General Assembly Meetings
8 January 2002 and 14 January 2002
MINUTES
Chairperson Cathy Weng called meeting on 8 January 2002 to order at 2:10.
Business meeting:
Minutes of the Assembly meeting of November 13, 2001 were approved as distributed by e-mail to the members.
Introductions: A. Vara introduced Mary Edsall to the Assembly (Part-time, temporary Archivist/Curator of the Philadelphia Dance Archive program. She is a Librarian and currently a PhD candidate in Dance at Temple. She is also currently the CORD President – Congress on Research and Dance).
Also introduced were three new Drexel Interns:
- Anastasia Karel – Special Collections/Contemporary Culture
- Amy Vaccarella – Access Services and
- Mark Werner – Systems
Report of the University Librarian M. Pastine:
The Collection Management issue on which many here are responsible for is nearing completion and may well be out in February.
The Emily Norwick Charitable Trust Fund of $99,000 will be used to name our user education/information literacy program and to establish an exhibit space on the first floor of Paley Library (with some focus on images of women in various professions and purchase of books by and about women). Task forces from ADC will be working on these. Martha Henderson and Byron Mayes are co-chairing the first and Margaret Jerrido is chairing the second. If you have any ideas for them, please contact them directly.
Robert Harting and Dave Synder, from the Development Office and Stuart Sullivan, Vice President for Development and Alumni Affairs, have been meeting with us in relation to development and outreach efforts. They are adding to information that we have provided them on library donors, along with a listing of endowments in support of the library. They hope soon to designate a particular development person to work with the libraries on fundraising.
Concetta Stewart, Dean of the School of Communications and Theater, has been appointed to chair a Provost’s Technology Committee. I am one of the members of the Committee. It met for the first time on December 12, 2001. One of its first tasks is to review the priorities of each of the tech Plans submitted for this year. Its final report to the Provost is due on February 2, 2002.
Boris Teske has applied for the ACRL Information Literacy Immersion, Track II Librarian as Program Developer for the summer 2002 program in Colorado. Only 90 participants will be selected.
Carol Lang is preparing the final paperwork for our libraries’ participation in the Association of Research Libraries’ LibQUAL+ (quality service and outcomes assessment of services) program, beginning next semester. Staff at all levels will be involved.
Contract renewals have been submitted to the Provost’s Office in a timely manner. PARA met their deadline with me and I met mine for submitting the materials to the Provost’s Office. We have not yet received a response from the Provost’s Office.
Carol Bell, Head, Acquisitions Department, begins on March 20, 2002.
We will be setting up an all-staff meeting to be held some time after ALA, and hopefully with the new Provost, Ira Schwartz, visiting us.
AAL Faculty Senate Representative report: S. Stormont gave a brief report on the Senate in which the main topic of discussion has been the ten-year review process which President Adamany wants to see revised.
Temple Centers & Institutes Research Project: T. Whitehead presented to the Assembly that which he previously outlined to the Steering Committee: that it may be worthwhile for the librarians to gather more information concerning the variety of “centers” and “institutes” throughout the University. At least for the public service needs of the library, he noted, information on the services, data bases, archives and libraries, and activities of these centers, beyond what is now known, would be beneficial positively as well as avoiding the numerous queries received which are not answered or answered only after a day or so of campus research. Acknowledging that more information has been getting onto Temple web pages he and the Steering Committee are binging up the topic for discussion in the Assembly. During the introduction and discussion a sample list of centers and information was displayed, as well as a sample data entry form for center investigation.
Following discussion enough interest was shown to continue considering the proposal. Whitehead was asked to distribute the preliminary alphabetical list and a revised list arranged by discipline. Final discussion will be held at the March meeting.
Questions raised during the discussion included responsibility for the list, updating a list once completed, definitions, University guidelines and definitions on centers, etc.
Proposed revision of By Laws: C. Weng led a discussion on the proposed AAL By Law changes necessitated by the requirement of the University President for each School of the University to present its By Laws this Spring for Presidential and Trustee review and approval process. C. Weng noted that the changes were not substantial, correcting inconsistencies, updating titles, correcting grammar, etc. It was proposed to be consistent in the naming of standing committees by changing three of them to end with “Committee” rather than start with “Committee on”.
During discussion two or three minor word changes were incorporated into the proposed By Laws (adding “each”, taking out “for”) and changing “Nominating and Elections Committee” to “Nominations and Elections Committee”.
Voting on the By Law revisions would be scheduled at the next, March, meeting of the Assembly. M. Pastine noted her concern for earlier submission to the President and following discussion L. Lane made a motion, seconded by M. Jerrido:
“I make a motion that the Assembly holds a special meeting next week.”
It was agreed that having a full Assembly meeting the following week would allow for voting on the By Law changes. The Motion was approved by a hand vote.
Chair C. Weng immediately called for a meeting of the Assembly to take place on Monday, January 14th, 2002, at 2:00 p.m. for the purpose of voting on the By Laws revision. This ended the business meeting of the Assembly.
Program:
At 3:20 p.m. Penelope Myers, Access Services, presented a program with slides on PALCI (Pennsylvania Academic Library Connection Initiative). She gave a history of PALCI since its initiation in 1996 and its successful programs in the past five years. She described the on-site borrowing program for faculty, the reciprocal photocopy agreement, the PALCI hotlink on Paley’s home page, and the Virtual Union Catalog. The slides gave particular and in depth statistics on lending and borrowing trends over the years by different libraries and types of libraries. She accepted and answered questions from the floor.
The Program and the Assembly meeting ended at 4:10 p.m.
Chairperson C. Weng called meeting on January 14, 2002 to order at 2:10 p.m. with one agenda item: voting on the proposed revisions to the AAL By Laws.
19 members of the Assembly attended, two more than required for a quorum and official Assembly meeting.
C. Weng called for a hand vote on the proposed revision/emendations to By Laws of the Academic Assembly of Librarians: 19 for acceptance, 0 against acceptance (unanimous).
The meeting was adjourned at 2:15 p.m. with thanks from the Chair.
Whitehead, Recorder
Attachment: By Laws of the Assembly, amended 2002.