Serials Section Executive Committee

Minutes from the 2006 Annual Conference in New Orleans, LA

First meeting:

Sunday, June 25, 2006
10:30-11:37 am
InterContinental Hotel, Acadian II

MEMBERS PRESENT:

• Jill Emery Chair
• Emily McElroy Vice-Chair/Chair-Elect
• Lauren Corbett Past Chair
• Meg Mering Secretary
• Marla Chesler Member-at-Large
• Helen Gbala Member-at-Large

GUESTS/LIAISONS PRESENT:

• Eleanor Cook (Chair, Policy and Planning Committee)
• Connie Foster (Representative to ALCTS Publications Committee)
• Marilyn Geller (Chair, CSA/Ulrich’s Serials Librarian Award Committee)
• John Hostage (Chair, Research & Publications Committee)
• Gary Ives (Chair, Acquisitions Committee)
• Lori Osmus Kappmeyer (Representative to ALCTS Organization and Bylaws)
• Tina Shrader (Incoming Chair, Continuing Resources Cataloging Committee)

PLEASE SEND CORRECTIONS TO Meg Mering at mmering1@unl.edu

Introductions

J. Emery welcomed Executive Committee members and guests to the meeting. Everyone introduced himself or herself. J. Emery announced that M. Mering would serve as the meeting’s timekeeper.

Acquisitions Committee Chair (G. Ives) (oral)

G. Ives reported on the committee’s program, “Perspective on Publisher Packages in the E-World: New Roles for Libraries, Publishers, and Agents.”

Elsevier has announced that they will no longer work with subscription agents. They will instead work directly with libraries. Current library customers who use agents when dealing with Elsevier can continue to do so.

ACTION: The Acquisitions Committee will consider preparing a survey on librarian, publisher & subscription agent relations.

Report on ALCTS June 24th Board Meeting (J. Emery)

• Roughly 100 people attended each ALCTS preconference.
• The ALCTS Strategic Plan for 2006-2011 is complete. The Serials Section’s Program and Planning Committee will oversee the Section’s efforts to create initiatives for the plan.
• Leslie Burger, ALA President for the upcoming year, has a number of initiatives in mind. One of her ideas is for emerging leadership in ALA. A first step could involve training for emerging leaders.
• The Board passed memorial resolutions for Ross Atkinson and Henriette Avram.
• L. Corbett will serve as the first chair of the Collaboration Citation Jury. The idea for the collaboration citation came from the Serials Section.
• The forum on the Library of Congress’ series decision went well. ALCTS will also have a forum on a hot topic at the 2007 midwinter meeting.
• Jenny Levine has been hired to help ALA make better use of evolving technologies.
• The Task Force on English Access has completed its report. J. Emery and E. McElroy will be gathering comments from the section.
• In name only, the Serials Section will be co-sponsoring the Acquisitions Section’s 2007 annual conference pre-conference, “Adapting to the Complexities of Electronic Resources: Workflow Analysis, Redesign and Implementation.”

Committee Chairs for 2006/07 (E. McElroy)

The Committee Chairs for 2006/07 are:

• James Millhorn, Acquisitions
• Mary Page, CSA/Ulrich’s Serials Librarianship Award
• Tina Shrader, Continuing Resources Cataloging
• Michael Elmore, Education
• Clint Chamberlain, First Step Award
• Christa Easton, Nominating
• Marilyn Geller, Policy & Planning
• Anne Mitchell, Research & Publications
• Michael Normans, Serials Standards
• Felicity Dykas, Union Lists of Serials

Outgoing Committee Chairs (J. Emery)

J. Emery thanked all outgoing chairs for their service. They are:

• Gary Ives, Acquisitions
• Marilyn Geller, CSA/Ulrich’s Serials Librarianship Award
• Renette Davis, Continuing Resources Cataloging
• Betty Landesman, Education
• Christa Easton, First Step Award
• Step Schmitt, Nominating
• Eleanor Cook, Policy & Planning
• John Hostage, Research & Publications
• Scott Opasik, Serials Standards
• Paul Moeller, Union Lists of Serials

J. Emery also thanked Lauren Corbett (Past Chair), Meg Mering (Secretary) and Helen Gbala (Member-at-Large).

Description of Member-at-Large duties

Since Midwinter 2006, over e-mail, the current Members-at-Large drafted the following description of the duties for a Serials Section Member-at-Large.

