Survey asks students "What's it like to be a college student in the digital age?"

Starting April 6, a random sampling of Purdue students received email invitations to participate in an online survey that's being conducted on several campuses this spring by Project Information Literacy (PIL) from the University of Washington.

The survey will help Purdue and Project Information Literacy learn more about the opportunities and challenges that online research presents to today’s college students — and the strategies they've developed to find information for course work and for use in their lives.

Sharon Weiner, the W. Wayne Booker Endowed Chair in Information Literacy at Purdue, is coordinating the survey on campus.

The survey will be available for two weeks through April 20. Participation is entirely voluntary and all responses remain confidential. The research has undergone Human Subjects Review and IRB approval at Purdue.

Survey participants will be entered into a random drawing for a $150 gift certificate to Amazon.com provided by PIL, and the survey takes about 10-15 minutes to complete.

Sharon will be working with Dr. Alison Head, the co-PI, to arrange for her to report the findings at an invited symposium at Purdue in September 2010. 

For more information on Project Information Literacy, visit http://projectinfolit.org/.

LCSSAC Hosts "Breakfast with the Deans"

The dean and associate deans were invited by LCSSAC to "Breakfast with the Deans" on Tuesday, March 30th, to have informal time with the clerical and service staff.

Beth McNeil, Nancy Hewison, Jim Mullins, Scott Brandt, and Paul Bracke welcomed this time to meet, talk, and to answer questions submitted prior to the meeting to Marsha Hill, chair, LCSSAC. The dean read each question and each associate dean replied according to their area of expertise.

“The meeting was well received by everyone who attended. There was a lot of good information shared in both directions,” said Marsha.  “We hope that LCSSAC will be able to make this an annual event.”

Included in this edition of INSIDE please see the questions and responses listed at the end of this issue. If you have more questions, please do not hesitate to send them directly to one of the associate deans or to Marsha Hill who will forward them (anonymously) to the deans.

On April 12-13, the Purdue Libraries will be hosting the 6th Annual ARL Initiative to Recruit a Diverse Workforce Visit to Purdue University Libraries. In an effort to support the nationwide initiative to broaden the diversity among library professionals, this partnership was created to allow participants of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Initiative to Recruit a Diverse Workforce program to become acquainted firsthand with the workings of a major research university library and living in a medium sized community. The scholars will conclude their visit better informed regarding the issues, challenges, and opportunities involved in working in a research environment. 

This year we are hosting nineteen participants. If you see any of the visiting scholars in your library or unit, please extend a warm welcome.

And a special thanks to the planning committee who will make their visit informative and memorable: Jake Carlson, Mark Newton, Rebecca Richardson, Gretchen Stephens, and Sharon Weiner.

The 2009–2011 Diversity Scholars are:
Anissa Ali, Wayne State University
Langston Bates, University of North Texas
Johnnie Blunt, Wayne State University
Roy Brooks, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Jeffery Cruz, University of Arizona
Kiyomi Deards, Drexel University
Marcela Estevez, University of South Florida
Emmanuel Faulkner, University of Maryland–College Park
Roland Garcia-Milian, Southern Connecticut State University
Xiaomei Gu, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Stacy Harris, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Christina Herd, San Jose State University
Jennifer Huck, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Sheetija Kathuria, University of Tennessee–Knoxville
Samip Mallick, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Yasmin Mathew, Pratt Institute
Myrna Elsa Morales, Simmons College
Derek Mosley, Simmons College
Laksamee Putnam, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Also attending: Mark Puente, Director of Diversity Programs at ARL

On Saturday, March 27th 2010, the Hicks Undergraduate Library was bombarded with wizards and their wizarding families to celebrate the grand opening of the traveling "Harry Potter’s World" exhibit. Each child who entered through the doors was promptly sorted into their respective houses and then let loose to enjoy the craft activities planned. At the height of the event, every craft table was full of busy little hands creating bookmarks and wands. Face painting was a huge hit with Matt Stahura never moving from his seat for four straight hours. We had two intense rounds of trivia and awarded six prizes including the complete set of the books, a complete set of DVDs plus some other Harry Potter -related goodies.

At 2:15 p.m. the activities moved outside for a game of Quidditch with the Purdue Intercollegiate Quidditch Team. The team showed the kids how to play with a demonstrative game and then let all those who wanted to try, jump in and join the game.

