Category: Universitywide

Central Technical Services Participates in Big Ten Academic Alliance Cataloging Partnership

Libraries operate on the premise of cooperation and support. Technical services, in particular, embodies this ideal, as evidenced by international union catalogs such as OCLC’s WorldCat and programs like the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC), which contribute catalog records that are created to specific standards that are shared with other libraries, ensuring an efficient, accurate, and timely workflow.

One of the most challenging aspects of cataloging is handling foreign languages, especially when in-house expertise is lacking. Outsourcing materials is costly and a challenge when funding isn’t available. Hiring someone short-term to handle a gift isn’t always feasible or productive. The Big Ten Academic Alliance (BTAA) recently instituted a partnership to solve this problem in a collaborative and cost effective way.

Catalogers from Central Technical Services (CTS) are participating in the BTAA Cataloging Partnership, a collaboration between 12 of the 14 BTAA institutions’ libraries to cooperatively share cataloging expertise for languages and formats. The partnership, coordinated by The University of Chicago, enables participants to leverage expertise across their libraries and is effective for the next two years (July 1, 2016–June 3, 2018).

Here’s a broad overview of how the partnership works and the benefits to Rutgers:

Step One – take inventory, create a work plan

The first step was to conduct an inventory of language expertise and needs, plus format expertise and needs. A spreadsheet with this information was compiled that includes a proposed work plan that details which institutions will handle what work. Rutgers will contribute expertise in Hungarian, Polish, and Hindi, as well as music scores.

Source: https://sites.psu.edu/librarynews/2016/08/01/big-ten-academic-alliance-cataloging-partnership-formed/

Step Two – develop a work flow

Materials cataloged for the partnership are sent via the BTAA’s Uborrow interlibrary loan program to hold down costs. All resources are marked by a purple band that stays on them until they are cataloged and returned to the owning institution. Cataloging can be done either using Resource Description and Access (RDA), the prevailing cataloging standard, or AACR2 (RDA’s predecessor). Materials will receive copy cataloging or original cataloging treatment, and all work is done using OCLC’s Connexion cataloging client. Catalogers will follow the BIBCO* Standard Record (BSR), which emphasizes access points over description. Participating libraries are required to commit to a minimum of ten hours of cataloging per month (ten hours per institution, not ten hours per cataloger).

Step Three – stay in touch and assess

A discussion list has been established for the heads of technical services at each participating institution, and there is a monthly conference call to discuss progress, concerns, etc. Statistics are submitted online monthly via a Google documents form and include language, format, number of titles cataloged (titles, not volumes, are counted), and any anomalies encountered while cataloging.

Outcomes

Thanks to this collaborative program, we will be able to catalog dozens of foreign language publications, exposing these valuable resources and making them discoverable. We have already sent Persian and Hebrew books to Maryland, Belarussian books to Northwestern, and Greek books to the University of Minnesota. Michigan will catalog 130 Arabic books and 72 serials for Rutgers later in 2016.

We are also providing cataloging for many of our peer libraries. To date, Rutgers is cataloging 32 music scores for the University of Chicago and 25 Hungarian books from the University of Illinois. Rutgers will also receive 100 Polish books to catalog from Michigan and Hindi books from Northwestern.

Roman Frackowski, Bela Gupta, Julianna (Kati) Ritter, and Catherine Sauceda are providing cataloging for Rutgers and Mary Beth Weber is Rutgers’ point person for the partnership. If you have questions about this program or the materials that are being processed, please contact Mary Beth.

*BIBCO is a program within the PCC that contributes high quality bibliographic records for books.

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September 29, 2016

Don’t Miss Your Open Enrollment Benefits Fairs

As recently announced, University Human Resources (UHR) will host a series of Open Enrollment Benefits Fairs throughout the month of October to educate employees about their SHBP benefits options, as well as other benefits and services that are available and may be of interest.

