Survey: Processes for managing Course material provision.
Informal DALIANZ survey conducted in September/October, 2006
Pamela Leuzinger, UTS, February 2007
12 universities responded to a request posted on the Deputies and Associate Librarians in
Australian and New Zealand (DALIANZ) listserv.
They were:
Bond University
Griffith University
La Trove University
Macquarie University
Monash University
RMIT University
University of Canberra
University of New South Wales
University of Queensland
University of Technology, Sydney
University of Western Australia
Victoria University
1. Summary of most interesting findings for UTS

Many libraries process reading lists even though it is labour intensive. The staff members
responsible for checking the lists in the first instance vary from library to library but often the
Reserve staff or Information Services (‘liaison’) librarians identify what needs to be ordered
from reading lists.

Some libraries have developed an arrangement with Coop bookshops. The bookshop takes
on the task of checking through reading lists and then orders any items not held by the
Library, or additional copies, in accordance with a Library-defined formula. These libraries
seem very happy with these arrangements.

Most libraries have advanced online systems in place to manage E-reserve items and print
material housed in Open or Closed Reserve. Students can find their reading list online and
identify/link to items in Reserve. However this does not seem to apply to holdings and
availability of items in the general or other short-loan collections. The systems do not facilitate
the labour intensive processing of reading lists.

UWA’s RLMS, with its involvement of academic staff in the process, seems to address some
of the issues raised in this survey and a proposed upgrade will extend the system. Monash’s
current project also looks promising.

This survey was regarded as timely.
2. Further discussion
UTS is interested in following up on system responses which go beyond e-Reserve systems e.g.
those at UWA and Monash. We have also identified some overseas sites which look interesting.
From our perspective, any system needs to take into account newly emerging UTS systems
which will require academic staff to lodge, and update, reading lists and course outlines into an
accessible central database.
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Survey: Processes for managing Course material provision.
3. Course materials survey 2006 – detailed responses.
University
Bond
Griffith
La Trobe
MQ
RMIT
UC
UNSW
UQ
1) How, if at all, does your Library assist academic staff to keep prescribed
course materials up-to-date?
Academics notify the Bond University Bookshop of prescribed course materials and
this information is passed on to the library which then orders materials via the
Bookshop.
Liaison Librarians check course outlines on the Faculty website and identify for
purchase any materials not already identified through the process mentioned
above.
Liaison Librarians may be notified directly by academic staff requesting Course
Materials to be placed on Reserve.
Liaison Librarians contact academic staff before the semester to remind them to
submit their reserve requests including prescribed textbooks.
New and updated versions of prescribed textbooks are ordered as they are
identified.
Faculty Librarians check reading lists to purchase new materials, and will buy the
latest editions and advise academics.
Our Digitised Course Readings system provides some self-help services to
academics who can search our database of existing readings, and update links to
selected readings from their online courses in Learning@Griffith. Academics can
request new readings to be digitised. Librarians collaborate with academics and
educational designers to develop online courses and learning materials.
Library staff check bookshop reading lists annually before the start of first
Semester, and if time allows, before the start of 2nd semester and order updated
and new titles being used for coursework for the library. Academic staff often let
the bookshop know of new course materials & forget the library.
Alerting services are provided by library vendors to Subject librarians and
Academic staff based on the teaching & learning profile of the University
No formal procedure for prescribed course materials. Our Learning Resources
(read "Reserve") staff order prescribed material if required for the Reserve
collection, but the basic rule is that teaching staff are expected to provide the initial
request, usually in the form or a reading list, or similar. Learning Resources staff
forward order requests to Acquisitions staff, who, as part of the ordering process,
will usually 'upgrade' a request to the most recent edition when they are placing
actual orders. Additionally, as key texts held in the Reserve collection wear out,
they are reordered, resulting in acquisition of the most recent editions, but this is
not systematic.
