N. Burckel; M. Frenn, Chair; J. Kirk, recording; S. Lamon; D. Neuman; H. Schweizer; M. Seitz;
J. South; K. Walker; Jamie Wu (for Beth Feste)
The Chair, Dr. Marilyn Frenn, called the meeting to order in the Dean’s Conference Room
in Raynor Library at 3:00 pm.
The minutes of the November 29, 2004 meeting were approved as distributed.
Governance Task Force Revision of the Board’s Description
Dr. Frenn had shared the revision of the description of the University Library Board by the
Governance Task Force with Board members and had asked for any concerns or suggestions.
She did not receive any suggestions for changes; therefore, she informed the Task Force that the
Board was agreeable to the revision.
Major Elements of Strategic Plan required of all deans and vice presidents
Burckel reviewed the guidelines for creation of strategic plans, which are required of all
deans. He also distributed a copy of the Libraries’ draft for the Board’s information.
Expensive Journal Review
Kirk discussed the current review of very expensive journals for which the subscription cost
is over $10,000 per year. Last year, a list of twelve expensive journals was distributed to
the Board and of these, three (3) were selected for cancellation review by faculty during the
Spring Semester. Online use statistics were gathered and six departments for which the
journals are received were contacted. To date, no department has questioned plans to
cancel these three journals. Funds saved by these cancellations will be used to purchase
other journals, to pay for increases in subscription costs of other journals and to provide
interlibrary loan and document delivery of articles from the cancelled journals. The
savings from the cancellation of these three journals will allow faculty and graduate students to
request approximately 1500 articles from these three journals via document delivery during
2006.
Migration From Print to Electronic Access for Journals
Many academic libraries in the United States are in the process of migration of most of their
journals from print to online journal subscriptions. Publishers see online or electronic
journals as the future of journal publishing and during the past five years, they have been
struggling with the development of a pricing model to support this transition. The model
most publishers have chosen consists of offering print and online versions of their journals as
separate subscriptions. Libraries subscribing to both versions of a journal pay a surcharge
for the duplication in content of 15-100%.
The Medical College of Wisconsin Library only receives ten percent of their total journal
holdings in print. Drexel University Library has reduced its print subscriptions to less
than 500. Fordham University has cancelled most of their print subscriptions as well.
While the migration from print to online journal access was occurring, Fordham, Drexel and
Marquette have more than doubled user access to the journal literature by adding online
journals. The Marquette Libraries now provide access to over 15,000 journals with over
12,000 linked in the online catalog.
To be better stewards of University funds, we need to reduce our expenditures for multiple
formats, and to this end Libraries’ staff are reviewing journals received in multiple formats.
The plan is to convert most subscriptions to the online version and cancel the print version.
Print subscriptions would only be converted, if there is a contractual commitment for the provision
of an online archive of the journal. Online journals have the advantage of ubiquity and
many provide content weeks and months before the print is distributed.
E-Reserve and Authentication
The Libraries have provided access to electronic reserve materials for the last few years.
These materials have not been totally secure from access via the Web. To provide security
for this collection, the Libraries are considering moving it behind the campus firewall after the
end of the spring semester. The Libraries are investigating the functionality of the new
course management software, D2L. Class reserve staff will be able to provide scanned
articles for placement in D2L by faculty.
Election of Chairperson
Dr. Michael Gillespie was elected Chair of the University Library Board.
The meeting was adjourned at 3:03 pm.
The date and time of the next meeting will be determined, when faculty fall teaching
schedules are finalized.