• Serves as a voting member of the section executive committee and attends all section executive committee meetings.
• Represents the general membership on the executive committee.
• Serves as a liaison or resource to section committees and/or discussion groups as determined by the executive committee.
• Other duties as assigned.

ACTION: The Serials Section’s Executive Board approved the description of the Member-at-Large’s responsibilities. The description will be added to the Serials Section’s Web site.

Reports of Committee Chairs, Section Representatives to ALCTS Committees, and Discussion Groups

Policy and Planning Committee Chair (E. Cook) (oral and written)

ACTION ITEMS:

The following recommendations are for the Serials Section’s Executive Board to consider implementing.

• Changing the Research Libraries Discussion Group name to Serials in College & Research Libraries Discussion Group. Put out a call to appropriate discussion for interested volunteers to serve as Chair and Chair-elect. This task could possibly be assigned to a Serials Section Member-at-Large. If no volunteers come forward, consider eliminating the Discussion Group.
• Asking the Journal Costs Discussion Group to consider changing its name to the Journal Pricing in Libraries Discussion Group.
• Requiring the Discussion Groups to always have a Chair and a Chair-elect for backup purposes. Serials Sections Member-at-Large should be assigned to Discussion Groups to ensure that officers are selected.
• Continuing to promote discussion group and interest Group topics in the ALCTS newsletter and making sure NMRT list and other lists as appropriate receive announcements about discussion group and interest group meetings.

E. Cook will contact the ALCTS newsletter editor and propose contributing a general article about discussion groups and interest groups. She will suggest to ALCTS Program Planning a program on development of facilitation skills.

COMMITTEE REVIEW

Policy and Planning is wondering if a checklist of questions to be used in the committee review process already exist. E. Cook will ask C. Wilt and other ALCTS Sections’ Policy & Planning Committees if they have a checklist of questions.

During the upcoming year, the Committee will develop its own Initiatives per the Strategic Plan as directed by the ALCTS Planning Committee and the Serials Section’s Executive Board. It will gather initiatives created by other Serials Section committees. It will review the Union List of Serials Committee. It will monitor the progress of discussion group recommendations.

esearch and Publications Committee Chair (J. Hostage) (oral and written)

The Guidelines for Managing Microforms in the Digital Age, which Michelle Sitko is working on, is scheduled to be completed in time for the 2007 annual conference.

The Committee has several concerns about the ALCTS Web site. The online publication Unraveling the Mysteries of Serials has not been removed from the Web site. A decision had been reached at the 2006 Midwinter meeting. Other problems include non-functioning links, redundant or outdated information.

The meeting adjourned at 11:37 am.

Respectfully submitted,

Meg Mering, Secretary

 

Serials Section Executive Committee

Minutes from the 2006 Annual Conference in Chicago, IL

Second meeting

Tuesday, June 27, 2006
8:05-9:33 am
Hilton Riverside, Salon 13

MEMBERS PRESENT:

• Jill Emery Chair
• Emily McElroy Vice-Chair/Chair-Elect
• Lauren Corbett Past Chair
• Meg Mering Secretary
• Marla Chesler Member-at-Large
• Helen Gbala Member-at-Large

GUESTS/LIAISONS PRESENT:

• Renette Davis (Chair, Continuing Resources Cataloging Committee)
• Susan Davis (Representative to ALCTS Budget & Finance Committee)
• Connie Foster (Representative to ALCTS Publications Committee)
• Linda Smith Griffin (Representative to ALCTS Education Committee)
• Gary Ives (Chair, Acquisitions Committee)
• Lori Osmus Kappmeyer (Representative to ALCTS Organization and Bylaws)
• Carolynne Myall (Representative to the LRTS Editorial Board)
• Kevin Randall (Representative to CCS Cataloging Committee: Description and Access)

PLEASE SEND CORRECTIONS TO Meg Mering at mmering1@unl.edu

Introductions

J. Emery welcomed Executive Committee members and guests to the meeting. Everyone introduced himself or herself. J. Emery announced that M. Mering would serve as the meeting’s timekeeper.

