Initiative Review Group VII Progress Report April 30, 2001
Provide access to full-text electronic resources in all fields where appropriate.
Members:
Elizabeth McKee (leader), Jan Dixon, Beth Juhl, Julie Thacker, and Marilyn Rogers present the following report on the full text initiative:
1. Background and Current Situation
"Full text" can refer to at least four different kinds of electronic products:
- Electronic books (including reference works, encyclopedias, directories, etc.)
- Databases of geographical (spatial) data or statistical data, such as digital map data and government statistical data
- Electronic journals (counterparts to specific periodical or serial publications)
Free with subscription to print
Online sold separately or at an additional cost to print
Available only online
- Databases of journal articles
Aggregates of several hundred or several thousand journal titles
Full text added to indexing and abstracting databases for specific subject areas
This format in libraries has evolved so quickly that our first widely-used, full-text product, Encyclopedia Britannica Online, was purchased in August 1997 and we now find online is frequently the preferred, even the only acceptable, medium for many students. As early as 1998, librarians began to see that while full-text aggregate databases were extremely popular with undergraduates, these products presented new problems of overlap, unreliability, mutability, and of course costs that made them very different from their print counterparts.
2. Issues that must be addressed
The issues will continue to evolve, but those we have currently identified and will explain further in our final report include:
- Defining and identifying the products and categorizing them to assign a relevant policy
- Division of responsibilities-changing contracts, negotiation, decisions and staff input
- Budget considerations-one time versus subscription
- Licensing-for example for ILL or Reserve
- Use-equipment, instructional support
- Access-identification and cataloging, promotion, instruction, authentication and passwording, technical support
- Printing-costs to library vs. users, also technical support
- Preservation and archiving-perpetual electronic collections vs. bound journals
- Content-time lag, completeness of product, graphics
- State trials and consortial agreements
- Communication-many departments involved, lots of discussion is necessary
3. Long term goals
Fulfilling the mission of the University of Arkansas Libraries, the provision of information in full-text electronic format is an ever-increasing and relevant form of recorded knowledge. Full-text resources in electronic format, and their availability both locally and remotely though the web, support the information needs of students, faculty and staff, irrespective of a user's location. The provision of electronic full-text is an innovation within the University Libraries: innovations are identified as vital to the Libraries' success. With the goal to upgrade the University of Arkansas Libraries to the Association of Research Libraries' (ARL) standards, the provision of electronic full-text resources should correspond with the information resources provided by ARL member libraries which have institutional missions similar to those of the U. of A.
4. Other relevant initiatives
IRG #1 User needs
IRG #3 Realign resources
IRG #4 Preservation/conservation
IRG #5 Evaluation of space
IRG #6 Collection development
IRG #8 In-house digitization
IRG #9 Collaborative digitization
IRG #10 Fund raising
IRG #11 Data Collection (use statistics)
IRG #12 Budget
IRG #13 Consortial relationships
IRG #16 Staff development and training
5. New initiatives needed
6. Individuals who are essential in the next phase
We recommend a representative from reference, automation, and someone with web design responsibilities.
7. Time needed to develop the plan for implementing this initiative
In this case the plan is after-the-fact, since we are already deeply involved in full text. It is an ongoing issue that we will need to continue to work with. We need to plan for efficient selection and acquisitions. The selectors will have to work cooperatively on this.
8. Priority level of this initiative in long-term plan
This is a mission-critical, priority 1 initiative. It is distinct and of highest priority, but also part of broader initiatives named above.
