University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Libraries
ALCTS CMDS Chief Collection Development Officers of Large Research Libraries and
ALCTS Technical Services Directors of Large Research Libraries
June 2010
GENERAL
ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT
The New Service Model process continues at UIUC. In past years, we closed our
Physics and Library and Information Science libraries. Currently, we are in the process
of planning or implementing consolidations that will impact our Geology Library; Biology
Library; Health Information services (Applied Health Sciences Library, Education and
Social Sciences Library, Vet Med, etc…); International and Area Studies units (Africana,
Asian, Global Studies, Latin American, Slavic); and Languages and Literatures units
(English, Modern Languages and Linguistics, Kolb-Proust Archives). Documents,
updates, and status reports are available at: http://www.library.illinois.edu/nsm/.
BUDGET SITUATION FOR FY10
Our collections budget for FY10 was sheltered. However, the library has returned cash
to the University from its operating budget. The University remains in financial crisis
largely because the state is behind on its payments to the University. Fortunately, tuition
and other sources of funding have covered most of the gaps. Like other institutions, a
furlough program was implemented.
In the last six months, the UIUC campus announced and implemented voluntary
separation and early retirement programs. The university’s former hard hiring freeze has
thawed a bit, and we are moving ahead on a couple vacancies. We will not be able to fill
all the vacancies that we had or those created by the early retirement program. This has
led up to work on alternative plans to meet collection development and instructional
needs, including work with other CIC member institutions to meet needs in Japanese
Studies, Middle Eastern Studies, and Psychology.
BUDGET PLANNING FOR FY11
We have been told our collections budget will be sheltered and that our operating budget
will take a 6.5% cut in FY11. We anticipate that a significant part of that reduction will
come from the separation programs. But, that will not cover all the needs. We are
anticipating shifting more costs off to our collections budget, including memberships,
cataloging and shelf-ready services, etc….
FACILITIES
After a seven-year delay in funding, the University Library has completed replacement of
gutters and downspouts, some masonry repair, etc….
The construction to replace the HVAC system serving the Rare Book and Manuscript
Library began. In the last fiscal year, the Library relocated 350,000 volumes to make
room. For more info, see: http://www.library.illinois.edu/news/materials_relocation.html.
COLLECTIONS
MATERIALS BUDGET
The Library is wrapping up FY10 without significant difficulties, and we are happy to
report that we did not need to return any funding to campus from our FY10 Collections
Budget. We are working on an A&I review and other projects that seek to save the
University Library funding in the coming year.
Beyond being protected from cuts, the Library is still in the dark about a materials
allocation for FY11. During previous difficult periods, we have made hay with print
cancellation savings, but that cushion is no longer available.
Patron Driven on Demand Acquisitions
The Library completed two pilots this year on PDA purchases. We loaded records
obtained from YBP under a set of defined profile parameters into our shared Illinois
CARLI catalog and all Illinois CARLI users had an opportunity to request an on demand
purchase for titles either not owned or with few copies available for sharing through the
76 member library system. We put 25K towards the project and expended the funds over
a two month period. This was for hard copy books and most were obtained and
delivered within three business days from YBP. The second project is still under way at
the close of FY2010 and focused on ebooks. We loaded records from YBP again who
worked with Ebrary on the service and local users are able to read and copy these with a
purchase invoked after a threshold of activity is reached. A second component of this
project was to provide funds to selectors to experiment with eBook approval plans on
YBP and that is also still underway at the close of our fiscal year.
COLLECTION MANAGEMENT
Collections transfers required for the RBML HVAC project spurred further discussion of
rationalizing the management of collections between unit libraries, our Stacks, and High
Density Storage locations.
Discussions have continued about a deduplication project and early projects have
started, both with serial and monographic literature.
Interest remains high among members of the Special Collections Division in gaining
better control over “fugitive” special collections. We have made significant progress on
backlogs of Music Special Collections, implemented a process to gain control over
materials that would qualify for management by rare books from within our Main Stacks,
and completed an intensive project to develop online collection descriptions and finding
aids for almost 350 collections that remain inaccessible within the Illinois History and
Lincoln Collections. We have also processed a backlog of records from businesses that
have been in an attic for 90+ years and completed processing a 150,000-volume
children’s book backlog.
GOVERNMENT DOCUMENTS
The University Library is actively working with the CIC/Google Government Documents
Digitization Project. At the time of writing, we are actively working with our regional
depository library to secure permission for a withdrawal of materials that would be
contributed to the digitization effort. The resulting digital content will be delivered via
HathiTrust, FDSys, and Google Book Search.
