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Metadata Quality

This article comes from the desk of our guest blog contributor, Graeme Williams, Online Catalog Analyst. Suppose you lived halfway between two libraries, both of which had friendly, helpful reference desks — but one gave incorrect or incomplete answers twice as often.  Which one would you ask for help?  Now what if one of your patrons wanted some bibliographic information, say, the title of the latest James Paterson novel.  They could go to Amazon, or Goodreads, or LibraryThing — or your online catalog.  Don’t you think they’re going to end up using the most complete, most accurate source of information? You’ve probably come across examples of errors on Amazon.com:  a listing for a jar of peanuts illustrated by a picture of a pair of scissors.  Hilarious, but not very common.  But do you know how many of your catalog records have incorrect or incomplete information? Suppose patrons visit your online catalog…Continue Reading

New Core Jobs: October 20, 2020

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Browse new job openings on the Core Jobs Site

Library Aide 20 Hours, LTI, City of Loveland, Loveland, CO Library Director, Mount Pleasant Iowa Public Library, Mount Pleasant, IA Online Learning Librarian, Assistant or Associate Professor, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Edwardsville, IL Data Services Librarian, Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, IN Metadata & Research Support Associate, Open Society Foundations, New York, NY Visit the Jobs Site for additional job openings and information on submitting your own job posting.

Summary, October Core e-Forum, “Regarding Library Database Cleanup”

Thank you all for an engaging start to the “Regarding Database Cleanup” e-Forum. We concluded with 134 messages from 70 contributors!  However, there were issues with the delay in or non-delivery of messages half-way through the first day, so we plan to continue this discussion at a later date, tentatively early-December 2020. Any emails posted to the list are viewable at the list archives: https://lists.ala.org/sympa/info/alcts-eforum The e-forum participants included librarians from public, academic, and special libraries across the United States as well as Canada, Great Britain, Bermuda, Thailand, and Egypt.  Their ILS/LSPs included (in alphabetical order) Aleph, Alma, Auto-Graphics’ Verso, Axiell’s Book-It, BookSystems by Atrium, EOS.web, Evergreen, Horizon, Koha, Polaris, Sierra, Symphony, TLC, Voyager, and WMS.  The most frequently mentioned ILS was Symphony. The most common database errors that our participants mentioned were primarily those identified in bibliographic data: typographical errors, overlaying brief records, handling or removing missing, lost, or…Continue Reading

Election Candidate’s Responses to Additional Town Hall Questions

During the Core Election Town Hall on September 30, candidates were asked the following questions, but time did not permit live answers. So, the candidates have responded in writing. 1. Do you support the recommendations for changing ALA’s governance structure, put forth in 2018 by the Steering Committee on Organizational Effectiveness (SCOE), and currently championed by the Forward Together Working Group? Evviva Weinraub Lajoie: Overall, yes. I support their recommendations and the ongoing work. The recommendation gathering was careful, inclusive, and timely and it would not be in the organizations best interest to dismiss the recommendations. That said, my biggest concerns about the implementation of the SCOE recommendations is that we are not doing it fast enough. An organization like ALA is a behemoth and there are a zillion moving parts, but we risk significantly more if we don’t make drastic changes quickly. Margaret Heller: Yes, I do. I have…Continue Reading

Summary, September Core e-Forum, “From Reactive to Proactive: Tech Today and Post COVID”

Close-up view of young woman working on her project while drafting her idea on notebook in comfortable workspace

On Day 1, the first question, “What successes or challenges have you experienced with pivoting library services during your COVID response?” garnered quite a bit of response.  Libraries commented about leveraging electronic forms built in Excel to decrease item tracing and handling.  Others commented on using tools such as QR codes on public printers to provide touch-free usage.  There were several remarks related to challenges around supplying equipment needed for staff to work from home, and realigning technology and assets to allow for this.  Of course, stress around the multiple unknowns still weighs heavily on people, and long range projects like facilities construction have been impacted.  Question 2, “What has been your biggest challenge that you solved by applying technology during this time? Is this a new technological solution, or did you expand an existing solution to meet current needs?” resulted in a discussion around challenges with new online meeting…Continue Reading

New Core Jobs: September 30, 2020

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Browse new job openings on the Core Jobs Site

ArchivesSpace Technical Lead, LYRASIS, Atlanta, GA Visit the Jobs Site for additional job openings and information on submitting your own job posting.

Gender and Library Technology

This article is from our guest blog contributor, Dr. Sharon Whitfield, Electronic Resources and User Access Librarian at Rider University. Designing library databases and websites that work for diverse populations is essential to ensuring equity in information literacy. Unfortunately, how differing genders interact with online information resources and the possibility of gender biases in their development has received almost no attention in the library technology community. Yet, there is research to support that there are significant gender differences in the use of library technology. Kim (2010) reports that gender differences may cause potential disparity in the benefits of using library website resources. Kim (2010) finds that female library users seek out resources that are easy to use, while male library users seek out resources that allow them to reach their research goal. Taylor and Dalal (2017) report gender differences in information literacy where males are more “confident” in their information…Continue Reading

Submit your 2021 ALA Annual Program Proposals

Submit an ALA 2021 Annual Conference program proposal for ALA’s newest division, Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures. Proposals are due September 30, 2020, and you don’t need to be a Core member to submit a proposal. Submit your idea using this proposal form. Core welcomes topics of interest to a wide range of library professionals in many different areas, including… 1. Access and Equity Advocacy in areas such as copyright, equity of access, open access, net neutrality, and privacy Preservation Week Equity, diversity, and inclusion, both within the division and the profession, as related to Core’s subject areas 2. Assessment Emphasizing the role of assessment in demonstrating the impacts of libraries or library services Assessment tools, methods, guidelines, standards, and policies and procedures 3. Leadership and Management Developing leaders at every level Best practices for inclusion by using an equity lens to examine leadership structures Leadership for talent management and human…Continue Reading