Library Services Dean

What is the program’s mission statement or statement of purpose? Why does the program exist?

Booth Library affirms the mission of Eastern Illinois University by providing materials, services, and facilities that support instruction and research. Just as the University is committed first and foremost to excellence in teaching, the library places its highest priority on the academic success of students. To this end, the library will strive to facilitate each student's educational experience, will build its collections to meet students' academic needs, and will provide an effective setting for learning to take place.

How does the program mission align with the university mission?

Booth Library strives to support the mission of the institution.  Its collections and services allow for students to practice the rigorous inquiry stated in the mission, as well as refine their abilities to reason. Professionally trained librarians provide research support and  assistance to patrons, and are available daily at the Reference Desk, and other times by appointment. Both the librarians and staff are available to provide assistance in the use of the library’s collections, identifying and retrieving materials; in addition to providing scheduled library tours and personalized bibliographic sessions with professors and their classes. The library supports diversity through our collections, the exhibits we host and develop, and the programs offered throughout the year.

Whom does the program serve?

    Library Services provides for the information and research needs of students, faculty, and administrators at Eastern, citizens of the region, and sister libraries and their patrons from across Illinois and the world.  Eastern students and faculty have access to Booth Library's online services around the clock from wherever they are in the world.

    In addition to print materials and online databases, Booth collections in various media formats are heavily used by the above constituents.  Our University Archives and Special Collections department retains materials relevant to the history of Eastern and the surrounding region.  The Media Services department provides expertise and maintenance of audio and visual equipment throughout the campus teaching facilities and meeting sites.

    The Booth facility is open 98 hours weekly and is heavily trafficked, with up to 12,000 persons weekly.  It is a major meeting space as well as study space.  It is one of the important campus stops students show their families on special weekends.  

    The library is successful in part because of its relationships with sister libraries.  Booth helps other libraries and they, in turn, help us provide certain materials to our students and faculty.  This interlibrary service is critical in providing access to items locally unaffordable or those materials that might be rarely used locally.

    To a lesser extent, Booth provides for information needs to citizens of the region.  Although the public library in most communities serves as the primary library for Illinois residents, the regional university library also comes into play because of the limitations of community libraries, especially in unserved or barely served areas in the state.

What are the services provided? How do these services align with the university mission and program mission?

Library services are complex. On the one hand, the public knows about books, journals, databases, non-print materials, website, and services at our staffed desks. They also know about our generous schedule of 98 hours open weekly and the largest stable of computers available on campus throughout the years. What may come as a surprise is what happens behind the scene - developing those website, purchase and payment for all new materials, digital preservation, continual sorting, filing, and cleaning of collections and shelving, furniture and equipment maintenance, emergency procedures for fire, flood, mold, and theft, and the list goes on with oversight of patron conduct, relationships with faculty, preparing instruction sessions, reserve materials, processing and public relations ensuring that Booth Library does its best to represent Eastern to the region and state in a positive light.

    Every academic department on campus has a librarian liaison that works directly with a designated teaching faculty library coordinator, allowing for a direct channel of communication between Booth and all academic disciplines. Liaison librarians select materials, in part, based on their refined knowledge of courses offered in their subject specialties. This school year, librarians attended meetings for the sustainable energy degree curriculum development, collaborating with teaching faculty in the selection of new periodical and monograph acquisitions to support this new program. Subject librarians draw upon Redden Grant funds, which augment the library collections and support undergraduate research. Many liaison librarians promote the collection by emailing faculty with information about new materials or by sending new book dust jackets to departments for display.

    A significant number of instructors who bring their classes into the library for bibliographic instruction have a particular assignment for which the students must conduct research. Instruction librarians tailor these sessions to the needs of the assignment, highlighting particular library resources that students will find useful. Librarians have provided mobile library services, offering instruction in the classroom and one of the campus residence halls. Some of the library’s displays are developed in conjunction with teaching faculty, staff, or students. Library materials are drawn in when appropriate.

Describe the program’s origins (e.g. year established, purpose, expectations).

    In 1899, Eastern’s library resided in three rooms on the first floor of Old Main, with a total floor space of 2,400 square feet and a 2,500-volume book collection. By 1934, the library expanded to the fifth floor of Old Main’s tower for storage, and part of a hallway for a reading room and two additional rooms. Mary Josephine Booth, the library’s longtime director, had been lobbying for a freestanding building. On May 27, 1950, the $2.1 million Booth Library was dedicated. The 150 x 154 foot building contained 37,500 square feet on four levels, seating for 500, and bookshelf capacity of almost 150,000 volumes.  By 1967, due to a shortage of space for both patrons and books and collections, construction began on a library annex, with a state-appropriated $1.8 million that was supplemented with a $671,000 federal grant. This 150 x 200 foot annex opened on September 10, 1968, provided a total of 103,500 square feet, capacity for 475,000 volumes, and seating for 1,300.  By 1988, enrollment at Eastern had reached a record 10,500, the library collection had grown to nearly 570,000 volumes, and expansion was needed to accommodate the burgeoning collections, clientele, and staff. In 2002, Booth Library was rededicated after a $22.5 million renovation project that increased the total square feet to 165,000 and stack capacity to approximately 1.5 million volumes.