As the party drew to a close, parents were stopping by to let me know how much they enjoyed the event and how excited their child was to participate. One parent said she thought it was an amazing thing the libraries did for the community. She loved how we brought to life the books and of course, Quidditch.  For me, this was the most gratifying part of the event. It was wonderful to know that all the hard work and planning not only paid off but made a room full of kids and their parents extremely happy.

Approximately 80 kids came through and by 4:00 p.m. we didn’t have one jellybean left.

I want to personally thank everyone who helped out with the event especially Kayla Gregory, Elaine Bahler, Ann O’Donnell, and Catherine Fraser Riehle. A big shout out goes to the Purdue Intercollegiate Quidditch Team for volunteering their time to make this event a huge success. Everyone did an amazing job in helping bring my vision/dream to reality! Thank you.

ImaginAsian Art Exhibition

On Friday, April 9, the Tippecanoe Arts Federation will be hosting an opening for the ImaginAsian art exhibition, on display April 2 – May 9, 2010, celebrating contemporary Asian Pacific America. The reception will take place from 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. at 638 North Street in Lafayette. The reception will also showcase the exhibit “Renaissance Magic: Plants, Potions, and Poetry,” displayed in conjunction with the “Harry Potter’s World” exhibit on display in the Hicks Undergraduate Library.

Sponsored by the Asian American Network of Indiana, the ImaginAsian exhibit is comprised of sixty-six pieces of work and cultural artifacts donated by sixty contributors from 13 states including writer Lac Su, artist and author Kip Fulbeck, civil rights activist Yuri Kochiyama, director Michael Kang, Senator Daniel Inouye, G.I. Joe creator Larry Hama, and other stakeholders in the Asian American community.

Thirty-eight pieces of additional art by the contributors will soon be available online for auction that will run throughout the duration of the exhibit. Carl Snow and the Digitization and Metadata group scanned the artwork for the online auction to help support this initiative. All proceeds will go towards the purchase of Asian American Studies materials for the Purdue University Libraries.

For a list of participants please visit: http://cla.purdue.edu/idis/asian-american/imaginasian/featured.html

Return of the South China Spirit
Giclee signed and numbered print
by Stella Lai

Stella Lai grew up on a small, car-less island southwest of Hong Kong Island called Cheung Chau. Her work has been featured in magazines such as The Face, IdN, Beautiful Decay, Giant Robot and Vogue China. In 2007 Stella was selected as one of 10 artists from around the world to design a can for Pepsi. When not working on commercial projects, Stella is busy working on new paintings for her next exhibition, having already shown in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Atlanta, Miami, New York, Manchester, Shanghai and Beijing. Her work can be seen at www.tree-axis.com/stella/#/home.

About the time I had a cell phone to dispose of and was ready to pop it into the mail for recycling, I learned about some nasty practices for handling hazardous electronics: sending electronic items to developing countries to be land filled there, sending them to developing countries to be dismantled of their toxic materials where safety standards were weak or nonexistent and where equipment and training are less than adequate, and sending them to prisons, again where standards were more lax. For more detail, see http://www.electronicstakeback.com/problem/export_problem.htm

There is a protocol and a certification to counteract this dumping, e-Stewards. For general information check here http://www.e-stewards.org/. For a comparison of standards, check here http://www.e-stewards.org/documents/e-Recyclers_standards_comparison.pdf.

Or check this site that was not written by e-Stewards:
http://www.electronicstakeback.com/recycling/estewards/Chart_Comparing_R2_eStewards.pdf

Questions to ask of a recycling event in the community:

1. Who pays?
   http://www.electronicstakeback.com/recycling/fake_recycling/beware_of_fake_recycling.htm (scroll down)
   

Questions to ask of a recycler:

1. Are they certified?
2. How much do they recycle?
3. Do they have written procedure?
   http://earth911.com/recycling/electronics/proper-disposal-and-recycling-of-e-waste/ (they list recyclers without comments; scroll down to waste preparation for full criteria and more information on prep).

Here you can find certified recyclers: http://www.e-stewards.org/local_estewards.html

An interesting “report card” on companies that take back TVs: http://www.takebackmytv.com/pages/102

I found two listed groups that accept cell phones and are e-Stewards certified (Capstone Wireless and Call2Recycle); now to call my cell phone company and see if that is where they plan to send the phone after I use their postage paid packaging; if not I can mail direct to: http://www.electronicstakeback.com/recycling/find_a_responsible_recycler.htm 

And I timed it well; this is National Cell Phone Recycling Week.

