Maine Shared Collections Strategy Collection Development/Technical Services Committees
June 17, 2014
Colby College, Miller Library, Diamond Building Room 241
1:00 pm – 3:00 pm
Attendees: Deb Rollins, Matthew Revitt, Joan Campbell, Becky Albitz, Peggy O’Kane, Lanny Lumbert, Brian Damien, Sara Amato (called in), Clem Guthro, Patrick Layne, Sarah Campbell, Karl Fattig, Sharon Fitzgerald, Sharon Saunders, Mike McGuire, Mary Saunders, Claire Prontnicki
1. Process going forward
The primary purpose of this meeting was for Matthew and Sara to present documentation they hope will assist the Committee members and staff at their libraries with some of the ongoing MSCS work, particularly once the grant funding for Sara’s work ends next month. Matthew hoped attendees would leave today’s meeting understanding their libraries’ ongoing responsibilities for MSCC and pass this message on to local staff not directly involved in MSCS.
a. CTR reversals – policy & procedures review and comment
Policy
Matthew commented that the most obvious responsibility for MSCS libraries is that they continue to retain at least one copy of a title they have been allocated a MSCC retention commitment for. However, there are going to be certain situations when a retention commitment could be transferred to another item (including at another library) or a local decision could be made to remove it. The Collection Development Committee at their last meeting had approved a Policy on Retention Commitment Changes (see here) that includes different scenarios where a retention commitment may be transferred or removed. Matthew asked both Committees whether they had any edits they wanted him to make before he published it on the MSCS website.
Matthew and Deb confirmed for Sharon Saunders that the Policy could be used for transferring a retention commitment to another edition of the title, but that the decision to transfer remains a local one. Libraries have no obligation to transfer a CTR to a newer version; especially as some older editions may have unique characteristics which warrant the commitment to retain.
Matthew and Deb reiterated that the Policy is only intended for one-off title-by-title reversals, not the large-scale reversal of MSCC retention commitments. The aim is to give libraries ‘wiggle room’ on retention commitments, but not undo the retention commitment process.
Clem commented that the criterion “replacement copy not available at reasonable cost” would be a local determination.
Following discussions regarding the contents of the Procedure for Transferring Retention Commitments (see below) the Committees asked Matthew to add language to the Policy on Retention Commitment Changes making it clear that transfer can mean either internal or external, but that the Procedures are specifically referring to external transfer to another MSCC library. Matthew will also add language regarding Clem’s point about the reasonable cost of replacing items.
Procedures
To go alongside the Policy on Retention Commitment Changes, Matthew has produced a set of procedures (see here) for libraries to follow when seeking to transfer retention commitments to another MSCS library (so not internal transfers to another edition, etc.). Because removal should only be a last resort if a transfer is not possible.
Deb had added some comments in the document that Matthew asked the Committees to discuss:
● Should all MSCS libraries sign on to be collection builders for purposes of being able to transfer a limited number of CTR titles such as lost or damaged copy events – even though we may not want to ingest large collections?
Matthew commented that so far the Maine State Library and Portland Public Library have agreed to be Collection Builders for Maine related items and fiction respectively.
A discussion then ensued regarding whether being a Collection Builder means just accepting one-off items, or more broadly (as Clem thought) for groups of titles from a particular subject for example, arctic studies.
Matthew will change the language of the Procedures to remove references to collection builder unless it refers to the Maine State Library and Portland Public Library who will get first refusal on Maine related items and general fiction and poetry respectively.
● Do we agree that libraries that wish to transfer a commitment should do the work using MaineCat of determining which libraries still hold – “H” – the title, and have this already filled in? Also, do we agree that by default if a transfer isn’t possible or accepted by another library, that becomes a group decision that we don’t want to keep that commitment–even if it’s the last copy in the group.
The Committees agreed that it should be left to the professional discretion of the MSCC library’s staff whether or not they chose to make the items available for transfer, or simply remove the item without notifying the other MSCC libraries. This is further evidence of the trust amongst MSCC partner libraries.
The Committee agreed that separate spreadsheets are not required each time a library identifies transfer candidates, instead there will be one spreadsheet which is updated each time there are new candidates. Libraries should indicate in their cover message which rows of items need reviewing.