Save the date and plan to attend the Open Enrollment Benefit Fair that is most convenient for you:

Rutgers University/ Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences (RBHS) New Brunswick
Oct. 10, 2016, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.	Medical Education Building, 1 Robert Wood Johnson Pl.
Rutgers University – New Brunswick/Piscataway
Oct. 11, 2016, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.	Rutgers Student Center, College Avenue Campus
Oct. 20, 2016, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.	Busch Student Center, Busch Campus
Rutgers University – Camden
Oct. 13, 2016, 10 a.m. – 2:30 p.m.	Athletic and Fitness Center, 301 Linden St.
Rutgers University – Newark
Oct. 19, 2016, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.	Paul Robeson Campus Center, 350 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
Rutgers University – Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences (RBHS) Newark
Oct. 25, 2016, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.	Medical Science Building, 185 South Orange Ave.

Contact the Benefits Administration staff with questions regarding benefits at (848) 932-3990 or via email at benefits@hr.rutgers.edu.

September 27, 2016

Quick Takes on Events & News – October 2016

Save the date for State of the Libraries – December 7, 2016

Many more details will follow, but please save the date of December 7 for the 2016 State of the Libraries. The program will begin with poster presentations at 10:30 a.m., lunch will be served around noon, and presentations by Krisellen Maloney and others at 1 p.m. The event will take place at the Busch Campus Center, so hopefully this schedule will allow many of our colleagues from Camden and Newark to avoid the brunt of rush hour traffic.

Judy Cohn to be a mentor in the 2016-2017 NLM/AAHSL Leadership Fellows Program

Congratulations to Judy Cohn who has been selected as a mentor in the 2016-2017 NLM/AAHSL Leadership Fellows Program, sponsored by the National Library of Medicine and the Association of Academic Health Sciences Libraries. The Program prepares emerging leaders for director positions in academic health sciences libraries through a year-long mentoring relationship with a director of another library and a curriculum focused on developing leadership knowledge critical to enhancing the value of libraries in their institutions.

In this highly competitive program, Judy will be one of ten fellows and mentors from academic health sciences libraries across the U.S. who will begin their work together in November. Since the program began in 2002, 42% of all fellow graduates have assumed director positions.

President Barchi mentions Libraries’ capital construction projects in Report to the University Senate

Excerpt: “University Libraries: The University has also launched an in-depth master plan for the university libraries. Libraries have changed their mission; we are looking to align them with what students want and need today, including better computing resources, collaborative areas, and other amenities. Individual projects have been identified and designs are under way for a new OIT computer center at Alexander Library in New Brunswick and a Professional Development and Scholarship Center in Dana Library in Newark.”

Read the complete report here.

“The centipede party,” 40 inches by 42 inches, oil painting by BFA student Audrey Meehan. This will be on view at the Mason Gross Galleries.

Art Library participating in The Co-Cureate Show

Undergraduate and graduate visual arts students are teaming up to conceptualize and install a collection of eight student exhibits at three locations across the New Brunswick campus: the Mason Gross Galleries, Rutgers Art Library, and Douglass Student Center. The co-cureate shows (the title is a mash-up of what the initiative has prompted teams to engage in: conceive, curate and create exhibits) are set to run from Thursday, September 29 through Monday, October 17, 2016. The shows will feature student performances, paintings, photographs, sculptures, media, and prints. Admission is free.

The Art Library will host In Search of Punchline is curated by Johanna Boyce, Audrey Meehan, and Ed Weisgerber and features the work of Johanna Boyce, Erin Keane, Audrey Meehan, Carlyn Perlow, Delfina Picchio, and Ed Weisgerber.

New Brunswick Music Scene Symposium Planned for October 27, 2016

Save the date. Special Collections and University Archives will hold the next New Brunswick Music Scene Archive symposium on October 27, 6 p.m. in the Teleconference Lecture Hall at Alexander Library. Stay tuned for more information, including the participants. In the meantime, here’s a look back at the 2015 symposium, featuring a who’s who of New Jersey music (http://www.libraries.rutgers.edu/news/symposium-local-notables-inaugurate-new-brunswick-music-scene-archive).

Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries at Douglass Library is hosting Laura Anderson Barbata: Collaborations Beyond Borders through December 16. Credit: Laura Anderson Barbata. — Credit: Laura Anderson Barbata.

Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries Welcomes “Laura Anderson Barbata: Collaborations beyond Borders”

This fall, the Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries in the Mabel Smith Douglass Library will welcome the 2016-17 Estelle Lebowitz Endowed Visiting Artist Exhibition, Laura Anderson Barbata: Collaborations Beyond Borders. The exhibit contains selected highlights of textile, sculptural, 2-dimensional, and video works from the traveling exhibition Transcommunality.

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September 27, 2016

Transforming the Way We Work at Rutgers

The new administrative information systems under Cornerstone are scheduled to go live over the next week. Cornerstone is the University’s strategic approach to unify, upgrade, and streamline its administrative information systems for Finance, Human Resources and Payroll, Procurement, etc. Upgrading and improving these systems will significantly improve how we work and collaborate across the university. These projects are also particularly exciting to the library because they will enable all of our units to finally utilize the same systems for administrative functions.

Be on the look-out for future announcements about process updates and training opportunities related to this implementation. If you have any questions about how the new systems may or may not impact you, please see your local business staff.

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September 27, 2016
Predatory Publishing: Rutgers Alcohol Library in Conversation with Jeffrey Beall

Faculty are inundated with email invitations to publish in scholarly journals or to serve on their editorial boards. Many of these solicitations are completely valid, but an increasing number of these journals are engaging in predatory publishing practices.

Predatory publishing, a term coined by Jeffrey Beall, a librarian and associate professor at the University of Colorado, Denver, is an unwanted and undesirable side effect of the open access movement and Beall has become widely known as the “go-to guy” when it comes to checking the validity, authenticity, or value of these invitations.

Beall maintains several resources that are great tools for promotion boards, hiring committees, and, as it turns out, librarians. The renowned Beall’s List of predatory publishers lists “potential, possible, or probable predatory scholarly Open-access publishers,” on his Scholarly Open access blog. Additionally, Beall maintains a list of standalone journals and a list of criteria—covering everything from editors, staff, and business management to transparency, integrity, journal standards, and publishing practices—for identifying predatory Open-access publishers.

The Rutgers Center of Alcohol Studies (CAS) has been a frequent users of Beall’s list, since nationally and internationally recognized researchers at the Center are primary targets of invitations to participate in scholarly communication in various ways. Addiction science has been experiencing an influx of new journals and conferences, akin to health sciences.

Judit Ward and William Bejarano have been monitoring this trend in the field at CAS and had the opportunity to interview Beall at the annual conference of the Substance Abuse Librarians & Information Specialists and the Association of Mental Health Librarians in May 2016 in Denver.

In the July issue of The Agenda, we invited you to read part one of this interview in the Center of Alcohol Studies Information Services Newsletter, in which Beall explains how he became involved in the growing area of predatory publishing, discusses the most vulnerable groups in academia, and gives an update of the current situation. Part two, focusing on topics of greater interest for librarians, is now available in SALIS News. Beall advocates for educating users about not only predatory publishing, but also the various forms of open access and publishing standards, so that they can avoid the traps of predatory publishers.

– RU Alcohol Library

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September 27, 2016
Quick Takes on Events & News – September 2016

Making Rowan University and Camden County College Students Feel Welcome

Through a partnership agreement, Paul Robeson Library is now the campus library for Rowan University and Camden County College students. Bart Everts is the library liaison for these students and has started a new Facebook page to share information about their library privileges and resources. The agreement allows students to access the library, use library databases, and check out books using their student ID cards. Robeson also has computers reserved for their use.

Morroe Berger–Benny Carter Jazz Research Fund

Each year the Institute of Jazz Studies (IJS) awards up to ten grants of $1,000 each to assist jazz researchers. Half of the awards are designated for students in the Rutgers University-Newark Master’s Program in Jazz History and Research and half are awarded to scholars from other institutions or unaffiliated researchers to enable them to visit IJS in conjunction with their projects. To date, we have given more than 70 awards to scholars and students worldwide working in a variety of disciplines, including jazz history, musicology, bibliography, and discography.