    Booth Library serves primarily to provide resources and research support for students and faculty, bibliographic resource sessions, access to various resources both in print and digital formats, computer workstations, and skilled reference librarians. Booth provides a quiet study space for students; group study, listening/viewing, and keyboard practice rooms; and computer labs. The Keep, Booth’s electronic repository for scholarly research, curates the collection of digital copies of scholarly activities, student theses and online journals.

How has the unit changed or adapted over time?

    Booth Library has always served the public best by keeping one foot in the past and the other on the pulse of change. Providing access to older materials is a major goal of the academic library.  Staying abreast of innovations and newer technologies has become critical in maintaining the users' interest focused on the library's offerings.

    Our library has embraced changes rather well for the provision of information services. Booth was one of the first units on campus to offer personal computers to students, to provide valued and expensive information from our website, and to provide group study areas to students on a first-come, first-served basis.

    The use of moveable shelving in the library has allowed for a maximum number of comfortable seating options for our patrons.  The use of off-site storage has allowed us to move some of the least-used materials from our building in order to provide better spaces for public service. Students appreciate the space, but will never realize the efforts the library and campus  have made to accommodate them in the best way possible.

    Adapting to modern standards of publishing, Booth has dramatically increased its reliance on digital products and services.  This has been positive, gradual change that has enhanced the use of the library, even though the user may be in their residence hall or on study abroad in Spain.

    The production of digital collections is well underway at Booth.  From early external grants in the field to the birth of The Keep, our institutional repository, we have marched quickly to ensure that we preserve materials for the far future. The library's role in actually processing these digital items and making them available freely on the Internet has been thoroughly embraced and even discussed as a point of pride for our library faculty and staff.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the program’s history and relevance to university mission.

    Symposia are sponsored by and held at the library, often associated with a featured exhibit. Faculty are invited to speak on a topic in their subject specialty and students and faculty are encouraged to attend. Booth After Hours brings in select groups of students every semester to experience the library in an unconventional manner. A consideration for future collaboration is to work with faculty to require students in their classes to utilize the library for research-related assignments. Senior undergraduates have been overheard in the library remarking that this is the first time they are being required to come to the library to do research, sometimes in their final semester at the university. We continue to fight that possibility by working closely with faculty.

    Self-printing services for digital materials using a convenient billing option was debuted at Booth and remains popular with students a dozen years later.

Provide data, if available, on the numbers of students, faculty, staff, or others served by the program during the past four years. If no data are available, please estimate the numbers served annually.

    Booth’s demand per student has remained steady. Our drop in total use of the library in recent years is related to the changes in student enrollment at the institution.

    Booth Library’s collections are available for all patrons, including community members and those accessing our collections electronically or through the interlibrary loan service. The Library is a member of the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries of Illinois (145-member consortia), whose members are committed to meeting the information and research needs of their 850,000 students, as well as thousands of faculty and staff. Many CARLI libraries (80) use I-Share, a union online catalog that facilitates sharing of materials and on-site access to all libraries by faculty and students of member institutions.

   It is important to recognize that contemporary library use has significantly shifted from print to online resources. To give a more complete picture of the vitality of our library for scholarship and learning, the following statistics of downloads of articles, books, and other types of electronic files are given. These numbers represent the companies that provide statistics on the number of electronic downloads. Not all electronic resources owned by  Booth Library have the capability to track the number of downloads.

FY11   455,680

FY12   475,219

FY13   460,461

Does the program offer any co-curricular opportunities for students (e.g., internships, RSO support, service-learning activities)? Please describe.

Booth Library serves as a laboratory for students preparing to become future teachers, scholars, and writers, as well as for those exploring librarianship as a future profession.  The Library Advisory Board sponsors an annual awards program for excellence in undergraduate and graduate research.

    Booth Library has a library intern program in which undergraduate students interested in pursuing a graduate degree in library and information science are hired as student assistants at Booth and rotate each semester to another department of the library to gain the widest understanding of and experience in specific facets of academic librarianship.  These interns have been successful in graduate admissions and attaining assistantship at various nationally ranked programs in library science.  Several are already serving as librarians in the field.   

    Booth Library is home to the Illinois Regional Archive Depository for documents of government agencies in our 16-county region. The program is sponsored by the Illinois State Archives. Two student interns are in residency throughout the year to respond to requests from scholars and researchers from around the country.

    The library serves as a station for court-appointed students needing to serve society.  It is hoped that the proximity of academic endeavors will be a good influence on those students who have run afoul of the law.

    Booth Library also routinely offers Booth After Hours programs. Library staff conducts a series of programs designed for specific Registered Student Organizations or designated student groups, welcoming them to a private session in the library to offer them educational and fun activities tailored directly to their interests.

Does the program contribute to the delivery of academic programs (e.g., providing professional expertise, serving as adjunct faculty)? Please describe.

    Booth Library serves as a resource for all academic programs on and off campus.  The electronic and print resources and the individualized assistance for students and faculty all enhance the probability of academic success for both faculty and staff at Eastern.

    One of the four student learning goals put forth in the university’s Plan for the Assessment of Student Learning is the ability to think critically. An objective within this goal is to “sort, evaluate, and interpret information.” The incorporation of information literacy objectives into curricula, courses, and assignments is less ubiquitous and likely course specific. Some subject librarians have tried without success to establish information literacy as a key learning objective in department-specific curricula. Suggestions to ameliorate this issue include subject librarians continuing to work with their departments to integrate information literacy into expected outcomes of courses, and meeting with faculty library coordinators, department chairs, and college deans.

