nov04a.indd N e w s f r o m t h e F i e l d Stephanie Orphan C&RL News launches reader’s survey College and Research Libraries News is so- liciting feedback through its online reader’s survey through November 30. ACRL values the input of its News readership and antici- pates the survey results will help determine areas that are most beneficial to them, as well as identify aspects of the magazine that could be improved or changed to fur- ther benefit academic and research librar- ians. The survey is comprehensive and takes approximately 15 minutes to complete. To participate in the C&RL News reader’s sur- vey, visit www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crl- news/collegeresearch.htm. NetLibrary to deliver Penguin publications as e-books NetLibrary has signed a distribution agree- ment with Penguin Group (USA) to distribute more than 1,000 frontlist and classic Penguin titles in the e-book format. Penguin Group publishes such imprints and trademarks as Berkley Books, New American Library, Pen- guin, and Viking, including authors such as Nick Hornby, Stephen King, Amy Tan, and Al Franken. The Penguin Classics series in- cludes ancient and modern classic literature, covering fi ction, nonfiction, drama, and po- etry. CrossRef Google pilot adds 20 publishers CrossRef, the reference linking service for scholarly publishing, has announced that it has added ten additional publishers to its pilot initiative in collaboration with Google, bringing the total number of publishers par- ticipating to 29 and the number of scholarly research articles included to 3.4 million. CrossRef Search is available to all users, free of charge, on the Web sites of partici- pating publishers, and encompasses current journal issues and back files. The results are delivered from the regular Google index but filter out everything except the participating publisher’s content and links to the content on publisher’s Web sites through DOIs (digi- tal object identifiers) or regular URLs. Pub- lishers participating in the pilot are surveying users on an ongoing basis. The pilot began in January 2004 with nine publishers and will run through the end of this year. Backstage acquires MARS authority control service Backstage Library Works, formerly known as MARC Link, has acquired the MARS au- thority control service from OCLC. The core business services of Backstage include cata- loging and retrospective conversion, and the company had previously used the MARS ser- vice as a reseller. Both companies are work- ing to ensure a smooth handover. Existing contracts will be honored and the current price structure maintained. Backstage plans to restore manual review, a component of MARS that was previously suspended by OCLC, and will be working to implement requests for software updates and improve- ments requested by MARS users. The com- pany will also begin accepting new client libraries. NCES Academic Library Survey available The National Center for Education Statis- tics’ (NCES) biennial collection of statistical C&RL News  November 2004 / 575 www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crl Late Night at Miller Library: A success story Who would have thought that the off- handed comment, “we should have an all-nighter at the library” would translate into a major outreach event for the library staff of Miller Library at Cornerstone Uni- versity in Grand Rapids, Michigan? With that statement, the idea for the event was born, the outreach librarian presented it to the director, and approval was granted. Timing is everything Wanting to hold the event around the time of finals, we encouraged input from student workers and found that often the week before finals was just as hectic, if not more so, than finals week, as papers and projects were due. We settled on May 2 as the day for the event, two Sundays before finals. Because of fi nancial and staffing resources, Miller Library is usually open from 8:00 p.m. until 10:30 p.m. on Sundays, so we originally intended for the library to be open all night on May 2 start- ing at 6:00 p.m. However, one concern for this event was the existence of a 2:00 a.m. freshmen curfew. Not wanting to discourage this popula- tion from attending, we approached Stu- dent Development to inquire about the pos- sibility of extending freshmen curfew for the evening. They provided support for the event but encouraged us to think about the faculty response. Would Miller Library be data from college and university libraries is in progress. Academic library directors re- ceived a letter containing a registration cer- tificate in October, including a user ID and password to access the Web-based forms. The interactive forms, available on the NCES Web page (nces.ed.gov), will be available until approximately March 15, 2005. As soon as possible after the end of the data collec- tion period, 2004 data will be available in the NCES Academic Libraries Peer Com- parison