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Prepared by Roxanne Sellberg
Assistant University Librarian for Technical Services
December 06, 2002
Introduction/Executive Summary
FY02 was a red-letter year in the history of central technical services. The Technical Services Division welcomed the Preservation Department to its membership. This new organization will expand the horizons and the expertise of the division. The Serials Department completed an important project to implement the new Voyager fund structure that took effect September 1, 2001. New equipment for producing spine labels resulted in better labels and faster application, and the Catalog Department accomplished a very nifty project to make a large set of catalog records from the German national library useable by U.S Libraries. The League of Nations digitization project, managed in the Preservation Department, was completed. Another major grant-funded project to digitize Curtis text will continue into the next fiscal year. The MARC Department made tremendous strides in developing staff, improving work procedures, and increasing production in FY02. A long effort to automate the acquisitions and processing of new monographic materials from our primary domestic vendor was completed, and the results are marvelous to behold. Together, the MARC and Catalog Department cataloged more titles than they received in FY02-this is a first for the Voyager age and sets the stage for a significant backlog reduction effort to begin in FY03.
Report on FY01 Objectives
Complete implementation of the new Voyager fund structure.
The structure of acquisitions funds used in Voyager got a major overhaul during FY01, to bring Voyager accounts into better synchronization with the accounts in the University's financial systems and to reduce the total number of funds with specific spending limits (in some cases spending funds were replaced with reporting funds). The changes took effect at the beginning of FY02, the transition went very smoothly, and the positive effects of the change have been as expected. In order to complete the transition to the new ledger, the old fund names had to be removed and the new fund names had to be added to thousands of standing orders. Congratulations to the Serials Department staff, whose staff completed these tasks in a special project during about six weeks of concerted effort last fall--prior to the annual push to pay subscription renewals.
Plan for transfers to the Kresge Underground
At the beginning of FY02 it was assumed that the materials transferred
to the new Library Storage Facility would virtually all be serials, and
this objective was devised with that assumption. Considerable planning
work was accomplished and a draft workflow analysis was produced in February
2002 for processing serials materials expected to be transferred. By the
end of the year, it appeared that a substantial amount of monographic
material (including a big collection of NU dissertations) would go first.
As this report is being written, plans for transferring the monographs
are well under way. When the facility is ready, Technical Services will
be ready to do its part in the transfer of both monographs and serials.
Increase original monographs cataloging
For several years after the initial implementation of Voyager, original
catalogers on the monographs side were asked to do a lot of copy cataloging
in an attempt to minimize the number of monographs that would have to
be backlogged. Among other considerations, we just didn't have enough
backlog space for them. Our ability to process monographs with copy has
improved greatly, and the need for original catalogers to do a lot of
copy cataloging has diminished. For FY02, we decided to try to increase
original cataloging by 15-20%. Achieving that goal would be a good thing
itself, and it also would be a signal that things were getting "back
to normal." The stated goal was achieved, and the Catalog Department
reported production of 23% more original cataloging in FY02 than in FY01.
This increase occurred in spite of two cataloging librarian vacancies,
and it bodes very well for the future.
Experiment with combining acquisitions and cataloging processes
For FY02, we wanted to start work toward achieving one of the original goals for the reorganization that formed the Monographic Acquisitions and Rapid Cataloging Department: to improve efficiency and processing turn-around time for some categories of materials by combining receipts processing and copy cataloging work. The time seemed right, because the MARC department had succeeded by the end of FY01 in developing both acquisitions and copy cataloging knowledge and skills in a significant number of MARC staff members.
The MARC staff not only experimented with the concept they call "cataloging on receipt" in FY02, but actually implemented it for two types of materials: titles received from our major US and UK vendors and Africana special purchases. The new procedures have been a success, saving time formerly spent on multiple separate processing steps and transits and speeding books to the shelves. Cataloging on receipt has virtually eliminated the need to even temporarily backlog any materials from our largest domestic vendor. Those materials are now coming in, being processed, and going out to the shelves in pretty short order.
Address the technical services goals in the Library's strategic plan
One of the objectives of the Library's most recent strategic plan, "expand acquisitions and cataloging production capacity to match anticipated collection growth" has in large part been achieved, so the objective will be dropped from the Library's FY03-05 plan. Voyager enhancements; restoration of catalogers toolkit functionality; strategic use of automated acquisitions and cataloging records from vendors; improved staff recruitment, training, and retention arrangements in MARC; and some new and/or changed staff positions have contributed to a gradual return to pre-Voyager production levels. In FY02 we processed more monograph titles than came in. With serials, we seem to be keeping up with new cataloging and title changes. As a whole, the technical services units anticipate being able to keep up with receipts for the next few years (barring a very large increase in the collections budget).