Chair's Report

J. Emery reported on the June 26th ALCTS Executive Board Meeting.

• The number of registrations at the ALA annual conference is 16,582, which is close to the targeted number.
• ALA Council accepted a health care proposal and approved supporting the unionization of private institutions.
• The Acquisition Section has expanded its charge to include some aspects of bibliographic control.
• The ALCTS operational funds will not be used to pay for the anniversary celebration. Money from funding raising will pay for the celebration.
• ALCTS will discontinue its sponsorship of the Technical Services Workstation Interest Group. LITA is expected to make a similar decision about the interest group.
• The ALCTS Board approved Organization and Bylaws Committee’s suggestion to remove the names of the sections and their charges from the bylaws. Specific information about the sections will become part of the division’s manual.
• As part of ALCTS’ fiftieth anniversary celebration, Library Resources & Technical Services will reissue its first issue.
• Deanna Marcum, Associate Librarian for Library Services at the Library of Congress, met with the Division Presidents. She asked them to put forth three names for the soon-to-be formed Library of Congress Advisory Board.

Committee items for the Serials Section report at the ALCTS Board Meeting

The Acquisitions Committee proposed a program for the 2007 Annual Conference entitled “Metadata Exchange and Exposure: the Shared Task of Making the E-Resource Access Infrastructure Work.” The Serials Section’s Executive Committee approved the proposal. J. Emery signed off on the proposal. G. Ives will submit it to the ALCTS Program Planning Committee.

J. Emery will share the new description of the Serials Section’s Member-at-Large duties. She will also ask if ALA has any plans to review the new schedule for meetings.

Reports of Committee Chairs and Section Representatives to ALCTS Committees

Continuing Resources Cataloging Committee Chair (R. Davis) (oral and written)

Approximately 90 people attended the CRCC Update Forum, which was less than normal but that was probably more a reflection of the number of people who were at the conference more than anything else.

Les Hawkins, CONSER Coordinator, gave a CONSER report. Regina Reynolds, Director of the National Serials Data Program, gave the LC/ISSN/NSDP report. In addition, Kevin Randall, the Serials Section liaison to CC:DA, gave a report on the CRCC RDA Task Force and on CC:DA activities. Marjorie Bloss, the RDA Project Manager, gave an update on RDA.

R. Reynolds gave a report on the Access Level Record for Serials Pilot. The concept seemed to be fairly well accepted by the audience. The last item on the agenda was a discussion led by Gene Dickerson of a proposal for limited use of latest entry for minor changes. The feeling was that a systems approach would be best, where an indicator or tag could be used to say "this is the current title" rather than redescribing whenever a minor change occurred for a serial.

Representative to LRTS Editorial Board (C. Myall) (oral and written)

The Editorial Board of Library Resources & Technical Services met once at 2006 Annual Conference. Below is a brief summary of information from this meeting of interest to members of the Serials Section Executive Committee:

• LRTS continues to have strong submissions and to appear on schedule, with varied content including research articles, notes on operations, regular reviews of literature in technical services specialties, and book reviews. During the past year, there has been increase in letters to the editor.
• Of the thirty-eight manuscripts submitted from June 2005 through May 2006, three were on serials cataloging and another three covered other serials topics.
• Acceptance rate for manuscripts during this period was 54.5%, up slightly from 52.5% the previous year.
• Starting with v. 51, each LRTS issue will have an additional four pages.
• LRTS is actively seeking more advertising content. An increase in advertising would enable LRTS to expand further.
• LRTS’ production method includes submission by authors of electronic files to the editor, double-blind review either electronically or on paper by board members and other referees, submission of Word files for a complete issue by the editor to ALA Production, and editor’s review of pdf pages following layout by ALA Production. Then, the issue is printed and mailed.
• Discussion continues concerning electronic distribution of LRTS. ALA members have indicated that they still want print issues of association journals. LRTS will likely move to a situation in which electronic publication is primary and print is secondary but still exists. The editor has not been pleased with some electronic products selected by ALA.
• LRTS has established a system of assigning mentors to aspiring authors prior to submission of their papers for consideration. If potential authors are interested, they are advised to contact the editor.
• Revised instructions for authors have been posted on the LRTS website.

In 2007, LRTS will celebrate the division’s fiftieth anniversary and its own fifty completed volumes.

• An index of v. 25-50, created by Edward Swanson, will be issued as a separate publication. It is tentatively expected to be mailed to all subscribers with v. 51, no. 2.
• A content analysis of the journal, examining trends and themes, is being written by Tschera Harkness Connell of the Serials Section and will appear in v. 51.
• A reprint of v. 1, no. 1 will be sent to all subscribers. C. Myall will convey the Serials Section’s concerns that this issue be clearly identified, so it does not end up in every library’s check-in problem bin!

