October has been a very active month in terms of library use and keeping the collections and facilities current.

The Libraries' Progress Report for 1999-2000 has been distributed on and off campus and in November I will report about this to the Board of Trustees and the Board of Overseers.

I want to thank each and every one of you for your dedication and hard work this past year. Thanks to you, we again had a most productive month. I want to point out our success in teaching our students information skills. The feedback from students collected through the Dey Systems, Inc. surveys indicates that more than 70% of the undergraduate and graduate students surveyed have learned relevant information and library skills, and intend to use these skills in the future.

It should be noted that we might be evaluated for membership in the Association of Research Libraries as early as next year.

October 26 and 27 we hosted the statewide KYVL (Kentucky Virtual Library) Endeavor meeting. Weiling Liu did an excellent job organizing this complex affair for more than 90 people including a special dinner with Jane Burke, the CEO of Endeavor Information Systems, Inc. Click here for photos of the event.

The criteria used by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) for accreditation is under review. All references to libraries and librarians have been removed. Academic librarians throughout the South have been submitting letters and comments to SACS in support of reinstating some library criteria related to the accreditation review. We will not know the final outcome of the revisions until early next year.

--Hannelore Rader, University Librarian