I’m experimenting with using GanttProject software for creating timelines and participants for our electronic resources program. Do you have a favorite bit of software that you use to schedule tasks/people for a project over a period of time? Fill me in with what you’re using by leaving a comment.
One year ago on this date we began the implementation process for our electronic resource management system, Innovative’s ERM. In the past year we have entered 352 resource records, which describe our databases, e-journal collections, and e-book collections. Through the ERM we are providing 72,841 access points to electronic content. We are managing 23,029 serial titles via the system. We’re using the ERM to store our usage statistics and are working with Innovative to persuade more of our publisher friends to provide usage statistics via the SUSHI protocol through the ERM. We’re beginning to manage our license agreements through the system too, and are now in the midst of that project.
The advantages of the administrative back end of the system aside, what we’re most pleased about are the patron-facing features of the ERM. Now when our patrons perform a keyword search in our catalog, relevant electronic resources are provided first in search results. We are able to now convey to our patrons their rights and restrictions for use of these resources, via the license record. Check it out live by looking at our record for ARTstor: http://linus.lmu.edu/record=e1000028~S1. The information in the box at the bottom of the screen is the rights of use.
Our development of the ERM is ongoing, but we are amazed at the progress made in just one short year. Happy birthday, ERM! May you have a long and healthy life here at our library.
keyword search results for ARTstor
what's that in your hand? what, where? that there, in your hand. it looks like a book contract. is it a book contract? why yes, it IS a book contract.
i met my co-author, cheryl laguardia, at the recent library assessment conference, in attendance at the presentation in which i depressed the whole room with my analysis (the short story: libraries don’t do a good job assessing their marketing techniques for electronic resources). we chatted via email and soon decided that a book on this topic, a practical approach to developing a marketing plan for a library’s electronic resources, was just the thing the profession needed. neal-schuman publishers, inc. agreed, so we’re on our way. the tentative title of the book is: marketing your library’s electronic resources: a how-to-do-it manual.
i’m pretty excited to be working with cheryl. she’s kind of fabulous. this book project also gave me a reason to start a hanging folder. i chose yellow for this project because it is the happiest of colors.
it’s like he knows me.
like most libraries, we have been moving to the electronic format for journal content, rather than retaining subscriptions in print. our library now has a policy for preferring the electronic format, with exceptions. we used duke libraries’ and cornell university library’s policies (http://library.duke.edu/about/collections/eonly.html; cornell’s no longer available) to guide our own.
over the last four years, in collaboration with our faculty, we have been canceling print journal subscriptions if our access to the electronic content is owned in perpetuity. this is the last year of our formal project to convert these subscriptions, and it has a very satisfying ending. as 2011 closes we will have converted 770 journals from print to electronic format, with no loss of content, just a simple format conversion. we have seen a modest cost savings as a result of this project, but it is not as dramatic a result as the knowledge that we are providing journal content to our users in a format that they prefer, with good stewardship to the preservation of the journal content for our collection.
here’s a simple chart i used in a report upon the conclusion of our project.
has your library gone through a similar conversion? if so, would you be willing to share your story? how many journals has your library converted to the e-format? did you accomplish this in an intentional project format, or as a matter of course? were your faculty involved in the decision making?