Matthew will make the requested changes to the documents and send them out for a final review before posting them on the MSCS website.
b. CTR additions
i. Recording and displaying retention decisions
Sara presented guidance for recording and displaying retention decisions (see here). Libraries that need to remove or add retention statements should follow this guidance.
Sara showed the different MARC fields that are used for recording retention information and a sample retention commitment with the fields filled in (see here).
ii. Applying CTR statements
Sara presented guidance for applying Commit to Retain (CTR) statements to item records, checkin records and OCLC LHRs (see here)
iii. Batchloading documentation
Sara presented guidance for submitting batchloading records to OCLC for updating the Local Holding Records of committed to retain titles (see here). Sara reminded the Committees that they need to include the appropriate OCLC Shared Print Symbol in the subject line of the message to batchloading services, indicate that the data is for an LHRUS project, and include the appropriate OCLC-assigned batchload Project ID number (which Sara lists in her guidance). The turnaround on OCLC processing the requests has been 1-2 weeks.
Sara confirmed for Sharon Saunders that in general the OCLC LHR refers solely to the OCLC number, not a specific copy. The 583 can contain a |3 which denotes the extent of the holding, e.g. v.3 – v.4.
iv. “Open” holdings & CTRs on currently received material
MSCS made the decision to close the holdings, so as not to commit to retain future issues, not in the library’s collection. Sara presented an example in URSUS of a retention commitment with closed dates for a currently received serial (see here).
The Committees debated how often MSCS libraries should be expected to review and update holdings information for new additions to CTR serial titles. Peggy commented that it would not make sense to update CTR holdings information each time a new item came in. Clem commented that this issue should be referred to the MSCC Collections & Operations Committee. Various ideas were discussed including: doing the updates every couple of years for new items and leaving the dates as is, as a record of a point in time commitment.
The Committees agreed that the decision whether or not to update retention commitments to include new issues will be left a local one.
Matthew reported that some libraries decided against committing to retain newspapers because they already had a short-term retention policy, but, for example: Portland Public left some of their newspapers which are in special collections on their retention list. Matthew asked whether there is already a project to preserve newspapers. And if not, whether as part of MSCS libraries should be making a commitment to retain smaller Maine newspapers, particularly if no one else is doing this work.
Karl and Peggy confirmed there had been a Maine newspaper project and that different towns had received grants for digitizing local newspapers. Becky reported that the Lewiston Sun Journal is no longer microfilming its issues. A discussion then ensued regarding efforts to share the load of preserving the Lewiston Sun Journal (separate from MSCC activities).
v. PAPR series maintenance
Another place where MSCS will be recording retention commitment statement (for serials and journal only) is in the Center for Research Libraries’ (CRL) Print Archives Preservation Registry (PAPR). Sara showed that MSCS libraries were listed in PAPR as archiving institutions (see here), but so far no holdings information is recorded for them. However, this will soon change as Sara has submitted to CRL example holding data for Bangor Public Library and the University of Southern Maine. Sara commented that CRL require the holding data for contributing libraries to be in a specific format, but CRL will do the formatting for libraries, so it shouldn’t be an onerous process for local staff. Amy Wood (CRL) hopes to have some initial holdings and data reports (based on the Bangor Public and USM examples) to present at the Print Archive Network (PAN) meeting that proceeds the MSCS session at ALA Annual.
A discussion then ensued regarding what titles are in PAPR for MSCS and how the data is presented. Sara commented that MSCS’s retention policy for journals and serials meant that MSCS will have few titles in there compared to other projects. Sharon Saunders commented that it would be helpful to have lists of committed to retain titles.
Sara will add to the MSCS Dropbox account spreadsheets containing retention commitments for both monographs and journals.
MSCS libraries will be expected to update holdings information in multiple places including: local catalogs, OCLC, PAPR, and MaineCat. Matthew and Sara will speak to Amy Wood about how frequently MSCS libraries are expected to submit updated to holdings information.
Note: Since the meeting Matthew found that CRL would like MSCS to have a regular schedule of updates. Most programs seem to update once a year and that is fine with CRL.
