Dean's Council Minutes: March 5, 2009

Present: Peter Blackmer, Susan Bishop, Marianne Burke, Selene Colburn, Tina Kussey, Jeanene Light, Birdie MacLennan, Jeffrey Marshall, Paul Philbin, Mara Saule


I. Faculty Merit Raises

Peter presented a draft proposal detailing the framework for determining faculty merit raises. The new model is an expansion of our existing model. Peter reported that the merit pool for next year is 1% of the Libraries faculty budget. It is important that we keep the merit methodology straightforward and simple. Since workload plans are used to help make merit decisions, any changes to an individuals’ workload should be indicated on their plan.

Birdie presented a document from Colorado State on “Merit Salary Criteria: One Academic Library’s Experience.” The appendix in the article could be very helpful to us. Birdie will work on adapting the language in our methodology to that in the appendix.

Evaluation levels for the proposed framework are:

1. unacceptable
2. below expectations
3. meets expectations
4. exceeds expectations

The draft guidelines will be circulated to library faculty for comment. They will then be revised and sent to the Provost’s Office. Staff guidelines for merit allocation will also be formalized.


II. Technical Services Processes

Marianne distributed a chart she developed which lists collections, technical services and patron discovery/delivery processes, with methods for upgrade, efficiency or change where known. This chart will help us to set the next steps in the reorganization and alignment of the Libraries technical services processes, creating more efficiency and avoiding redundancy. There also needs to be some distinction made between collection development processes and other technical services processes. Mara noted that we need to determine which of the collection development support processes could be centralized in one unit and which of those could remain separate. There should be a central system for scholarly stats and e-resource management.

The Serials Implementation (SIT) group has done a lot of work on serials and maintenance issues. For the next round of process planning we need to have someone additional from Dana on that group. Marianne noted that all e-books need a standard Voyager record. Since there is no A-Z list of e-books they are often hard to find, particularly if patrons think that the A-Z list is just for journals. Dana is planning to add more e-books to its collection as they continue to become an important resource. Also, the vendors’ records for books often do not have Mesh headings, which is a problem for Dana. Paul noted that Systems can work on making the e-books more easily discoverable. Mara proposed forming a small working group to work on e-books and access issues. Birdie and Marianne will form the group. Mara also asked if there was a need for periodic combined meetings of the B/H and Dana Collections Teams.

Submitted by,
Susan Bishop (in Nancy Bercaw's absence)