Direct liaison by the School Liaison Librarians. We have access to some of the
readings on the course guides as they are online and can check those and the
course outlines to note changes in teaching focus or themes. Time intensive and
not always most effective way as not all of the course guide for each course is
made available, and naturally not always easy to get direct contact w/teaching
staff.
This is mainly the Academic Planning Librarians task. Ordering staff also advise
lecturers of newer editions available if it comes to their notice.
We rely on the academics and the bookshop knowing the latest edition of any
textbook. It is in the best interests of the bookshop to alert the academic to any
more recent editions of any textbook they prescribe. In that way they can sell the
Library multiple copies of the newest edition.
Liaison librarians make suggestions to academics if they feel there are later
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Bond
Bondcontinued
Griffith
La Trobe
editions or better resources available.
Library expeditiously orders all materials recommended for purchase via UQ
Bookshop (see below)
We order the latest editions of any prescribed and recommended materials we
become aware of.
We have approval plans which also ensure the prompt receipt of latest editions in
some key areas.
Training in the use of alerting services for academic staff
Library staff order the latest edition of newly requested items for reserve collections
Reminder emails sent to academics to review their reading list requirements
Academics can directly edit their online course materials list in the Library’s
Reading List Management System (RLMS). The RLMS is a component of the Hive
software and was produced by Harvest Road, a local Perth company, to our
specifications.
2)
If you process reading lists how does your system work? Specifically,
how do you identify whether there are new items on reading lists submitted
in subsequent semesters for the same subject? E.g. do you load reading lists
into a database or onto spreadsheets?
Bond University provides access to all course materials/readings (print and
electronic) via the library catalogue system. Students may search for course
readings via the lecturers’ names, course codes or course name in addition to the
usual access points (author, title etc.) in the course reserve subset of the library
catalogue. They will also find many of these in the full catalogue, but do not have
search access there via course codes or lecturers names.
When a list is received in the Library, all the resources on the list are checked
against the Library's catalogue. If they are not already held and the item can be
purchased from the University bookshop this is done in the case of prescribed
textbooks. In the case of recommended reading, items may be purchased or a
lecturers copy obtained if the item cannot be obtained quickly.
In terms of books and other hard copy materials in course reserve, records are not
kept in the course reserve subset of the library catalogue – as they exist
‘permanently’ in the full catalogue database and are ‘derived’ and added back to
the course reserve subset at the beginning of each semester or when requested.
Electronic resources such as scanned journal articles and book chapters do not
have catalogue records in the full catalogue. These records are not to full
cataloguing standards and reside only in the course reserve subset. They are
suppressed from display if they are not on a current reading list and unsuppressed
if required in a subsequent semester. This process is very much based on the
functionality in the library system.
Readings and text lists are included in the online Course Outlines system and are
checked when available, and new editions systematically purchased or digitised on
request.
The library provides access to all Reserve lists via the Library Catalogue. This is
managed by using the “Course Reserves” module of the INNOPAC Library
System. Using the catalogue, students may access this material via the Reserve
link under “subject code” and/or “subject name” and/or name of academic staff.
Students also have the option to find individual titles using the main search
functions on the catalogue – author, title (of article or book).
Reserve lists are created by their “type” (e.g. 3 hour, 3 day, 7 day, EReserve and
Audio visual) and the specific “subject code” (each “subject code” may have a
number of lists depending on the “type”)
Each semester, or as required, academic staff send their reading requirements
using an online form, via the library’s web page, or email Reserve using a specific
email account. This form is printed and placed in order of receipt within the
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following actions: “New”, “Update” and “Remove”. Priority is given to “new”
material.
If there are no changes to the actual lists of readings, from semester to semester or
from the previous year, then it is only necessary to update information such as,
current date, name of the academic staff member teaching the subject and/or
changes to the subject name and/or code.
Additional titles required for Reserve are retrieved from the main collection using
the library catalogue. If the title is not held in the Library an order is placed.
Material no longer required for a specific subject is removed from that “subject” list.
If this material has been placed on multiple “subject” lists, however, the system will
alert us that it is on another list and the material remains in Reserve.