    Librarians may work with teaching faculty to develop assignments that foster information literacy skills. Librarians may provide instructors with samples of applied information literacy practices to interweave within an assignment or course. Creating a library instruction component in mandatory, discipline-specific courses would ensure all students receive some type of information literacy instruction during their time at Eastern, a broadly practical skill they will be able to take with them along whatever path they follow upon graduating. Encouraging departments to create an undergraduate course for introduction to research as a curricular requirement remains a challenge, but a worthy goal librarians want to tackle.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the internal demand for the program. Note any clarifications or special circumstances (e.g., curriculum changes made by another program) that should be considered when reviewing the above data.

    Teaching faculty regularly attend pedagogically related conferences to stay abreast of trends in the field, including the I-Share Instruction Team conferences and the Illinois Information Literacy Summit. Reference librarians provide five levels of assistance to patrons: classroom instruction, one-on-one in person, phone, email, and chat. Bibliographic instruction is almost exclusively done in a computer lab, so students may follow along. Combining the use of live demonstrations, verbal instruction, and paper handouts, instruction reaches the auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learners. Suggestions for future work include posting a list of best pedagogical practices on the library intranet, considering active learning components to incorporate in library sessions and developing online tutorials.

    Librarians are very willing to work with faculty in whatever way the faculty member finds best. That being said, most instruction sessions are provided in a very traditional classroom lecture-style format, in the e-classroom, one-shot for 50 minutes, mostly using the library webpage and library resources, and perhaps including a library tour. There is some use of PowerPoint and other presentation software. Each librarian has his/her own style of presentation, although that is usually within a narrow range of styles. There is very little group work or inquiry-based learning in these classroom sessions. As instructors request library sessions, librarians fill out a checklist with content the instructor requests.  Occasionally, librarians will travel to classrooms to provide instruction.  At this point in time, there are no online learning modules that could be accessed by faculty for use in classes, or for students to access individually. With the new course management software, there may be an opportunity for faculty to “embed” a librarian who could provide assistance with research needs in an online environment. Librarians have in the past requested evaluations of their instruction sessions, usually through a “one minute evaluation.” Pre-and post-tests should be developed to show that students are learning in these instruction sessions. Librarians and faculty also need to work collaboratively to provide instruction that is assignment based, rather than just general. Point-of-need instruction is nearly always more effective than general instruction without perceived purpose.

Is the program accredited or approved by a recognized external agency or otherwise certified to meet established professional standards? Provide an executive summary of and link to the program’s most recent accreditation or certification report, if available.

    There are no accrediting agencies for university libraries.  However, Booth Library incorporates into its practices the suggested performance guidelines of the Association of College and Research Libraries.

Is the program required to meet any regulatory or legal requirements? Is the program subject to any special auditing requirements?

    No regulatory nor special auditing requirements that are not already covered in procurement or equipment controls pertain to university libraries in Illinois.

What are the most important outreach or public service activities supported by the program?

    Booth Library is an avid partner for projects both on and off campus. For example, library faculty members serve on the planning committee for the Embarras Valley Film Festival, and an exhibit promoting the series was recently on display. The facility is used routinely for topical exhibits at the request of campus and community partners. Professors and their students are encouraged to use the formal library setting to give research presentations. The library’s various conference rooms are routinely used by campus groups to hold meetings and programs. Through our exhibit and program series, we invite representatives from the campus and community to participate as performers, researchers and presenters. These programs also attract an audience from throughout the region. We present some of these programs at public libraries in our region, as well, providing cultural experiences for their library patrons in a way that these rural and less-equipped libraries cannot do on their own.
    
    We partner with area public school districts by allowing elementary, junior high and high school students to conduct research at our facility, along with receiving bibliographical and research training by our faculty members. The Ballenger Teachers Center offers regular story times primarily for the children of EIU faculty, staff and students, but these programs are open to the community, as well. The BTC also welcomes teachers from throughout the region for research and materials.    
    
    Through our Booth After Hours program, we invited a selected campus group to our facility after hours for a special series of programming devoted specifically to them. And, to attract a more general public audience, we offer activities such as the semi-annual book sale, which attracts many members of the surrounding area, and the Edible Book Festival during National Library Week. This unique program has involved community members both as participants and judges.

How do the local community and the region benefit from the program?

    Community patrons use the library for Internet access, to conduct research, and to borrow books, DVDs and other materials. Even younger community members visit regularly to take advantage of programs at the Ballenger Teachers Center, which contains books and other materials suitable for children. Several Saturday story hours are planned during the school year to encourage attendance by our younger patrons. Teachers from area high schools bring their students here to experience doing research in a large academic library and to receive library instruction from our faculty.

    Booth Library attracts the interest of residents from a wider geographical area because of its full repository of Illinois government documents and because it serves as a site for the Illinois Regional Archive Depository. IRAD manages the archival records of local governments. The IRAD depository at Booth Library contains records of historical and genealogical significance from various governmental units in East-central Illinois. University Archives, also housed in Booth Library, contains many historic documents relating to EIU and the surrounding area. Many community patrons have used the resources of both IRAD and University Archives.

    Booth Library continuously displays exhibits on a variety of topics in many display cases throughout the building. Oftentimes, the library offers programming related to the exhibit, including lectures, drama and musical performances, and community members often can be found as an enthusiastic portion of the audience. These free exhibits and programs provide educational opportunities that are often found only in larger cities.

