Library, Department & Team News

Assessment Team
SWAT (Superbly Witty Assessment Team) . . .
. . . seeks like-minded individuals for possible team membership. If you are interested in the answer to questions like "What do you think?" and "How are we doing?" this may be the relationship for you. We enjoy long walks in the forest (not the trees), new challenges, efficient and fun meetings, good food and bubble-sheet surveys. Contact Melissa Laning at 852-8726 if you want more info!

Technology Team
The Library's new URL: http://library.louisville.edu is available. (This is the same as http://www.louisville.edu/library/ and either one will go to the main page.)

The proxy server (for people to use databases or e-journals off-campus without UofL.net Remote Plus) is in production. The direct URL to instructions on registration and configuration is http://library.louisville.edu/proxy/. The link has been added to the Research Center page.

Y2K
As of November 24, 1999, all PCs (431) were reported tested, but only 359 appeared on the latest official report. About 150 of them have been upgraded with the Win95 Y2K patch file. On paper, the project is completed on the continuity plan. However, remediation will continue until January 1, 2000. Then, the project will be in watching stage until April.

Voyager
About 97,000 of 160,000 Government Documents records (not including the Law Library's) have been loaded into the system as of November 24, 1999.

Network Upgrades
Required lines in UARC and the ground floor have been upgraded. 100 assigned student study carrels have been wired with 10 MB Ethernet lines

Art Library
Mallica Landrus, former student assistant in the Art Library who is currently working on her doctorate in London, sent an electronic reference question last week about a British art journal. She notes that she could have asked at the Bodleian Library, however “things move real slowly out here. I could order it today and may not see the journal till next week!” She also reports that in most academic libraries there, students are allowed to photocopy only one chapter from each book at any one time.

Closer to home, this semester a record number of UofL faculty brought their students to the Art Library to learn about the services and resources. Students from the Brown School, Ballard and Atherton also came to the library to learn how to research their art projects. We hear so often about how adept students are with technology but, as these high school students showed, some of them are not computer literate at all.

Ekstrom Library
Media and Current Periodicals
Shelving and DVDs
We are very proud of our new video shelving which makes the collection look as substantial as it really is! All our videos, some of which were previously stored in the "video vault" are now displayed for the public. The more valuable or risqué titles are kept in a unit with locking glass doors. The small but growing DVD collection is also shelved here. These DVDs are available for checkout for three days by anyone on the staff. We also have a DVD/computer workstation set up in the department for in-house use.

New Student in Special Services
It is a pleasure to welcome Yerusha Martin as the new student assistant for Special Services. This is in addition to her job at the Arts & Science Advising Center. Yerusha, a sophomore, loves to work with young children and is contemplating a major in early childhood education. A native Louisvillian, she has three siblings, including a sister who is a senior at UofL. Yerusha especially looks forward to spending family holidays and reunions with relatives in Alabama. Please extend a warm UofL welcome to Yerusha.

New York Daze (by Eric Neagle)
I thoroughly enjoyed myself in New York City. It was my first time there and I was in heaven. I saw at least 500 pairs of black shoes that I “needed.” But, I resisted. The highlights of the trip were the Sensation exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (the one the mayor was all freaked out about), and Eurythmics in concert at Madison Square Garden.

Sensation

Well it was certainly that. I was concerned that the hype, was just hype. Au contraire. The pieces that had been debated in the news do not give you a clear idea of the exhibit as a whole. They certainly were powerful, but not the most shocking pieces there. The Saatchi collection is composed of works by British artists in the 1990s. The major themes are race, gender, class, sexuality and the dichotomy of life & death. The digital tour was narrated by David Bowie, which only added to the experience. I highly recommend going, if you plan to be anywhere near New York in the next few months. Being the book-hound that I am, of course I brought back the exhibit guide. If anyone would like to take a gander, let me know, I’ll bring it in for a showing.

Peace, Baby

Eurythmics played an absolutely flawless two-hour set at Madison Square Garden on November 9. I was there and couldn’t be happier. I came, I saw, I bought the t-shirt. If you want to have a look/listen at what I saw/heard, check out the following on the web …thank you VH1 (you’ll need RealPlayer): http://www.vh1.com/insidevh1/events/eurythmics/index.jhtml

Office of the University Librarian
Promotions
Congratulations to Rachel Hodge, who has been promoted to Library Associate, Grade 25, in the Music Library effective December 13, 1999.

