SEPTEMBER 13, 2011

by Gerald Doyle

ACADEMIC ASSEMBLY OF LIBRARIANS

GENERAL ASSEMBLY

TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2011

2:00PM

PALEY LIBRARY, LECTURE HALL

MINUTES

Attending: Steven Bell, Brian Boling, Jim Bongiovanni, Carla Davis Cunningham, Mark Darby, Anne Harlow, Thomas Heverin, Delphine Khanna, Molly Larkin, Jonathan LeBreton, Krystal Lewis (recorder), David Murray (Chair), Penelope Myers, Brian Schoolar, Margery Sly, Gretchen Sneff, Tom Whitehead.

Meeting called to order at 2:02 PM.

  1. Approval of minutes from the May 10, 2011 meeting

Minutes approved without corrections.

  1. New Drupal-based AAL website (D. Khanna)

Delphine announced that the AAL website content is migrating to Drupal.  Drupal is database-driven and has more functionality than Contribute, e.g. WYSYWYG editor, events creation.  In Drupal, web pages are not deleted, but unpublished, and revisions are tracked.  Currently, only Steering Committee members have access to Drupal. Once LDAP authentication is set up, others may have access, however the AAL members present indicated that they see no need for every AAL member to have access/editing privileges at this time.  Adding content to Drupal by cutting and pasting from Microsoft Word does not cause formatting problems, but the source code can be edited manually.

  1. Remarks by the Interim Dean of Libraries (C. Lang)

Carol gave several updates:

  • Temple University Libraries was ranked 57 (up from 58 previously) in the ARL Library Investment Index 2009-10, which was recently published in the Chronicle of Higher Education.  The index measures library expenditures on materials and staff salaries and wages.
  • Temple University is hosting Library Journal’s second “Future of the Academic Library Symposium: Bridging the Gap” on November 11.  A website for the symposium will go live next week.
  • Hiring: In July, the Libraries received several hiring exceptions for positions.  The Part-Time Reference Librarian positions have been posted.  Other exceptions have been submitted.
  • Tonight Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives is hosting the program “Sound and Vision” at the Piazza at Schmidts at 7:30 PM.
  • An all staff meeting will be held tomorrow at 2:30.  Please encourage colleagues to attend.
  1. Old Business

Librarians’ new roles in the Faculty Senate were discussed.  Previously the AAL elected two representative faculty senate librarians who observed Faculty Senate meetings, but due to a bylaws change, many librarians are now members of the Faculty Senate. The AAL will continue to elect representative faculty senate librarians. Carla Davis Cunningham pointed out that Faculty Senate membership includes the Law and HSC librarians. Questions were raised about whether Law and HSC librarians are eligible to vote for representative faculty senate librarians and whether faculty senate membership includes department heads.  Brian Schoolar has asked the Faculty Senate Executive Committee about librarian service on Senate committees.  Librarians should now be receiving Faculty Senate emails and if they are not they should notify Brian or David Murray.

  1. New Business / Announcements

Gretchen Sneff suggested investigating paperless AAL GA meetings.

  1. Adjournment

Meeting adjourned at 2:40.

This entry was posted in Minutes.