A discussion then ensued regarding whether libraries should update holdings information in catalogs on a case-by-case basis, or do the updates periodically.
The Committees agreed that libraries should be able to decide locally how frequently they update retention information in catalogs.
Mathew reported that as contributing libraries the MSCS partners will be able to submit to CRL a list of titles and holdings from their collection and receive a spreadsheet free of charge showing which of their titles and holdings are committed (as reported in PAPR) to an existing print archive or shared print program. The spreadsheets might be useful in future collection analysis and for in-house weeding projects. Matthew will speak to CRL about instructions for submitting these spreadsheets.
Note: Since the meeting Matthew found out that CRL require: ISSN (if libraries have it), OCLC#, title, holdings. But if libraries want other data to appear in the results, they should include that as well. The data should be formatted in a spreadsheet or csv or tab separated text file with each category of data separated in the columns or by the tabs. Libraries don’t have to include their local holdings if they only care about a title level comparison.
vi. Requesting LHR lists
Sara showed the form MSCS libraries can use to request from OCLC a free spreadsheet list containing committed to retain titles for a particular shared print symbol (see here).
c. MSCC committee work – Google group & drive, website & working with new members
Committee work
On August 31st, Maine Shared Collection Strategy’s grant activities will come to an end. Starting September 1st the Maine Shared Collections Cooperative (MSCC) will go live. The Executive Committee for MSCC has been appointed by the Maine InfoNet Executive Board and Matthew has asked Clem as chair to start the process for appointing the Collections & Operations Committee. Each former MSCS library will have a representative on the Committee and it’s likely to be made up of current members of the MSCS committees. Clem responded that he is going to ask the MSCC library directors to nominate both a collection development and technical services representative.
Google group and drive
To aid the work of the MSCC committees, Maine InfoNet have setup a Google Group and accompanying Google Drive in their business account that can be used as a working area for the MSCC committees (for example, where the proposed transfer lists will be posted and shared). Once the committee roster has been finalized, Matthew will send out invitations to join the Group.
Website
The current MSCS website will remain live and will be kept updated with meeting summaries, news, etc. Sharon Fitzgerald commented that she found parts of the MSCS website to be not very intuitive. For example, the guidance that Sara had been presenting was hidden under “People”. Matthew responded that he can meet with Sharon to look at making improvements to pages, but at this stage there wasn’t a lot he could do about the overall structure of the website because this would require the support of a web designer which MSCS doesn’t have the grant funds for.
Working with new members
One of the unknowns for MSCC is whether it can attract new members. Matthew reported that on Thursday June 19th he hopes to take an important step in this regard because he and Sara have a meeting with Debbie Lozito, the director of Edythe L. Dyer Community Library in Hampden, who in the Cooperative Collection Management survey, Matthew had sent out to Maine library directors had expressed interest in potential MSCC elements. Matthew commented that he hopes MSCC can partner with Edythe L. Dyer to show in particular how MSCC can assist them in collection analysis. MSCC representatives will deliver a joint presentation with Edythe Dyer at the Maine InfoNet Collection Summit in October, hopefully showing how MSCC can benefit smaller libraries.
d. Wrap-up project meeting
On Thursday August 7th, MSCS will have wrap-up meeting for all project committees. The meeting will be held at Colby College’s Diamond Building Room 145 from 10 am – 1 pm. The meeting will include a working lunch catered by Colby.
In terms of content for the session, Matthew is going to send a project evaluation survey to MSCS participants prior to the meeting, so he can discuss some of the results. Matthew would also like representatives from the different project committees to discuss project results, schedule performance, problems that arose during the project, changes to the original plans, grant expenditure, whether MSCS met its objectives, lessons learned, etc. Matthew felt all this information will be of use in MSCS’s final reports to IMLS and any future collaborative projects. The Project Team can also discuss MSCS’s plans for the future of MSCC.
