University Library Committee
Minutes
September 21, 2000

Present:
Ansar Ahmed, Veterinary Medicine, Chair
Eileen Hitchingham, Library
Paul Colley, Staff Senate
Deborah Milly, Arts and Sciences
Anne Zajac, Faculty Senate

Guests: Linda Richardson, David Beagle

Absent: Diane Gillespie, Human Resources and Education; Richard Helm, Natural Resources; Douglas Patterson, Business; Raymond Plaut, Engineering; Mark Schneider, Architecture and Urban Studies; Jay Stipes, Agriculture and Life Sciences, Robert Perry, GSA

Dr. Ansar Ahmed, chair of the University Library Committee, welcomed members and initiated a round of introductions. He noted that the committeeâs work has moved to a certain level of prominence within the university governance following the administrative move (2 years ago) from Informational Technology to the Provostâs Office, bringing issues in closer connection to the academic institution. He added that he anticipates the committee having some key areas of activity this year ö promoting discussion about the critical issues surrounding scholarly communications and addressing how library resources relate to President Stegerâs desire to move Virginia Tech on to the top 30 ranking.

Committee members agreed to continue to invite non-voting library representatives from the Commission on Research, Library Faculty Association and Commission on Undergraduate Policies to ULC meetings. The reporting structure was reviewed ö the ULC reports directly to the Commission on Graduate Studies and Policies, but has a "dotted line" associated with both the Commission on Undergraduate Policies and Commission on Research.

ServQual

E. Hitchingham briefed members on the preliminary results of the campus-wide on-line library services survey that was conducted in Spring 2000. Virginia Tech participated along with eleven other member libraries of the Association of Research Libraries using a survey format called ServQual. The survey asked participants to indicate on a scale of 1 ö 9 what the minimum level of quality was expected in a particular service, what the perceived level was being delivered, and what was the desired level of service. Virginia Tech had the best response rate of the institutions participating, which E. Hitchingham felt was a tribute to the Virginia Tech climate and level of communications technology. On every scale of the survey Virginia Tech scored above average in comparison to the other institutions, and there was less of a gap between perception and where the users would like services to be. We ranked high in timely document delivery and machines available, but lower in convenient access to library collection and resources being added to the collection on request. Because those institutions we were compared against had much larger staffs and stronger resources, E. Hitchingham felt the results were a testimony to very effective operations on the part of the University Libraries staff. She hopes to use the survey results as a baseline from which to measure future improvements, especially if the university begins to invest more heavily in the collections. There is more analysis to be done and there are plans to do the survey again, though in a streamlined form next Spring. Several of the ULC members who had completed the recent survey recommended that it be made shorter.

Tempe Principles

E. Hitchingham distributed copies of The Tempe Principles: Principles for Emerging Systems of Scholarly Publishing. This paper was the result of an invited conference sponsored by the Association of American Universities, the Association of Research Libraries and the Merrill Advanced Studies Center. Former Provost Peggy Meszaros attended the conference this past Spring and was one many signatories who helped build the principles. All the participants agreed to promote broad-based discussion in their institutions as a means of helping each campus community decide what steps it could/should take to resolve the scholarly crisis (rising costs of scholarly resources, limited funding, implications of digital revolution). P. Meszaros recently invited the University Distinguished Professors, the Alumni Distinguished Professors, E. Hitchingham, and A. Ahmed, to a meeting to discuss how to structure the campus conversations about the Tempe Principles. There was agreement that communication with faculty was an important first step in the exploration of what it is that we can do as a body at large in addressing this. As E. Hitchingham noted, there is no way that higher education can fund 10% increase in prices every year across the board, across the country. We have to begin talking about and thinking about other kinds of solutions because the scholarly literature is critical to research, to graduate programs, to undergraduate programs. Furthermore, the scholarly literature emanates from the academy, it is shopped out and then comes back with this 10% per premium tied on top of it. Dr. Ahmed pointed out that the problem, as most faculty are aware, is critical at Virginia Tech because flat budgets for materials during the last five years have allowed our funding levels to drop below those of our peer institutions.

As the committee members looked over the text of the principles, various comments and observations were made: A. Ahmed noted that a new system of scholarly publishing requires changing the culture of the university with many difficult steps requiring wide involvement. D. Milly commented that weâre juggling several different levels of discussion and policy simultaneously, with major shifts that would range across different disciplines, affecting in different ways. It is difficult for people to approach a topic that involves both private and public sectors, presidents, provosts, publishers, societies, faculty etc. Members acknowledged that, in any case, opening the discussion is the first step to creating policy changes, and that a faculty-wide mailing of the ARL brochure, "Create Change," along with a letter from the committee, would be a good beginning. Further discussion of the Principles will be planned for the next ULC meeting when more members can be present.