Applications for the 2017 grants are due October 21, 2016. Awards will be announced by November 14.

“Homecoming! Some Highlights from the Library of J. Milton French” at Alexander Library

Homecoming! Some Highlights from the Library of J. Milton French is on display now in the Scholarly Communication Center at Alexander Library. This case exhibit features a selection of volumes recently donated to Rutgers by the family of J. Milton French (1895–1962), a Milton scholar and professor of English at the university from 1940 to 1960.

The books on display include rare first and early editions of works by John Harington, Richard Barckley, Michael Drayton, Ben Jonson, John Suckling, George Wither, William Wollaston, and John Milton.

New Brunswick Music Scene Symposium Planned for October 27, 2016

Save the date. Special Collections and University Archives will hold the next New Brunswick Music Scene Archive symposium on October 27, 6 p.m. in the Teleconference Lecture Hall at Alexander Library. Stay tuned for more information, including the participants. In the meantime, here’s a look back at the 2015 symposium, featuring a who’s who of New Jersey music (http://www.libraries.rutgers.edu/news/symposium-local-notables-inaugurate-new-brunswick-music-scene-archive).

Credit: Laura Anderson Barbata.

Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries Welcomes “Laura Anderson Barbata: Collaborations beyond Borders”

This fall, the Mary H. Dana Women Artists Series Galleries in the Mabel Smith Douglass Library will welcome the 2016-17 Estelle Lebowitz Endowed Visiting Artist Exhibition, Laura Anderson Barbata: Collaborations Beyond Borders. The exhibit contains selected highlights of textile, sculptural, 2-dimensional, and video works from the traveling exhibition Transcommunality.

“Peep Show: Books from the Art Library X Room” Exhibit at Rutgers Art Library

Megan Lotts has raided the X Room to put on a case display of beautiful, surprising, amusing, and impressive books.

Stop by to get a taste of the treasures that reside in the Rutgers Art Library’s archives.

Location: Rutgers Art Library

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September 1, 2016
The Final Report on Latino Americans: 500 Years of History
Latino Americans: 500 Years of History was made possible through a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Library Association.

Rutgers University Libraries recently concluded the ALA-funded program Latino Americans: 500 Years of History. Over the course of a year, Rutgers and other scholars led 17 PBS film screening discussions about the experience of Latinos in New Jersey in collaboration with Rutgers University Libraries, the Nilsa L. Cruz-Perez Branch of the Camden County Library, New Brunswick Free Public Library, and the Newark Public Library.

Beyond the film showings in Spanish and English, project partners offered exhibits, book talks, lectures, and special celebrations. Highlights include A Day of the Dead Celebration and Cinco de Mayo festivities in New Brunswick showcasing a variety of performances and children’s activities; a Cuban musical concert by renowned singer Gema Corredera; the exhibit “Beyond Exile: Cubans in New Jersey” at the Newark Public Library, including a keynote address by Lisando Pérez; and two separate exhibitions at the Rutgers Art Library, Ilya Genin’s “Photographs of Cuban Revolution 50 Years Later,” and “From Island to Ocean: Caribbean and Pacific Dialogues by Fidalis Buehler and Juana Valdes.”

As project director Nancy Kranich notes in the final report on this initiative, this program allowed Rutgers University Libraries to become “a catalyst for bringing together scholars and organizations involved with the New Jersey Latino American experience and encouraging more attention to documenting it. The grant enabled us to take a more assertive role in building and strengthening relationships with local Latino communities and the scholars, organizations, and public libraries that interact with them.”

