RDA Outreach Group Report
October 2006
At the April 2006 JSC meeting in Ottawa, the charge for the RDA Outreach Group was
altered to reflect changes in the structure of the RDA project team. The revised charge
clarifies the expectations for the Outreach Group, describes its relationship to other
committees and individuals associated with RDA, and details the terms of reference for
the Outreach Group. The critical change is to the reporting line: the Outreach Group now
reports directly to the RDA Project Manager. This change has aligned the Outreach
Group more closely to the RDA project activity and relieved the Outreach Group of selfmanagement duties. The Outreach group activities are guided now by the RDA Project
Plan, especially section C, Outreach, and the RDA Communication Plan.
The Outreach Group has a new member, Gordon Dunsire, Deputy Director, Centre for
Digital Library Research, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, Scotland. Gordon has been
an advocate for adoption of RDA by the National Library of Scotland and the Scottish
community in general. He has been engaged with Dublin Core and other metadata
communities. Gordon has spoken on RDA at several venues, notably at the German
Libraries Annual Conference in Dresden, in March, 2006 and at the Austrian Libraries
Conference in Bregenz, in September, 2006.
The Outreach Group membership is now: Matthew Beacom (ALA) is Chair of the group,
and the members are: Everett Allgood (ALA); Robina Clayphan (CILIP/BL); Ebe Kartus
(ACOC); Christine Oliver (CCC); Gordon Dunsire (CILIP/BL).
The Outreach Group has been involved in three areas of action.

Identify and contact RDA stakeholders

Identify meetings/conferences and potential speakers

Assist groups in planning for RDA training
Stakeholders
With respect to stakeholders, a few additional stakeholders have been identified (by
Gordon): CISAG Cultural Technical Group, IEEE Learning Technology Standards
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Committee. WG12: Learning Object Metadata, and Encoded Archival Description (EAD)
Working Group. (The DCMI and IEEE LOM communities are both currently represented
within the ALA community via memberships on CC:DA. EAD users may, to some extent,
be represented within the ALA community by the SAA (Society of American Archivists)
liaison to CC:DA.) Others have reiterated the importance of working with ILMS vendors
on RDA. However, no significant contact with these groups has been undertaking by the
Outreach Group itself. That contact work is being done by the Project Manager or other
members of the RDA project team.
Significant contact with the Dublin Core community has continued due, largely, to
Robina’s efforts and the work of Diane Hillmann, the Dublin Core liaison to the ALA
Committee on Cataloging: Description and Access (CC:DA). At the DC 2006 meeting in
Mexico this October, discussion of RDA emphasized interest in developing a data model
for RDA analogous to the DCMI abstract model and in development of clear definitions
of entities and relationships for RDA. As a result of the discussions at the 2006 DC
meeting, the DC community and the IEEE LOM community are interested in pursuing
active engagement with RDA development. A meeting has been proposed by the DCLibraries Group between RDA developers and members of these other metadata
communities in order to brainstorm about data models and their relevance for RDA.
Meetings and speakers
With respect to meetings and speakers, the Outreach Group members have assisted the
RDA project by speaking at several venues. Their actions have supplemented the
outreach work of the JSC members. Gordon’s presentations in Germany and Austria
noted above were particularly important in reaching out to groups that have little direct
connection to existing JSC constituencies or connections. The work by the JSC
Secretary to chart the calendar of past and pending RDA presentations is much
appreciated. Specific Outreach Group member presentations can be seen there.
One point regarding the existing RDA presentations should be mentioned. The Outreach
Group members acknowledge the need for flexibility in the available RDA presentations.
For example, when presenting RDA beyond the communities familiar with AACR, a very
different approach is needed. Currently, customization is left to the individual making the
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presentation. In the end, this may be the only viable approach. However, the JSC and
the Outreach Group should work to develop RDA presentations that are more easily
adapted to a variety of audiences.
Training and Implementation
Regarding training efforts, the Outreach Group has begun discussion via email of some
issues. Some groups were identified in their countries that are responsible for training. In
the UK, for instance, the key training body would be the Cataloguing and Indexing Group
(CIG), a special interest group of the Chartered Institute of Library and Information
Professionals. In the US, the obvious training parties are ALCTS, PCC, the Library of
Congress, and a variety of cataloging specialty groups such as OLAC, the Music Library
Association, etc. In Canada, the CCC has representatives from the Library and Archives
Canada (LAC), the Canadian Library Association (CLA), and the Association pour
l'avancement des sciences et des techniques de la documentation (ASTED), as well as
others from associated organizations. CLA has two interest groups, Serials Interest
Group (SIG) and Technical Services Interest Group (TSIG). These interest groups have
a history of active involvement in training Canadian technical services staff. Overall,
these established library infrastructures should be able to offer training routes for RDA.
However, training for new metadata communities will require tapping into their own
specific groups, procedures, and perceived needs.
Some Complexities in the Liaison Role
The work of the Outreach Group members as RDA Outreach Group members is
sometimes difficult to distinguish from their work as members of other bodies. The
relations with the DC community are one example of this; the RDA Update Forums held
at ALA meetings are another. JSC members are, of course, used to the mysteries of
being a liaison between two groups. One must sometimes oscillate at times too rapidly
from one role to the other. It is difficult to some extent for the members of the Outreach
Group to advocate RDA to another community one moment, and at the next represent
the views of the other community within the RDA project. Such potential for conflict may
be one of the factors that limits the potential usefulness of the Outreach Group itself.
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Limits to the effectiveness of the Outreach Group
The Outreach Group has made some progress in each of these three areas of action.
This progress has been small but useful. Contact with one group (DC) has been
maintained, developed, and extended. Presentations have been made to groups that
otherwise would not have heard from one of the JSC members about RDA, and the
Outreach Group continues to be a useful advisory group for meeting training and
implementation needs as RDA is rolled out.
The goal for the Outreach Group to be an active, executive, arm of the RDA project may
not be entirely realizable. Given the limits on time for the members of the group and the
demands on time needed to master the content of RDA, initiate contact with other
groups, negotiate the politics or social context of other communities or their
representative bodies, and engage others meaningfully in the RDA development
process, our expectation for results may need to be scaled back. Clearly, the Outreach
Group has and can continue to make an important, incremental difference in the JSC’s
ability to reach out to cataloging communities and beyond.
Submitted by
Matthew Beacom, Chair
RDA Outreach Group
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