Representative to ALCTS Education Committee (L. Griffin) (oral and written)

All sections are moving forward with the development of courses for the Fundamentals Series. Elaine Yontz, in-coming chair of CRC, has agreed to develop the content for the Technical Services Management course. Christa Easton is developing the Fundamentals for Serials course.

The core competencies are still under review by the section’s executive boards. The competencies will be included in the ALCTS Policy Statement.

The prototype for evaluating programs for possible course offerings is due at the 2007 Midwinter conference.

Section representatives are to ask their respective section’s education committee chairs to identify early possible continuing education course offerings.

Representative to ALCTS Publications Committee (C. Foster) (oral and written)

The ALCTS Publications Committee reviewed all of the sections’ publications currently in process. The Serials Section has one publication in process, Guidelines for Handling Microforms in the Digital Age (Michelle Sitko et al.), and one (Guide to Performance Evaluation of Vendors, Bosch & Sugnet) which is currently in the Acquisitions Section, but will be coming back to SS.

Christine Taylor prepared a flyer, which is also on the ALCTS Web site, about publishing opportunities. She will be working on a FAQ after receiving input from the ALCTS Publications Committee. C. Foster suggested that studying the Education Retreat Competencies might spark some publication ideas as that list becomes more final.

ALCTS is the fourth largest sales generator in ALA.

Representative to the ALCTS Organization and Bylaws (Lori Osmus Kappmeyer) (written and oral)

The committee reviewed and approved the continuation of the Medium Heads of Technical Services Discussion Group, MARBI, and the Membership Committee. They also reviewed the LITA/ALCTS Technical Services Workstation Discussion Group (an interest group in LITA) which is also up for renewal in LITA this year. The chair of this group has had difficulty finding replacement leadership and attendance is small. Organization & Bylaws Committee (O&B) did not think the group was viable to continue in ALCTS.

O&B also discussed how to renew interest groups. The Committee will develop a procedure following the LITA model. They looked at the list of when various groups should be reviewed during the next seven years, and will need to adjust it to account for the three-year renewal cycle for interest groups. During 2006/07, the groups that will be reviewed are the International Relations Committee, the Newspaper Discussion Group, and the Role of the Professional in Academic Technical Services Departments Discussion Group. Since the first interest groups were not officially approved until August 2005, they might not come up for renewal until 2008/09. There also needs to be coordination with LITA for renewals of joint interest groups.

The Acquisitions Section asked to change its charge in order to reflect the cataloging work that takes place as part of acquisitions functions. O&B approved the change with the addition of wording that accounted for gift functions in addition to commercial acquisitions processes. O&B also looked at how to change the bylaws by removing section names and charges from Article X. These changes do not have to be approved by the ALCTS membership. On the advice of the Serials Section Executive Committee, they recommended moving this information to an appendix or to the ALCTS Manual so it will still be available.

Representative to CCS Cataloging Committee: Description and Access (K. Randall) (oral and written)

RDA

Resource Description and Access (RDA) was the only topic of discussion Friday afternoon, and was a major part of the agenda on Saturday and Monday. Jennifer Bowen, ALA Representative to the Joint Steering Committee, reported on JSC work to date. J. Bowen and CC:DA Chair Mary Larsgaard requested that discussion be limited to major issues in chapters 6-7, because of the limited time available at the conference. More detailed matters can be taken care of via the Confluence web pages after the conference.

Some of the observations:

• The rules are still verbose and include a lot of redundancy
• The rules are still too “text-based”
• More work needs to be done to put the rules into “plain English”
• Should chapter 6 be renamed (it is currently called “Related Resources”)?
• Some of the categories of relationships in chapter 6 can be combined
• The wording of some of the rule captions and rule text in chapter 6 is confusing
• The special rules in chapter 6 for music, art, and legal resources seem to be merely placeholders for examples and do not contain any instructions different from the more general rules in chapter 6
• The JSC is considering moving rules about contents out of chapter 4 and into chapter 6
• Any rules in chapter 1-5 dealing with relationships with other resources should be moved into chapter 6
• The “rule of three” is still alive and well in chapter 7; can this be eliminated?
• AACR2 21.1B2 appears to have been carried over into RDA 7.2.1.4.1; should this be changed?
• Are “primary access points” (formerly “main entry”) still necessary? (big discussion; probably nothing can/should be changed in the short time frame available for development of RDA)

Many of the issues in the previous review period brought up by the CRCC Task Force for Reviewing RDA Documents were addressed in the new chapter 6 or are still being discussed by JSC. K. Randall has been added to JSC’s RDA Examples Group for chapters 1-5, to work on examples for serials. He will continue chairing the CRCC Task Force for Reviewing RDA Documents, and will input the comments of that Task Force per the deadlines.