Kranich also lists several other outcomes that may be of interest to our colleagues:
- Several new items were added to Special Collections, including several leaflets of unpublished poetry by Newark poet Pablo Le Riverend, clippings of anti-Castro activities in Hudson County, Sarah Hirschman’s papers covering People & Stories/Gente y Cuentos.
- The publisher and owner of Impacto, published in the 1960s, donated 99 issues of the publication to Rutgers University.
- 15 Latino clubs are Rutgers are planning to learn how to organize and preserve their own records in conjunction with Rutgers University Libraries’ archivists.
- Two possible books are in discussion: a history of Latinos in NJ and an anthology of unpublished documents about Latino migrant workers in NJ and the United States.
- The New Brunswick Free Public Library and Rutgers University Libraries are discussing partnering again on another ALA public programming grant proposal.
- A deeper understanding of the Latino collections in the state and increased participation in depositing scholarly works into our Rutgers Inclusion and Diversity Research Portal.
For additional information about this program, please visit the project LibGuide

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September 1, 2016
Introducing Full Text Finder
On August 18 the Libraries upgraded to Full Text Finder, EBSCO’s newest holdings and link management tool designed to replace its A-to-Z and LinkSource services, which are being phased out. A-to-Z is the product that powers the Libraries’ electronic journals search. LinkSource is the product that powers its link resolver service (locally known as “Get it @ R”). You may notice some changes to these interfaces. Below is a quick summary of what to expect.

The new e-journals search interface is a little cleaner, better organized, and offers a variety of new features including:
- Responsive autocomplete to facilitate known title searching
- Discipline-specific browsing to help users identify titles in their subject area
- Filters to refine results by subject, format, or publisher
Click to enlarge.

The new link resolver menu has been streamlined to help users determine the availability of an item faster, more efficiently, and with less confusion. New features include:
- Improved menu layout and design
- Intuitive labels and icons
- Real-time catalog lookup for print holdings
- Fail-safe options in case of link resolver error
Click to enlarge.

Please be sure to update any guides or tutorials that refer to these products. Links to the old A-to-Z Journals and Citation Linker pages have automatically been updated in LibGuides, but you may want to double check your guides just to be sure.

As with any software migration, you may notice some irregularities as we work to resolve temporary glitches. If you have any questions or wish to report a technical problem, please contact serials@rutgers.libanswers.com.

Special thanks to the Serials Team for their work migrating our holdings data as well as the Web Team for their help customizing the design of the interface.
August 29, 2016
Changes to the Rutgers University Photo Gallery Policy
A recent policy change means that high resolution images from the Rutgers University Photo Gallery are now available free of charge for Rutgers projects.

Douglass Library. Nick Romanenko/Rutgers University

The gallery offers access to professional images of Rutgers buildings, faculty, staff, and students. Previously, low resolution images (72 dots per inch, suitable for projects such as PowerPoint presentations, email newsletters, and webpages) were available for free download, while high resolution images (300 dots per inch, suitable for print projects such as flyers, posters, and brochures) had to be purchased for $20 each. Now, however, because of changes due to RCM, the high resolution images are also available at no cost to the Rutgers community.

Finding the perfect image for your project is as simple as following these three easy steps:
1. Log in to the gallery using your NetID and password.
2. Browse through the categories to identify a photo you like.
3. For low resolution images, read and accept the terms and conditions to download the image immediately; or, for high resolution images, contact photo archivist Jane Hart with the file name and how you intend to use the photo.
In the event that you can’t find an image you like in the gallery, you may request access to the University Communications and Marketing Photo Archive, which contains thousands of additional photos for your perusal. Contact Jane for access to the archive.

For more information, visit University Communications and Marketing’s guide to finding photos.

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August 25, 2016

Quick Takes on Events & News – August 2016

Libraries’ Wordsmith Wins National Slogan Contest

Mary Beth Weber won the ALCTS Slogal Contest for her slogan, “Creating the future, preserving the past.” This slogan will be used during the 60th anniversary celebration of ALCTS in 2017. In addition to bragging rights, Mary Beth also received a prize of registration for CE webinars valued at $350. Congratulations Mary Beth!

