1) Denis Galvin informed Exec that it will be necessary to upgrade SirsiDynix Symphony before the LSP migration. The upgrade should happen in the middle of May.

2) Mary Lowery invited staff to attend two upcoming Friends events (both events are now full):

• Meet the Author with Diana Strassmann (Thursday, February 15, 6:00 pm): http://www.library.rice.edu/event/meet-author-diana-strassmann
• The Books That Shaped My World, featuring David Leebron (Tuesday, February 20, 6:00 pm): http://www.library.rice.edu/event/books-shaped-my-world-featuring-david-leebron

3) Exec discussed the Research Data Management Team’s idea to collect information about the range of skills represented on Fondren’s staff through a survey. Lisa Spiro will draft a survey that will be discussed and refined.

December 14, 2017

Stravinsky collection: Fondren has acquired 48 items from the son of composer Igor Stravinsky, purchased from both Woodson and general collections funds.

Charge to Web Team on identifying tool to facilitate access to staff information: Denis Galvin reported that he has asked the team to reorganize its report to separate the main recommendations from auxiliary observations and recommendations. The revised report should be available shortly.

Schedule for performance appraisals: The group will discuss in January after recess.

Town Meeting December 20: The agenda items are Central Quad 4.0 and Customer Service training.

Careers@Rice training: Supervisors are receiving invitations to participate in a series of four training sessions, to precede general training for all staff prior to the implementation of this new position grading system in FY19.

Printing: In response to library user requests for better access to color printing capability, Central IT is relocating a color printer from the Mudd Building to the first floor of Fondren. A resume printer, utilizing acid-free paper, will also be relocated to the library.

Strategic planning: Following anticipated Board approval in January of the final draft of the university’s strategic plan, activity will resume in Fondren to further refine the library’s plan in support of identified university priorities.

January 11, 2018

The group discussed further details of the Careers @ Rice program.

Performance appraisals: All completed appraisals library-wide are due to Sara by March 23. Library managers are free to set schedules in their areas so as to meet the March 23 deadline. Though the library has not yet received the budget letter (so that the salary pool is not yet known), it is likely we will use the same merit rankings and bonus levels as last year. Self-evaluations by Executive Committee members are due Feb. 2.

The group discussed sending Fondren representatives to the GWLA OER (Open Educational Resources) conference.

Having received earlier January 11 the recommendations about subgroups for the Alma implementation project, the group agreed to review the recommendations and discuss them at the next meeting.

Sara shared that she had met recently with the Executive Committee of the Staff Association, learning that they plan to update the organization’s bylaws and procedures.

Executive Committee Meeting Summary, September 28, 2017

1)   Debra Kolah reported on the results of the Survey of All Students. See UX Office update: Survey of All Students, Ambassadors, and UX Question of the Week on the libstaff blog.

2)   Denis Galvin presented the charge for the LSP platform group, which was approved.

3)   Sara Lowman updated the committee on the outcomes of the Communications Task Force.

1. The birthday lunch has been scheduled for those with October birthdays.
2. Departments should invite Lowman to one of their meetings.
3.   Lowman received feedback from the chairs of all committees. A few (e.g. the sign committee and the public access ad hoc committee) will be removed from the staff wiki, since they are no longer active.

Executive Committee Meeting Summary, October 19, 2017

The executive committee briefly discussed Fondren’s draft strategic plan.  We will evaluate whether there are holes in our plan, especially in comparison to Rice’s strategic plan. We will wait until January or February to seek feedback from outside Fondren.

Sara Lowman provided an update on follow-up to the recommendations of the communications committee:

•      The first birthday lunch was held in October and went well.
•      Each department should invite Sara to attend a meeting.
•      The accessibility committee has been reconstituted and there are new members of LTTD.

Denis Galvin gave an update on the library service platform (LSP) project. The oversight committee will hand off the project to the implementation group.

Lisa Spiro provided an update on the new Harvey Memories project, a digital archive of stories and artifacts related to Hurricane Harvey. Harvey Memories is a collaboration among Fondren, Rice faculty, UH Libraries, Houston Public Library, and Harris County Public Library and is modeled after similar archives such as Hurricane Digital Memory Bank and the Our Marathon archive.