    Occasionally, the library serves as the site for a larger community program that brings in a wider audience. For example, the library hosted the Illinois Patriot Guard Fallen Heroes Traveling Memorial Wall, along with EIU Veterans Services, in April 2013. In March 2014, the library will host the Illinois State Historical Society's annual Illinois History Symposium.

If needed, provide supplemental comments or data sources to help the reader understand the external demand for the program.

    Library staff and students routinely respond to patrons who request access to archival materials through University Archives or the Illinois Regional Archive Depository. These requests come both via phone calls and mail and through personal visits to the facility.

    Off-campus inquiries regarding databases and research help are offered through our Ask A Librarian program. Inquiries handled by Booth Library reference staff have climbed into the hundreds each year for this service.

    In a typical week, there are more than 15,000 visits to the library. Visits to the library website and online catalog number in the hundreds of thousands each year. More than 200,000 materials per year are circulated to library patrons both in the building and through online sources, in addition to hundreds who receive materials from other libraries through the interlibrary loan program. As a member of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine, the library routinely offers consumer health information to community members from throughout the region.

    Each year Booth Library welcomes thousands of patrons who attend programs and presentations on site, including exhibits/lectures and activities at the Ballenger Teachers Center. In addition, hundreds of EIU and high school students receive library instruction and research help from our faculty each year. This research help is offered on a one-on-one basis and through classroom instruction, as teachers bring their students to the library classroom for instruction from our librarians.

What are the two or three more important measureable outcomes tracked to assess program quality? Does the program conduct an outcomes assessment, and if so, what has been the impact?

*Contemporary library use has significantly shifted from print to online resources. To give a more complete picture of the vitality of our library for scholarship and learning, these numbers are useful; however, not all databases track the same information, and therefore this figure is in no way meant to be comprehensive of the gamut of electronic resources made available through Booth Library efforts.

**Bibliographic information sessions are held for groups of students throughout the year, especially for required freshman English and speech courses in addition to upperclassmen research classes in most disciplines.  Public school students are also welcomed throughout the year for their day of research with Booth librarians, an effort to provide a quality library experience that is being neglected in hundreds of schools in Illinois.

***Reference questions are handled in person, and by phone, fax, chat and online.

    The Booth Library website organizes information into easily-understood categories: “Search,” “Services,” “Help,” and “About the Library.”  The library website is a task-oriented website, promoting ease-of-discovery by organizing resources based on user needs. The website receives 137,736 pageviews per month from 59,000 visitors (averaged over the period July 1, 2007-February 29, 2012).

What are the two or three most effective best practices that the program has implemented? What benefits have been gained from implementing these best practices?

    In 2010, planning began for Library Services to host an institutional repository (IR) and electronic archive for Eastern Illinois University. Named “The Keep,” the repository brings together the research, administrative output, historical archives, conferences/exhibits, historical images, and special collections of the University. The Keep is an excellent platform for working papers, university documents, copies of published articles, and conference papers. The growth of the IR and the number of materials accessed has EIU listed in the “Most Popular Institutions Top 10 in the Digital Commons Network” in the disciplines of labor economics, community college education administration, higher education administration, biotechnology, cellular and molecular physiology, and labor relations.

    Booth Library's staff created a unique program to promote the library as a cultural center.  The plan capitalized on developing programming to complement exhibit themes. Since 2004, the Library has engaged a variety of stakeholders to invest in the initiative and to assist in crafting and delivering its message to on- and off-campus communities.  Through these programs, participants have benefitted from the research of local scholars, as well as the support from regional and national organizations that provided their expertise either in the development of the exhibits through the availability of presenter, or financial help to support local programming.

    The library provides access to, guidance for, and assistance with high-quality information resources in print, electronic and emergent media formats. Library personnel are well prepared academically to perform their duties, and the staff also are highly educated, with 92 percent having a bachelor’s degree and 31 percent having a master’s degree. The academic preparation of the library faculty and staff allows us to better understand other units on campus and better respond to their information needs. All library faculty have a MLS from an ALA Accredited Institution, and all but one (MS Biology in progress) have obtained a second masters degree or a Ph.D. representing 14 disciplines. This is truly a major part of quality public service.

What external recognitions (e.g., awards, accommodations, professional certifications, references in trade publications) have the program and its staff received in the past three years?

    Recognition for the success of Booth Library programs has been robust over the past decade. The past few years have been less so due to national, state and local recessions in funding for library grants and operating funds with which to promote extraordinary efforts by libraries. A basic “hunkering down” attitude has pervaded many fronts for a variety of reasons, mostly economic, but also from distrust of getting too close to political quagmires.    

    That being said, librarians at Eastern Illinois University are active in research and creative activities.  They have been published in peer-reviewed journals and by major presses.  Many conference presentations are made each year on the local, regional, national and international levels.

    Sarah Johnson, who serves Public Services Quarterly as Professional Reading Column Editor, Historical Novels Review as Book Review Editor, and NoveList as a columnist, has been instrumental in leading several members of our faculty to productive posts as a book reviewer.

    Allen Lanham and Marlene Slough have long led several initiatives related to Art and Architecture in Illinois Libraries, an LSTA-funded project documenting efforts of more than 1000 public and academic libraries in our State with respect to art in public settings.  Digital images and various realia are featured on our web presence.
 