The library always orders the latest edition where it can be identified even if
requests are for earlier eds.
When a reading list is received, the list is annotated, item by item by Learning
Resources staff, and given treatment according to need. New material is ordered,
(number of copies dependent on course size - info. provided by academic), books
and other hard copy items which are held are searched and placed in the Reserve
and/or 3 Day Loan collections, chapters and articles are scanned or linked & made
available via e-Reserve. This is all very manual, we don't load reading lists to a
database or spreadsheet.
The Bookshop orders for us based on a formula from the lists they receive from the
academics. These are not checked against the catalogue or any prior list. Happy to
do this as it means we then actually are guaranteed a copy of the prescribed &
recommended, so even if duplication occurs the benefits outweigh the pains. Not
perfect as Bookshop rarely gets all course lists. The only other way to see reading
lists is via online course guides (but see above not always comprehensive) or
wrestle it out of students hands.
It is a new process each semester which means manually going through each list
and identifying new items and newer editions this way. We do not load reading
lists on to a database. They are either emailed direct to us by the lecturer or given
in hard copy.
UQ Library provides access to all resources on a reading list via the catalogue.
These resources are also linked through the course reserve module in our ILMS so
are available by course code or course name as well as individually. When a list is
received in the Library, all the resources on the list are checked against the
Library's catalogue. If they are not already held or not held in the branch library,
decisions are made as to whether to buy it, obtain it via ILL, create a print
"photocopied article" and/or digitise it locally (if it is a book chapter or journal
article), link to an article available through a subscribed resource, or obtain it by
some other method (e.g. ask the lecturer).
Once all the checking, decision making, copyright investigation and preparation is
done, all resources already catalogued will be linked to the required course reserve
record, and all resources not catalogued, will be. Branch library staff create an
abbreviated bibliographic record (call number, author, title, citation, book title (if a
book chapter), and the digital link if available). These are then also linked to the
appropriate course reserve record.
Reading lists are no longer processed because it is an unsustainable activity.
Academic staff are requested to identify new items on reading lists and submit
orders for them. We are hoping to move to a better system and this survey is a
step in that direction.
Reserve staff review Closed & E-Reserve listings with academic staff at the end of
each semester.
Provision of reading list is automated through our RLMS. This system allows
academics to edit and manipulate their online course materials for each unit.
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La Trobe
Monash
Monash
continued
MQ
RMIT
UC
Materials can be located in the catalogue or Hive, the digital repository and be
made available to students via the RLMS from the academics desktop. The
academic can request digitization of the material by library staff. Currently there is
a bit of a mismatch in our system in that the academic is required to email their
specific subject library to request the physical item be added to the reserve
collection after they have added it to the RLMS, but future upgrades to the RLMS
will generate an automatic email to subject libraries when new materials are added
to a units list – this upgrade is on a wish list. This would make the management of
reading lists a one stop shop for academics.
3)
Have you found a better way to identify prescribed monographic course
materials than processing reading lists?
Bond has found that working with the University Bookshop has been the most
successful as they provide the library with booklists throughout the semester.
An online repository of course outlines contributed by academics is helping the
timely availability of reading lists for checking.
Working with the bookshop to get their lists helps supplement the reading lists as
we can get some requests through in a more timely fashion. The bookshop suffers
the same issue of late (or no) requests coming in as we do.
All our Student Reading texts are sourced firstly through the Monash Bookshop,
where available, but the method of acquiring the titles varies between the branch
libraries.
For some locations, the local Monash Bookshop receives the reading lists from the
academics and, checking the web Voyager catalogue, orders the required number
of copies for that branch, based on a grid formula which the library has supplied.
The Bookshop then sends the lists of the titles and the number of copies they have
ordered for us to the Information Resources Division, and the orders are loaded
into the Acquisitions module of Voyager.
In other cases, local branch library staff or IRD orders staff receive lists, either from
the Bookshop or branch library staff, and calculate the number of copies required
for the location, again based on the library grid formula. IRD staff then load the
orders into Acquisitions, and send an order through to the Bookshop.
