Management Council Minutes Wednesday, September 5, 2007

Facilitators: D.J. Hoek, Suzette Radford
Recorders: Clare Roccaforte, Roberto Sarmiento

Attendees: Stu Baker, John Blosser, Frank Cervone, Beth Clausen, Russ Clement, Scott Devine, Peter Devlin, Jeff Garrett, Catherine Grove, Alex Hernandez-Herrera, D.J. Hoek, Scott Krafft, Harriet Lightman, Katie Melody, Bob Michaelson, Laurel Minott, Sarah Pritchard, Patrick Quinn, Suzette Radford, Clare Roccaforte, Roberto Sarmiento, Roxanne Sellberg, Denise Shorey, Andrea Stamm, Claire Stewart.
Guest: Devin Savage.

Introductions and Announcements:

Roxanne welcomed Devin Savage.

Scott Garton begins this year as Kaplan fellow. Jason Kruse, a Reference departmental assistant, has been appointed to a one year post MLS internship to take over some of Scott Garton’s duties.

Stacey Devine has been appointed head of Acquisitions and Rapid Cataloging (ARC) department.

Two new employees from visual media collection (the slide library): Roman Stansberry, curator and Julie Rudder, digitization coordinator.

Morris Levee is the new senior music cataloger. His first day at the Library will be October 1.

Frank Cervone thanked everyone involved in recent the Voyager upgrade, especially Stu Baker and Suzette Radford, and Marek Babela, Matt Stork, and Bob Trautvetter for getting the servers up after the power outages.

Approval of Minutes from August 15 Meeting:

There were no corrections to the minutes.

Administrative Committee Report (Jeff Garrett):

The Administrative Committee report for August 20 and 27, 2007 was sent prior to the MC meeting and is listed in Appendix 1 at the end of this document. Jeff Garrett opened the floor for questions.

Denise Shorey asked if the report on the United Library would be circulated to the staff. Sarah replied that once she and the AULs have had a chance to meet and discussed the report with Beth Sheppard, the new Garrett director, the ideas for implementation will be shared with the staff. Sarah also indicated that there are some things in the report that the Library will not be pursuing.

Roberto Sarmiento asked if the new focus of the ARL index will have an impact on the statistics the Library provides to the ARL. Sarah replied that the new index uses variables that we currently collect. Apart from the Index, there will be some changes in the main statistics this year and likely more changes next year. The main change will be in how we count serials, we will be de-duping titles when we submit numbers. With the new index the Library is ranked in the mid 30s among the ARL institutions, not a significant change from where we are currently ranked.

Roberto Sarmiento asked Frank Cervone to clarify the laptop printing option. Frank replied that the September launch of laptop printing will be a pilot, which will help determine the best printers and locations to set up on such a network.

Other Departmental, Committee, and Task Force Reports:

Jeff Garrett announced the following:

Leveraging year-end fund balances on our allocated, endowment, and gift lines and working closely with selectors and the Electronic Collections Committee, we were able to make some significant year-end purchases: nine items at a total cost of $236,867 from our year-end wish list. A summary of items purchased can be found in Appendix 2.

A number of these purchases would not have been possible without substantial additional support from selector endowment balances. I want to specifically thank Bob Michaelson and Anna Ren for their support of the Earth & Planetary Sciences backfile purchase from Elsevier; Harriet Lightman for supporting the Boston Globe and Burney Collection purchases, and Charlotte Cubbage for contributing endowment funds to acquire the 19th C. British Newspaper collection. It was not necessary to incur any debt on owed balances to carry over into the new year. Finally, I want to thank John Blosser for working with me so closely to get all of these items ordered and paid for in a very brief period of time.

NULSA Update (Devin Savage):

Devin Savage, NULSA president, delivered the NULSA year-end report, noting both NULSA’s accomplishments in the last year and its goals for next year. The 2006/07 year brought new endeavors and revitalization of old roles, expanding on both social events and opportunities for staff education, information, and participation. They focused on departmental outreach and an increase in communication with the staff, Management Council, and the University Librarian.

NULSA officers made the first Constitution revision and amendment in 13 years. The Constitution has been revised to reflect the current realities of the Library. Jennifer Young and Devin Savage have agreed to be the first two year officers, extending their terms into this year. NULSA will send out an announcement regarding 2006/07 officers once positions are finalized.