Although no detailed plan was produced in FY02, a good deal of thought
was given to another objective in the Library's strategic plan: "reduce
the size of the backlog of uncataloged library materials by 20%, as the
first phase of a backlog elimination project." The Library has committed
to the funding of a new position in the Catalog Department, to be filled
some time in FY03. It is hoped that the new librarian will contribute
to backlog reduction directly by original cataloging and will contribute
indirectly by managing a project to outsource the cataloging of some backlogged
materials. In order to achieve the goal of reducing the main library backlog
by 20% in three years, we will likely purchase cataloging services from
OCLC TechPro, using one-time (lapsed salary) money. For FY03, we hope
to plan more specifically and begin the initial backlog reduction project.
If we make good progress beginning in FY03 and if funding for TechPro
remains available, the Library's strategic objective can be completed
by the end of the 05 fiscal year.
Other Highlights
Each of the technical services department annual reports includes a discussion of that department's highlights; the reader is urged to review those reports for a more complete idea of the year in the Technical Services Division. Some of the most significant highlights and trends, from a divisional point of view, will be discussed here.
Preservation joined Technical Services
The biggest news of FY02 was not something anticipated at the beginning of the year: the Preservation Department joined the TS Division. This reorganization took place when it did because the AUL for Collection Management position and the Preservation Department Head position were vacant at the same time. The transfer of the Preservation Department from the Collection Management Division to the Technical Services Division should facilitate better integration of related processing activities, and will help balance out the supervisory assignments of the AULs. The AULTS is very pleased to have an opportunity to work more closely with preservation staff and issues, and everyone involved is anticipating good things to come out of the change.
The acting head of preservation during the search for a new permanent head was Harriet Lightman. Harriet did an excellent job in this temporary assignment, and she deserves primary credit for a smooth initial transition of the Preservation Department from one division to the other. Also in FY02, the digital technology unit of Preservation completed an IMLS-funded project to digitally reformat 49,000 pages of League of Nations documents for NUL Web access. They began a two-year IMLS-funded project to digitally reformat Edward Curtis' 20 volume text, The North American Indian. This project will ultimately provide access and searching capabilities to text and integrate the previously digitized images of photographs from the set. The materials processing unit completed a project to microfilm 480 volumes of newspapers from the Africana collection. This two-year NEH-funded project was part of a CIC cooperative microfilming project.
Increased automation of YBP materials processing
The implementation of a long-awaited new workflow for new materials acquired from the Yankee Book Peddler Company was completed. This was the culmination of several years work by staff in MARC, Catalog, and Serials, and followed a number of temporary workflows put into place as various pieces of automated support were added.
Now, materials are ordered from Yankee through their GOBI system. Yankee sends us early order confirmation records (EOCR) electronically. The EOCR information is loaded locally, creating short bibliographic and purchase order records in Voyager. Later, invoice information is also added to Voyager by electronic batch load. More complete bibliographic records provided by OCLC's PromptCat service replace the short bibliographic records created from the Yankee EOCR information.
When everything goes smoothly, MARC staff confirm that the electronic records are correct, trigger payment, add local call numbers, and send the items on for physical processing. Everything does not always go smoothly and problems with individual record loads must be solved. However, there is no doubt that a great deal of staff time is saved by this new workflow, and that it helps speed the processing of a big proportion of our monographic receipts. Successful implementation of the highly-automated workflow was a major factor in the division's ability to process more monographs than were received in FY02.
New marking technology
The Catalog Department adopted new technology for printing spine labels in FY02. New state-of-the-art thermal printers now produce clearer, more easily read, and un-smudgeable spine labels. Barcode labels can also be produced as necessary. The spine labels produced using the new equipment need not be applied with heat, and do not need to be hand-trimmed the way the old Sel-in labels did. A computer program created by Gary Strawn adds to the capabilities of the new printing equipment: the font size adjusts itself to call number variations. The marking room operation has become more efficient and produces a better quality product.
Bibliothek der deutschen Literatur project
Loading machine-readable bibliographic records for large microform and/or
electronic text sets has become a major contribution of the Catalog Department
in recent years. In FY02, over 60,000 records were added to NUcat in this
way-dwarfing our additions to the catalog using more traditional cataloging
methods. The department also participated in a ground-breaking project
in international bibliographic record exchange in FY02.