Michael Purcell has been promoted to Programmer Analyst II, Grade 27, in the Office of Libraries Technology effective retroactive to August 1, 1999.

James Ryan has been promoted to Library Assistant, Grade 11, in Ekstrom Circulation effective retroactive to August 1, 1999.

New Hire
Jill Sherman has been hired as Library Assistant, Grade 11, in Content Access effective November 29, 1999. She has nine years of library experience from the Columbus, Ohio Metropolitan Library and more recently at Spalding University Library.

Resignation
Kathy Shambo has announced her resignation from her position as Program Assistant II, Grade 11, in the Office of Information Literacy. Her last day will be December 3, 1999. She has accepted a Public Information Officer II position at the Kentucky Pollution Prevention Center in Lutz Hall.

Reference Department
Barbara Whitener spoke to over 30 Louisville Free Public Library librarians November 18th (at the main LFPL) about the Government Publications web. The librarians were from the main library and the branches.

Anna Marie Johnson got the opportunity to see far-flung parts of Kentucky as she traveled with KCVL librarians to Bowling Green, Paducah, and Somerset to help train librarians and technology coordinators around the state on the new KCVL databases and Web Z interface. She got to meet many people from different types of institutions such as school libraries, public libraries and special libraries. The trips confirmed her opinion that Kentucky is both very beautiful and populated with very friendly people!

Special Collections
Exhibit News
Barbara Crawford is included in the current exhibit The Photographic Persona in the Belknap and Covi Galleries of the Allen R. Hite Art Institute, Schneider Hall. This show is a national invitational exhibit curated by Mitch Eckert and Mary Carothers of the Fine Arts Photography Department. Barbara is the only Kentucky photographic artist represented. The show runs through December 15.

The Vietnam Perspectives exhibit in the Photographic Archives Gallery has been extended to February 18. See Jamie Noe's and Bill Carner's photos from the reception and panel discussion on November 11 on The Owl on the Web.

Kersey Library
Campus Preview Day
This year's Campus Preview Day was held on Saturday, November 13 at the Swain Student Activities Center. It was a huge success. This marks the second year for the University Libraries’ involvement. Margo Smith and Marcia Kotlinski represented the libraries this year. The most- asked question was: “Are the libraries open 24 hours, and if not, do they plan to be?” Other frequently asked questions dealt with web site access, the location of Kornhauser Library, and which is the main library. Our table was well-visited!

TLC
Its hard to believe that finals are upon us! As usual Kersey Library will have a TLC exam post with refreshments provided by Student Affairs. We enjoy doing this, knowing that the students truly need and appreciate this effort.

Kornhauser Library
A Ruffling of Feathers
There has been a change of command
Throughout Kornhauser Library land.
The Owl reporter cap has passed,
From seasoned Karen F
To the fledgling Elizabef.

So now I am on the prowl
For news worthy of our Owl.

Attended a conference?
Developed some skills?
Launched a new service?
Had a library thrill?

I'll be coming round to hear all your tales,
For submission to Owl,
The forum by which all others pale.

--Elizabeth Barrett Browning Smigielski, 1999

Research Louisville
The Information and Education Services Team participated in the Research! Louisville 1999 activities. Judy Wulff, Michel Atlas, and Elizabeth Smigielski staffed an information booth on November 17 and 18 during the Faculty and Postgraduate Research Day poster sessions at the Jewish Hospital Rudd Heart and Lung Conference Center. They answered questions about KHSL information resources and services and demonstrated tools such as Web of Science and Science Direct. Many researchers visited the booth, asked in-depth questions, and provided useful feedback. A good lunch and view were savored by all.

New Office Furniture
Nancy Utterback is coordinating the purchase and installation of new office furniture for each office. All staff members have the opportunity to provide input as to what they need and want, within limits of the budget.