Q&A from LCSSAC Breakfast with the Deans

1. With all of the work that goes into the performance appraisal process, will past appraisals from non-pay-raise years be taken into consideration when/if we get raises in the future? If not, why not?

Appraisals from non-pay-raise year[s] will be taken into consideration when merit raises are once again available. In reviewing performance a prime consideration will be consistency in performance, with greatest weight given to performance from the most recent year. 

2. What can clerical and service staff do to be more involved?

Be aware of what’s going on throughout the Libraries – read INSIDE, check the intranet for council and task force minutes and document, watch for e-mails from the dean, associate deans, councils, committees, and task forces. When supervisors or unit/division heads mention to you new opportunities, tasks, committees, etc., say yes to these opportunities. If you have time in your day or week to take on new duties, say so! 

3. Staff hours have been reallocated, resulting in reduction of staff hours available to open/close/staff circulation desks, causing larger workloads for those remaining. With no raises [potentially] for the second year in a row, and with concerns about rising future costs of health benefits, what can deans/supervisors do to ensure we keep our current staff from looking elsewhere for jobs?

Yes, we have seen some movement of staff time from smaller libraries to other units. Also, staff in libraries are taking on new work (oral history transcribing, theses and dissertation cataloging, collection management projects, for example) that can be worked on at their desks in their primary locations. For the most part, this has been a portion of a staff person’s time. We do not want to lose hard working, excellent staff to other employers; however, it is important for each person to consider what is in their and their family’s best interest.

4. How likely is it that any campus-wide outsourcing will affect any Libraries staff? What about ITD? What effect will the ITAP changes have on the staff?

First off, there are going to be changes to how IT is managed across campus. As everyone might have heard, there has been a campus wide charge to reduce IT expenditures by $10 million by FY12, possibly growing to a $15 million reduction the following year. This will mean that everyone will see change regarding IT. The Libraries cooperate with campus efforts to become leaner – exploring server virtualization, increase the number of virtual desktops, moving to more shared printing, and implementing energy saving measures. We’ll probably have to make some changes with which not everyone will be happy. 

You may have seen the two draft reports released a few weeks ago as part of the Sustaining New Synergies initiative, which make recommendations about cost savings and also IT governance structure. There will also be reorganization of campus IT staff, and everyone will be more accountable to the VP for IT for the decisions they make. The Libraries administration has worked closely with members of the IT governance structure committee to make sure that the needs of the Libraries are understood and will continue to be met into the future. When the final report is released this week, you should see that ITD will remain part of the Libraries and report to the dean. We will be taking a look at places where we could provide services more cost effectively by coordinating with ITaP, however, so some people’s roles will change. Outsourcing public computers to ITaP, for example, will mean that we will need to shift some job responsibilities.

As for other campus outsourcing, it is too early to forecast what that might include, however, the areas mentioned (transportation, maintenance) will likely have little or no impact upon most Libraries employees. 

5. Could we have more notice of changes before they happen – be in the loop while things/changes are happening instead of finding out right before or right after they happen and not having any input? Why isn’t our input being asked for when we are on the “front lines” dealing with patrons every single day?

We have a new group forming, made up of operations coordinators. The intent and goal of this group is to increase communication and collaboration throughout the Libraries, and should, therefore, help staff feel more “in the loop” on day-to-day happenings in the Libraries, and to seek staff input on "front lines" issues.

6. What kind of progress is being made on combining libraries?

As you know, two libraries were closed three years ago, Psychological Sciences and Consumer and Family Sciences. However, there will be no other library facilities closed until the new combined science and engineering library is built by the end of this decade. Presentations have been given to administration and development groups to generate support for this combined classroom/lecture hall and science and engineering library building on the site of the old power plant at the very heart of the campus.

7. With the reduction in student hours it is becoming more difficult for the clerical/service staff to attend Libraries events, meetings, training, etc. We don’t all have supervisors who are as accommodating/helpful as others. Is there something ADMIN can do to encourage supervisors to be more helpful to their staff so that we can participate in such events as this morning’s event?

ADMIN will take this into consideration when scheduling events, meetings, and training, and try, when possible, to schedule more than one option for attending these events. Also, ADMIN can help supervisors to understand the importance and/or priority of meetings.

