Regional Campus Libraries Discussion Group
ALA Midwinter Meeting Notes
January, 2006

Attendees: Carole Svensson, Darby Syrkin (DG Leader), Elizabeth Burns, Elizabeth Richardson, Evelyn Greenlaw, Harvey Gover, Julie Miller, Laura Ramirez, Linda Frederiksen, Michele Russo, Pat Duck, Robin Lockerby

Notes submitted by Evelyn.

Announcements/Comments

• OCLS Presentation (April 2006)
  “The Face of Regional Campus Libraries and Librarianship” John Brandt, Linda Frederiksen, Tina Schneider, and Darby Syrkin will be presenting.
  
• Annotated Bibliography
  This is available on the Regional Campus Libraries Discussion Group web site, in the Research section (http://www.tacoma.washington.edu/library/rcl/research.html). [Syrkin note: Carole has made updates to the format since Midwinter meeting.] This is an on-going project and we need more annotations. Elizabeth Burns will provide additional citations. If you choose an article from the list to annotate, please send a message to the Listserv indicating which article you have chosen; this will keep us from duplicating effort. The National Association of Branch Campus Administrators (NABCA) is very interested in this project and is linking to our site.
  
• Directory
  Through our work on “The Face of Regional Campus Libraries and Librarianship” paper and project, we know we should refine the previously created directory of over 600 entries before publishing it on the Web. This process of refining will be related to how we define the regional campus library (see below).

Questions

• ACRL
  No one has decided to present at ACRL. Deadline for presenters is in May.
  
• Midwinter meeting date/time preferences
  Scheduling has become more difficult and while we might be able to avoid conflict with most of DLS meetings, we may not be able to avoid conflicting with the DLS Executive meeting. [Syrkin note: Our Annual meeting in New Orleans is scheduled for 6/26/2006 from 4:00-5:30 pm. Location to be announced.]

Discussion

What's in a name?

Are we regional, branch, or satellite campus libraries? How can we help establish the definition and nomenclature?

We know the word “regional” can be confusing. Perhaps we should be regional/branch?

John Brandt reviewed the directory and survey findings we created for the OCLS presentation, and came up with a few suggestions on how the NCES definition, “A campus or site of an educational institution that is not temporary, is located in a community beyond a reasonable commuting distance from its parent institution, and offers full programs of study, not just courses” could be clarified to better suit our needs.

We could consider adding “the regional campus library has a physical library presence.” This would help differentiate between regional and distance library services. We will still need to define what is a ‘presence.’

We could also consider adding “has a main campus” to the definition. This would eliminate the institutions that have multiple campuses, but no main campus (e.g. community colleges).

It has been suggested we look more closely at whether a campus has “independent funding,” “independent faculty,” and/or “independent accreditation” from the main campus and use this independence as a criteria for a regional/branch library. However, none of these “independent statuses” are consistent for any of us.

The definition, therefore, still needs to be very broad. Much discussion ensued and most attendees agreed finding a definition that is suitable for all of us will be very difficult. One person suggested we should define ourselves as “anything that is not main;” another suggested we are the “Unique Library Group.”

Still, the directory will be refined. Law, Medicine and other subject-libraries will be removed; for-profit institutions and community colleges will be placed in sub-directories. Co-located institutions might also be separated. Syrkin reminded the group of the “Partnerships Library Discussion Group.”

Our Databases, Ourselves:

How does our status as regional campus libraries affect the acquisition, licensing, and use of electronic databases? As enrollment increases on the regional campus, vendors notice. Some regional campuses have been dropped from the main campus licenses and/or forced to pay for their own subscriptions.

Discussion involved a comparison of how each of us accesses and uses databases, whether we are responsible for our own licenses and how that has changed over time. Several attendees reported having Proxy access to the main campus resources. Some attendees mentioned having unique subscription resources on the regional campus, completely independent from the main campus. Others mentioned giving a token amount of money to the main campus to maintain access. Two attendees reported being given little to no notice of changes in subscription and license rights.