In the upcoming year NULSA will continue to assist in the institutional improvement of Communication, Participation, Evaluation, and Green Initiatives. NULSA would also like to work on outreach to other branch libraries, especially SEL and Schaffner. Please remember to use your NULSA liaison to report staff life and loss events to NULSA, and of course to keep the NULSA officers informed with any changes concerning the liaison position in your department.

The complete NULSA report can be found in Appendix 3.

Reorganization Update (Sarah Pritchard, Jeff Garrett, Roxanne Sellberg)

The reorganization update will be given in two parts; today’s part 1 will be presented by Jeff and Roxanne covering the new Special Libraries Division, the re-assignment of the old Collection Management duties and an update on the new Technical Services and Resources Management Division. At the next MC meeting, Frank Cervone and Laurel Minot will present details on the Library Technologies and Public Services divisions.

Sarah Pritchard shared a few staffing notes that directly effect the reorganization: We are currently in process of hiring new heads for the Academic Liaison Services Department and the Digital Collections Department. The deadline for applications is September 6, 2007. All applicants will be interviewed. There will be no internal presentations. All candidates will be asked questions from a common list of questions. The filling of these positions is crucial for other re-org actions to happen and will have direct impact on other units, such as the Slide Library. Until we have these heads in place, Roman Stansberry will report to Russ Clement and Julie Rudder will report to Claire Stewart. Sarah also indicated that she and Dan Linzer will be notifying all faculty members about the change in the Slide Library once everything is settled.

Jeff Garrett reported on the formation of the Special Libraries Division.

1) The Special Libraries division relates to the strategic plan in two principle areas:
a. A new emphasis on primary collections and a realization that our special libraries/collections of distinctions share a number of problems that must be approached in a consolidated manner—the same way across collections (i.e., security, preservation);
b. A new emphasis on Library digital projects: the re-org includes a Digital Collection department, so we can begin to look at all our collections as potential digitization projects. This collaboration is not new but we want to support it and strengthen it by organizationally bringing them to the same table.
2) There are several items that are issues for all the special collections/libraries of distinction that are on an initial discussion list: security; hidden collections; exhibits; publications; fund raising; preservation; and digital projects.
3) Implementation timeline
• September 1: Visual Media Center officially moves to NUL; CDO duties transferred from Jeff Garrett to Roxanne Sellberg
• September 15: New administrative assistant for SL division appointed by this date (interviews completed and hiring recommendation made by September 1)
• October 1: New head of Digital Collections Department appointed. With that appointment, the new department comes into being.
• October 2: First Meeting of Special Libraries Department Heads
• On or about October 19: Curators’ Field Trip to University of Chicago’s Special Collections Research Center
• Early November: Division of Special Libraries All-staff Meeting

Roxanne Sellberg shared a list of issues to be resolved in distributing formerly centralized Collection Management Division responsibilities and activities among the AULs and staff of Special Libraries, Public Services, and Technical Services and Resource Management divisions. MC members were encouraged to contact her with questions about, and suggested additions for, the following list—and to stand by for announcements about who will assume which duties and when.

1. Representing NUL at ALA Collection Development Officers group
2. Reconfiguration and membership of Allocations Advisory Group
3. Management of "selectors wish list" process (connected with the Board of Governor’s request due October 23rd)
4. Representing NUL at CIC Collection Development Officers (Roxanne) and the Electronic Resources Officers groups (John Blosser)
5. Transition of CM office staff and budget
6. Leadership of de-selection projects
7. Defining disciplinary coordinator duties and naming disciplinary coordinators
8. Electronic Collections Committee--future make up and leadership
9. Elsevier contract negotiation
10. Administrative Committee liaison with Exhibits Committee
11. Voyager ledger design work
12. Selection assignments
13. Selectors coaching/mentoring/training
14. Selectors group meetings, etc
15. Supervision of bibliographers, etc during transition
16. Leadership of Kaplan institute library fellow selection committee

Roxanne updated the group on the process of establishing the new Technical Services and Resource Management (TS&RM) Division (see attached chart). The division will have five departments: Acquisitions and Rapid Cataloging (ARC--Catherine Grove, Head), Bibliographic Services (Andrea Stamm, Head), Business and Finance (Katie Melody, Head), Electronic Resources and Collection Analysis (ERaCA--John Blosser, Head), and Preservation (Scott Devine, Head). The TS&RM department heads have been meeting regularly for a couple months, and there has already been one meeting of all TS&RM staff. The major functions of the five departments have been established, but not all of the departments have figured out exactly how they will be organized internally. The department heads will update Management Council about those internal organization decisions in the weeks to come. Most of the reporting line changes necessary to put the division together took place September 1. At that time the individuals changed supervisors within the TS&RM family as necessary. A few more changes involving movement of staff either into or out of the division (Virginia Kerr, Paul Clough, Jeeyuhn Kang, Lucy Lyons) will happen within the next few weeks.

