| Newsletter 11, February 1996 |
A post of Electronic Information Services Co-ordinator has recently been created, with the responsibility for managing and developing the increasing range of electronic information services that Library Services has to offer.
A major challenge we face, along with other HE academic libraries, is in ensuring that electronic information services are used to their full potential. This new post demonstrates to our service users that we take our responsibility of improving their learning environment through the use of new technology seriously.
The EISC's responsibilities are carried out in addition to those of a Tutor Librarian. The Tutor Librarian structure remains the key mechanism for liaison with the faculties on all aspects of information provision, electronic or otherwise; their jobs (including mine as Tutor Librarian for Engineering!) will evolve to embrace electronic-based services we introduce as appropriate. However, the EISC post will provide the backup to ensure that all library staff are well placed to fully utilize any new services and to do so within the context of a co-ordinated and supported framework.
An equally important aspect of the post is the promotion of electronic services to our users, particularly Faculty staff. Much of what we want to do is not just related to "mere" information provision - it could, and should, also affect the way students learn. To make the most of this new educational space, we need to develop services in partnership with teaching staff, and this dialogue needs to take place with Tutor Librarians, or through your faculty's LSS FAST. In collaboration with my colleagues I will try to promote this development by, for example, the use of short courses, workshops and by acting in a general advisory role.
In summary, this is an exciting opportunity to work at the leading edge of new technology to provide high-quality, innovative learning resources for staff and students at LMU.
One of the issues that the EISC will need to address over the coming months is the development of an electronic information strategy. Libraries are changing rapidly through the increased use of IT, and we find ourselves facing a bewildering array of options. Our overriding objective must be to keep abreast of electronic developments affecting libraries and ensure that we are always in a position to take advantage of them.
Often, the new technology-based services are designed around assumptions concerning infrastructure, and much thought needs to be given to planning the fundamentals upon which a whole range of services might be offered. In the way that it would be futile for a library to decide to add thousands of new books into stock each year unless it also acquired the shelf space to hold them, new technology requires that you have the right amount and type of computers, the right network, and that you haven't already unnecessarily duplicated materials in other formats. You need therefore to have an idea of what sort of electronic library you want and a clear plan of what you need to do to achieve it.
This is a process we are now embarking on: some work has already been done, and some new initiatives, such as the EBSCO journals service, have been acted upon already because we know that they will fit in with some central themes of the strategy.
When thinking about the role of electronic services in the Library we must not be constrained by thinking only in terms of what we can currently do. The Library is presently striving to maintain existing services within the context of a big expansion of student numbers, explosion in academic knowledge and information, shrinking resource levels and large increase in cost of "traditional" forms of learning materials. Electronic information can sometimes be a very effective way of dealing with these problems, but to see it only as a way of maintaining services when under pressure is short-sighted: it can also be a means by which we expand and enhance services too. This is what the strategy is in part about, looking at not just how we do things but also what we do, what we can't at present do, and what we'd like to do.
For example, we currently spend large sums of money buying multiple copies of textbooks to place on restricted loan - although wasteful, there is no other way of meeting the demand for set texts. Within an electronic library environment, we could make available to each student whose course requires it an electronic "copy" of the relevant sections of a set book. Not only would this save the library having to buy, process, and store multiple copies of the printed version of the book, it would also guarantee each student access to the required material for as long as it was required - a major improvement.
This concept of an electronic "reader" is challenging, but is likely to be reality within a relatively short time-scale. This and other changes in the publishing world will force all libraries to rethink how they operate. Those libraries that have given the matter thought now will be in the best place to respond to these changes. Traditional print will continue to dominate for a long, long time, but the economics of traditional publishing have forced the publishers to look at other (electronic) formats, and already there are literally thousands of journal titles that are available in electronic versions.
The way we deliver information to users could also radically alter. We will be moving towards a state where the location of the information is synonymous with getting the information - no longer the frustrating delay whilst waiting for an inter-loan request to arrive. There are a number of developments taking place in this area, and we are delighted that we have just been selected by the British Library as one of their beta test sites for a new document delivery service - a decision they based in part on our commitment to delivering this type of service.
The areas outlined above, and many other aspects of service provision, will be shaped in the future to a large extent by what we do with new technology, and the decisions we take should be all the easier for having a clear perception of the kind of electronic services we want to provide.
Mike Berrington
