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NEWS FROM THE FIELD

C&RL News, March 2005
Vol. 66, No. 3

by Stephanie Orphan

Columbia and London School of Economics partner to increase access to scholarly materials
Researchers at Columbia University and the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) will be using a new Internet technology, developed by the Internet2 community, to share scholarly materials. The technology, named Shibboleth, allows for sharing online resources in a secure and confidential manner by leveraging organizations’ identity management infrastructures. Shibboleth has been tested by a number of higher-education institutions, government agencies, academic publishers, and other higher-education vendors. The joint Columbia/LSE project, Digital Anthropology Resources for Teaching (DART), aims to explore the potential of digital resources for teaching undergraduate anthropology. The project can be found online at www.columbia.edu/dlc/dart.

Mellon continues funding for collaborative library recruitment program
The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded a second grant to six academic libraries to collaborate on a major project to address librarian recruiting and diversity issues at the undergraduate level. The $500,000 award funds the second half of a three-year program. The libraries of the Atlanta University Center (serving Clark Atlanta University and Morehouse and Spellman Colleges) and of Mount Holyoke, Oberlin, Occidental, Swarthmore, and Wellesley Colleges are participating in the project, which is directed by Ray English, director of libraries at Oberlin. The project includes broad-based, issues-oriented programming that familiarizes large numbers of undergraduate students with significant challenges facing the library profession and draws their attention to the potential of librarianship as a career.

The emphasis of the program is to recruit at the undergraduate level. Students who are strongly interested in librarianship as a career are selected to participate in a semester- long undergraduate internship experience, through which they learn about the nature of professional library work, complete projects under librarian mentors, and may also participate in summer internships at other libraries. The project also provides a small number of full-time, post-baccalaureate intern positions and graduate library school scholarships.

Elsevier partners to distribute books in developing countries
Leading scientific publisher Elsevier has formed partnerships with Europe-based Book Aid International and U.S.-based Sabre Foundation to facilitate the distribution of books throughout developing countries. Activities already underway are “Bring a Book to Work Week,” through which Elsevier employees make individual book donations; a recent grant by Reed Elsevier to purchase books for refugee children in Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia; and a new company policy by which all unsalable returns of paperback books to the company’s U.K. warehouse will be distributed in recipient countries. Book Aid and the Sabre Foundation have many years of experience distributing books and have formed strong local alliances in many developing countries, with a particular breadth of experience across sub-Saharan Africa.

NIH announces public access policy, ACRL responds
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) announced in February its new policy regarding public access to published articles resulting from NIH-funded research. The policy calls on scientists to release to the public manuscripts from research supported by NIH as soon as possible, and within 12 months of final publication. The peer-reviewed, NIH-funded research publications will be available in a Web-based archive to be managed by the National Library of Medicine. Beginning May 2, 2005, the policy requests that NIH-funded scientists submit an electronic version of the author’s final manuscript upon acceptance for publication. Authors are also strongly encouraged to exercise their right to specify that their articles be publicly available through PubMed Central as soon as possible.

In letters to Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt and NIH Director Elias Zerhouni, ACRL congratulated NIH for having “taken a significant step to improve public access to NIH-funded research.” However, Frances Maloy, ACRL President, and Ray English, chair of the ACRL Scholarly Communication Committee, also expressed concern that the NIH policy is voluntary on the part of researchers and that articles will be accessible through PubMed Central 12 months after publication, compared to six months in the original draft proposal. Complete information on ACRL’s open access and scholarly communication efforts is available in the Scholarly Communication area of the ACRL Web site (www.acrl.org, click on “Issues and Advocacy,” then “Scholarly Communication”).