NOTABLE ACQUISITIONS
The Library continues its efforts to migrate to electronic delivery, as a means of
facilitating access, serving non-traditional students, and as a means of freeing prime
shelf space. Over the last few months, we have made investments in significant backfile
packages, e-book packages, digital newspapers, and streaming videos.
Content Access Management (CAM)
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Implemented OCLC’s Bibliographic Notification service.
Through New Service Model programs, centralized several cataloging units into
CAM, including Slavic and Eastern European Languages Cataloging, Music and
Performing Arts Cataloging, Government Information Services Cataloging, and,
later this summer, Asian Language Cataloging. We have made good progress
integrating catalogers, workflows, processes, and training.
Ongoing work to process and catalog backlogs of maps in Geology and Map and
Geography Libraries. Over the past year, we have cataloged and processed over
30,000 maps and moved these items to the Library’s High Density Storage
Facility.
We are in the final stages of implementing use of electronic book plates and
discontinuing the use of print book plates.
Eliminated backlog for Music and Performing Arts Library and made significant
progress in cataloging the Library’s Special Collections.
Started sending gift materials and some foreign language blanket order materials
to remote storage without classification.
Working with Proquest to digitize and catalog older collections of dissertations
and theses. We have also automated a process to adding metadata records into
online catalog of new dissertations and theses. In 2010, the University of Illinois
will require electronic submission of new dissertations and theses and individuals
will deposit copy into IDEALS, the Library’s digital repository.
Participated in the FDLP Pilot for loading MARC records for new publications
(and some older materials being digitized).
In May 2010, we started working with HathiTrust to add digital scans and
metadata for items digitized through UIUC Library’s work with Internet Archive
and Open Content Alliance (nearly 27,000 volumes so far).
MJ Han, Metadata Librarian, did good work to automate a process that allows us
to create MARC records for all we digitize through various projects and submit
these records into our online catalog, Illinois State consortial catalog (I-Share),
and OCLC WorldCat.
We will start contributing materials to the CIC Google Digitization project this
summer, beginning with submitting U.S. Federal Government publications and
then progress other items in the Library’s collections. We have put lots of work
into upgrading bibliographic records to accompany items to be digitized.
In January, we started working with Zhejiang University and Internet Archive to
digitize Chinese materials in UIUC Library’s collections that are in the public
domain. These materials will be about China or Chinese culture in all languages.
Total volumes will be around 10,000 volumes. These digitized volumes will also
be available in Internet Archive and HathiTrust.
General Acquisitions
Acquisitions successfully completed a major revend to YBP this past year. Shelf ready
services with YBP commenced in June 2010 and will be expanded during the year. The
Acquisitions Unit as well as CAM was hard hit by retirements and those who took
advantage of a campus buyout program. The unit is reorganizing and will be relying on
part- time help during a transition into different workflows and with the acceleration of
eBook purchases. Acquisitions work now includes all new copy cataloging and
classification work. New material from all the blanket order and approval plans and a
majority of the firm orders will be handled completely in Acquisitions with the new books
going straight to their permanent library after the work is completed. Acquisitions is
purchasing records from a variety of vendors and we will extend those record purchases
in FY2011. Slavic work is now consolidated under Acquisitions and Asian acquisitions
will be centralizing within the year. Acquisitions initiated a cost benefit analysis of our
exceptional Dewey classification schemes which is now a full study on DDC vs. LC. We
are looking at the possibility of moving to Library of Congress Classification for portions
of the collection though most likely only for newly acquired material. A decision will be
made sometime this summer. Visits with all vendors are underway now to streamline
profiles, to review ordering processes and to update EDI processes. An RFP is
underway for Slavic purchases. Changes to the Illinois procurement code is requiring
additional work to review large purchase workflow.
Patron Driven on Demand Acquisitions
The Library completed two pilots this year on PDA purchases. We loaded records
obtained from YBP under a set of defined profile parameters into our shared Illinois
CARLI catalog and all Illinois CARLI users had an opportunity to request an on demand
purchase for titles either not owned or with few copies available for sharing through the
76 member library system. We put 25K towards the project and expended the funds over
a two month period. This was for hard copy books and most were obtained and
delivered within three business days from YBP. The second project is still under way at
the close of FY2010 and focused on ebooks. We loaded records from YBP again who
worked with Ebrary on the service and local users are able to read and copy these with a
purchase invoked after a threshold of activity is reached. A second component of this
project was to provide funds to selectors to experiment with eBook approval plans on
YBP and that is also still underway at the close of our fiscal year.