    Other major digital image projects have included regional theatre (David Bell), local historical documents, photographs, and publications (Robert Hillman and Robert Wiseman), and Illinois postcards (John Whisler, Ellen Corrigan, and Allen Lanham).

Is the program active with any regional, national, or international professional organizations?

    Booth Library is a governing member of the Consortia of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois, an organizational member of the Illinois Library Association, and a member of the Illinois Heartland Library System and Online Computer Library Center, a worldwide library utility supporting shared cataloging, among other services. Additionally, Booth Library works in partnership with the Illinois State Library and is a member of the National Network of Libraries of Medicine.

    Booth Library partners with other institutions on a regional, state, and national level in order to achieve greater cost-effectiveness and to expand access to collections.

    As a CARLI member Booth Library participates in the shared automated library system, the Universal Borrowing interlibrary loan request and delivery system, and shared purchasing of electronic resources. As an OCLC member Booth Library participates in the interlibrary loan system and shared cataloging. An example of Booth Library partnering with the State Library is the Ask?Away service, an around-the-clock program answering patron questions and information needs online.

    Booth library faculty and library civil services members demonstrate diligence to remain current in their field.  They are members of many professional organizations dedicated to the development of libraries and librarians.  They attend library meetings and conferences across the country and beyond, volunteer for task forces and working groups, and generally help enhance the role of our profession throughout society.

Booth librarians are members of the following professional organizations and their respective committees:
    Alibris for Libraries Advisory Board
    American Association of School Librarians
    American Library Association
    Association for Educational Communications and Technology
    Association for Library Collections and Technical Services
    Association of College and Research Libraries
    Charleston Carnegie Public Library Board of Trustees
    Coles County Historical Society
    Coles County Genealogical Society
    Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois
    Council of Directors of State University Libraries in Illinois
    East Central Illinois Consortium
    Embarrass Valley Film Festival Committee
    Health Science Librarians of Illinois
    Historical Novel Society
    Illinois Library Association
    Illinois Association of College and Research Libraries
    Illinois School Library Media Association
    Monarch Award Steering Committee
    Illinois State Historical Society
    Illinois State Genealogical Society
    Library and Management Association
    Library Information Technology Association    
    Midwest Archives Conference
    Midwest Chapter of the Medical Library Association
    Music Library Association
    Reference and User Services Association
    OCLC Music Users Group
    Phi Beta Kappa Association of East Central Illinois
    Society of American Archivists
    Society for American Music
    Viola da Gamba Society of America
    
    Additionally, library faculty and staff are eager to share their expertise with others.  Our Staff Development Committee sponsors several sessions each year on topics of need or general interest.  Often these sessions are led by persons working in our library, although persons from other campus entities or beyond are brought in when their knowledge is appropriate for our staff.

Note any presentations, publications, or offices held in the last three years.

Several faculty at Booth Library are actively involved with local and regional governing boards of professional organizations. Others have received invitations to present their scholarly activity, while many have had their proposals accepted for presentation at regional and national meetings.

If needed, provide supplemental comments or data sources to help the reader understand the quality of program outcomes.

    For many years Booth Library has been a partner with the Mortenson Center for International Library Program, housed at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Through the program, visiting librarians from around the world have spent a day or more with Booth faculty and staff.  The tours, information, and hospitality your library has shown toward our visitors has been heartfelt and our visitors have commented upon the friendly ambiance of Booth and your dedication to public service. Since 2005, Booth Library has hosted visitors from Nigeria, South Korea, El Salvador, Vietnam, Nigeria, Japan , Uzbekistan, Kenya, Ghana, Bahrain, Palestine, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and more. Through their commitment to librarianship and this program, Booth librarians have not just touched the lives of our international librarians; they will have also touched the lives of thousands of people around the world served by the work of our international colleagues.

Note any special benefits (e.g., personnel support, equipment, permanent improvements) that the program has received in the past three years from its grants and other sponsored programs.

Grants in 2011

    National Network of Libraries of Medicine -Empowering Innovation: Technology Award   $ 4,900
    ALA: Benjamin Franklin: In Search of a Better World   $ 1,000

Collection Enhancement Donation 2012

    Bertrand P. Holley Ethics & Social Responsibility    $ 2,665

Grants in 2013

    ALA/NEH-Muslim Journey  $ 4,500
    ALA/NEH America’s Music  $ 2,500
    Ruth and Vaughn Jaenike Access to the Arts Outreach Program  $ 2,000
    Charleston Arts Council     $   250

Total Revenues for the grants and collection support listed above: $17,815.

How does the program benefit from donor gifts (e.g., scholarships, endowed chairs)? Does donor support provide a significant percentage of the program’s overall funding?

    Booth Library has maintained a healthy list of donors over the years. Most of the donors provide gift materials for the library's collections.  Retired professors, book reviewers, local citizens, and others provide us hundreds of titles annually.  All materials are reviewed by subject specialists and either added to the library collection or sent to our periodic book sale.

    Some recently donated collections have greatly enriched holdings in music, Illinois history, cooking, fiction, the settling of the American West, and popular cinema culture, among others.  The library also receives donations from a small list of financial donors each year.  Our largest gifts have come from the estates of Eastern alumni.  Quite often the library was unaware of the alumnus until the receipt of the donation. We also have a few gift accounts from retired professors or honoring retired programs, but their buying power is not great.