Roxanne also listed the following features of the new TS&RN:

• Shelf preparation now in Preservation Departmen (Elaine Bond will supervise)
• Compilation of issues for serials volume binding now in Preservation
• Kirtas Machine digitization operation will be in Digital Collections Department
• Bibliographic Services Department is responsible for complex copy, original cataloguing, transfers and withdrawals for monographs, serials, and some materials in other formats
• Acquisitions and Rapid Cataloguing includes the acquisition and rapid cataloguing of serials, monographs, and some materials in other formats
• Business and Finance Department no change in functions
• Electronic Resources and Collections Analysis is a brand new unit that will provide a lot support to other units in the Library
• Jeeyuhn Kang will report directly to Roxanne.

To conclude, Sarah Pritchard stated that the emerging strategic plan has been the underpinning for, and in turn has been informed by the reorganization. She feels increasingly encouraged that the goals are meshing with ideas we want to implement. A new draft for the strategic plan is still pending; we are holding off as we worked on re-org. Plans to have the final strategic plan by the end of September. We will see a draft of it soon. Also, we will soon see a page or two of a scope of work document for remote space planning project that will be circulated to potential consultants. The project would look at all space utilization in Evanston and Chicago libraries, would take into account options for remote storage and new service areas such as those already proposed. The plan should have a 20 year growth horizon but also steps to be taken within the scope of the current strategic plan. In the “immediate needs” category, Deering will now be included into the space Capital Planning proposal, joining SEL and Schafftner.

University Librarian’s Report

United Way campaign forms will be delivered shortly.

Concerning the closure of Campus Drive behind Library: the closing of North Campus Drive is expected to last until summer of 2009. Deliveries will have to be made by coming up through the “A” entrance from the south end of campus. The new back entrance to the Library will be a service entrance only and not a public road. We met with Facilities and Police yesterday and two compromises were negotiated: a limited number of key cards will be granted to operate the gate (including select Library staff and regular vendors making deliveries); an intercom will be installed at the gate that will be controlled in the receiving room. Please note that staff will not be able to park in this area nor would we be able to be picked up at the loading dock. . There will still be pedestrian access for staff in and out the loading dock door. Additionally, the handicapped spots will be moved further away (Locy or South parking lots). All patron complaints regarding handicap parking should be directed to NU PD Parking Services parking@northwestern.edu, Phone: (847) 491-3319.

Questions: Stu Baker: In terms of after hours staff, is there a way to extend the Marlock privileges to open other doors? Sarah Pritchard: We could look into giving staff with scheduled late hours additional Marlock access but only if there are reasons related to vehicular access, since people can still walk in and out the back door with current Marlock keys.

With regards to Development, there are many Board of Governors meetings happening as preparation to the October 23 full BOG meeting. September 6 is the Leadership Council Dinner, an event organized for high level donors.

Also related to Development, we are having a meeting this afternoon to discuss Deering improvements and the 75th anniversary projects. 75th Anniversary book will be published by NU press.

Also upcoming is a CIC director’s meeting to discuss funding and governance of the proposed shared digital repository, being held in Champaign- Urbana.

ARL is also celebrating its 75th anniversary this year. Each Library was asked to submit a special collection for inclusion into the book, ours is the Africana Library with its Winterton Collection.

Qatar campus planning is moving ahead. Roberto is accompanying Sarah to these meetings. The contract is still not signed, so it is still not public. It looks likely that the Qatar library director will be hired by the end of the calendar year to work with us here for a time before going over to Qatar.

We have been offered an opportunity: The Illinois State Library and the U. of I. Mortensen Institute have an IMLS grant to expand a program on international librarian hosting. They are looking for volunteers to participate on a 3-day program: Oct 3-5. One day in Urbana and 2 days at host library. Time is the key, someone has to devote 3 days to this and make a lot of logistical arrangements. Please let Sarah know by the end of the week if you are interested.

New Business

No new business!

