Rod Library, University of Northern Iowa

•        Sandra Warner retired from Rod Library at the University of Northern Iowa in December. She began working at the University in 1981 and at the Library in 1985.  Sandy served as the P/S supervisor of the Order/Payment section in the Technical Services Department.

•        Cedar Valley Hunger Games were held at Rod Library on October 24, 2009.   Eight teams of high school aged students were locked in the library and had to undergo amazing physical and mental feats.  Only 1 team survived!

•        Rod Library is now on Facebook! Take a look at our Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/rodlibrary.  We have photos, YouTube videos, events, specialized search boxes and much more! Become a fan today!

•        Rod Library and the Cedar Falls Public Library have partnered to offer a selection of recently published works of fiction and non-fiction owned by the public library to faculty, staff, and students of the university.  Check out the CFPL @ UNI Collection!

Palmer College of Chiropractic Health Sciences Library  

The library has been a very busy place since last summer. At that time we were prepping for a migration to a new catalog system, Symphony from Sirsi-Dynix. We went live in October and have been tweaking things and having additional training since that time. The students seem to like the new interface. In addition, the library has added several new online resources. Dynamed is an evidence-based, clinical reference tool for healthcare professionals with summaries for over 3000 conditions; the Rehabilitation Reference Center is a comprehensive collection of evidence-based rehabilitation information including clinical reviews; SPORTDiscus with Full Text contains full text for over 490 sports and sports medicine journals. Our students and clinicians have appreciated the addition of these clinical resources to our vast collection of databases.

Dunn Library, Simpson College

We now have a LibQUAL+ results web page. Check out what was perceived as important to our students and faculty; 17% of the faculty and 24% of the students participated. After this survey, we have been making many changes including:

• working on noise concerns and collaborating with SGA to find more solutions (Library as place);
• adding electronic resources: America: History and Life, ATLA Religion, First Research, Oxford Language Dictionaries and all Wiley InterScience journals for more science access (Library information); and
• placing updates in Campus Pulse and The Simpsonian, on the Dunn web site and the new Dunn Library fan page (Library service). Please check out the results page to see other improvements.

Wartburg Seminary

1.Theological Libraries Month:

• We again received a small grant to celebrate Theological Libraries Month in October.
• Book sale: The book sale was October 6-9.
• Cookie Fest: We had a study break on Tuesday, October 13, during Research & Study Days.
• Ambassador Dan Mozena reception: We hosted and paid for a reception for the ambassador to Angola after his lecture on October 19.
• Scavenger Hunt: We had a scavenger hunt in the library from October 20-22 and gave away two books as prizes.
• Rare Book Presentation: October 27 and 29, library staff showed some of our rare books after chapel.
• Halloween candy: October 30, we had lots of candy in the library from after chapel to closing.

2. We celebrated Johann Michael Reu’s ( our library’s namesake)140th birthday in the library on November 16, after chapel. Professor Craig Nessan shared stories about Reu.

3. We hosted the Rev. Eliakim Shaanika, General Secretary of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia, for an hour during his visit to Wartburg, showing him and his two hosts the theses and projects of our alum from Namibia. We also took a tour of the Namibian Archives.

4. The Namibian Archives, which is under the Center for Global Theologies, now has a home. In March we will be celebrating the 20th anniversary of the independence of Namibia. Wartburg Seminary was instrumental in helping Namibia’s struggle for independence. Our Namibian Archives includes items from that time.

Grinnell College

1. Students Teaching Students at Grinnell College Libraries

Have you ever needed to know how many books you had checked out from the library, or which database to use for a particular subject or class? The Libraries have trained the 40+ students already working at service desks in Burling (circulation, Listening Room, and the Iowa Room) and Kistle Science Libraries to serve as Peer Information Advisors (PIAs). These students, as well as their desk supervisors, can now help with a range of commonly asked research questions—such as the two listed above.

The Libraries have also trained three students as Reference Assistants (or RAs) who can help with more advanced research inquires. Look for our RAs on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons at Burling’s reference desk; the RAs will also be available from 10 pm-12 midnight on Sunday thru Thursday evenings.

Please direct comments or suggestions on these new services to Phil Jones ( jonesphi@grinnell.edu) or Beth Bohstedt (bohstedt@grinnell.edu).

2. Library Student Assistants Honor Cinema’s “Golden Year”

1939 was a monumental year for cinema. Some historians have minted it as the greatest year in film history. Indeed, some of the 20th Century’s most memorable titles, including Gone with the Wind, The Wizard of Oz, and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, came out during that year. The selections for 1939’s Oscars were so great that instead of the normal five nominations for Best Picture, ten films were nominated in this category.

Throughout November, student assistants from Burling Library’s Listening Room are honoring the seventieth anniversary of this memorable year in cinema by creating posters, presentations, and displays about films released in 1939. Be sure to check out the display of books on the first floor of Burling about the political, social, and cultural landscape that inspired the explosion of excellent cinema during this historic year. Related projects by Listening Room student assistants are also on display in the Listening Room and on the library’s first floor. The topics, ranging from censorship in 1939 films to film directors, are listed in more detail below.

The Libraries will co-sponsor an evening of “Pizza and a Movie” with SGA Films and the Student Government Association on Thursday, November 19th, at 7:00 pm in the Forum South Lounge. The featured film is one of 1939’s finest, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. Appetizers, pizza, and beverages will be provided, and the event is free and open to the public. (Organized by Madeleine Allen ’10 and Rachel Smith ’11)

3.New Faces in the Libraries!

Amy Roberson has joined us as a one-year term Reference & Instruction Librarian, filling in for Gail Bonath, who is on sabbatical leave this year. Amy is a recent graduate of the School of Information and Library Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her professional interests include reference services, information literacy, and Web usability. When not at work, Amy enjoys cooking, playing music, knitting, and hiking.