Northwestern acquired from the German national library a set of cataloging
records prepared for the Bibliothek der deutschen Literatur microform
set. Jeff Garrett put this deal together under the auspices of the ARL's
German Resources Project and recruited the financial support of several
partner libraries. Gary Strawn analyzed the records and wrote a program
to put them into AACR and US MARC-compatible format and to automatically
translate standard notes to English. Several original catalogers in the
Catalog Department cleaned up name authority problems as necessary, creating
new or modified existing name authority records for all of the authors
represented in the set. Northwestern distributed copies of the new and
improved bibliographic records to our project partners, to the German
national library, and to OCLC (who will make them available as part of
the WorldCat Collection Set program).
Staffing Changes
Two new department heads joined technical services in FY02. Last winter Rebecca Routh became the permanent Head of the MARC Department. Rebecca served as acting head for a number of months prior to her permanent appointment. Tyra Grant became the new Head of the Preservation Department in the spring. Tyra came to us from the Wisconsin Historical Society, bringing to her new position many years experience as a preservation specialist and manager.
The MARC Department finished building a management team to better support the many staff members and activities of the department. Jonathan Seyfried assumed an existing LA3 position that supervises most of the MARC staff. Monique Brada was promoted into a new LA3 position concentrating on copy cataloging support, including authority work. David Cipris' LA3 position was better defined to concentrate on acquisitions support and problem-solving. Together, the team made significant headway in FY02 toward better staff training, feedback, and problem-solving processes. The MARC Department also continued the experiment, begun at the end of FY01, of using one or two term positions to supplement the work of permanent staff and help mitigate the negative effects of permanent staff turnover. The first person hired into a term position later joined the permanent MARC staff.
Two new librarians joined the Catalog Department: Amanda Bakken and Deborah
Rose- Lefmann. The Serials Department lost a cataloging librarian, and
spent the second half of the 02 fiscal year looking for a replacement.
Finishing that recruitment and then training a new serials cataloging
librarian will be goals for FY03. In addition, the Serials Department
will also be recruiting and training a librarian who will specialize in
managing electronic serials. The new librarian will work closely with
the Serials Department Head/Acquisitions Coordinator to help the Library
plan, prepare for, and manage growth in electronic collections, including
resources for which the Library buys access. Beefing up support for electronic
serials processing should also contribute to the Library's successful
implementation of the ENCompass system (or something like it).
Statistical Summary, with Five-Year Comparisons
Because the Preservation Department joined the division mid-year, preservation statistics are not included in the FY02 technical services summary chart. They will be included beginning next year. Some of the statistical highlights from Preservation for FY02: commercial binding increased 7% and reformatting (microfilm and photocopy) increased 30% from FY01; the conservation lab reported the completion of 7,992 general repairs and temporary bindings.
Orders and Receipts
A slight dip in the total number of orders counted in the divisional statistics can be accounted for by an experimental workflow in which selectors and other non-MARC staff create some orders on GOBI. The total number of titles ordered did not actually decrease in FY02. Receipts went up, as is to be expected in a time of increasing collection budgets. However, it should be noted that the increase was almost entirely on the monograph side; serials receipts were stable. Traditional serials receipts (and also serials binding statistics) may even decline in the future, as more and more serials become electronic only, and if the Library reduces subscriptions to paper versions of journals that are also available electronically. Items selected from gift collections represent the fastest-growing category of receipts. This may represent a new trend, rather than a statistical anomaly. Gifts processing is a labor and management time-intensive activity, and figuring out the policies and procedures for coping with increased gifts activity will be a challenge for FY03.
Serials Cataloging
Despite the loss of a serials cataloging librarian in March 2002, the serials cataloging unit was able to maintain a productive rate of cataloging and reduce the serials cataloging backlog. When a new serials cataloging librarian joins the team, the situation should improve. The fact that we did not achieve our goal of performing 250 CONSER authentication/maintenance transactions is a concern. For FY03, the Serials Department has set a higher goal of 320 transactions, which will still not meet the minimum contribution rate for full CONSER membership. If we are not able to meet the minimum contribution rate by FY04 and maintain it consistently in the future, we will have to withdraw from the program-or at least change to a less-than-full membership level.
Monographs Cataloging
Original and monographs cataloging production was higher in FY02 than it has been at any time since the Voyager implementation. As was mentioned earlier, the number of monographs cataloged (49,983) was higher than the number of monographs received (46,420). This bodes well both for our ability to keep up with monographic receipts over the next few years, and also for our ambitions to begin serious backlog reduction efforts.
Backlogs
There was a significant reduction (from 1,235 volumes to 870 titles) in the serials cataloging backlog in FY02. Although most of the reduction came from adding volumes to already cataloged corporate annual report serials runs, this represents a good accomplishment. All those volumes are now easily available to users on the library shelves, and all those volumes are no longer taking up precious space in the crowded Serials Department.