Appendix 1: Administrative Committee Report

AC Meeting August 20, 2007

Sarah began the meeting by reporting that the August 27 meeting of the newly-formed Chicago Collections Collaborative (or Committee, CCC) has been postponed. The postponement was to give time for the CCC to clarify its relationship with another Chicago-area initiative, the Black Metropolis Research Consortium (BMRC). This clarification is necessary to better coordinate approaches to foundations and other funding sources, and also to avoid redundant activities. The CCC includes, in addition to Northwestern, Chicago Public Library, University of Chicago, UIC, and the Newberry Library. Northwestern is also a member of the BMRC.

The Administrative Committee then discussed the report that David Bishop has prepared and submitted in July to Sarah, entitled “Opportunities for Enhancing Cooperation between the United Library and the Library of Northwestern University.” Everyone agreed that the report included a wealth of interesting ideas and should be released to the seminaries, and that the next step should be to begin a conversation with Beth Sheppard, the new director of the United Library, to identify areas of collaboration based on David’s study. Not everything in the report is necessarily to be implemented.

Sarah described the changes to the ARL Index that have been implemented. The new “expenditure-focused” index includes five variables but not volume counts, and presents a better measure of support for libraries than a count of physical items. This new index is what will be sent to The Chronicle in the future. The old index will be calculated, but not published. The new index has now been generated using the new algorithm, but interestingly, there are no great changes to NUL’s standing.

With Peter Devlin present, Administrative Committee continued its discussion of ongoing searches, especially the new department head positions for Digital Collections and Academic Liaison Services. Vacancy announcements have gone out to all library staff and interviews will begin in early September. A description of procedures for filling these vacancies will be given at the next Management Council.

Following up on the security audit being conducted by Officer Stein of NUPD, Sarah brought up the need to make changes to our Building Use Policy. There is now such a policy on the web, but it does not deal with acceptable standards of conduct nor with disruptive behavior—two areas where we have had serious incidents in the recent past. Everyone agrees that it is important to separate these areas from other “behavior” topics, e.g. appropriate behavior during fire drills.

The Administrative Committee returned to its review of reorganization issues, including the duties of coordinators in the new Academic Liaison Services Department.

Jeff outlined briefly plans for “Phase III” of the JSTOR print withdrawal project, which is expected to generate about 600 boxes of JSTOR journals which will be stored for the next year or two on campus, pending the successful outcome of the University’s efforts to locate offsite storage we can count on for as long as we need it. Jeff emphasized how important it is for our progress on a number of fronts to clear as much space as possible, and suggested that individual collection managers would need to document why journals they wish to keep in browsable stack space offer necessary advantages over JSTOR access.

Administrative Committee meeting August 27, 2007

This meeting began with a debriefing on the Library’s response to the huge storm, tornado warning, and power outage that closed the Library for an entire day on Friday, August 24. One important realization was that we urgently need to update the emergency phone lists at the divisional levels. Other issues may come up through divisional meetings where the Library closure will be a topic.

Reorganization update: We hope to have the interviews for head of Digital Collections soon after Labor Day. The Academic Liaison Services interviews will follow as soon as feasible. Until the ALS head is named, Jeff will serve as acting head of the department. Roxanne will become CDO (Collection Development Officer) as of September 1. The interdepartmental reorganization changes in Technical Services & Resource Management Division will also take place September 1. We hope to have the new department heads for ALS and Digital Collections announced and in place by October 1. The Scholarly Communications search has failed. This vacancy will be reposted as a full-time position with a revised description in the hope of attracting a larger pool of applicants. Further updates, especially in IT and in Public Services, will be given at the Management Council meeting on September 5.

Peter, who was present for the reorganization-related part of our meeting, also announced that the vacancy for Director, Special Collections, has been posted.

Frank reported on progress to allow laptop printing from within the library or to send output to library printers (via Pharos) from any location. There will be a separate webpage with client software for users to download. We are identifying several, i.e. 6–7, printing locations library-wide for this service. Since these print jobs will go through the Pharos system, jobs will be discarded after 16 hours if not released on site. Laptop printing should be up and running by September 17.

Frank also gave a brief report on the IFLA conference in Durban which was attended by three Northwestern librarians: himself, Kathleen Bethel, and David Easterbrook. There will be a brown-bag presentation (with pictures!) to share this experience with library staff.

