Traditionally, academic librarians have delivered "beck and call" service to educators both in and out of the classroom. However, far from being merely auxiliary to the learning cycle, academic librarians are educators in their own right. If the primary challenge before them is to change how they're perceived within their institutions,…

Rhode Island is committed to ensuring that all educators receive fair, accurate, and meaningful educator evaluations that provide information that can help all support professionals improve and refine their practice. Currently, local education agencies (LEAs) in Rhode Island may submit a district-designed model for approval that complies with the…

Rhode Island is committed to ensuring that all educators receive fair, accurate, and meaningful educator evaluations that provide information that can help all support professionals improve and refine their practice. This document describes the process and basic requirements for the Rhode Island Model Support Professional Evaluation and Support…

This project was originally defined to explore the potential for ARL libraries to provide support to small, print-only publishers in order to ensure long-term digital access to their content. Research library publishing programs vary widely, from posting PDFs in an institutional repository to full-fledged publishing operations. During the life of…

Three library consultants--Rick Richmond, Wilson Stahl, and Jose-Marie Griffiths--discuss the implications of six issues for the success and stability of library automation vendors: (1) vendor business characteristics; (2) competitive advantage; (3) the library marketplace; (4) system selection; (5) corporate planning; and (6) library interests.…

Describes unethical practices in library automation, including vendors'"low-balling" bids in order to make sales; libraries' stating required specifications so that only one vendor can qualify; and consultants compromising their objectivity and independence. Procedures to help identify and prevent such practices in the future are…

Representatives of five library integrated system vendors express their views on ethics and the marketplace, emphasizing the need for ethical behavior by librarians, consultants, and vendors. Four sidebars are included: one on the need for customer data rights standards; others containing the codes of ethics of three professional consultants'…

Six prominent consultants consider the technical dimensions of retrospective conversion, the appropriate standards to employ, the proper relationship of conversion activities to the entire automation project, and several options available for converting a bibliographic database into machine-readable format: online or batch shared cataloging…

This discussion of methods for selecting an integrated, public-access library system highlights the traditional idealized selection model; participation by the library director, consultant, task force, committees, and vendors; fads and cost figures; selection of the wrong system; and suggestions for an informal approach to purchasing. Five sources…

Six library consultants address issues related to the future of online catalogs, including (1) types of material that will be accessible; (2) the role of the automated library; (3) evolving beyond the current objectives of library automation; (4) new technologies; and (5) the library profession's image of the future. (3 references) (MES)

Initiating a consulting model for librarianship in a small college library involved a transition to an organizational model that defines positions by their relationship to constituencies. As a case study of such a transformation demonstrates, such an ''outward'' looking organization has resulted in an increased number of instruction sessions,…

Offers practical approach to locating and understanding sources of current information in industrial relations from four groups: non-profit, policy research associations; professional and trade associations; advocacy and lobby organizations; and private, profit-making agencies. A method for enriching library collection development and a new…

Several consultants address the development and use of RFPs (requests for proposals) in the library automation procurement process, including the cost of developing a request; the need to concentrate on overall goals, not just the document; and the usefulness of the request as one step in a broader planning process. (CLB)

Aimed at consultants and those responsible for the development of school library media programs, this paper outlines the functions of school library media personnel, with emphasis on their instructional role and their role as agents of societal change. A discussion of entry-level competencies which should be required for school library media…

This manual was developed to assist the members of the Network of Alabama Academic Libraries in the library collection assessment that is now required by the Alabama Commission on Higher Education as a component of any proposal that an institution submits for new program review and approval. This assessment component considers the ability of the…