On balance, some of the methods work better at some branches than others, but it
is not a perfect arrangement, particularly where subjects are taught across several
campuses.
On the whole working closely with the Bookshops saves time for the Library in
checking and placing the orders.
Monash is reviewing it's Readings and Reserve service and while we have a draft
project proposal, have yet to have our first meeting since the proposal. The issues
are around defining the service (it has grown over the years, is highly regarded by
academic staff and varies considerably amongst branches) and developing a
systematic approach that is sustainable and can accommodate growth without
increasing staffing demands quite likely by engaging technology, procedure and
policy changes - a big project. Currently it includes electronic and print copy and is
accessible by author/title etc, or unit, via the catalogue. More details at:
http://lib.monash.edu.au/services/reserve-brochure.pdf
The discussion is interesting at this time, and if you have questions about details of
what we've been doing, I'll ask the relevant people to respond.
No, mainly because at MU the academic staff are responsible for initiating the
process. They provide the list - the library reacts. As recently as 4 years ago, the
Coop provided the Library with a master list of course texts, but this ceased due to
competition with other textbook providers, and a consequent reluctance on the part
of the Coop to let the list out of their hands.
RMIT - no, the automatic Bookshop ordering has helped though.
We are working on negotiating Information Access Plans with course convenors
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Survey: Processes for managing Course material provision.
UNSW
UQ
UTS
UWA
VU
Bond
Griffith
La Trobe
which address prescribed readings as one of the criteria. This process is driven by
the Academic Planning Librarians
At UNSW, the university bookshop is used for providing course material.
Academics send their list of textbooks and books that are recommended readings
to the bookshop with their name and course code.
The bookshop checks the Library’s catalogue and the enrolment numbers for the
course code and sends the Library extra copies where necessary according to a
formula we have given them. If the title is “new” the bookshop will send the Library
copies of the title.
UQ Library collaborates closely with UQ Bookshop as they get hold of required
textbook lists faster than the library receives the full reading lists. The Bookshop
checks the library catalogue for existing holdings and then bulk buys for both
themselves and the library (based on a library-defined algorithm).
Our staff no longer request and process entire reading lists for all subjects because
they have established that over 9 years only 6% of items on lists checked were not
already held. Academics are now requested to only submit new material
requirements to the Library. As a result of this new policy some Information
Services staff are checking reading lists to identify new items that have been added
and to ensure they are ordered.
Reading lists for new subjects are accepted and any material not already held is
ordered.
The Library has for some years supplied an optional Reading List template for
academic staff to use.
Yes – Our RLMS enables academic staff to process their own reading lists. The
library does not process the list as such. Academics have the ability to manipulate
their own reading lists. Future upgrades will see the online unit lists and physical
reserve fully integrated.
We have successfully modelled a relationship with our university bookshop based
on a model Monash University's library uses. The bookshop came to us wanting
additional business and we have both really benefited. The Library now has a
standing order with the Bookshop for a set number of copies of new editions
(Bookshop calls these "new adoptions") related to prescribed and recommended
reading.
This has been really positive as it has cut down work endlessly checking lists as
well as produced a better relationship with the bookshop in that we both actively
market the academics and teachers for their reading lists early (with prizes) and
ensure we share any results.
4)
How do your workflows for acquiring course materials (Orders) and
placing copies on Reserve relate to each other? From the academic’s
perspective is this one process or two?
At the point of ordering the item is identified as a course material and details on
course code, lecturer etc added to the order record.
After the item is received and catalogued it is given to staff who deal with Course
reserve who add the item details to the course reserve module.
As far as academics are concerned it is one process.
We are relying on digitised chapters and articles and multiple copies of texts more
than on a physical reserve collection. Academics submit course outlines to one
repository. Faculty Librarians use this infroamtion to purchase texts. Academics
may choose to send lists to our digitisation team for processing. It would be
seamless for our digitisation staff to source lists for the course outline repository,
but we have not been able to resource the digitisation team sufficiently to
systematically digitise all materials listed in course outlines, but have been able to
satisfy specific requests from academics.
