Technical Services Monthly Report
Oct. 2005
DIVISION-WIDE ACTIVITIES:
Roberta Winjum declared Oct. 27th to be
the official TS Feng Shui
Day, to be used to de-clutter our work areas.
Staff overall responded very positively by clearing out masses of paperwork,
files, notebooks, boxes, and all manner of other clutter from personal cubicles
and communal areas. Doughnuts (a circle
within a circle) were an essential part of our success. At least one of us
reports feeling "much closer to being one with the universe," while
others are still waiting for the "balance, harmony, and beneficial
energy" that is supposed to result from this type of activity. Overall, though, the process felt very
liberating and we highly recommend it. One day was not really adequate after
years of accumulation. We think this
should be an annual activity.
Another unusual activity for October was writing our job
descriptions which were due to Roberta Winjum on Oct.
7th. The first year is always the most
difficult for such an activity. Next
year, all we will need to do is revise them a bit.
The Cataloging Documentation and Training Task Force (Don Jones,
Becky Atack, Pete Wilson, Denise Chavez and Alice
Cunningham) met with TechForce to discuss the task
force's outline for an online cataloging manual.
Roberta Winjum demonstrated the process
of adding records to the VU e-Archive for the Cataloging and Authorities Team
and some practiced with loading records and creating metadata using that
software. Roberta also did a demo of the VU e-Archive for Peabody Library staff
and interested faculty.
PERSONNEL ACTIVITIES AND EVENTS:
Mary Charles Lasater hosted a
celebration for the completion of the Peabody Ed.D. project. Work continues on the Peabody Master theses
project.
Zora Breeding, Mary Charles Lasater
and Pete Wilson attended the first meetings of the Metadata Committee, chaired
by Roberta Winjum.
Many staff attended the Library Staff Awards Ceremony at which we
honored the following TS service award recipients: Mary Ellen Wilson, 30 years;
Linda Davis, Mary Charles Lasater and Jo Nell Owens,
25 years; Machelle Keen, 15 years; Keith Curd, Charlotte
Lew, Jean Wright, and Paul Van Cotthem, 10 years; and Dennis Sauls
and Roberta Winjum, 5 years. Congratulations and
thanks to all! The GLB TS teams also held their own celebration to honor those
receiving service awards this year.
Various staff attended the following meetings:
--Strategic Planning discussion about the newly formed committees
--Staff Development sponsored meeting on the RSS news feed format
for the Staff Newsletter
--"History of Presidential Libraries" talk by Robert Bohanan, Deputy Director of the Jimmy Carter Library and
Museum, held at the Peabody Library
--Community Giving Campaign's Thanksgiving Matinee program (made possible by Paul Van Cotthem) of "
Roberta Winjum participated in the Southern Festival of Books as a
moderator for Jack Pendarvis, author of The
Mysterious Secret of the Valuable Treasure. She also
joined other LMC members for the meeting with Provost Nick Zeppos
and Dennis Hall.
CATALOGING AND AUTHORITIES:
Molly Dahl continued her training.
Don Jones worked most closely with Molly on a daily basis and Zora Breeding and Pete Wilson filled in with review during
Don's absences. Ann Ercelawn
gave Molly Dahl an introductory presentation on series. Mary Charles Lasater
held the first session of LC's Basic Subject
Cataloging training for Molly, Yuh-Fen Benda and Chris Benda. The remaining sessions will be held in
November.
Gina Berry 'wiped out' the UN materials that Amy Stewart-Mailhiot had put on the shelves for us to get records into
Acorn. Gina was able to catalog many, some went to Ann
Ercelawn as serials, and the rest to Mary Charles Lasater to finish.
Statistics:
TS totals: 2179 new titles cataloged.
CAT totals: 1420 new titles cataloged, 177 of which were original
contributions or national level enhancements to the OCLC database and 858 were
modified locally.
We recataloged 268 titles and reconned 34 titles.
Linda Davis withdrew 86 items.
Marcive delivered 5512 new or modified authority
records. The team reports making changes
to 711 name, 496 subject and 33 series headings on Acorn bibliographic records
(not part of new cataloging activity).
We deleted 151 authority records.
ORDER
SERVICES:
Statistics:
Received
and processed:
Serials/Periodicals:2864
Approvals:1054
Added to
Acorn:
SSO's:122
Gifts:
112
OS also
placed 1242 new orders, and Speed Cataloged 705 titles.
Receiving:
Serials and periodicals are current. Monograph receivers are currently
processing books received in OS in October and early November.
Special
Projects: Chris Waldrop, Monica Sanchez, and Mary Ellen Wilson now have the
Java client on their computers. We are
testing the product (in Production) prior to migration of all OS staff.
Problems and suggestions for improved work flow have been conveyed to Sirsi, and they have been very responsive to many of our
concerns.
As we
have received permission to fill one of our LAIII positions in OS, Chris,
Monica and Mary Ellen met to discuss the process and the qualifications desired
for the position. The position (for
verifier/receiver)
will be posted with HR until November 11th, at which time we will begin to set
up interviews with the applicants.
Roberta,
Chris, and Mary Ellen met with Will Fuqua and Rebecca Day from Ebsco on the 24th; John Laraway
was scheduled to visit on the 26th, but unfortunately his home in
PRESERVATION:
We would like to remind the libraries that the Thanksgiving and Christmas
holidays affect the typical 2-week binding schedule. There will three shipments
in November: 11/1, 11/15, and 11/29. There
will be ONE shipment only in December:
12/13. Please take these dates
into account as you plan your binding shipments for the rest of 2005.
LINCPlus is still broken, but the binding staff
persevered with LARS. On Halloween,
Dale Poulter notified the team that LINCPlus
was truly fixed (not so, as it turns out).
Machelle Keen and Karen Pillow plan to test
it with the bindery before resuming use, but they are looking forward to using
the software very soon.
The marking staff met with Julie Loder
on Oct. 13 to demonstrate and explain current marking practices; Julie is
investigating an expanded labeling module in a new SIRSI Java Client currently
in test mode. Speaking of marking, the
team is working with LITS to fix and/or replace one of the two labeling
printers. These two printers receive heavy-duty use every day and are probably worn
out even though they are only a few years old.
Charlotte Lew and Sue Davis trained
Meredith Hammons from Divinity on identifying and diagnosing physical condition
problems with books. Meredith is working on the large Divinity Annex transfer
process and many of the older items require repair, boxing, and/or cleaning before
their transfer. A few are too moldy and
need to be withdrawn. Since it appears at this early stage that many items will
need preservation attention, the details of how to manage the work flow in
Preservation have not yet been determined.
Sue Davis began meeting weekly with Bill Hook to revise the Heard
Library's disaster response plan. At
this early stage the discussion is focusing on what to keep of the old plans,
what has worked well in the past, what should be in our new plan, and how to
improve the organization and distribution of the information. The two are also investigating other
university library disaster response plans and other departments on campus who
may be involved in disaster response.
Sue Davis successfully uploaded data from all four PEMS (two at
the Annex and two in Special Collections) and generated reports for Peg Earheart and Juanita Murray.
Binding:
540 monographs
41 rebinds
322 periodicals
168 serials
1071 volumes total
897 new paperbacks sorted and 383 selected for immediate
binding (43%).
347 monographs rebarcoded in preparation for binding
Marking:
3970 volumes
The labeling only slipped a little to
almost a 2-week turnaround instead of our usual goal of 1-week.
Repair:
247 volumes were treated with 417 treatments.
It was another month full of typical repairs: protective enclosures, spine repairs, super
(that strip of cheese cloth that holds the cover to the textblock)
repairs, and hinge repairs.