labor, except the librarian’s
main office may be in GSLIS
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Sue has already received a lot of feedback from LIS users. They value / fear (possible
negative outcomes):
o Fear that the collection will be decimated
o Fear that the budget for the collection will be decreased
o They want an advocate and staff who can help with their needs
o Want to know that the virtual new book shelf will continue
o Worry about where to put the Cataloguing tools table
o Concerned about losing valuable staff expertise
o Loss of intermediaries who can quickly resolve library users’ problems with, for
example, course reserves or overdues. (GSLIS faculty, in particular, have
expressed this fear.)
o Diminished support for research and evidence-based professional practice within
the University Library. (Library faculty, in particular, have expressed this fear.)
o Loss of individual and group study space in which GSLIS students feel
particularly welcomed.
o Loss of a “home base” for some LEEP students during their on-campus sessions.
o Loss of familiarity with print resources on the part of the librarian and staff
members; such knowledge comes naturally from examining new books and
journals as they arrive in the departmental library.
o Inability to respond quickly to reference queries most easily answered by
recourse to print sources.
o Loss of the physical library’s iconic value to the University. The existence of a
world-class special collection legitimates the field and reflects UI’s proud tradition
of LIS scholarship.
Vision (positive outcomes):
 A content-rich and feature-rich portal to LIS information, accessible from anywhere, that
exceeds the offerings of the current LIS Library website.
 Greater ability for users to customize their view of LIS information through RSS feeds
and other technologies.
 Improved access to relevant LIS content by information seekers outside the Library and
GSLIS.
 More opportunities for members of the GSLIS community to have direct contact with the
specialist librarian and library staff in their own surroundings (LIS Building).
 Better service to online learners, especially in the LEEP program.
 Ability of the University Library to reassign rooms 306-312 Main Library.
 Increased flexibility in staff allocations within the University Library.
 A test bed for piloting new forms of information access that might later be expanded to
the entire University Library.
 Not to keep the same, print model going if it means doing it less well.
Work in Progress:
 Material in LIS that relates to children’s literature is being transferred to ESSL (along
with the funding); LIS is keeping the children’s librarianship material
 Reference has indicated they are willing to house the LIS Reference collection
Sue’s document also detailed “Baseline requirements to maintain a virtual LIS library” and
“Special Considerations”. The committee ran out of time to discuss these at this meeting.
The meeting ran overtime, and eventually Lisa and Brant had to leave for a prior appointment.
Those remaining began to discuss which steps should be taken next:
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Survey the Library faculty regarding their service needs. What do they value under the
current model and what new needs do they foresee?
Do a small focus group with the College of Media faculty (one rep from each department)
to find out if there are additional needs / services that they have
We also noted a HUGE bottleneck for any of this to move forward: STX. Apparently it won’t
open up anytime soon. LIS has, roughly 35,000 volumes. Children’s literature (~2000 volumes)
is already moving to ESSL. What to do with the 20-25,000 monographs?
If STX is closed, perhaps we should have a OCLC analysis run, which will show which titles are
“unique” to the LIS collection.
There was some discussion that, if a certain collection in ESSL were moved out (as JoAnn
would like it to be), there would be room in ESSL for displaying the print journals and some
other materials. It was pointed out that LIS is a “social science”, so this would be a logical home
for these materials.
Action Items:
 Floor plans for the two libraries
 OCLC analysis of LIS collection
 Author survey of Library Faculty
 Pull together folks in College of Media for focus group
Future Items:
 Outline the diverse subjects held in LIS, estimate size, and see which libraries they
would logically fit into
 Discuss the “Baseline requirements to maintain a virtual LIS library” and “Special
Considerations” portion of the LIS report.
See also, as separate documents:
 Report on COMM Library
 Report on LIS Library
 Charts