KHSL Halloween Party
Those from the Technical Services Section transformed their area into ghoulish gathering grounds for the KHSL Halloween Party. Among those enjoying the Bloody Marys, lady fingers, knuckle sandwiches, and other finger foods, were Miss Kentucky runner-up contestants Miss Guided, Miss Informed, and Miss Shelved, known about the library in their humbler work guises as Kathy Rogers, Judy Wulff, and Michel Atlas.

Staff News
If we see Paula Mattingly again, we'll know that she survived her trip to Ft. Benning, Georgia to protest the School of the Americas. Her partners in protest were Nikki Gaines and Wendy Bronson.

Judy Wulff went to Woods Hole, MA the first week in October for a course in medical informatics sponsored by the National Library of Medicine and the Marine Biological Laboratory. The schedule was a pretty intense for such a lovely spot, but cool, rainy Cape Cod weather helped keep the 32 fellows and the dozen faculty focused on the topics at hand—database design and construction, web interfaces, the electronic medical record, controlled vocabulary, telemedicine, security, policy, evaluation, etc. About half the fellows were librarians; most of the rest were physicians. They took time for a clam bake (in the cafeteria of the conference center, but the lobster was mighty tasty anyway) and a quick trip to Martha’s Vineyard.

UARC
A new full-scale history entitled The University of Louisville is to be published in December by the University Press of Kentucky. The book is to be introduced at a noon luncheon at the University Club on December 10, and at a 7:00 p.m. book-signing at Hawley-Cooke, Shelbyville Road, on December 16. Its authors are Dwayne D. Cox and William J. Morison. Cox, now university archivist at Auburn University, was associate archivist at U of L from 1975 to 1986. Morison, who joined UofL's history faculty in 1969, has been director of archives and records since 1973.

Archivist on Two Wheels
Margaret Merrick and her husband Robbie took a western vacation in October. They flew to Phoenix early on October 18. As soon as they arrived, they picked up their traveling vehicle - a big, red motorcycle, the new BMW 1200 model. After getting careful instructions from the rental agent, the two took off for the Grand Canyon on the scenic route (meaning miles out of the way.) After a long, but good day traveling through Arizona, from desert to pine forests, they arrived at the Grand Canyon in time for sunset over the Canyon. It may have been because they were exhausted from hours on the bike, but the beauty and the immensity of the canyon rendered them speechless for quite awhile. The next day after leaving Grand Canyon, they started for their ultimate destination of San Diego, California. While in San Diego, they visited Robbie's cousin, Margaret's aunt and uncle, and a friend who is living there. As they traveled in California and Arizona, they went to Old Town, Torrey Pines, Mount Palomar Observatory, the Julian Apple Pie Festival, the London Bridge now in Lake Havasu, a portion of the original Route 66, and enjoyed walking and riding by the ocean. The trusty bike took them back to Phoenix where they visited the Heard Museum and attended the Dios de Muertos festival that took place on the museum grounds. Traveling by motorcycle for a concerted period of time was an interesting experience, not to be missed, but maybe not repeated! They enjoyed the scenery and the spirit of adventure of motorcycling through the desert, the mountains and ocean side. One treat was watching a full moon rise over the Chocolate Mountains as they rode one night through the desert from California to Arizona.

ARMA Meeting
In October, Margaret Merrick attended a Leadership Meeting for the Association of Records Managers and Administrators in Cincinnati. Margaret is a co-director of the Educational Institutions Industry Specific Group for ARMA. The seminar was designed to assist leaders of the ISG format to prepare the mid-year seminars in April. The ARMA International Meeting was held in Cincinnati this year.

Kathie and Ron Johnson visited daughter Cass for Parents' Weekend at the College of Charleston, the first weekend in October. They stayed at a wonderful old B&B right in downtown Charleston, just a block from the dorm. The weekend was spent meeting other parents, touring the campus, wandering the streets of the old city, shopping, and eating at fabulous restaurants. Luckily, they will get to visit Charleston on a regular basis for the next few years!

Then, if a trip to South Carolina wasn't enough, Kathie and Ron flew to Reno in November for a long weekend visit with friends. The weather, though cold, was great, with mostly sunny skies. There was snow in the mountains which added to the beauty of the area. Activities included a hike to a Viking-style castle on Lake Tahoe; a cruise on the lake; and drives which included so much beautiful scenery that it was hard to take it all in.