List two or three key relationships that the program maintains with external constituencies (e.g., community colleges, other universities, government bodies). How do these relationships advance the university mission or otherwise benefit the university?

    Booth Library takes seriously its role among sister libraries around the world. Being a valued partner ranks high among our goals. The primary way we, or any library, organizes information for effective discovery and access is through its catalog of materials and resources.  At the foundation of effective discovery is bibliographic data of high quality.  Booth Library strives to provide this by adhering to established standards for the content of bibliographic records (following current cataloging rules), through the uniformity of access terms (applying authority control to headings for persons, corporations, subjects, and titles), through the use of standard classification schemes (Library of Congress Classification, Dewey Decimal Classification, Superintendent of Documents Classification), and through the use of standardized data coding (MARC).  These efforts assure us that our catalog will remain compatible, comparable, and competitive with the catalogs of all other libraries that similarly follow these standards.  It also prepares us well for future changes, because clean, standards compliant data will always transfer to new system architectures better than will problematic data. We are well known to the Illinois library community as supporters of multi-type libraries and their various needs and concerns.  
    
    Each semester the library also hosts visits for several groups of students from area public schools. These are often research days for high school students or tours for youngsters, creating an environment for learning that the public schools cannot provide and introducing the students to the academic side of university life and intellectual exploration. Whether it is 90 students from Olney High, 120 from Effingham, or 10 from a Charleston daycare center, we provide each with a unique experience that could be life changing tothe individual. Opening minds to new opportunities is a worthy endeavor.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the resources generated by the program. Note any clarifications or special circumstances (e.g., revenue pass-throughs) that should be considered when reviewing the above data.

    The Keep, Eastern’s online digital repository based at Booth Library, provides EIU faculty with individual SelectedWorks pages.  These pages give faculty a one-stop-shop platform for collecting, preserving, organizing and presenting all of their scholarship and creative activity.  This greatly increases the discoverability of these materials, increasing student access and promoting the EIU mission of integrative learning.  
    
    The Keep also provides a platform for important departmental output by featuring specialized community pages such as the Theatre Arts Productions collection (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/theatre_productions), the Wesley Whiteside Botanical Garden collection (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/whiteside_garden), and the Booth Library Exhibits collection (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/lib_events).  In these community pages, formerly nebulous materials are compiled, organized, and presented in a form that greatly increases their discoverability and value.  As of April 15, 2012 over 10,200+ full text document have been downloaded from The Keep. Scholarship and documents in The Keep are meta-data tagged and harvested, making these previously un-accessible materials discoverable via Google and other search engines.  Faculty members that maintain a SelectedWorks page are able to link from their department webpages directly to the full-text content in The Keep.  Publishers are able to link to The Keep to provide access to supplemental material related to faculty publications.  Additionally, The Keep is listed in several institutional archives discovery portals including OpenDOAR (http://www.opendoar.org/), ROAR (http://roar.eprints.org/), and repository66 (http://maps.repository66.org/).
        
    Supporting student research and creative activity is at the core of the EIU mission.  The Keep organizes and presents student works ranging from Masters Theses (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/theses), to Honors Theses (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/honors), to student publications such as The Warbler (http://thekeep.eiu.edu/warbler).
    
    Booth Library maintains a presence in social media via a Facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/BoothLibrary), a linked Twitter account, shares images via Flickr, and offers a YouTube channel. 

Provide an executive summary of and link to any metrics or benchmarks that the program tracks to measure productivity.

   The library’s budget has stagnated the past six years. Although it is sufficient to provide resources to meet the majority of users expectations, purchasing power for books, journals, and electronic resources has been severely reduced over time due to both inflation and the new attitudes and publishing modes of academic resources.

    According to the ACRL 2012 Academic Library Trends and Statistics Survey, Booth Library’s budget ranks in the middle of institutions identified as being peers of Eastern Illinois University. As seen in the chart below, Booth Library ranks 10th of 21 in terms of library expenditures. In ranking the library against its 20 peer institutions in terms of Library Expenditures per FTE student, Booth Library places fourth out of 21.

What initiatives has the program implemented to enhance staff productivity (e.g., access to training, workflow improvements)? Briefly describe the costs and benefits of these initiatives.

    Booth Library's Staff Development Committee is charged with identifying areas of need and opportunities for training among Booth Library personnel.  Activities are developed to enhance the staff’s skills and abilities, leading to a greater success in their positions. Throughout the year activities are held to promote teamwork; other workshops address safety and preservation issues.  Several workshops have been designed to assist staff with the latest tools to help them assist library patrons. Opportunities for staff to participate in the American Library Association's vendor exhibition has been arranged when the meeting is held in Chicago.  In addition, a few staff attend Reaching Forward South—an annual conference for library support staff.  Costs for participation are minimal. The Committee also organizes an appreciation reception in honor of the National Library Workers Day Celebration held each year during National Library Week in April.

    Librarians are encouraged to participate in professional conferences both as an observer and as a presenter. A more recent, cost-effective way of staying current has been through hosting webinars.  Topics being discussed include trends in academic librarianship, a rapidly changing field that requires the professional to stay relevant and knowledgeable of these changes.

    Another initiative that has enhanced staff productivity is the practice of sharing the existing personnel to assist in the scanning center for The Keep. Two staff members, located in close proximity to the scanning center, are able to oversee the student assistants working in the scanning center. This provides close coordination of the materials being scanned while still being able to maintain their existing duties. The addition of these duties also provides an opportunity for staff to develop skills that may lead to future opportunities.