8. Could more consideration be given when choosing dates for the all staff meetings? Spring Break is not a good time because most student workers are gone and we continue to be busy taking over what the student workers would normally do.  I imagine it is more difficult for the smaller libraries.

It is a challenge to find two contiguous dates that will meet as many calendars as possible. However, in the future every effort will be made to stay away from scheduling All Staff meetings during Spring Break, understanding the challenge for staff to be away from the smaller libraries. The two different days, with one in the morning and one in the afternoon, is our attempt to provide options and the ability to plan for coverage within the Libraries. It may require that someone who does not typically work at a service point, or even in that library, sit in to help another staff member have the time to attend the All Staff Meeting.

9. What progress is being made on intralibrary tasks that can be accomplished in one’s own library? So far most involve going to other sites, and that is a problem for small libraries.

Some examples of new projects and duties moving OUT into the libraries so staff can work on them while remaining in their primary location include: oral history transcribing, cataloging of theses/dissertations, collection management projects, and some interlibrary loan/document delivery work. There are actually more projects that are moving work OUT to the libraries than projects where staff need to be in a new location (barcoding project, for example).

10. Some of the flexibility we have all shared in the past is disappearing. It seems one is sometimes made to feel guilty if one is sick or just needs time away to rejuvenate. How can this be addressed, so all can benefit?

Continuing to find ways to cross divisions and units to share the workload and share staffing will help with this. Additionally, everyone (supervisors, administrators, faculty, and staff) needs, and deserves time away from work, whether it is for illness or for vacation (rejuvenation). Each person should remember how he or she would want to be treated or be supported while ill or on vacation, and then do the same for those with whom one works.

11. Communication still seems to be a serious problem between supervisors and staff members in some areas. How can the deans ensure supervisors are held accountable and do communicate in a timely manner to their staff?

In our new performance management system for C/S and A/P staff, the expectations for supervisors are based on three “supervisory elements;” all three of these specifically require communication by the supervisor (details below). As part of the performance management process, division heads and associate deans will discuss these expectations with supervisors and evaluate their performance related to the expectations.

• Communicates regularly with staff members throughout the year to set goals and offer constructive feedback about performance and advice about development. (Coaching and Developing Others)
• Provides guidance when needed. (Accomplishing Strategic Objectives)
• Shares information effectively and in a timely manner to support the work of employees. Sets and communicates goals and expectations in a clear manner. (Accomplishing Operational Objectives)

12. We have some supervisors who just aren’t very “staff oriented.” We realize we can’t change personalities but we would like to see some consistency when it comes to work environment policies. It seems some supervisors impose their rules and regulation without checking to see what Library and University policies are – in other words, some areas have a lot more flexibility than others. It just seems that it would be more beneficial (in terms of morale) to offer some of the same flexibility library-wide where it is possible. How can clerical/service staff raise these concerns without the fear of “punishment or labeling” for questioning work area policies?

One of the roles of our new HR administrator will be to provide supervisory training/refresher training on University and Libraries policies. In addition, the HR administrator will be a person with who staff can talk and confide concerns and issues, and know that follow-up will be accomplished. The staff member can trust that the HR administrator will be discrete and that there will not be retribution.   

13. What is the status of the projects that were being worked on by staff that had time to help out (like the barcoding)? Is there more of this type of project upcoming? Is it working out using staff from different libraries?

Our current projects are working very well. Barcoding continues in HKRP and will continue for the foreseeable future. We have staff at two libraries working on cataloging theses and dissertations, and will soon having training for staff at a third library, so they can participate in this project. Oral history transcribing is going well, and with several staff members now helping with this we are making great progress catching up on the transcribing.

14. With the dissolution of the circulation discussion group, Circulation staff are missing vital pieces of information to ensure our patrons receive the best service. Communication from CSSC is lacking. What can be done?

We're working on addressing this. In the last month, most of the CSSC meeting notes have been posted. The rest will be posted very soon. CSSC chair Laurie Sadler and CSSC members have been busy these past few months helping with the URM work, in addition to the regular work of their committee. CSSC members will bring information to you from the committee and also from you back to the committee. Ask your CSSC member representative or any CSSC member for information or contact CSSC chair Laurie Sadler when you need any circulation-related information.

15. What kinds of changes are anticipated with the new HR position?