Tools. The tool is currently avail- able, with 2002 data, at nces.ed.gov/surveys /libraries/academicpeer/. Upon completion, a summary report of the 2004 data will be posted on the NCES Web site. encouraging behavior that might translate into students not attending class the next day? Based on this concern, Miller Library opted instead to call the event Late Night at Miller Library and the hours of operation were from 6:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. Student Development encouraged their residence life staff to promote the event in the residence halls through the use of e-mail and posters. It was wonderful to gain the support of Student Development. The importance of partnerships As the outreach librarian, I wanted to be- gin to develop partnerships across cam- pus, so I approached the Learning Center about the possibility of providing tutors for the event. The Learning Center provided several tutors who were available through- out the evening. With writing tutors and tutors from other disciplines available, Miller Library was transformed into a one-stop shop of academic assistance for the evening. As a staff we agreed that reference as- sistance would also be a must throughout the evening and several of us took two-hour time blocks, which enabled someone from the library staff to be at the research assis- tance desk throughout the entire evening. Making a small budget work Though there were plenty of academic op- Syracuse Univ. opens political cartoon exhibit Syracuse University (SU) Library has opened an exhibition of the political editorial cartoon artwork of some of the country’s most in- fluential humorists and cartoonists from the mid-19th century through the 1960s. Original artists such as Thomas Nast, Carey Orr, Boris Drucker, and Ted Key are represented. The pieces chosen for the exhibition are from the library’s collection of editorial, general hu- mour, and political artwork created by more than 150 artists. In the 1960s, a group of SU library curators solicited contemporary man- uscript collections from the cartoonists as part of a larger project to create a repository 576 / C&RL News  November 2004 http:nces.ed.gov portunities, we also wanted to provide other perks that would attract students. Not having a formal café in the library, we transformed the lobby area into one by having Campus Services place several round tables and chairs strategically in the foyer area. This provided a wonder- ful place for students to congregate and take study breaks. We also had a limited budget. A local coffee shop donated both fl avored and regular coffee. PepsiCo donated several cases of pop and water for the event. The staff each brought a couple of dozen homemade brownies, cookies, or other baked goods. As the evening progressed, library staff drew door prizes. We asked area food establishments and businesses for donations of gift certificates or other prizes they may be willing to part with. These door prizes included free extra value meals from McDonalds, a Corner- stone t-shirt, six-inch Subway sandwich coupons, and more. The students received a raffle ticket upon entering the library and every hour they stayed to study, they could approach the circulation desk for another ticket. To market the Late Night at Miller Library, the campus newspaper covered to support research in the areas of architec- ture, industrial design, journalism, literature, music, philosophy, religion, photography, social and political history, transportation, and the visual and performing arts. The exhibit is open to the public and will run through January 25. Thomson Gale offers MLA access in two formats Subscribers to the Modern Language Asso­ ciation (MLA) International Bibliography through Thomson Gale who also have a subscription to Literature Resource Center can now access the bibliography in two formats. For one subscription price, librar- ies can provide researchers with access to MLA as a discrete database on InfoTrac or as an integrated resource within Literature Re- source Center. With both formats, users can the event, we tacked up posters around campus, and we hung a large poster in the campus dining room. The verdict: Success! On May 2, Miller Library was soon hop- ping with students busily working on group projects, presentations, and pa- pers. Survey comments included, “I really thought this was cool” and “It was fun and I got lots of homework done.” Approximately 300 students came through the doors of Miller Library that evening and early morning. The library has seating for around 200 people, so at times the library was bursting at the seams. The food ran out but energy didn’t when the doors closed at 2:00 a.m. When planning the event, it was evi- dent that developing partnerships across campus contributed to its success. Because this was the first time that Miller Library had hosted a late-night event, we did not know quite what to expect. It was a smashing success, and we were encour- aged by its popularity.