    Since 2000, the library has lost six staff positions through attrition. The library’s work remains steady, but with fewer persons, the work is harder to complete. Additionally, new initiatives in digital preservation have eaten into staff positions traditionally working on standard library routines and duties.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the productivity of the program. Note any clarifications or special circumstances (e.g., accreditation requirements, curricular changes, program restructuring) that should be considered when reviewing the above data.

    The library contributes to student recruitment, retention, and academic success with a variety of activities.  
    In the area of recruitment, Booth Library works closely with the Admissions Office and the Office of New Student Programs.  The library is included on the campus tours for all prospective students, and information about the library is given to all of the tour guides.  Local high school students—often a source of new student recruitment—are introduced to Eastern through the library’s instruction program.  High school teachers bring their senior students to the library for an introduction to our academic library resources and for instruction on how to do college level research.  This interaction in the library may encourage some of these students to enroll at EIU in the future.
    Regarding retention, Booth Library seeks out ways to interact with the students throughout their academic careers. All newly admitted students attend a Debut Day during the summer before their freshman year.  There are 26 of these days offered each summer. Booth Library has a table at each of these events, during which time a librarian is there to distribute literature about the library and encourage the students to visit the library when classes start.  During the fall 2011 semester the library partnered with the BOOST program to pair librarians with students.  This was an attempt to provide individualized attention to students at risk of not remaining in school.  Booth Library works with the newly created Summer Institute for Higher Learning and provides library workshops and research help to ensure academic success for this innovative cohort.
    As far as academic success is concerned, the library strives to accomplish this in all we do.  We ensure that our collections support the research needs of the faculty and students. We provide services that lead to academic success. These include but are not limited to reference services to help users find the information they need, interlibrary loan from other libraries to get materials that we do not own, library technology services that provide access to technological tools necessary for success, and instruction sessions teaching information literacy skills useful in all classes.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the costs associated with the program. Note any clarifications or special circumstances (e.g., expenditures made centrally or externally, expenditures made on behalf of other units) that should be considered when reviewing the above data.

How does the program seek to distinguish itself from similar programs at other institutions?

    Booth Library is both unique and traditional in its offerings.  We routinely review and monitor the international standards in librarianship and meet or exceed those goals.  As most academic libraries, we model our collections and services to the university's curriculum and topics of interest to our teaching faculty. We remain responsive to new directions in the university curriculum and research, and recently in nursing and sustainable energy. However, it is rarer to find medium-sized university libraries embrace programming and outreach as Booth does.  

    Our annual exhibit and speaker series has been successful in spreading the library's message across campus and throughout the region, pushing Eastern's name into communities not often given full attention from higher education sources. Our efforts have been recognized and supported by the American Library Association, the National Endowment of the Humanities, The National Library of Medicine, and others.  Awards have been received from the Association of College and Research Libraries for Exemplary Marketing for Library Programs, specifically noting success in building campus and community partnerships and from ALA for special programs and events, citing outstanding efforts for library public relations (one Best in Show Award and one Honorable Mention).  

    The Keep, our institutional repository, is an infant of only two years, but is the fastest growing among Illinois universities.  We expect to surpass several other IRs in productivity this year.

    The EIU Online Catalog is known to be one of the cleanest databases among the CARLI I-Share users.  This achievement can be attributed to our Cataloging Services department, whose staff maintain the highest standards of description and classification.

Note any unique and/or essential contributions that the program makes to the university.

    Booth Library is one of Eastern's most versatile departments, providing information and technical services for most every department on campus throughout the year, in addition to meeting the needs of students and faculty from all disciplines on campus and for patrons of regional libraries and sister colleges and universities.  We are responsible for providing the raw materials for much of the enquiry that makes up Eastern's academic programs, and for providing expertise and training for using those resources.

    Booth's physical facilities are unparalleled on campus and in the community for work, study, and meeting spaces, for providing Internet access to a large number of  simultaneous users (including to non-university citizens of Illinois), and for having specialists on duty to help users maneuver the wide world of information.

    Each term the library also hosts visits for several groups of students from area public schools. These are often research days for high school students or tours for youngsters, creating an environment for learning that the public schools cannot do and introducing the students to the academic side of university life and intellectual exploration.

    Our dedication to quality public service is evident and remarked upon routinely.  We accept requests for materials and services from everyone, and make it our business to respond whenever possible, to communicate well, and put Eastern in the best possible light locally and throughout the State.  We are well known to the Illinois library community as supporters of multi-type libraries and their various needs and concerns. 

Provide any program-specific metrics that help to document program contributions or program quality. Examples of some commonly used program-specific metrics may be found here.

    Booth Library maintains a body of evidence that demonstrates its impact, primarily though the collection and reporting of statistics.  The library participates in the National Center for Educational Statistics’ biennial Academic Library Survey, in surveys from the Association of College and Research Libraries, and in various other national, state, and local surveys.  

    In April of each year Booth Library also conducts a Patron Satisfaction Survey.  This instrument, distributed during class periods, is completed by faculty, undergraduates and graduate students, and measures how patrons are using the library and how satisfied they are with the services and collections provided.