2. Project Updates
a. CTR summary
Sara updated the Committees on the status of adding retention commitments in local catalogs, MaineCat and OCLC:
Status Summary MSCS Stats Page
Scenario 1 COMPLETE
Scenario 2 Library Sent to OCLC Returned from OCLC
BBH 5/17/2014 5/27/2014 * Still working on ~100 odd analyzed series
BTS 5/18/2014 5/28/2014
BYN 4/18/2014 4/25/2014
CBY 5/24/2014 6/4/2014
MEA 5/28/2014
MEU 4/19/2014 5/12/2014
PPN 5/25/2014 5/28/2014
USM 5/27/2014
Bangor Theo
Series Library Sent to OCLC Returned from OCLC PAPR
BBH pending sara
BTS 6/4/2014
CBY 6/5/2014
BYN 5/27/2014 6/17/2014 5/9/2014
MEA pending sara
MEU pending sara
PPN 6/17/2014
USM 5/27/2014 5/9/2014
Bangor Theo
Sara next presented the latest (in-progress) figures for committed to retain titles for both monographs and serials (see here). Sara commented that the work on adding commitments is close to completion, which is exciting news for the project. The Committees congratulated Sara on her hard work in getting this work done.
Once the retention commitment numbers have been finalized, Matthew will ask the Committees to calculate what percentage of their monograph collection has received a CTR, so he can include this data in his reports to IMLS.
b. Public displays of CTR statements – local, MaineCat & OCLC
Sara presented examples of the public display of the retention commitment statement for monographs in the opacs of URSUS (using JavaScript, see here), in the Colby, Bates and Bowdoin catalog (using the ‘w’ tagged field and opac message, see here), and in the classic catalog of the Portland Public Library’s catalog (see here). Sara commented that Portland Public may in the future decide to include the statement in their public catalog and make “MSCC” a link.
Sara showed the display of retention commitment statements in OCLC WorldCat using the OCLC Shared Print Symbol, alongside the regular OCLC institution symbol (see here). Sara showed that in WorldCat by default the WorldCat Search API is doing FRBR grouping (see here). This may result in holdings being displayed for editions which are not actually held. To limit the holdings display to single editions, use the “just this edition” link.
Sara reported that based on feedback from the previous Technical Services Committee meeting she will show the effect of the OCLC Shared Print Symbol on ILL workflow and what happens when the OCLC API is used to generate retention statements in MaineCat.
Sara next showed the display of retention statement in MaineCat (see here), which are currently generated using the OCLC WorldCat API. But Innovative’s long-term solution for the display of retention information in MaineCat should be in their July release of Inn-Reach. There is an Inn-Reach meeting at ALA Annual where some of the new functionality might be presented. Matthew commented that one of the MSCC Collection & Operations Committee’s first issues to discuss could be the recording and display of the retention statement in MaineCat and whether Innovative’s fix meets MSCC’s needs.
Sara showed the display of retention statements for series titles in URSUS (see here), CBB (see here), MaineCat (see here), and in OCLC WorldCat (see here).
Sara commented that to view holding level retention information staff need to be in local catalogs because MaineCat and OCLC WorldCat only show information at the title level. But looking at Local Holding Records in OCLC Connexion (see here) will provide more detailed information on retention commitments (see here).
c. Oddities in catalog & OCLC LHR 583s-monographic series |3 from “v”olume field
Sara made the Committees aware of some oddities that will be seen in the different catalog’s retention commitment statements.
The first example (see here) showed a monograph series with a MSCC for each of the individual volumes.
The Committees agreed that it would be left a local decision whether to address this oddity.
The second example was where for series or multi-volume sets some of the titles/volumes met the retention criteria and others did not. In the catalog it looks rather odd that some of the titles had commitments (most likely because of circulation), but not all (see here). Sara asked whether gaps in commitments for volumes should be filled in. The Committee discussed whether the benefits of making the records appear cleaner warranted making additional retention commitments.
The Committees agreed that it would be left a local decision whether libraries decide to make pro-active commitments on titles and volumes they haven’t been allocated a commitment for.
The third example was where some media items at commitments (see here). However, on further investigation these appeared to be monographs with just CDs in them, so they were in scope for MSCS. Some maps also had commitments (see here).
The Committees agreed that it would be left a local decision whether libraries decide to keep MSCC commitments on these titles.
Sara will be adding to her documentation between now and the end of July, including screencasts.