Maharishi University of Management Library

Maharishi University of Management Library succeeded in getting administration approval of a new policy requiring information literacy for completion of all programs. The policy identifies three required exposures to IL: New student orientation, Composition II, and information literacy-intensive courses identified for each department.

In December, Director Martin Schmidt and Reference/Instruction Librarian Suzanne Vesely introduced the concept of IL to the Faculty Senate, explaining the ALA/ACRL five points of information literacy, some materials developed by another Iowa block system school, Cornell College, a rubric that we developed for grading IL papers, and more. The presentation was followed by a breakout session of cognate groups focused on key questions that would help them pinpoint different types of IL needs.

Since then, we have had a good response from the faculty and are very busy scheduling and teaching research skills sessions in many departments, covering specialized topics such as “Critical Thinking for Sustainability Majors,” “Visual Cultures,” “Discrete Mathematics,” and more fascinating fields. We also approach the course instructors of programs identified as “IL intensive” for meetings.

In other news, Suzanne Araas Vesely was elected Treasurer of GODORT for ILA/ACRL.

Wilcox Library of William Penn University

Staff at the Wilcox Library of William Penn University are working on a collaborative project with the Oskaloosa Public Library and Mahaska County Historical Society. They are using Content DM software to digitize college historical documents and archival photographs. There are also plans to digitize the student newspapers. These documents are an important part of the history of William Penn University and the history of Quakers in Oskaloosa. You can view the digital archives on the Wilcox Library website : http://cdm270701.cdmhost.com/index.php

Jennifer Sterling, Instructional Services Librarian, is in the beginning stages of a collaborative project with faculty to revamp information literacy instruction.

Briar Cliff University

Briar Cliff University has hired Debora Robertson as the new Director of Library and Information Services. Deb came to Sioux City from Blountville, Tennessee where she was working for Virginia Highlands Community College in Abingdon, Virginia as the Director of Library and Instructional Services. With this recent change in leadership, the library staff decided to host a day of formal focus group sessions in January. Two retired BCU professors spent the day meeting with students and faculty to learn what the library at BCU means to them and what it might look like if it were the "perfect" library. With the feedback from these sessions the library staff is now working to find ways to meet the needs and expectations of their user community.

North Iowa Area Community College

The North Iowa Area Community College Library has set up a Facebook page and a Library News blog as another means of connecting with students and sharing information. The library staff also set up a Wiki to replace the print manual for library work study students.

Kirkwood Community College- Iowa City Campus

The Kirkwood Libraries have had a busy school year so far with increasing enrollment and new technologies and services in the works. In January we unveiled a new website that combines library information and resources for all Kirkwood students, regardless of location, and also got a proxy server in place. Students log on to the proxy server with the same login and password they use to access their student accounts, so this is a huge improvement from the several passwords they had to keep track of before. We continue to work on improving off-campus access to library resources and services for students and faculty.

This issue of the ILA/ACRL Newsletter features a semi-annual President’s Piece submitted by sitting ILA/ACRL president, Mary Iber, and news from academic libraries across the state.

ILA/ACRL President’s Piece

Welcome to a new year with ILA/ACRL. As I reflect on what is in the plans for our organization this year, we seem to be in tune with larger cultural trends. From “friending” more colleagues (i.e. expanding our membership) to creating ways to connect with and inspire our fellow “fans” of academic libraries (e.g. the Spring Conference) we are propelling our efforts to broaden our networks.

 Academic libraries are dynamic, forward-moving organizations and ILA/ACRL aims to provide support, education, and inspiration to ensure that each of us feels prepared for the changes in the works. In our times of fiscal challenge, we must remember to keep our attention on long term goals at the same time we are exercising creative approaches to deal with specific situations.

Many committees on the ILA/ACRL Executive board are demonstrating their commitment to being innovative, progressive and relevant. The work the committees does result in benefits for all associated with college and research libraries in Iowa. A few examples follow:

Save April 23, 2010 for the Spring Conference at Kirkwood in Cedar Rapids. Barbara Fister, librarian at Gustavus Adolphus, professional writer, blogger, and fiction writer will deliver the keynote address -- Read/Write Culture: What Open Means for Learning, Research and Creativity. With the theme of The Library is Open: Open doors, Open Minds, Open Access there promises to be enough content and people to reignite the fires of our own creativity. Thanks to Beth McMahon and her committee for all their work. Watch for more information in the next newsletter, and on the ILA/ACRL website.

Over half of our members responded to the survey on new directions for our electronic membership directory. Thanks to Deb Seiffert and her committee for all the work they’ve done so far, and all the work they will be doing to respond to the needs of the time.

The ad hoc Mentoring Committee will continue for two more years due to the positive results of its first two years. Watch for opportunities to mentor a new librarian, or to be mentored by an experienced librarian at http://www.iowaacrl.org/content/mentoring

The Scholarly Communication committee is reincarnating this year as an ad hoc committee. In these fast changing times, we want to provide current assistance to faculty and libraries on publishing, retaining copyright, and other related issues.

Beyond Iowa, the national associations can fuel our ideas and help success be even more pervasive. Stay in touch via the ACRLog

Stay connected in whatever ways work best for you. I look forward to meeting you at the conference, on the listserv, and other opportunities which we can create at any moment. The possibilities are boundless.

Moving forward in 2010!

~Mary Iber

A third session ILA/ACRL sponsored session, “Humo(u)r in Libraries: Making Fun at Work and Staying Productive,” and Gertler’s presentation sponsored by Support Personnel,  were cancelled due to illness.  Those of us who attended the Annual Conference and were planning to attend Fred Gertler’s presentations were disappointed.  But, hopefully, he will be able to present at a future ILA conference.