Academic’s choice. If the request goes via reserve, the non held titles will be
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automatically passed to Resource Acquisitions for ordering as a priority. The
downside is that their reading list is queued with all the others so it builds in a
delay. Some Academics place requests for items they know the library doesn’t
hold direct with Resource Acquisitions, which makes it two processes for them, but
makes it more likely that the materials will be available.
A reading list is received and orders are placed. Orders for the Reserve collection
have the associated Unit code linked with the order request. When the item is
delivered, it is processed and forwarded to Reserve for addition to the Reserve
collection, using the Unit code originally linked with the order. From the academic's
perspective this is probably seen as one process - but it can be a lengthy one.
Items already held are searched and added to the Reserve collection directly,
presumably seen as a single short process.
RMIT - the purchase request forms include an option for requestor to note whether
an item is to be placed on closed reserve, but staff can also place anything on
reserve at any time.
From the Academic’s perspective, it is one process. The library orders material and
on the lecturer’s advice (ie. from the reading list information) it is placed in 3 hour
or 7 day loan collection.
The workflows for textbooks and recommended readings and placing copies on
Reserve are 2 different workflows from the academic’s point of view. They send the
textbooks and recommended readings to the bookshop and they send the titles for
Reserve to our Reserve team.
Making sure there is not duplication where an academic recommends a book for
Reserve that we do not already hold (and so we order it) and sending the title of
the same book to the bookshop as a textbook is a problem we have not totally
solved yet. The bookshop will send us the same title as, according to the
catalogue, we don’t hold it. We sometimes end up with an extra copy in these
circumstances.
Depending on a number of factors, liaison librarians make the decision as to how to
house the resources for maximum benefit. If resources being ordered are known to
be on a reading list, Liaison Librarians can make a a decision at ordering stage to
house some or all of the resources in the Reserve (we call it High Use) collection.
When these arrive, they will be processed directly to those collections by our
Information Access Service.
Materials are noted by many academic staff as for Closed Reserve or regular loan
when they place an order. This is one process from their perspective. However for
many academics the two processes would be discrete processes. Different Library
departments process CR requests and orders.
Some academics may presume that lodging a reading list with one department will
automatically ensure that the item will be placed in Reserve and copies ordered for
the general collection. Our current system does not guarantee that.
An order that is indicated as being for reserve is placed as a rush order.
Subject Libraries are responsible for checking monographs that have been ordered
as a rush (as these are often for reserve). These items are then processed into
reserve by the subject libraries.
5)
Are students at your university able to access their reading lists online
and link directly to Library records for items and, where appropriate, fulltext?
If this question relates to eReserve (online full-text material) then yes resources on
reading lists are linked to the course reserve record in the catalogue.
If this question relates to access to the digital version of the student’s actual
reading lists, these are not directly linked to the Library records or full text
resources unless the lecturer incorporates the list with links within Blackboard. This
is beginning to occur more often but is not a widespread practice at this stage.
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La Trobe
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UC
UNSW
UQ
UTS
UWA
Bond
Griffith
Students can link from resource lists in their online courses in Learning@Griffith to
digitised resources, and other links created by academics. We are not currently
creating links from descriptions of print resources (books) to the appropriate
catalogue record, so students still need to search the catalogue to find their books.
It is unclear if this question relates to EReserve (online full-text material) or the
access to the digital version of the student’s actual reading lists.
If the former, then Latrobe Library has an EReserve collection which consists of
digitised articles or book chapters and articles linked from full-text online
subscriptions.
If the latter, then “no”, however we do provide access to all Reserve readings via
the Library Catalogue which enable students to ascertain if an item is physically
held in the Reserve collection or if an item has been digitised.
Some academic’s, however, will request the URLs to online resources so that they
can organise a list of weekly readings via WebCT which will link directly to specific
title on the library’s catalogue.