Executive Committee Meeting Summary, November 3, 2017

The executive committee discussed how to proceed with Fondren’s draft strategic plan. Since the library’s strategic plan was written prior to the university’s, both the strategic planning team and the executive committee will identify gaps in Fondren’s plan and align it with the university’s. Fondren’s plan will be rewritten so that it reflects the style and structure of the university’s plan, putting forward an argument for each goal rather than a list of objectives and action items. Departments and interdepartmental teams will draft action items in support of the revised plan.

Executive Meeting Summary, November 16, 2017

Jeff Koffler, Michael Chiles and Jeanette Sewall visited to discuss plans for upcoming customer service training. CMACS has been working with Melinda English (Organizational and Professional Development Consultant in HR) to create a two-session course on providing excellent customer service. The pilot course will take place in January. Plans for the training will be presented at a Town Hall meeting tentatively scheduled for December.

The executive committee reviewed and approved the library hours for summer 2018 through spring 2019.

Lowman gave an update on Rice’s strategic planning activities. The executive committee and strategic planning team will work to align Fondren’s strategic plan with Rice’s in January, when the final plan is expected to be released.

August 10, 2017

Sara reported on her trip to North Carolina academic libraries, accompanied by President Leebron, Provost Miranda and Matt Taylor, Associate Vice-Provost for Academic Affairs. The Rice group visited the libraries at Duke University, North Carolina State University (NC State) and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC). Duke’s $160 million renovation and addition by Shepley-Bulfinch included a classroom shared with IT, a pavilion, a GIS center and a conference center. NC State has a new Engineering/Agriculture library with high-density storage and interesting furniture and a very creative renovation of their main library, including faculty and graduate school commons spaces. UNC had done some renovations but not as major as the other two. Back at Rice, both President Leebron and Provost Miranda took extensive walking tours of Fondren. The net impact of the trips and the tours was heightened interest at the highest administrative levels in more investment in the library.

Sara also shared that the Sewell staff temporarily housed in Fondren study rooms this summer should be moving to the BRC.

Kerry reported she is still working on the requested study of possible alternatives to building a new LSC bay. She reminded the group that there has been campus interest in storage of art and archival records in addition to library materials.

Sara reported on a meeting of the Texas ARL library directors, held at Fondren on August 9. The group discussed possible future collaborations, including group action with respect to broad or narrowly targeted deals with vendors, archiving/access rights, APCs (article processing charges), author rights and sharing online special collections exhibits and OERs (open educational resources). Any group negotiations with vendors are likely to be narrowly focused.

Melinda shared a summary of the latest report from the Linked Data Working Group. Executive Committee members showed appreciation for the group’s experiment showing that “sharing our collections via Google” is a complex and partial process governed by Google’s primary interest in revenue-generating information. The report is available at: https://wiki.rice.edu/confluence/pages/viewpage.action?title=Reports+-+Library-wide&spaceKey=FONDREN (login required).

Kerry is moving forward on collections budget allocations for FY18.

Sara is working on summarizing input from Fondren committee chairs as followup to the Communications Task Force recommendation that all committees be reviewed.

Sara will start working shortly on the new round of ROARs (Rice Outcome Assessment Reports)/SACS (Southern Association of Colleges and Schools) documentation. She will ask Executive Committee members where she needs help.

Lee reminded the group of Fondren’s participation in the upcoming Houston Archives Bazaar on September 10.

Kerry and Sandi Edwards will be participating in an O-Week (Orientation Week) event on Sunday, August 13, the first of many O-week appearances by Fondren staff.

August 24, 2017

Sara led the group in a discussion of the presentation on which she has been asked to work with Matt Taylor in connection with the University’s planning process. The topic is Central Quad 4.0 (the quad west of Fondren and space use in the buildings which border it) and the 15-minute presentation is one of four that will be made to the Rice Board of Trustees on September 13.

Discussion of Central Quad 4.0 included the role of cloisters as connection/protection when traveling among buildings, graduate student needs for offices and commons, undergraduate needs for classrooms and study spaces and faculty needs for a mid-sized event space and possibly a conference center. A central question is: what functions work best in which building? Twenty-four hour functions are likely best located in Fondren.

Other agenda items were postponed:

Review of Fondren committees
Progress toward migration to a new library service platform (LSP)
Proposal to digitize remaining masters theses and dissertations