Reference Services Committee
January 11, 2012
Present: Laura Anderson (Rotman), Michelle Baratta (Engineering), Patricia Bellamy
(Acting Faculty Liaison Coordinator), John Bolan (Bora Laskin), Juliya Borie (Robarts),
Richard Carter (St. Michael’s), Chad Crichton (UTSL), Heather Cunningham (Gerstein),
Elsie Del Bianco (Trinity), Monique Flaccavento (OISE), Margaret Fulford (University
College), Helen Ger (Knox), Debbie Green (Robarts), Helen He (Dentistry), Marc
Lalonde (ITS), Joan Links (Media Commons), Judith Logan (Robarts), Suzanne Meyers
Sawa (Music), Mary Reynolds (Regis), Lana Soglasnova (Robarts), Elena Springall
(Gerstein), Joanna Szurmak (UTM), Susanne Tabur (Gerstein), Jennifer Toews (Fisher),
Jenaya Webb (OISE), Jacqueline Whyte Appleby (Scholars Portal), Claire Wollen (BIC),
Gabbi Zaldin (Victoria)
Regrets: Lucy Gan
1. Minutes: Patricia Bellamy
2. Changes to minutes of the last meeting:
Email Joan Links if you want Rita Vine’s addenda to the November meeting’s minutes.
Joan welcomed Clare Wollen and Juliya Borie to the committee.
3. Business arising:
Lib Answers
Susanne Tabur announced that LibAnswers is now up and running. From the UTL
homepage, go to Help / Library FAQ; alternatively, go to the Quick links menu. Susanne
will speak in greater detail about LibAnswers at a future Reference Services meeting.
New Chairperson
Michelle Baratta volunteered to serve as the next chairperson for the committee,
beginning in February; however, she will miss the June meeting. Joan Links has already
arranged the agenda for the next few months:
 February: Klara Maidenberg will speak about Ask: Chat with a Librarian
 March: Alastair Boyd will outline the Serials Solutions process
The committee gave a round of applause for Joan Links’s tenure as committee chair for
these past three years.
4. Harnessing New Tools / Joanna Szurmak and Lauren De Monte (not present)
Joanna Szurmak presented Harnessing New Tools, a prezi presentation that she and
Lauren presented at the TRY Conference last year, on the process of creating videos for
chat and in-person reference.
a) The Example
Joanna showed a brief video on identifying the parts of a citation as an example of a
student help video. This video took less than 60 minutes to make.
b) The Motivation
UTML added their chat widget on every single UTML page. As a result, chat questions
increased by 800%! Many were research questions. Since the librarians and reference
technicians on the UTML reference desk run chat, chat staff needed scripts as a way to
respond to simpler questions.
Joanna did a literature search and discovered many relevant articles, such as “Screen
casting as a reference tool.1” Here are some tips gleaned from the literature:
 Screencasts must be less than two minutes
 A one minute script differs from a four minute script
 Screencasts are (almost) disposable
 Screenshots can also be used as a tool.
 The University of Michigan uses Jing to create videos on the fly.
 You have to have a person who creates videos, reviews them, and updates them
on an ongoing basis.
c) The Process
The process is quick:
 Plan the need, the script, and develop the content.
 Film. Use free stuff: Screenr, Blueberry Express, Screencast-O-Matic, Camtasia
Relay (free for UofT folks). Not free stuff: Camtasia Studio, etc.
 Share: YouTube
d) The Challenge
Keeping up, being creative.
e) Discussion
Jacqueline Whyte Appleby noted that Scholars Portal staff often use Jing with vendors
in response to their frequent reply to technical problems, “Well it’s working for me.”
Jing can then capture how a resource is not working.
Marc Lalonde asked would we like a chat icon on every UTL web page? Joan Links
reminded us that chat is on the agenda next month.
Carr, Allison and Pearl Ly. “’More than Words:’ Screencasting as a Reference Tool.”
Reference Services Review (January 2009) 37 (4): 408-420.
http://simplelink.library.utoronto.ca/url.cfm/226195
1
5. Report from ITS – Marc Lalonde
YaCy: The Peer to Peer Search Engine
ITS now has the YaCy search engine that allows us to crawl all of the UofT Libraries
web space, including LibGuides and staff searches, which were not previously searched.
We can then present this information to our users when they search the All tab. A staff
member search will now include name, department, job title, etc. To ensure YaCy can
work effectively, the title element in your html markup must reflect the content of the
page. Include possible search words in your title—this is especially important for
LibGuides. Marc will send out a memo on this.
360 MARC records service
Many older mini-bib records have been replaced by better MARC records in the library
catalogue. ITS has also loaded about 300,000 360 MARC e-books records. Since older
EIR records will be carefully removed from the library catalogue, you may find two
records for e-books. This is a temporary situation.
What will happen to the simple links? Marc will look into this.
Shelf Location Service
Shelf location for books for Robarts Library only went live today. If you would like this
service for your library, please contact Sian. The shelf containing the item is
highlighted in red. (In response to a question, Marc will provide the name of the
software at a later date.)
6. First Stop Database List
Lots of discussion. The following suggestions were made:
 Add a single entry point for EBSCO
 Add IBSS, PsycInfo, and Summon, Periodicals Index Online, CBCA, CPI,
Engineering Village (to include GeoBase)
 Remove Ulrich’s. It is not comparable to the other large databases
 DOAJ, Internet Archive, Scholars Portal Books, and JSTOR all fall into large
collections and should be separated out
 Add ProQuest Dissertations & Theses as it is relevant across disciplines
 Others questioned DOAJ, but PubMed (used more than OVID) should be added
 Remove Art Abstracts, Business Source Premier, FADIS, Gender Studies
Database
 Marc will move the Subjects A-Z up to the top.
Others asked what is the purpose of the page: to give quick access to popular databases
or to give access to the large multidisciplinary databases? Popular is a misnomer—call
it interdisciplinary or some other name that students will understand.
Debbie Green, Judith Logan and Patricia Bellamy will take this conversation and create
a new list to take to the Web Advisory Committee.
7. UTL Homepage defaults
Should the UTL homepage default to the library catalogue or to ALL?
There was consensus that the ALL default should remain. If your library would prefer
to default to the library catalogue page, contact Marc for the necessary link.
Margaret Fulford proposed that we consider having the library catalogue results
display first in the results of an All tab search. Opinion was divided and a quick show of
hands indicated that the room was roughly half. Marc proposed that this be forwarded
to Sian for a reply.
8. RACER LibGuide
Jacqueline Whyte Appleby asked reference staff for comments on Scholars Portal’s new
LibGuide on Racer and the related FAQs. Are there any questions not covered?
Using RACER
http://guides.scholarsportal.info/RACER
RACER Frequently Asked Questions
http://guides.scholarsportal.info/content.php?pid=274449&sid=2262958
9. Additional suggestions
Joan proposed that we invited Larry Alford to a future meeting.
Meeting adjourned.
Next meeting: February 8, 2012 at 9:30 a.m., Alice Moulton Room.