dec08a.indd David Free N e w s f r o m t h e F i e l d ACRL launches interest groups The ACRL Board of Directors has approved the formation of the ACRL Residency Inter­ est Group, the first interest group approved under a recent change to the association by­ laws. Approved by the membership in the 2008 ALA/ACRL election, interest groups provide a way to easily create a “home” within ACRL for topics and issues that are currently underrepresented in the organiza­ tion. The Residency Interest Group supports the creation, implementation, management, and promotion of library residency programs through the centralization of information re­ garding program availability; the creation of core competencies, evaluation, and assess­ ment standards; and the overall advancement of the quality of resident education. “In many ways, the work of our interest group is geared towards continuing these points,” said convenor Megan Perez (Univer­ sity of Arkansas). “We have plans to achieve this in a variety of ways, including the publi­ cation of a regular report of resident statistics, the development of educational content for both residents and library professionals who train and mentor residents, the creation of service opportunities for current residents, and the refinement of a series of tools for administrators who manage residency pro­ grams. Having a home within ACRL will pro­ vide us with methods of support, visibility, representation, and participation.” ACRL interest groups provide a dynamic sys­ tem for members to form communities around important emerging issues in the profession and to increase opportunities for involvement within the organization. ACRL interest groups are very fluid and can be quickly formed in response to environmental changes. Any ACRL member can propose the creation of an interest group by submitting a proposal form consisting of the name of the proposed group, identifi cation of the initial convener(s), proposed scope, an ex­ planation of how the proposed group is unique within ACRL, and a petition with signatures of 25 active members. Proposals are reviewed on an ongoing basis by the ACRL Board of Directors, which approves the creation of new interest groups. Once an interest group is formed, ACRL members may join by selecting it as one of their choices when they renew their mem­ bership. Additional information on creating ACRL interest groups, including a link to the proposal form, can be found on the ACRL Web site at www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl /resources/policies/ch15interestgroups.cfm. Slavery and abolition resources online Millersville University and Dickenson College have launched “Slavery and Abolition in the U.S.: Select Publications of the 1800,” a digital collection of books and pamphlets that dem­ onstrate the varying ideas and beliefs about slavery in the United States as expressed by Americans throughout the 19th century. The 77 titles in the collection represent the works of more than 70 authors and/or organizations, published between 1787 and 1911, refl ect ar­ guments on both sides of the slavery debate, and include first person narratives, legal pro­ ceedings and decisions, anti­slavery tracts, re­ ligious sermons, and early secondary works. Drawn from the holdings of Millersville Univer­ sity Library and the Dickinson College Library, the collection includes more than 15,000 indi­ vidual pages of printed text and corresponding searchable transcriptions. “Access to the first person narratives, le­ gal proceedings and decisions, anti­slavery tracts, religious sermons, and secondary works found in the ‘Slavery and Abolition in the U.S.’ digital archive will allow scholars, educators, students, and others interested in the tumultuous debate on slavery to explore more than 14,500 pages of these rare research materials and to form their own opinions about the controversy that fractured our na­ tion,” noted Tracey Weis, professor of history at Millersville University. “Slavery and Abolition in the U.S.” uses CONTENTdm to organize and present materi­ als. The software makes it possible to view textual materials online, to display page im­ ages and full­text transcripts side by side, and to offer full­text searchability of the materials in the digital collection. This collaborative digitization project was supported in part by the Institute of C&RL News December 2008 666 www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl Updated Academic Library Position Descriptions for CUPA-HR An ACRL Board­appointed task force recently completed work on revisions to academic librarian position descriptions included in the College and University Professional Association for Human Resources (CUPA­ HR) surveys, which cover salaries, benefi ts, and other benchmarks. CUPA­HR for many years has compiled survey results for library administrators and mid­level administrators and professionals. Many higher education institutions use this data to calibrate salaries for their employees. In 2005, it became obvious to one ACRL member institution that the CUPA­HR data used as one factor in a predictive regression analysis for professional librarian salaries was well out of date. The ten­year­old position descriptions into which institutions had been “wedging their information” bore little resemblance to current jobs and responsibili­ ties. This matter was brought to the attention of ACRL leadership, discussions were held with CUPA­HR executives, and an ACRL task force was appointed to review and revise as necessary CUPA academic library position descriptions. The task force conducted hearings at the 2007 ALA Midwinter Meeting and the 2007 ALA Annual Conference.The draft position de­ scription document was placed on the ACRL Web site for comments in the spring of 2007, and the document was revised to refl ect sug­ gestions received.ACRL leadership discussed the changes with CUPA­HR officials, and