Interactive reading lists....what a great idea. If received as a word file, I'm sure we
could build links into the reading list, but it would be VERY labour intensive. At
MUL, the Library catalogue, and e-Reserve are not integrated. The catalogue
(Voyager) can provide lists of hard copy items held in Reserve for specific courses.
We do this by creating course lists in a Reserve module which is part of the ILMS.
Our e-Reserve contains all digitised copyright material required for a Unit, as well
as scanned reading lists/lecture notes/unit outlines and other full-text items, as
required. Our e-Reserve is an in-house product, not related to the ILMS.
Additionally, WebCT is optionally used by a number of academics to link to records
on e-Reserve. A very small number of e-books normally accessible via the
catalogue have links from e-Reserve as well.
RMIT - no not yet from the official course guide but in some instances the liaison
librarians have worked with academic staff to arrange that linking from the readings
listed on the online learning system
Yes. Students can access their course booklets via WebCT. In some reading lists
there are direct links to web resources (not journal articles). There is also a link
from WebCT direct to e-reserve where students can access course readings
placed by the lecturer.
The bookshop has a simple database on their website where students can input
their course code and find out the titles the academics gave the bookshop. This is
the “reading list”. They cannot link directly to the Library catalogue from the
bookshop website.
Yes, all resources on the reading list are linked to the course reserve record in the
catalogue.
Subject outlines available through UTSONline (Blackboard) or Faculty web pages
do not provide lists of course materials.
The Digital Resource Register does provides direct links to book chapters and
journal articles in e-format from reading lists, and students can check Closed
Reserve holdings by subject number. However there are no other direct links as yet
such as described in the question.
Students can access their reading lists online. This includes the full text of items
that have been requested by academics (within copyright restrictions). We are
using a Hive repository and Reading list management system to provide our course
materials online service. We currently have 23,000 digitised items in the
repository.
6) If reading lists are provided for students by the Library as per 5) how is
responsibility for the accuracy and currency of the data managed?
The Library doesn’t provide reading lists.
Academics create the readings lists. Faculty librarians may advise updates, such
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as editions etc. The digitisation team is responsible to create and maintain the links
from online courses to digitised resources and online resources (library databases
etc) where the academic has requested the service. As mentioned in Q.4 we have
not found staff resources to do this systematically.
Reading lists are not the responsibility of the library they are the responsibility of
the School/Faculty that is teaching the subject. Material required for Reserve must
be requested by academic staff. There are no changes to the records with the
exception of the location code which is managed by the Library system.
If the lists are submitted late then material could potentially be lent out for normal
loan periods. Library staff will recall these books. If books are not able to be
located, the requesting academic is notified. If the academic has a personal copy
of the book they will sometimes lend that to the library to place on Reserve until
either the missing copy is found or another copy purchased. We can also request
an ILDDS loan in order to digitise the required chapter (adhering to copyright
regulations – part VB).
Again, if I'm reading this question correctly, for MUL, the onus for currency is
always the responsibility of the academic. The Library will often work out that more
recent material is available, but there is no mandate for this. With regard to
accuracy, comprehensive checking procedures are built into the acquisition of eReserve items, and the subsequent creation of e-Reserve records. This ensures
copyright compliance, and a reliably cited and delivered product for the end user.
With regard to accuracy of reading lists themselves - direct liaison with the
academic is often the only way to interpret some of the (wish) lists we receive.
RMIT - by the academic
Reading lists are not provided for students by the Library. Accuracy and currency
of the data is not the Library’s initial responsibility.
The academics preparing the lists retain responsibility for the accuracy and
currency of the data, though the liaison librarians will suggest later additions,
corrections if the need rises.
Not applicable at UTS. The responsibility for content and accuracy is held with the
Faculty. How this is ‘managed’ would depend on each Faculty’s internal
arrangements.
Our reading list management tool is designed to be managed directly by the
academic who can edit and manipulate the list. The library is responsible for
overseeing the RLMS in terms of quality control of metadata, copyright compliance
and problem solving any problems.
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