—Rachel Van Den Broek, instructional services/outreach librarian, Cornerstone University, cra­ chel_vandenbroek@cornerstone.edu access the Merriam-Webster Encyclopedia of Literature and the Gale Literary Index for ad- ditional reference. LISU publishes scholarly journal pricing report LISU, based at department of informa- tion science at Loughborough University, has published a report covering scholarly journals pricing over the last decade. The report was originally commissioned by Ox- ford Journals, a division of Oxford Univer- sity Press (OUP), in an effort to better un- derstand the “serials crisis.” LISU analyzed data from 12 named scholarly publishers, including OUP, taken over a fi ve-year period, plus a base year for comparison. Among the findings are average price in- creases by publisher ranging from 27% to 94% over the 2000–04 period. The full re- C&RL News  November 2004 / 577 mailto:chel_vandenbroek@cornerstone.edu port is available online in PDF at www. lboro.ac.uk/departments/dis/lisu/pages /publications/oup.html. ICOLC updates statement on practices for the selection of electronic information The International Coalition of Library Con- sortia (ICOLC), an informal organization of more than 200 library consortia around the world, has made available a second update to its 1998 Statement of Current Perspective and Preferred Practices for the Selection and Purchase of Electronic Information. “Up- date No. 2, Pricing and Economics” focuses on crucial financial topics, while updating and reaffirming the broad goals of library consortia as expressed in the previous state- ments. The update is initially endorsed by more than 50 consortia in 12 countries. The original statement and updates are available at www.library.yale.edu/consortia. Univ. of Pittsburgh launches historic images Web site The University of Pittsburgh’s Digital Re- search Library has unveiled the historic Pitts- burgh Image Collections Web site, featuring photographs of Pittsburgh’s diverse work- force, steel industries, civic renaissance, and legendary jazz musicians. The project is a collaboration between the university’s Archives Service Center, the Library & Ar- chives at the Heinz History Center, and the Carnegie Museum of Art. The Web site is a single gateway to dozens of important visu- al image collections in the city of Pittsburgh and provides a comprehensive look at how Pittsburghers lived and worked in the 19th and 20th centuries. The project is available at images.library.pitt.edu/pghphotos. EBSCO A-to-Z now offering MARC updates EBSCO A-to-Z with MARC Updates is now being offered as an add-on to EBSCO’s standard A-to-Z service, a locator tool for a library’s e-resources. A-to-Z with MARC provides a customizable file in MARC 21 format representing the library’s e-resource holdings, title URLs, and online coverage in- formation. It supplies bibliographic records from CONSER and monthly updates to facil- itate online catalog maintenance. A holdings change report is also included.  Update on Characteristics of Programs of Information Literacy that Illustrate Best Practices In June 2003 the ACRL Board approved the “Characteristics of Programs of In- formation Literacy that Illustrate Best Practices: A Guideline” document. This document is intended to assist librarians, faculty, administrators, and others in de- veloping, assessing, and improving their information literacy program to meet the needs of their community of users. The guidelines provide broad categories that should be considered in the development of an information literacy program, as well as a framework for assessing excellence in information literacy programs. Since its approval, the Best Practices Project Team has added annotations to the guidelines. These annotations defi ne terms used throughout the document and help to place the document in context with other recognized standards and guidelines. They provide helpful information about how characteristics were chosen and, in some cases, examples of institutions that exemplify specific characteristics. The Characteristics of Programs of Information Literacy that Illustrate Best Practices: A Guideline, with annotations, can be found at http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards /characteristics.htm. The Best Practices Project Team met at the ALA Annual Conference in Orlando to discuss additional initiatives to promote the Best Practices Initiative. Key components of the project are to provide examples of best practices that can be used as models for others and to disseminate the characteristics of best practices to the wider audience of faculty and other key stakeholders. A new Web site designed to provide examples of best practices will be developed. 578 / C&RL News  November 2004 http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlstandards www.library.yale.edu/consortia