SHARES Meeting

October 17, 2008
Hall of Graduate Studies
320 York Street, Room 211
Yale University
New Haven, CT


All staff from RLG Programs partner institutions were invited to attend a meeting of the SHARES resource sharing consortium. About 50 people from 22 SHARES institutions met in room 211 of the Hall of Graduate Studies, located on 320 York Street, directly behind Sterling Memorial Library.

This was an opportunity for program participants and those considering signing up for SHARES to spend quality time with peers and with RLG Programs staff, hear updates on SHARES plans and operations issues, discuss hot topics, debate future directions for the partnership, and hear presentations about new toys, new thinking about workflow, and important work being done at partner institutions and in OCLC's division of Programs and Research.

Agenda

9:30 a.m.

Coffee and mingling

10:00

Welcome and introductions

  • Danuta Nitecki, Associate University Librarian, Yale University
  • Carol Jones, Document Delivery Librarian, Yale University
  • Dennis Massie, Program Officer, OCLC Research

10:15

Morning session: SHARES update and discussion

The presentation is available here (.pdf: 61K/17pp.).
  • Weigh in on life after one year in the new SHARES technical environment.
  • Analyze the fill rates for SHARES requests and the "reasons for no" for unfilled requests.
  • Hear SHARES Executive Group plans, plus reports from each of the six SHARES working groups.
  • Discuss the next steps and future directions of the partnership.
  • Karen Bucky, Collections Access and Reference Librarian, Clark Art Institute, "On Green Shipping."

    Karen offered some images of shipping material she has received recently, as well as some thoughts on green practices in the realm of ILL shipping:
    • "Grassroots efforts are OK to a point. But to effect real change an overall organizational structure must be in place. We need to investigate and report on the environmental impact of a typical ILL operation. We need to share best practices and data."
    • "For green shipping practices to succeed and take hold, they must be affordable. Perhaps incentives could be offered to those who 'ship green.' Perhaps SHARES could receive special pricing on supplies or equipment if we acted as a group. We could certainly share our expertise and knowledge. We should do all we can to promote e-delivery. The current economic crisis is distracting us from green concerns."
    Karen's presentation is available here (.pdf: 497K/7pp.).

12:00 noon

Lunch

On your own—form an ad hoc group and try out a local eatery (recommendations will be provided)

1:30 p.m.

Afternoon session: Spotlight on operations

The presentation is available here (.pdf: 63K/21pp.).
  • Hear and discuss the results of two new SHARES surveys:
    • "Rethinking the SHARES Pricing Structure" and
    • "What Makes a High-Performing SHARES Lender?"
  • Receive the second round of analysis of the mysterious "Library X's" ILL data for the past six years (first round presented at ALA in Anaheim, with a summary forthcoming).
  • Learn the results of the Future Evolution of ILL/DD poll undertaken just before ALA (with a summary of ALA discussion forthcoming).
  • Hear an update from the Delivery branch of OCLC Products and Services by Global Product Manager Katie Birch.
    Katie's presentation is available here (.pdf: 750K/62pp.).
  • Find out what new and exciting projects your peers are working on.

3:45

Wrap-up and sayonara

For more information, contact Program Officer Dennis Massie.