“Peep Show: Books from the Art Library X Room” Exhibit at Rutgers Art Library

Megan Lotts has raided the X Room to put on a case display of beautiful, surprising, amusing, and impressive books.

Stop by to get a taste of the treasures that reside in the Rutgers Art Library’s archives.

Location: Rutgers Art Library

It’s Getting Hot in Here

Late in July, America faced record temperatures outside and Smith Library in Newark was no exception. With the A/C out for several days, the librarians and staff had to come up with new ways to keep their cool. Here, a short haiku on the experience:

The books are burning!
Librarians are weeping…
The heat is too much.

– Sarah Jewell

Communications Tip – Using Rutgers Go to Shorten URLs

Want a short, trackable URL to use in an email or social media post? There are many URL shorteners on the market including goo.gl, bitly, and ow.ly, but go.rutgers.edu offers something the others can’t–an actual Rutgers URL to make your link appear official and trustworthy. This service allows Rutgers users to quickly and easily shorten a URL and track how many times that URL is viewed.

For example, in a social media post over the weekend, I shortened a URL for a news story in the Keene Sentinel from http://www.sentinelsource.com/news/local/in-a-wired-world-local-libraries-turn-page-to-the/article_615d127a-ac0a-5f4e-904d-fb0a595a39ea.html to http://go.rutgers.edu/rhuu643k. Checking in today, I can see that link has been used 129 times since July 30.

While I used the same shortened URL on both Facebook and Twitter, I could have created separate shortened URLs for each social media site to track the relative traffic. I did this for an earlier post about the New Brunswick Music Scene Archive, which allowed me to see the number of views on each platform (162 for Twitter, 7 for Facebook).

I highly recommend you try out go.rutgers.edu if you have not already done so.

–Jessica Pellien

New Brunswick Music Scene Symposium Planned for October 27, 2016

Full Text Finder Training

This fall the Rutgers Libraries will be migrating to Full Text Finder, EBSCO’s newest holdings and link management tool designed to replace its A-to-Z and LinkSource services, which are being phased out. A-to-Z is the product that powers the Libraries’ electronic journals search. LinkSource is the product that powers its link resolver service (locally known as “Get it @ R”). Although the basic functionality of these tools has not changed much, we have taken the opportunity to introduce a few custom modifications that we hope will simplify the process of finding full-text articles and improve the overall user experience. If you’d like to learn more about Full Text Finder and the upcoming changes, feel free to attend one of the 30 minute drop-in sessions scheduled in August. Videoconferencing to Dana, Robeson, and Smith is available upon request.

Full Text Finder Information Sessions

August 4 @ 2 p.m. — LSM Conference Room, Library of Science & Medicine
August 8 @ 2 p.m. — Pane Room, Alexander Library
August 11 @ 2 p.m. — Pane Room, Alexander Library

Buttons! Buttons for Everyone!

Sample buttons v2 — Custom buttons are now available from the Communications Department.

The buttons we mentioned in the July issue of The Agenda proved a popular giveaway at the New Student Orientations in New Brunswick. This is a relatively low-cost and fun way to run a promotion or to market something at the Libraries. If you are interested in borrowing our machine for a project, please make sure to purchase the supplies that are available here. We’re happy to train you or your student workers on how to create buttons.

You’ve Got People, Now What?

August 3, 2016
9 a.m. – 1 p.m.NEW DATE!

This course is ideal for new and experienced managers, supervisors, and administrators who have direct reports and would like to apply their knowledge of personal styles to flexibly manage their staff.

Location: Pane Room, 1st floor, Alexander Library

RSVP: Erica Parin on behalf of the Professional Development Committee

Manager as Leader – Developing Staff

August 30, 2016
9 a.m. – 12 p.m.

This course is ideal for managers, supervisors, and administrators who would like to sharpen their situational leadership skills and discover how flexible and effective they are in a variety of situations with staff.

Location: Pane Room, 1st floor, Alexander Library

RSVP: Erica Parin on behalf of the Professional Development Committee

July 31, 2016