CC:DA members will read the non-ALA comments on RDA Part I and identify those with which they strongly disagree by July 28, 2006. CC:DA members are to add their comments on RDA chapters 6-7 into Confluence by Aug. 14, 2006 and indicate their agreements/disagreements with others’ comments by Aug. 21, 2006. New proposals for rules in chapters 6-7 are due to JSC by Aug. 7, 2006.

ALA responses to RDA drafts will continue to be made available on the CC:DA Web site.

Don Chatham from ALA Publishing reported that a company was hired to create the prototype of the RDA online product; the purpose of the prototype is to look at the concept and get a very rough ballpark figure of the cost. So far, it does not appear that the online product will be a cost-prohibitive endeavor. Communication is occurring with ILS vendors and Library of Congress regarding implementation issues of the online product. RDA is being envisioned as a suite of products (online plus various print products), although it is not certain yet what the print version would look like. A variety of pricing models is being considered.

Task Forces

K. Randall reported on the Task Force to Maintain “Differences Between, Changes Within”. He took changes and corrections to the ALCTS office in May 2006. He and C. Taylor discussed ways of reformatting the book. C. Taylor will not be able to return a proof of the revised book until the end of July 2006. In the meantime, K. Randall and the Task Force will work on remaining changes. The final revised book will hopefully be finished and published later in 2006. The three main recommendations that the Task Force will be making to CC:DA for future publications: 1) work with ALCTS on the design of the book before the final manuscript is delivered for publication; 2) all authors must thoroughly read the proofs from ALCTS before publication; 3) ensure that all formats (e.g., print and PDF) are essentially the same (e.g., page numbering is identical).

MARBI

Of particular interest to the Serials Section is Proposal no. 2006-08: Addition of subfield $r in field 865 to accommodate date of issuance for indexes in the MARC 21 Holdings Format. This change would allow for compatibility with ONIX for Serials, and is for cases where date of issuance and date of coverage are different. The proposal was approved with minor revisions (mainly changing $r to $v).

Other

Laura Smart reported on her testing of ALA’s Communities software. It may be possible to start using it later in the year, but it does not appear to be robust enough for CC:DA’s needs. It was decided that CC:DA will mainly use Confluence for the time being, and will try out very small documents in the new groupware.

Representative to ALCTS Budget & Finance Committee (S. Davis) (oral and written)

The Budget & Finance Committee (B&F) will be reviewing the level of dues income against the operating costs at the 2007 Midwinter meeting to determine whether a dues increase will be needed in the future. B&F had previously agreed that dues should cover the costs to run the association.

ALCTS membership is stable. ALA Membership increased approximately 2.3%. The number of LRTS subscribers decreased by 7-8%. However, the journal is expected to finish the fiscal year in the black.

The ALCTS fiftieth anniversary plans are moving forward. Special fundraising efforts are underway to support these activities. ALCTS operational funds will not be used to underwrite any of the activities.

The ALCTS Board passed the 2006-2011 strategic plan. B&F will be working on revising the ALCTS Financial plan accordingly.

Education Committee Chair (Betty Landesman) (written)

B. Landesman announced that “Unraveling the Mysteries of Serials” has not been removed from the ALCTS Web site.

The Committee agreed that the Syllabus for Serials Collection Management, Records Systems, and Preservation Teaching and Training should be withdrawn and replaced by two new syllabi: Serials Management (Print and Electronic) and Serials Preservation and Archiving. The appropriate form to withdraw the current syllabus was submitted to the ALCTS Publications Committee. Andrea Rolich has been appointed as a consultant from PARS to work with Virginia Taffurelli and Ellen Kovacic on the Serials Preservation and Archiving syllabus. Michael Elmore and Erin Wise will work on the Serials Management syllabus. M. Elmore, as incoming committee chair, will submit the appropriate forms to request new publications to the ALCTS Publications Committee.

Committee members were asked to provide a recommendation on whether to update, revise, or withdraw the 1992 “Guidelines for Handling Library Orders for Serials and Periodicals”. They felt that the document should be completely revised to address electronic ordering as well as orders for electronic materials. They recommended that it be referred to the Serials Section Acquisition Committee, who wrote the original guide, to do the revision. They also should consult with the ALCTS Acquisitions Section to see if they have a similar document that covers aspects of the topic that are not serials-specific, such as relationships between libraries and vendors and what a library should expect from a publisher or vendor.

