ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries


March 1991/ 179

P R E S E R V A T I O N  
N E W S

P r e p a r e d  b y  B a r b a r a  B r o w n

College Libraries Committee
Commission on Preservation and Access

•  A n d o v e r ,  M a s s a c h u s e t t s .  From a recent 
Northeast Document Conservation Newsletter, a 
word of caution for those who are addicted to using 
“Post-It Notes”: the paper is potentially acidic, 
color can transfer to originals over time, and adhe­
sive remains when the note is removed. All of these 
qualities will cause irreversible damage, according 
to the National Archives.

•  A n d o v e r ,  M a s s a c h u s e t t s .  The Spring 1990 
NEDCC News contains a brief article by Karen 
Motylewski on “Protecting Collections during 
Renovations” with a helpful checklist prepared to 
alert institutions to common sources of construc­
tion-related damage. Single copies of the NEWS 
are available free-of-charge from: N ortheast 
Document Conservation Center, 24 School Street, 
Andover, MA 01810.

•  W a s h i n g t o n ,  D . C .  “Taking a Byte Out of 
History: The Archival Preservation of Federal 
Com puter Records” (House Report 101-978) is a 
30-page report submitted to Congress by the Com­
mittee on Government Operations which esti­
mates that “75 percent of all Federal transactions 
will be handled electronically in the year 2000.” 
The findings o f the study and suggested recom­
mendations will be of interest to the broader pres­
ervation and access community. Check the hold­
ings of your local depository library or send for a 
free copy from: House Document R o o m , HOB 
Annex 2, Room B18, 2nd and D Streets, SW, Wash­
ington, D.C. 20515 (include a self-adhesive, self- 
addressed label).

New England ACRL conference report
“Creative Staffing in the 90s” was the topic of the 

New England Chapter of ACRL, held at the Col­
lege of the Holy Cross, Worcester, Massachusetts, 
on November 2, 1990. Each speaker challenged 
the 335 librarians present to rethink traditional pat­
terns of library and personnel organization. Key­
note speaker Sheila Creth, university librarian at 
the University of Iowa, warned that we cannot stay 
the same and survive. She said that knowledgeable, 
well-trained staffs must act quickly a n d  provide 
timely communication (and cataloging), even if it 
means changing traditional library organizational 
structures. T he most important issues facing us, she 
said, are the implications of electronic publishing 
and networking; we must redefine our roles in 
relation to those developments.

C reth’s challenges were developed by other 
speakers: William Uricchio, head of the Biblio­
graphic Control D epartm ent at the University of 
Connecticut; Richard Kesner, chief information 
officer at Babson College; and Gerald R. Lowell, 
associate librarian at Yale, who has made some of 
the changes advocated by Creth. He dismantled 
the hierarchical structure and reorganized the 150- 
member Technical Services D epartm ent into au­
tonomous teams of generally six to ten members 
working under the general supervision of four 
departm ent heads. Although 100 desks had to be 
moved and everyone had to rethink everything 
about work, the experiment has resulted in a more 
aware and educated staff; the support staff has 
been empowered; and productivity has increased 
2 0 - 4 0 % . ■ ■