the maximum number of positions was set at 15 total positions, which reflected the number of slots for other academic departments. The task force revised the descriptions again, and they were approved by the Board at the 2008 ALA Midwinter Meeting. Subsequently, CUPA­HR offi cials informed ACRL of problems with three of the new de­ scriptions, which equated to more than one of the historical positions. Since data had been collected for the older position descriptions for many years, there were salary discrepan­ cies when compared to the new proposed positions. The task force again revised the positions in a way that allowed CUPA­HR to maintain the integrity and continuity of their survey categories, while addressing the con­ cerns of ACRL for updating the descriptions. Various levels within the positions in ques­ tion were created. (See reference/instruction librarian position and the cataloging librarian position for examples.). These final 19 descriptions are more rep­ resentative of what was originally proposed and, while not perfect, they are in place for the 2008–2009 surveys. It will take several years to build a track record for the newest positions.The titles that are similar to those in the former listing have a historical base of information and will continue to collect data. As the newer, more precise descriptions begin to be used, the older listings will become more realistic as well. In the fi nal analysis, both parties obtained their desired results, and CUPA­HR was an excellent partner with which to work on this important project. So how will these revised position descrip­ tions be helpful to individual libraries? First, the survey now includes descriptions for new positions, such as systems librarian and coordinator of library services for distance education, as well as updated descriptions, such as reference/instruction librarian and catalog/metadata librarian. Second, the task force recommends that when an academic library position review is undertaken at any institution, the library director or dean discuss the CUPA­HR de­ scriptions with the HR staff involved to as­ sure that the positions under consideration are aligned as close as possible to one of the approved positions.This will ensure that 1) the library’s professionals are in the category that best matches their duties and respon­ sibilities and 2) the institution is using the proper compensation range for the correct position when reporting and/or establishing starting salaries. Ongoing management of these position descriptions will be handled by the ACRL Personnel Discussion Group. Additional information, including the full, updated posi­ tion descriptions, is available on the ACRL Web site at www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl /issues/personnel/index.cfm.–Debbie Malone, DeSales University, debbie.malone@desales. edu; Thomas Abbott, University of Maine- Augusta, tabbott@maine.edu . December 2008 667 C&RL News mailto:tabbott@maine.edu mailto:debbie.malone@desales www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/acrl Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Tech­ nology Act as administered by the Com­ monwealth of Pennsylvania, in association with Millersville University and Dickinson College. “Slavery and Abolition in the U.S.” is freely available online at deila.dickinson.edu /slaveryandabolition/. EBSCOhost adds music resources Music researchers now have additional re­ sources available through EBSCOhost with the release of RISM Series A/II: Music Manu­ scripts after 1600 (RISM) and the Index to Printed Music (IPM). RISM indexes historical musical sources while IPM offers access to individual pieces of printed music that are provided within scholarly literature. RISM contains bibliographic records of music manuscripts written after 1600 and up to 1800. The records include informa­ tion in standard bibliographic categories as well as graphical images of more than 780,000 music incipits, which can be viewed as musical scores. The goal of the database is to document the world’s musical sources of manuscripts or printed music, works on music theory, and libretti stored in libraries, archives, monasteries, schools, and private collections. The database contains more than 585,000 records covering over 20,000 com­ posers and is compiled by the International Inventory of Musical Sources. IPM contains more than 300,000 records with detailed indexing including (but not limited to) composers, poets, librettists, per­ forming forces (medium), formats, genres, etc. A separate collection authority link makes it possible to search for titles of music col­ lections, as well as individual compositions. IPM is compiled by the James Adrian Music Company, a not­for­profit organization, and has received support from the National En­ dowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. More information on these databases is available at www. ebscohost.com. Jacob Lawrence and The Legend of John Brown The Wayne State University (WSU) Library System recently received grant funding from the Detroit Area Library Network (DALNET) for an outreach project to create an informa­ tional display featuring digitized images of artwork by notable African American artist Jacob Lawrence’s important series The Leg­ end of John Brown, a suite of 22 silkscreen prints. The prints currently reside in WSU’s David Adamany Undergraduate Library. “This display will allow us to bring cul­ turally significant art to libraries that are not equipped to display original works of art,” said Diane Sybeldon, WSU librarian and coordinator of the grant. The traveling display will be a freestanding modular display system that will include de­ scriptive text and graphics, along with an ac­ companying informational brochure, title list, and bibliography. Over a three­year period, the display will travel to libraries throughout the state of Michigan and