Daisy Waters was elected Chair-Elect of the ALCTS Serials Section, and consequently submitted her resignation from this committee. B. Landesman was elected Chair-Elect of the ALCTS Collection Management and Development Section, and will be leaving this committee when her term as chair is completed June 30. Due to this unexpected turnover in committee membership and time constraints on the continuing members, planning a program on “Electronic Serials 101” was postponed until the 2008 annual conference.

Serials Standards Committee Chair (S. Opasik) (written)

156 people attended the Serials Standards Update Forum. All three presentations given at the forum will be mounted on the ALCTS Web site.

The committee will complete and submit an ALCTS publication proposal for a revised edition of the Serials Standards Bibliography.

The committee will changes its meeting time at annual conferences. The committee will now meet on Saturday’s from 8-10 am.

Union Lists of Serials Committee Chair (Paul Moeller) (written)

Myrtle Myers of OCLC provided the Committee with a brief update on OCLC’s transition to the use of the Connexion browser for the support local holdings maintenance. The use of MARC 21 Format for Holdings Data in Local Holdings Records, the use of 008 byte 20 (lending policy) and byte 21 (reproduction policy), batch loading, possible MFHD file output, and challenges faced in the transition were discussed. M. Myers noted that the use of MFHD had made users rethink procedures. Many users are interested in the increased granularity of holdings information, the do not loan/copy options, and the policy level deflections by format that are now available. This discussion led to a review of the document “Characteristics of an Ideal Union Listing World”, which the Committee has been developing. A number of changes to the document were suggested and the Committee agreed to a complete revision of the document by the 2007 Midwinter meeting.

The Committee members also reviewed a document which is intended to become a links library of resources for and about Union listing and MARC 21 Format for Holdings Data. They agreed that the collection of links in the document were appropriate. M. Myers will check for more up-to-date links to OCLC documentation as well as information on the Library of Congress Newspaper Project.

Finally, the Committee considered a possible refocusing its energies. The activities mentioned above support ALCTS’ efforts to promote the development and use of both standards and best practices.

Representative to the ALCTS Program Committee (Cindy Hepfer) (written)

The ALCTS Program Committee met for eight hours during the Annual

Conference to review program and pre-conference proposals and to offer feedback to the individuals planning them. The Serials Section will be well represented on the 2007 annual conference program.

Pre-conference:

The Acquisition Section (AS) is planning a pre-conference that has a working title of "Adapting to the Complexities of Electronic Resources: Workflow Analysis, Redesign, and Implementation." The Serials Section (SS) will be asked to co-sponsor in name only.

Programs:

"Serials Standards Update Forum" (SS Committee to Study Serials Standards).

This regularly presented forum is being institutionalized as an annual session. Douglas Kiker submitted a proposal and will serve as the program planner for 2007.

"Effective MetaData Exchange & Exposure" (SS Acquisitions Committee). G.

Ives offered this new proposal which was enthusiastically accepted by the ALCTS Program Committee.

The AS submitted a proposal for a program with the working title "New Tools for Old Problems." This session will look at "social software" such as wikis, blogs, RSS feeds, instant messaging, and so forth in a technical services setting. Planner Jeffrey Carrico indicated that he will seek co-sponsorship from SS.

Submitted but then withdrawn:

Electronic Serials 101 (SS Education Committee). In a note to the committee, Betty Landesman indicated that this concept might be developed and resubmitted for Annual 2008. C. Hepfer strongly encourages the SS Education Committee, or the Section if necessary, to endorse the idea and throw some resources in that direction. It has potential as a program or, probably even better, a pre-conference.

Regarding the forums:

Each section, as well as ALCTS itself, has already developed or is considering developing one or more standing forums. The Serials Section already has its Standards Update Forum. It could develop an additional one as well. The role of the Program Committee liaison will be to ensure that someone is chairing the section's standing forum(s), to shepherd the proposal through ALCTS Program Committee, and to work with the planners if assistance is needed.

Finally, Julie Reese from the ALCTS Office indicated that she would like to see all program planners hand out an evaluation form at their session. While evaluation forms are not required by the Office, they not only provide program planners with feedback but can be useful tools for soliciting ideas for future programs and speakers.

The meeting adjourned at 9:33 am.

Respectfully submitted

Meg Mering, Secretary