Much of the meeting was taken up by a review of forthcoming national meetings and a consideration of whether—and if so, by whom—Northwestern should be represented. Eleven meetings in all were covered:

1.) “Digital Scholarship/Digital Libraries, November 2, 2007,” at Emory University (sponsored by CLIR) — www.metascholar.org/events/2007/dsdl/
2.) “Collaboration and Community-based Initiatives,” September 19 in St. Louis or September 20 in Kansas City (sponsored by JSTOR) — www.support.jstor.org/surveys/morsvp
3.) “Enhancing Graduate Education: A Fresh Look at Library Engagement,” October 12, 2007 (hosted by ARL and CNI) — www.arl.org/events/fallforum/forum07/
4.) “ARL/ACRL Regional Institute on Scholarly Communication,” December 5–7, 2007, at UIC — www.carli.illinois.edu/institute07.html
5.) “Curating Our Digital Scientific Heritage: A Global Collaborative Challenge,” December 12–13, 2007, in Washington, DC (hosted by CNI) — www.dcc.ac.uk/events/dcc-2007/call-for-papers/
6.) “Understanding Institutional Copyright Policy,” October 15–17, 2007, in Charlotte, NC — www.academicimpressions.com/conferences/1007-copyright.php
7.) “27th Annual Charleston Conference: Issues in Book and Serials Acquisition,” November 7–10, 2007, in Charleston, SC — www.katina.info/conference/
8.) “Symposium on the Future of Integrated Library Systems,” September 13–15, 2007, in Champaign, IL (sponsored by the Lincoln Trail Libraries System) — www.lincolntrail.info/ilssymposium2007/intropage.html
9.) “Leadership Development for Business Managers,” all year, at Northwestern — www.northwestern.edu/hr/training/leadership.html
10.) “From Selection to Access: Optimizing the Collections/Technical Services Workflow,” October 17, 2007, at Washington University, St. Louis (organized by the Missouri Library Network Corporation) — www.mlnc.org/Workshops/selection.html
11.) “Human Rights Archives and Documentation: Meeting the Needs of Research, Teaching, Advocacy and Social Justice,” October 4–6, 2007, at Columbia University (co-sponsored by CRL–Global Resources Network and Columbia’s Center for the Study of Human Rights) — www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/indiv/humanrights/conferences/2007/

Names were identified as possible NU participants and AC members will contact each of them over the next week. The only exception was for item no. 6 (“Understanding Institutional Copyright Policy”) which at over $1000 for registration we felt was too expensive. Jeff agreed to pass information about this meeting to John Calkins in the University Counsel’s office, just in case he would wish to attend.

We also discussed an initiative being discussed between NU’s Graduate School and Harriet Lightman to have a library program as part of NU Directions, which is the orientation and training component of the Graduate School’s continuing education program for students. This initiative will be fully supported by the Library.

Finally, Administrative Committee discussed the response of Administrative Committee to the memo “A Possible Approach to Delivering Electronic Resources,” dated August 13, received from the Library Web Services Group. It was agreed that Sarah would draft a response on our behalf and solicit comments and feedback from other AC members.

Respectfully submitted by
J. Garrett
September 4, 2007

Appendix 2: Jeff Garrett’s List of new resources

• two historical U.S. newspaper backfiles from ProQuest, the New York Amsterdam News, 1922–1993, $38,530, and the backfile of the Boston Globe, 1872-1923, for $30,181. The New York Amsterdam News, one of the leading African-American newspapers of the 20th century, was purchased with UL discretionary funds;
• two historical British newspaper collections, the Burney Collection from the 17th and 18th centuries for $31,100 and the 19th Century British Newspaper Collection for $58,225, both from Thomson Gale;
• the backfile of The Economist, a total of 550,000 pages, complete from 1843 to 2000, for $30,725, also from Thomson Gale;
• Moody’s/Mergent Digital Archive ($30,000), a major source for corporate information, now available in digital form for the first time;
• CQ Almanac Online 1945–2006 with the Congressional Collection Dataset Feature ($11,750);
• Earth & Planetary Sciences Backfile from Elsevier/ScienceDirect for $28,764, combining complete backfiles for 98 journals as far back as 1937;
• Edward R. Murrow Papers, the only non-electronic item purchased, for $6,782.

Appendix 3: Devin Savage’s NULSA report to Management Council
NULSA 2006-2007: A New Beginning

Hello, my name is Devin Savage, and I served as the 2006-2007 NULSA President. Last year, I came before you to talk about the constitutional roles that NULSA had not been fulfilling in recent years, and how the 2006-2007 officers were hoping to address them. Today, I am fulfilling the final task in delivering the President’s end of the year report, and I would like to tell you about the success NULSA has had in the last year, and what we look to do in the next year.

