REEL & PAGE

 

Vol. XII, no. 4   ALBERT COLUMBUS TATE LIBRARY          March-April 2002

 

 

New staff – Many of you had the opportunity at the last faculty meeting to meet Mary Halliburton, our new Distance Education Librarian Southeast and Knoxville Branch Library Administrator. Mary joined us on March 11. On April 1, Jan Fleece became our Knoxville Branch Library Assistant. These two library veterans are hard at work providing administrative and direct faculty/student support services from our new facility at the Knoxville Center.  Please give both of these ladies a hearty TC welcome when you see them.

 

Knoxville branch library hours – The new Tate Library branch in the Knoxville Center is up and running. On hand already are 1,000 volumes and 12 networked computers.  Bibliographic instruction and other library services are available, with a program of remote instruction ready to launch.  Following a survey of all potential users, we are pleased to announce that new regular library hours will be observed at the branch beginning on April 15. These hours, which will be monitored reviewed and, if necessary at a future point, adjusted will be:

 

   Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday:  9 a.m.    – 8 p.m.

   Friday:                                                          12 p.m. – 4 p.m.

   Saturday:                                                       10 a.m. – 2 p.m.

 

 

Books ready – All of the books purchased at the end of last year  in response to our SACS response, in the areas of business and education,  have now all been processed and are on the shelves. You are cordially invited to review these titles; many remain on our “new book” trucks, which are located adjacent to the video boxes collection in the main reading room.

 

Public services report – In March, Tate Library (main campus only) enjoyed its highest average daily attendance of the year, 94.5—and that despite spring break. A total of 17,079 folks have visited Tate since July.  Database searches (not including e-books, but now including ERIC document reproduction service) have really taken off since October;  through February, 27,013 have been made from both campus and remote sites. In March, the number of e-mail reference questions tripled.

 

Building renovation – The campus library committee met with architect John Fisher and consultant Dick Waters from Providence Associates on March 22. During the morning-early afternoon sessions, a variety of details concerning the internal arrangement of the enhanced Tate Library were reviewed and addressed. The committee wishes to thank all who make suggestions and recommendations to it ahead of the meeting; these were all duly considered.

 

Library surveys – This year’s  survey instruments will be distributed from the Office of Institutional Research about midway through Block 8. We want to take this advance opportunity to thank all of you involved in the process and to let you know that the results will have a keen impact our continued planning for library improvements.

 

New ACA database – To consolidate earlier individual e-mails, we have received our first new database as the result of our membership in the ACA (Appalachian College Association) Central Library: Polling the Nation http://poll.orspub.com. This is a survey database designed to be of value across the curriculum, with special emphasis on social science matters, including business and education. Both graduate and undergraduate students should find the raw polling information of value in their research and it is easily accessible from the menu which appears on the left-hand side of the main page. The tool is available from any computer hooked to the campus network and is also available to remote users who employ the username: alice  and the password: torku.

 

Conference participation – Reference librarian Charles Tunstall is representing Tate Library at the annual ACA Central Library annual meeting for library public services being held at the Adelphia Centre at Mellenium Park in Johnson City April 4-5. Charles will be joining our colleagues in an investigation of several  exciting new possibilities in the delivery of virtual reference services via WWW.  Our enhanced ability to provide traditional reference services in a non-traditional, virtual manner and to allow access to library resources 24/7 regardless of a patron’s physical location will be of increasing importance as we move further into the DE future.

 

Library web pages – Our Tate Library web pages will be undergoing a revision this summer upon the arrival of our new Assistant Director for DE/Webmaster Anne Reever on May 1. In addition to more interactive web pages, we anticipate that the current large links library arrangement may be altered or otherwise revitalized. If any readers have suggestions as to what might be included in or eliminated during this upgrade project, please let us know during Block 8.

 

Cool new links -  For science friends and students,  we note the new Becoming Human website http://www.becominghuman.org that is a blend of science and multimedia that takes one on a journey through human evolution. An interesting rendering of the complex theories involved. The historians may enjoy and want to foster, no pun intended, Understanding History http://www.sbrowning.com/whowhatwhen/index.php3 which plays on the strength of WWW to present timelines that juxtapose events from dates of choice with links to additional information.