    Most of the statistics gathered reflect quantitative data on library collections, services, and use of facilities. Some qualitative data is gathered in the comments portion of the Patron Satisfaction Survey. The library uses the data gathered to represent its contribution to the users, but does not directly measure how it impacts their success. The results of the annual patron satisfaction survey are distributed to library faculty, the Provost, and the Library Advisory Board.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand the program impact on the university mission.

Provide a link to or listing of the program’s goals and/or strategic plan.

    Booth Library goals remain as follows:
    1.      Maintain and develop the electronic, print, and media collections to support the quality and integrity of undergraduate and graduate programs and research.
    2.     Provide adequate academic and technological equipment for the library and           classroom use.
    3.     Continue to maintain and improve the use of physical space allotted to Library Services.
    4.    Enhance current level of patron services.
    5.    Promote the library and media services to the university community, the region, and beyond.
    6.    Maintain adequate funding for student assistants, without whose help we could not offer a desirable library program.

    These goals are the basic building blocks of a quality academic library program, and have been followed for some time.  Each year opportunities exist to move forward on each of them or just some of them, but overall they have served us well.

What role will the program have in the implementation of the university’s strategic plan (provide link to strategic plan)?

The role of Library Services is to play in the implementation of Eastern’s strategic plan mirrors closely the goals and actions described in the document.  We feel that the library is central to most of what takes place at the university, whether it is providing materials and services to student athletes or to young scholars in the sciences, or making sure that administrators and faculty have the current online  resources for their work.

The library is always about academic rigor and literacy.  The most successful students and faculty make the best use of a multitude of resources, many of which they would not have access to if it were not for the library.  Our exhibits try to work from the edges of our curricular programs, enticing the university community to reach beyond the obvious and take advantage of topics new to them. The diversity of our offerings is unparalleled on campus or in the community.        

Our profession’s dedication to access to information covers the range of students, both traditional and non-traditional.  We feel that opportunities in the library lead to success in degree completion, better preparation for advanced studies, and a knowledge base that pushes students on a clearer career path.

We provide 24-hour web services for those participating in National Student Exchange and study abroad, and facilitate the needs of faculty who teach away from campus.

Library Services remains dedicated to the highest technology standards possible for our patrons, and feels strongly about campus investments in our technology infrastructure.  The proposed exploration for alternative models for administering technology funding and expenditures is most interesting.  Adopting  changes that enhance departments’ ease of technology use is welcomed.  Campus efforts to increase the participation and community collaboration in  activities have been a part of our operations for many years.  Taking our programs and exhibits on the road has been popular, and of course, attracting a regional audience has been our practice forever.  Increased communication with alumni, donors, and external audiences will remain a goal as we spread the word about Library Services and build partnerships with organizations and agencies away from Eastern.

In the next two or three years, what best practices, improvements in operations, or other opportunities to advance the university’s mission are likely to be implemented?

    Booth Library expects to continue to maintain national standards for academic libraries, affirming our dedication to the best public service possible.  Along with this, our devotion to providing open access to information for all and access to materials on all sides of the issue is never separated from our obligation to build diverse collections.

    In developing collections and providing access to information, we plan to increase our current practice of reducing the acquisition of print materials in favor of electronic publications in selected areas, including journals and reference materials in all disciplines, and in science, technology, business, and medical-related topics.  We expect to maintain print acquisitions for most arts, education, humanities, and social science disciplines, as well as in best sellers, teaching materials, and others.

    As a highly ranked initiative, Booth Library faculty have begun discussion of a major overhaul of its instruction program.  Reaching thousands of students is not the difficult part; we have done that for years.  Convincing the teaching faculty of the value of library instruction for all students is challenging, and keeping the students focused on their academic education at Eastern is also tricky.  Academic rigor and the development of good information retrieval techniques go hand in hand.  With more active support from teaching faculty, the library should have a larger impact on student success at Eastern.

    Librarians have nothing to do with evaluation of students in a course, and therefore can only suggest to a student or a faculty member that certain resources be used or consulted.  Both students and faculty are usually rushed and rarely have sufficient time for research in the library. Therefore, librarians are moving faculty participation into a higher priority for assistance in meeting our goal of increased contact with our student body. The library will provide nimble, responsive and customized curricular support via the course management system and in collaboration with faculty across the disciplines.

If needed, provide supplemental comments to help the reader understand future opportunities for the program.

    Booth Library is committed to using the most recent technologies for the provision of library services to our students and faculty.  As much as possible, we will evaluate and judiciously embrace new methods as they arise, knowing that we never want to be on the absolute cutting edge of technology because of the time and financial obligations necessary to do so.  

    Over the years, the library has been one of the leading divisions on campus to provide technology-rich services to our constituents.  Depending on future budget allocations, the library would aspire to remain a touchstone for technology at Eastern.

    The library's development of The Keep, our institutional repository, should continue to grow at current pace.  This will ensure that more and more archival materials will be available online and that the university's production of journal and newsletter publications and graduate student theses will be freely accessed from around the world.

    We will continue to seek state and national grants to augment funds available for collections and services.  Even though these are more difficult to obtain than before, librarians understand the necessity to approach all opportunities as if they will produce in the long run.

    Librarians will continue to work with other departments on campus to ensure that students and faculty may easily access Booth Library services online, including from the Eastern website and Booth Library's web presence.  We have a goal to integrate library resources from the course management system in place at Eastern, allowing ever-present reminders that graduate and undergraduate education is substantially enhanced by the use of materials provided by the university library.  Library staff is planning the launch of our redesigned website during 2014.