The monographs cataloging backlog grew by about 5,000 volumes (from 35,699 to 40,791). This seems to be a contradiction to the earlier statement that more monographic volumes were cataloged than received. At least a significant part of the explanation is this: a project to combine the previously separate processing backlog (aka the frontlog) with the cataloging backlog was completed in FY02. Many volumes were moved from the processing backlog (where they weren't actually counted, only estimated) to the cataloging backlog (where they were counted).
Goals for the Year Ahead
A number of expectations and hopes for FY03 have already been mentioned. More are listed in the individual reports of the three technical services departments. Here is a summary of the ones that have high significance for the whole division.
1. Increasing production in targeted areas. Building upon the progress made in FY02, the MARC Department will attempt to increase its copy cataloging production relative to receipts. This should translate into about 3,000 more titles copy cataloged by MARC. The Serials Department intends to increase its CONSER production, making at least 320 CONSER transactions in FY03.
2. Reducing backlogs. The Serials Department intends to reduce the serials cataloging backlog by 10% in FY03. The Catalog Department intends to plan, staff, and begin a three-year monographs cataloging reduction project that includes an outsourcing component. The MARC Departments intends to eliminate an out-of-print order backlog.
3. Solving workflow problems. One by-product of the reorganization of Technical Services Division to include Preservation (and of the arrival of a new preservation manager with "fresh eyes") is consciousness-raising about the places where cataloging and preservation activities converge or need to be synchronized. Problems and questions that we didn't recognize before seem to be crawling out of the woodwork and demanding attention! A substantial amount of managerial time will have to be devoted to working out these issues in FY03.
Michael Babinec will complete an analysis of monographic materials flowing (controlled by a weekly quota) into technical services from the Government Publications Department. Based on that analysis, it is expected that some policy and procedural adjustments will be made in the Catalog Department, the MARC Department, or both.
The number of gift collections coming into the Library seems to be increasing.
The MARC department will work with other technical services and collection
management units to develop new policies, procedures, and arrangements
for the efficient processing of gift collections.
4. Moving forward on digitization. The addition of the Preservation
Department to the Technical Services Division will dramatically increase
the division's interest and involvement in digitization projects. In FY03,
completion of the second Curtis digitization project will be a high priority.
In addition, the Head of the Preservation Department will be part of a
small group that will coordinate operations aspects of future digitization
projects. It is hoped that the small group will be nimbler than the DLC
as a whole, resulting in more effective and efficient project management.
4. Recruiting for key positions. As has already been mentioned, Serials
will be looking for two new librarians and Catalog will be looking for
one new librarian. One of these positions (Serials Cataloger) will help
the Serials Department maintain basic services. The other two positions
will help us achieve strategic goals of decreasing the monographs backlog
and developing electronic collections.
Northwestern University Library, Technical Services Division
Statistical Summary, 1997 - 2002
|
Activity |
1997/98
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1998/99
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1999/2000
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2000/01
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2001/02
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| Orders | |||||
|
303
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203
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95
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130
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147
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Other |
14,169
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18,530
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11,913
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14,250
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13,091
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Total |
14,472
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18,733
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12,008
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14,380
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13,238
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| Receipts | |||||
Serial Vols. Received |
|||||
|
14,186
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13,262
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13,281
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12,934
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12,990
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Other Receipts |
|||||
|
8,230
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17,683
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12,583
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14,840
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15,374
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|
9,561
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9,613
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13,745
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15,373
|
16,899
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|
2,801
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1,470
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1,354
|
760
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4,951
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|
7,273
|
4,945
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7,520
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9,073
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9,196
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Total |
42,051
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46,973
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48,483
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52,980
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59,410
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| New Cataloging Records | |||||
Serial |
|||||
|
487
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149
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362
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351
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287
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|
1,138
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659
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1,465
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1,264
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1,236
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Total |
1,625
|
808
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1,827
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1,615
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1,523
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|
|||||
|
2,872
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2,324
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2,446
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3,268
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3,950
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|
2,467
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1,140
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1,212
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945
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1,301
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|
33,988
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22,084
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36,182
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40,759
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44,732
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Total |
39,327
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25,548
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39,840
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44,972
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49,983
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| Rush Cataloging (Mono) |
911
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1,283
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1,880
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1,498
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1,314
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| Vols. and Pieces Cataloged | |||||
| or Added to Existing Cat. Recs. |
118,544
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119,275
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130,413
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107,015
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131,576
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| Shelf Preparation |
107,580
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71,650
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72,286
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73,127
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91,614
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| Cataloging Backlog (Serials) |
-
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-
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1,038
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1,235
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870
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| Cataloging Backlog (Mono) |
25,946
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26,477
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27,510
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35,699
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40,791
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| Processing Backlog (Mono) |
-
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9,640
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8,550
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4,613
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0
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