to other non­profi t organizations and institutions. For more information, visit www.lib. wayne.edu/geninfo/news/jacoblawrence/. IGI provides InfoSci-On-Demand IGI Global recently announced the launch of a new pay­per­view service, InfoSci­On­ Demand, allowing researchers, scholars, and practicing managers to search and instantly purchase full­text PDFs of more than 25,000 research articles written by prominent ex­ perts and scholars in the field of computer science and information technology man­ agement. No subscription is needed to ac­ cess the articles in InfoSci­On­Demand. InfoSci­On­Demand contains every re­ search book chapter, journal article, teaching case, conference proceeding, and reference material published in six IGI Global imprints: “IGI Publishing,” “IRM Press,” “Information Science Publishing,” “CyberTech Publishing,” “Information Science Reference,” and “Medi­ cal Information Science Reference.” The database is updated on a daily basis with new articles, many of which are not available in print. Full­text PDF versions of articles can be downloaded immediately for $25 per entry. Purchased research can be stored locally for future use. Visit www.infosci­on­demand.com for additional details. NYPL LGBT Visiting Scholars Program The New York Public Library (NYPL) con­ tinues to expand, build, and make acces­ sible its extensive Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual C&RL News December 2008 668 http:www.infosci-on-demand.com http:ebscohost.com http:deila.dickinson.edu and Transgender (LGBT) collections by an­ nouncing the creation of the LGBT Visiting Scholars Program. Created with the gener­ ous support of LGBT Committee Ambas­ sador Martin Duberman and his partner Eli Zal, the program enables NYPL to provide travel stipends to New York City for up to three visiting scholars to conduct LGBT research in the library’s collections. The awards will be limited to emerging scholars or those who are unaffiliated with an aca­ demic institution. The selected Martin Du­ berman Scholars will receive travel grants that range from $1,000 to $8,500 and will as be provided with workspace at the library to pursue their research. Interested applicants should send a three­ to­five page research proposal specifying the collections at the library relevant to their project, a draft budget, and itinerary for their trip, a cover letter, and an appropriate letter of recommendation. Applications should be sent to Jason Baumann, the New York Public Library, 11 West 40th Street, South Court 3, New York, New York 10018. Applications must be received by January 31, 2009. No­ tification of awards will be sent beginning March 1, 2009, and recipients must make their trip within 2009. The NYPL LGBT collection includes the archives of pioneering LGBT activists, such as Morty Manford, and Barbara Gitting and Kay Tobin Lahusen; the papers of scholars, such as Martin Duberman, Jonathan Ned Katz, and Karla Jay; organizational archives of pivotal civil rights groups, such as the Mattachine Society of New York and Gay Activist Alli­ ance; and the papers of LGBT writers, such as W. H. Auden, Virginia Woolf, and Joseph Beam. The library’s collections also include archives in the history of the AIDS crisis, extensive holdings in the history of LGBT the­ atre, and the Black Gay and Lesbian archive. Visit lgbt.nypl.org for additional information, including links to digital collections. Innovative announces Encore API Innovative Interfaces recently unveiled En­ core xQuery, a Web service API (application programming interface) that offers search and retrieval access to the Encore database. “The launch of Encore xQuery is the next step in the vision established when Encore was fi rst launched. Encore can offer libraries sleek end­user discovery capabilities, but it is also designed to leverage and liberate library data,” said Betsy Graham, vice president of product management at Innovative. “As we move forward with Encore devel­ opment, libraries will have multiple ways to bring the best of search and analysis func­ tionality to their users and staff.” Planned for release in early 2009, Encore xQuery will provide locally developed library applications with flexible access to data from a wide range of record types. Harry Ransom Center humanities fellowships The Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center at the University of Texas­Austin is now accepting applications for its 2009– 2010 research fellowships in the humanities. About 50 fellowships are awarded annually by the Ransom Center to support scholarly research projects in all areas of the humani­ ties. Priority is given to proposals that con­ centrate on the center’s collections and that require substantial on­site use of them. All applicants, with the exception of those ap­ plying for dissertation fellowships, must be post­doctorates or possess an equivalent terminal degree or a substantial record of scholarly achievement. Independent scholars are encouraged to apply. The fellowships range from one­to­four months, with stipends of $3,000 per month. Also available are $1,200 to $1,700 travel stipends and dissertation fellowships with a $1,500 stipend. The stipends are funded by individual do­ nors and organizations, including the Ransom Center, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the Hobby Family Foundation, the Dorot Foundation, the Schusterman Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, American Society for Eighteenth­Cen­ tury Studies, South Central Modern Language Association, and the University of Texas at Austin Office of Graduate Studies. The application deadline is February 2, 2009. Information about the fellowships and the application process is available online at www.hrc.utexas.edu/fellowships/. Awards will be announced by letter on or before April 1, 2009. December 2008 669 C&RL News www.hrc.utexas.edu/fellowships http:lgbt.nypl.org