San Jose State University announces executive MLIS program
San Jose State University has developed a new executive MLIS program specifically for managers and supervisors looking for increased responsibilities and leadership opportunities in libraries. The program combines the core values and competencies of librarianship in a management and leadership context. The executive MLIS program will bring together a national cohort of 25 current leaders, managers, supervisors, and directors without the MLIS degree for the first residency in San Jose in August. This will be followed by distance courses, annual short residencies, and professional projects. The program is designed specifically for experienced managers. Few electives are provided and core competencies are coupled with graduate education in leadership, human resources, finance, marketing, effective communication, and program evaluation. More information is available at slisweb.sjsu.edu/classes/exec.htm.

Penn launches ScholarlyCommons
The University of Pennsylvania Library has announced the debut of a digital repository of research scholarship produced by Penn faculty and students.

ScholarlyCommons@Penn, a Web-based service of Penn’s digital library, emerged through a partnership between the library and the School of Engineering and Applied Science. Early content includes journal articles, conference papers, technical reports, and dissertations from the school’s six departments. It is expected that a broader range of engineering research, including computer code and simulations, will eventually be housed in the repository. Researchers can browse, search, and download full text from the repository Web site at repository.upenn.edu.

South Carolina libraries choose Innovative
A group of 16 libraries at 8 institutions from the Partnership Among South Carolina Academic Libraries (PASCAL) will be migrating to Innovative Interface’s integrated library management system, Millennium. PASCAL will also be installing INN-Reach, Innovative’s patron-oriented resource sharing system, as a move toward universal borrowing among academic institutions throughout the state. The eight participating institutions are Clemson University, University of South Carolina, the College of Charleston, South Carolina State Unviersity, the Citadel, Francis Marion University, Florence Darlington Technical College, and Aiken Technical College.

President’s budget requests IMLS funds
President Bush’s fiscal 2006 budget requests $252.24 million for the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). Of this, roughly $221 million is for the Library Servcies and Technology Act, nearly $39 million is for the Museum Services Act, and $2 million is for a new grant program authorized by the African American History and Culture Act. The request represents an increase of approximately $21.5 million in funding for IMLS core programs. The President’s budget will specifically allow IMLS to increase support for state library administrative agencies; recruit and educate a new generation of librarians; expand, create, and preserve educational and cultural content in a digital form; strengthen learning through new models for library and museum programs; and build sustainable partnerships among museum, libraries, communities, and schools.

CQ press introduces CQ Online Editions
CQ Press has introduced a new series, CQ Online Editions, to its electronic offerings. The first product, CQ Historic Documents Series: Online Editions, provides access to the complete 32-volume Historic Documents series, published since 1972, including the cumulative index, in one searchable online database. The online edition allows users to search by keyword and browse by title and topic.

Wiley receives publishing awards
John Wiley & Sons, Inc. has received two awards and one honorable mention in the 2004 awards competition of the Professional/Scholarly Publishing Division (PSP) of the Association of American Publishers. Wiley’s Handbook of Industrial Mixing: Science and Practice (Edward L. Paul, Victor A. Atiemo-Obeng, and Suzanne M. Kresta) was selected as the best new PSP book in engineering, while The Human Fossil Record: Volume Three, Brain Endocasts-the Paleoneurological Evidence (Ralph L. Halloway, Douglas C. Broadfield, and Michael S. Yuan) was named best new PSP book in sociology and anthropology. The Dictionary of Engineering Materials (Harald Keller and Uwe Erb) received honorable mention in the single volume reference (sciences) category.

SALALM celebrates 50 years  in support of Latin American research
The Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials (SALALM) is celebrating 50 years of professional activity fostering and supporting Latin American research in areas ranging from the humanities and social sciences to science and technology. Since its founding in 1956, SALALM has provided the only forum focused exclusively on collection development and services in libraries with Latin American collections.

The first SALALM meeting was held in Chinsegut Hill, Florida, with 30 participants. In 2005, for its 50th meeting in April, SALALM will return to Florida, hosted by the Latin American Collection of the University of Florida-Gainsville. SALALM currently has an international membership of nearly 500, including research institutions and book dealers.