Sharon Saunders asked whether Sara had any guidance on OCLC Spotlight so libraries can claim their OCLC symbols. Matthew responded that he had previously circulated guidance from Sharon Fitzgerald, who had gone through the claiming process for UMaine.
d. E-book-On-Demand & Print-On-Demand update
MSCS’s testing of the Print-On-Demand service in MaineCat came to an end in April. Matthew has been discussing with the UMaine Bookstore and Printing & Mailing Services about them taking over the service on an ongoing basis, but for the record links to remain in MaineCat. These discussions are going well, but there will still need to be some significant testing required before the POD service comes back online.
The records containing the POD links and links to HathiTrust and Google Books currently reside in Solar, but with this system being de-commissioned the records are being moved to a new home in URSUS. With the Sierra migration occurring next month the records probably won’t be loaded into URSUS until the end of July/beginning of August. It’s likely that a combination of Sara and Maine InfoNet will handle the load.
The URSUS Directors met last Friday (June 13) and approved the records moving to URSUS, but with a couple of minor caveats which Matthew will be discussing with Sara, the Project Team and Printing Services.
e. HathiTrust membership update
UMaine are now officially a partner of the HathiTrust; Deb and Matthew have been promoting the availability of HathiTrust services on UMaine webpages.
f. ALA event
MSCS are co-sponsoring a ALA Annual Conference pre-conference session with the Center for Research Libraries on Friday June 27th from 10 am – 3 pm. Interest in the event has been good and there are already 120 registrants.
g. MSCS Shared Print Manual
As part of MSCS’s legacy to other shared print projects, Matthew has spent a large part of his time over the last two months working on the shared print teaching guide which he will have a final version of ready to promote at MSCS’s ALA Annual Conference session (see above). To help him with the contents of the document, Matthew asked the Committees the following questions:
● Would you have changed anything about the scope of material included in the collection analysis?
The Committees would not have changed the scope of material considered. Sarah felt that it’s helpful to have multi-type libraries to ensure the collections being analyzed are not too similar.
● What did you like and dislike about the data reports asked for from SCS? Also, did you have sufficient time to review the data reports?
Joan felt that it was hard when SCS arrived with the data and the Committee looked at it together for the first time – and it seemed SCS wanted us to make decisions on the spot. The Collection Development Committee agreed that at times they found it difficult to absorb the spreadsheets and respond immediately. The consensus was it was definitely better to get the spreadsheets ahead of time. However, Peggy pointed out this need for immediate decisions was mostly a result of the time pressures MSCS were working under during the grant period, following the delays in the first two years of the project waiting for the OCLC reclamation to be complete, and the development of OCLC’s Collection Evaluation tool.
● If you were do this work again would you still use the same retention criteria?
Deb responded that in hindsight MSCS probably should not have included items from special collections in the analysis because MSCS eventually committed to retain them all anyway. Matthew commented that SCS had informed him that MSCS were unusual in their inclusion of special collections items. However, Clem felt that MSCS had made the correct decision to include special collections items in the analysis because the data helped MSCS to identify accompanying circulating copies that MSCS decided needed to be committed to retain. Peggy commented that the Maine State Library had also used data on special collections titles to make preservation decisions.
Deb and Matthew both felt that MSCS’s retention criterion of “retain if any usage” in circulation history (over 25 years) was very conservative. Again, MSCS’s approach on this had differed to most other projects SCS have worked with who set their threshold for retention at a higher minimal circulation number.
Clem felt that MSCS’s focus on making retention commitments rather than identify withdrawal candidates alongside the inclusion of public libraries meant that SCS had to adapt their approach accordingly. Deb commented that a good example of where this happened was with the retention commitment allocation rules, where SCS’s usual rules of retaining minimal levels of holdings didn’t fit MSCS’s needs.
● Do you have pieces of advice for other projects carrying out similar work?
The Committee felt that having a systems librarian and full-time program manager were vital for the success of the project.
Clem felt it was vital that all MSCS libraries use the same ILS and that circulation means the same thing across the group.
Sarah felt that trust between the partners was also key, as retention commitments made by MSCS libraries were done so in good faith.