In the NULSA constitution, the objectives of the Northwestern University Library Staff Association are "To provide for educational and social needs of the staff”… and ‘to offer a voice to the varied segments of the staff and to respond to their specialized or collective needs” as well as “to disseminate information.”

In meeting this goal, the NULSA 2006-2007 year may well have been the most successful in recent memory. The 2006-2007 NULSA year was full of new and exciting endeavors, and yet also was a “return to business” in reviving defunct organizational roles. In addition to providing the same expanded docket of social events to the staff on the same budget as last year, we also assisted in providing additional opportunities for staff education, information, and participation in communication.

All of our traditional social events were successful; the Halloween party, Christmas party, Spring Party, Summer BBQ and our weekly Donut Day (with no unscheduled cancellations!). More recent traditions were also continued, including the Valentine’s Day Bake Sale, NULSA Break, Fall Block Museum Tour, NUL Garden Tour, and the Holiday Food Drive. Eleven boxes full of food were gathered and donated to the Greater Chicago Food Depository.

Organizationally, last year’s great start began with departmental outreach, when I met with every department that would have me to talk about NULSA’s new outlook. I also did archival research of past NULSA & ULASC roles and activities, as well as speaking to past officers about NULSA’s changing role through the decades. At the start of last fall, when we began our process of revitalizing our organizational role, we did our best to keep not only the staff, but Administration and Management Council informed as well. And we looked for new ways to communicate. The NULSA Sharepoint Site was instituted, and publicized through work with the Staff Development Committee’s “What’s New” Series. One of the uses found for the site was the online sign-up sheet for the Chicago Bike-to-work Week competition, the use of which resulted in the winning of our division.Proposals to NULSA membership, Management Council, and the University Librarian. Also for staff information the we considered the University Librarian’s address to NULSA membership & staff a great success.

For staff education, we added a Spring Block Museum Tour upon request. We invited recycling coordinator Julie Cahillane to come talk to the staff, which brought a number of possible Green Initiatives that this Institution can implement. And for a new social event, I ran the first NULSA NCAA Men & Women’s Basketball Tournament Bracket Contest.

As I mentioned, we revived the organizational aspect function, and instituted monthly meetings, a Sharepoint site, and NULSA Departmental Liaisons to increase our ability to communicate. At the request of the university librarian, we established a NULSA representative on the new Art Committee. We have most recently engaged in outreach to the Green Committee to address concerns about recycling and other Green Initiatives, as well continued ongoing discussions with Staff Development Committee & Assembly, and worked to support the Assembly Speakers’ Committee.

The NULSA officers also did the first Constitution revision and amendment in 13 years! Every amendment passed by a wide margin. Our Constitution has been revised to reflect the realities of our organization. Jennifer Young and I have agreed to be the first two year officers, extending our terms into this year. With this step we hope to do a better job of retaining organizational memory in our yearly transition. Jennifer has agreed to take the position of Vice-President, and I will retain the position of President for the next year. Also, Nina Barrett has accepted the revived Communications Officer role. We have formed the 2006-2007 officers, and will send out the announcement once positions are finalized.

I still believe that NULSA is an appropriate venue to discuss issues of staff communication, representation, and participation. We look forward to working with Administration, the Assembly, Staff Development Committee, and other committees to work on issues that are still of concern to the staff. Although we feel that the last year has been one of great progress in many, many areas, as well as maintaining our high levels of production and customer service. There are aspects of we would like to assist in the institutional improvement of, namely Communication, Participation, Evaluation, as well as the aforementioned Green Initiatives. We would also like to work on outreach to our other branches, especially SEL and Schaffner. We ask that the department heads for their continued support of our officers, events, and organization. Also, we would like to remind you to use your NULSA liaison to report staff life and loss events to NULSA, and of course to keep the NULSA officers informed with any changes concerning the liaison position in your department. You can find our current list of liaisons on our Sharepoint site. We hope to utilize both the liaisons and the sharepoint site in more efficient ways of meeting staff social, educational, and informational needs. In October we will start our monthly meetings, donut days, and I’ll happily come and speak with any interested department again. Thanks to you for all of your support over this last year! As always, we welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions.