Joe continued that he just wanted ULAC to know about the receipt of the planning grant. The grant actually goes to the North Carolina Humanities Council, which will pass on funds to UNC partners as needed.

Joe Hewitt had another announcement. The global resources funding which he had announced a year ago that he was planning to pursue as an endowment and subsequently share the resources with other UNC System units has not yet been sought. He needs to approach the Chancellor when the time is right. He is seeking an endorsement in the $5-10 million range.

Jim Kuhlman asked if there were any changes or additions to the agenda. Joe Hewitt asked to lead a discussion on the future of the academic library. Input had been requested from him by Mary Reichel, President of ACRL. The addition was allowed, the discussion to be held after Susan Nutter arrived.

Joe Hewitt led a Personnel Committee report. He asked Mari Marsh of his staff to talk about the work of the Personnel Flexibility Committee at UNC. SPA matters were first discussed, then EPA.

ACareer banding@ was described. This puts all levels of classifications within one group. Managers could perform reclassification procedures without having to go through the State Office of Personnel. A pilot program in information technology may start in the fall.

Specific changes regarding library classifications were also discussed and referred to the Human Resources Advisory Board. There has not yet been any action. These recommendations may go to human resources personnel at the Office of the President. It would be desirable to upgrade these positions also.

Betsy Brown suggested that it may be advisable to send the recommendations to her and Gretchen Bataille and they could talk to Ron Penney and Cynthia Bonner.

Concerning personnel flexibility, each unit could create its own personnel structure. But the legislation to make this possible has not yet been approved. UNC Chapel Hill has its own committee to develop the characteristics of a flexible personnel system. Mari provided everyone a copy of the charge of the Personnel Flexibility Committee, which is available on the Web. It could be used as a draft for a legislative study for other units of the UNC System.

Concerning the EPA salary survey, Joe said the selection of peer libraries is an individual campus matter. Two years ago he conducted a peer study and provided results to ULAC members, to be used as they saw fit.

The salary/classification study for SPA will continue. An EPA salary survey could be conducted in the fall based on 2002 data.

Susan Nutter suggested a proportional increase in salaries due to upcoming shortage of library school graduates to fill retirement slots. Jim Kuhlman suggested a white paper or a task force on this subject. The level of benefits are also a concern, Joe Hewitt mentioned.

At this point the discussion of the future of academic libraries was led by Joe Hewitt. The focus was on major issues facing ACRL libraries. There may be a program on the topic when ACRL meets in Charlotte.

Everyone was asked to provide opinions on what were the issues facing academic libraries and libraries in general, as well as problems in their specific libraries.

Answers dealt with staffing, the budget, the marginalization of the role of libraries, the difficulty of providing duplicate resources, and problems with defining today's library. Concerning the professional staff, there is a shortage and perhaps alternate ways of obtaining certification should be developed. Copyright problems and the ability of the students to identify quality information were also mentioned.

Peggy Hoon then presented information about copyright and electronic reserves.

Following her presentation Joe Hewitt asked about the status of the appeal of the court decision involving the collection of fines. There has been no decision. Some schools are continuing to collect fines, which are being held in escrow.

Jim Kuhlman thanked Peggy Hoon for her presentation. Susan Nutter said Peggy would be available to talk to personnel at other libraries.

The status of the Cooperative Direct Borrowing Agreement was next introduced as a topic. Elinor Foster reminded everyone it was in a trial period which was to end the next day. She had asked Robert Canida, Electronic Resources/Access Services Librarian at UNC Pembroke, to survey circulation personnel to get their opinions on how well it was working. Robert had devised a survey questionnaire containing five questions which he had emailed to the listserv ulaccirc. He had heard from only two libraries, those at the School of the Arts and UNC Wilmington. Those schools reported no problems from users but Robert and some other people thought circulation personnel needed to discuss further the ways lending libraries handled delinquent patron accounts. This topic is not treated in the agreement itself but Robert suggested that circulation personnel would be interested in discussing it.

Persons present wanted to continue the topic the next day and to see a copy of the agreement. Elinor Foster said she would distribute them at dinner.

Jim Kuhlman then asked Susan Nutter to comment on the news article about the NC State budget situation that had just appeared in The News & Observer. Susan said about 10-12% of the library staff positions had been cut according to an established set of rules for the reduction in force. The Saturday and 24-hour services had been eliminated and there were no guards. There was further discussion about cuts made by deans and what was decided upon as the definition of instruction. At present no cuts had been made from the staff at the UNC Chapel Hill library except for frozen positions.

Jim Kuhlman thanked Joe Hewitt and Susan Nutter for their hospitality and reminded everyone about the dinner meeting.

The meeting was then adjourned at 5:10 PM.

The meeting of May 31, 2002, began at 10:10 AM with the following in attendance.

Appalachian State University - Mary Reichel

East Carolina University - Carroll Varner

Elizabeth City State University - Patricia Hines

Elizabeth City State University - Rebecca Ware

Fayetteville State University - Bobby C. Wynn

North Carolina A & T University - Waltrene Canada

North Carolina School of the Arts - Vicki Weavil

North Carolina State University - Susan Nutter

UNC Asheville - Jim Kuhlman

UNC Chapel Hill - Larry Alford

UNC Charlotte - Lee Gray

UNC Greensboro - Dana Sally

UNC Pembroke - Elinor Foster

Western Carolina University - Bil Stahl

Winston-Salem State University - Lizzie Reeden

Office of the President - Betsy Brown

Office of the President - Bill Kirwan

Office of the President - Alan Mabe

The meeting began at 10:10 AM. Jim Kuhlman stated that Larry Alford would be sitting in for Joe Hewitt. Larry said he had just returned from a final check of the newly renovated Undergraduate Library. To his knowledge it is the first building completed using bond money for construction. It will open in August.

Jim also noted that this would be Lee Gray's last meeting with ULAC and his service had been appreciated.

The topic of the Cooperative Direct Borrowing Agreement which had been preliminarily discussed May 30 was again addressed. It was recommended by the group that the survey Robert Canida had sent May 9 be resubmitted and a copy sent to the directors also. Bil Stahl suggested extending the trial period until the next ULAC meeting. This suggestion was termed a motion by the Chair; it was seconded by Mary Reichel. Susan Nutter recommended that we continue to endorse use of direct borrowing as is currently described in the agreement. Bil Stahl will collect use statistics in his capacity of Chair of the Cooperative Issues Committee. It was suggested that it was useful for everyone to continue to maintain these statistics.

Next the ANC charge was discussed. The draft charge or mission statement developed by ANC at the request of ULAC was next discussed and the statement was modified in several ways. Final text follows; the motion for approval of the modified charge was made by Jim Kuhlman, seconded by Waltrene Canada, and approved by consensus.

The mission of ULAC ANC is to investigate and share information about those

aspects of information technology and computer networking pertinent to libraries,

and to recommend to ULAC solutions to issues and problems. The Committee in

its recommendations will place special emphasis on ways in which libraries of the 16

constituent institutions of the UNC System can cooperate to improve information

access and services for all UNC students, staff, and faculty.

The committee will consist of a single representative from each of the 16 constituent

institutions, appointed by the library director of the respective institutions. The Chair

of the Committee will be the representative from the institution whose library director

is the current Chair of ULAC.

The Committee will meet at least once each semester of the regular academic year.

Additional meetings will be called as required to respond to specific charge from

ULAC or as other needs arise.

Susan Nutter suggested to Jim Kuhlman that he send a letter to ANC on behalf of ULAC thanking them for their cooperative planning.

A report on distance learning followed, provided by Alan Mabe, Vice President for Academic Planning. Susan Nutter invited Dr. Mabe to sit in on the budget discussion led by Betsy Brown which followed his presentation.

Libraries fall under the Intellectual Capital Formation set of strategic priorities. A separate proposal, apart from those submitted on expansion budgets at the individual schools, will be drawn up for a System-wide allocation in support of resources pertaining to the selection and purchase of consortial licensing for online resources. The breakdown of the requested $2,750,000 is:

$2,620,000 for databases

100,000 for staff

30,000 for the operating budget

Bill Kirwan distributed a list of electronic database resources various institutions had submitted to him which would be desirable titles not available through NC LIVE. He said CINAHL needed to be added. These will be listed as examples, only, in the system-wide budget request. If funded, actual databases will be selected later.

Betsy Brown will be working with the library budgets from the individual schools. She is going to send target figures and deadlines to the different schools. Some people may have already submitted expansion budget requests to provosts on campus but they can be changed. Betsy suggested looking at popular topics like distance education and collaborative programs when making requests.

Larry Alford mentioned the impact the loss of student wages would make on students who were temporary employees in libraries; Susan Nutter agreed this would be an economic blow to the students. Larry also brought up the problems caused by the elimination of the money provided several years but no longer to cover the escalating cost of materials. And he mentioned the costs associated with collecting fines and fees.

The topic of graduate students' use of libraries in the summer was discussed by Betsy Brown. There is a low-cost fee for people who are working on a thesis that is in place on most campuses. Mary Reichel provided copies of Roy Carroll's 1999 memo about clarification of the UNC policy on completion of theses and dissertations and library use pertaining to these pursuits. Betsy Brown said it's up to the individual campuses to handle this matter.

Jim Kuhlman addressed the topic of the Preservation Committee next. He said the committee had met once at UNC Charlotte in February 2001 and the Chair had asked in the spring to resign. The committee didn't know what its charge was. The committee had been formed as an alternative to dealing with the Preservation Society. But if we don't have a charge for it, maybe it should be disbanded.

Susan Nutter suggested that we let it go for now but not permanently. Carroll Varner moved to disband the Preservation Committee. Vicki Weavil seconded the motion. All voted in favor of the motion except Susan Nutter.

Bil Kirwan called for endorsement of the privacy guidelines for electronic resources vendors that was mentioned May 30. Bill made the motion to do so; Bil Stahl seconded the motion, which passed unanimously.

The best practices/virtual reference program was brought up by Jim Kuhlman. After some discussion it was decided that the library representatives would participate in the Learning and Technology Exposition to be held at N.C. State in September. Bil Stahl asked how the library person would be identified. It was decided that this person would be the ANC representative unless someone different was reported to Jim Kuhlman.

Jim next broached the topic of the study of the state-on-line catalog. He said the ANC Committee had done a good job of developing recommendations. He posed the question of whether it should be included in the collaborative budget request. Jim said the proposed document delivery system had been dropped so maybe this idea should be too for now.

Betsy Brown said it could be added later to the continuation budget.

Jim Kuhlman said he thought thanks were in order to ANC for their work and they should join us at the next meeting and provide an OCLC update report.

Susan Nutter gave a brief NC LIVE report. A new publicity committee is coming out with downloadable brochures. There will be an NC LIVE publicity week the first part of June.

Mary Reichel invited everyone to attend the ACRL reception Sunday night 5-7 during the ALA Conference. Everyone was also invited to attend the President's Program and the reception for the ACRL Librarian of The Year.

Jim Kuhlman asked when the group should meet again and where. Susan Nutter suggested coordinating the meeting with the Technology Exposition at N.C. State University and this idea met with approval from the members.

There being no other business, the meeting was adjourned at 2:10 PM.

Elinor Folger Foster, Secretary

June 7, 2002