Technical Services Monthly Report
April 2005
DIVISION-WIDE ACTIVITIES:
Ann Ercelawn, Zora Breeding, Chris Waldrop, and Roberta Winjum,
among others, attended a demo of Verde, Ex Libris' electronic resource
management system.
Sue Davis and Roberta Winjum attended a demonstration by Jody
Combs of the LOCKSS software (Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe), which was
developed at Stanford as a preservation method for e-journals. Sue will become
involved in the library’s participation in the LOCKSS project.
The annual performance review process was completed on time
by the end of the month.
PERSONNEL ACTIVITIES AND EVENTS:
Roberta Winjum served as one of the panelists, along with
professors Robert Barsky and Larry Marnett, for the Open Access at VU meeting.
Several staff in TS were able to attend. Roberta also attended a Public
Relations/Communication workshop for College of Arts and Science faculty, where
she gave a brief introduction to the VU e-Archive.
Mary Charles Lasater conducted additional NACO training at
Vanderbilt for the Middle and East Tennessee Funnel participants. Many members
of the CAT team attended the section on geographic names to refresh their
skills with the newer training documentation.
We are always glad of such structured training opportunities. Thank you, Mary Charles.
Mary Charles Lasater participated in a panel discussion on the Tennessee
NACO funnel project at the Tennessee Library Association meeting in Nashville.
Ann Ercelawn conducted a serials workshop as a pre-conference for
the Alabama Library Association.
Don Jones attended the Kickoff Meeting for the 2005 Faculty Staff
Campaign.
Gina Berry began working in CAT on April 11th. She is off to a great start. Becky Atack has been her principal trainer
and reviewer.
Michael Scott has accepted a cataloging position at Yale. Congratulations, Michael!! We are very proud to have given you the
experience so prized by our more prestigious colleagues but are terribly sad to
lose such a valued member of our team.
Michael's last day will be Friday, May 13th.
Many TS staff volunteered to help with the Central library book
sale. Several team members attended the
Google Scholar brown bag conducted by Janice Adlington and Melinda Brown. A few attended the Open Access at Vanderbilt
panel discussion.
CATALOGING AND AUTHORITIES:
CAT made a few subject reassignments this month. Mary Charles Lasater took over responsibility
for Government Information cataloging for materials NOT received through the
depository agreement. Ann Ercelawn
will take over English (3100) serials. Zora Breeding will take on partial
responsibility for French materials. All
subject assignments can be found at:
Jeff Taylor processed a batch of new VU theses, and a number of
new electronic theses. Pete Wilson
cataloged a number of manuscript collections for Special Collections. Michael Scott cataloged more of the Cuban
materials. The Japanese set of Godzilla
DVDs and a Godzilla bust were waiting for Yuh-Fen Benda upon her return from a
visit to Taiwan.
Zora Breeding, Mary Charles Lasater, Ann Ercelawn and Jean Wright
met with Amy Stewart-Mailhiot to discuss cataloging support for Government
Information. In addition to support for
new acquisitions, there continues to be a great deal of clean-up work that is
needed.
Many team members have begun using Connexion for cataloging on
OCLC. Some of us are just using it
enough to become familiar and others are using it exclusively. Reliability and speed are still serious
issues with the new software. In preparation for Connexion, Zora Breeding updated
some OCLC logons and deleted 21 old authorizations that have not been used in
years.
Zora Breeding organized a webcast and telephone conference call
session on using Connexion for NACO work that was offered by OCLC. The session included participants from about
30 NACO libraries. Several CAAG and CAT
members attended.
Statistics:
TS totals: 2521 new titles cataloged.
CAT totals: 1677 new titles cataloged, 337 of which were original
contributions or national level enhancements to the OCLC database and 814 were
modified locally.
We recataloged 147 titles and reconned 5 titles.
Marcive delivered 5745 new or modified authority records.
721 name, 316 subject and 121 series headings were changed on
Acorn bibliographic records (not part of new cataloging activity). 118 authority records deleted.
Copy cataloging is working on materials received on 4/22.
ORDER
SERVICES:
Statistics:
In the month of April, Order Services received and processed:
Serials/Periodicals: 3115
Approvals: 1053
Added to Acorn:
SSO's: 100
Gifts: 91
OS received 1994 requests, created 2059 new orders, and Speed
Cataloged 841 titles. Requests are up
since last month as we race toward the end of the fiscal year
***Bibliographers have until May 31 to submit routine orders to
OS for ordering in the 2004/05 fiscal year***
Invoices: Invoices and materials for firm orders and continuations are current. Approval invoices are fairly up to date, as well:
French approvals - no invoices
Russian approvals - 2 invoices, totaling $350
German approvals - one invoice,
$1154
Latin American approvals - the materials we are currently
processing were received within April, and are with vendors who have been
prepaid.
BBS approvals - we are in the process of paying the invoices for last
week's shipment of approvals (we expect to have them paid by the end of this
week), leaving us with just this week's shipment's invoices waiting to be
paid.
Following Gina Berry's departure for the Cataloging Team, all of
her subject areas are currently being handled by the existing alternates, with
the exception of the Russian approvals - Gina will continue to process those
for the time being.
We enjoyed a visit with John Laraway (Blackwell’s Book Services);
we discussed our BBS approvals and firm orders.
PRESERVATION:
A new book digitizing service is available from Mid Atlantic
Bookbindery. ICI, its parent company,
has purchased the Kirtas automated digitizing scanner in addition to more
standard scanners. If you are
interested in this service, contact Sue Davis for information, including a
price list.
Sue Davis consulted with Flo Wilson and Peg Earheart about Annex
lighting.
The biosafety hood received its annual inspection and was
recertified with flying colors.
Charlotte Lew will be on vacation from May 25-June 21. We will provide limited repair service while
she is gone.
Machelle Keen is still under physical restrictions per her
doctor's orders. But she is working
almost full time once again, and we are glad she is so much better.
Binding:
684 monographs
56 rebinds
609 periodicals
139 serials
1488 volumes total
1035 new Central paperbacks sorted and 497selected for
immediate binding (48%).
34 monographs rebarcoded in
preparation for binding
We had spotted a few quality issues with specific volumes in a
March shipment, but a bindery representative corrected the errors quickly and
readily during a visit. We are still
pleased with the high level of service provided by the new binder.
Linda Davis and Sheranda Lee together updated 451 Acorn periodical
and serial records as a result of binding.
Marking:
4409 volumes
155 RUSH items
An additional 145 items were also processed, but not caught by the
automated report. The oldest items on
the regular marking shelves have been there less than a week. Good work!
Members of the marking unit met with Special Collections staff to
work out a new procedure for labeling all protective enclosures generated
through the repair lab. Previously the
box enclosures had not been labeled either with title or call number. The procedure now calls for both to aid
retrieval and reshelving. The items
themselves will remain untouched. The
new procedure goes into effect immediately and is posted at: http://staffweb.library.vanderbilt.edu/rs/techserv/Preservation/Marking/labelspeccollbox.html
Repair:
176 volumes were repaired with 280 treatments. Many of those items
were protective enclosures for music scores that were too complicated for
commercial binding.
Two wrapper orders were prepared, but not yet received. Next month's totals will reflect those
numbers. Meanwhile the repair staff concentrated on in-house enclosures and
spine repairs with other accompanying minor repairs for items from Central,
Peabody, Music, Science, and Special Collections.