Library profile: Penn State

Institution profile: Penn State is a land grant institution often described as the one university geographically dispersed. Penn State supports twenty-two campuses scattered across the commonwealth. Contrary to what one might infer from the name Penn State, the University is considered "state related," not state supported, since less than one quarter of expenditures come from the state. We have just completed a $350 million capital campaign effort to support the programs of the university.

New Feature Library Profile - Penn State / by Joyce L. Ogburn (Head, Ordering Section) Institution profile: Penn State is a land grant institution often described as the one university geographically dispersed. Penn State supports twenty-two campuses scattered across the commonwealth. Contrary to what one might infer from the name Penn State, the University is considered "state related," not state supported, since less than one quarter of expendi tures come from the state. We have just completed a $350 million capital campaign effort to support the programs of the university. receiving, cataloging, and processing of library materials are cen tralized at the main campus at University Park. Bibliograpic Processing, a section ot the Cataloging Department, performs pre-order searching. Acquisitions comprises two sections, Ordering and Receiving, which handle both serials and monographs. Approval plans and exchanges opera tion s are located in Ordering, while the foreign materials. In contrast, the Acquisitions exchange program is relatively small. However, Penn State does support insitutions in Africa by sending gifts, withdrawals, and duplicate receipts. Most ordering and receiving functions operate in a manual environment. We use Faxon's LINX SC-lO system for serials check -in and we take advantage of the online ordering systems of NTIS, UMI, and Information on Demand. We are exploring Faxon's Library profile: Pattee~~~~t.t.t ~Jt,1t1.~~9 new ABACIS system for Library supports the humanities,T ~ ordering out of print social sciences, business, and life materials. The gifts area uses sciences collections at the main a micro-based version of our campus, University Park. online system to download University Park also maintains t=.==1 t=.==1 records and create lists, and (I separate branch libraries for other gifts program resides in employs various other software sciences (4), undergraduate Receiving. Acquisitions has packages for tracking gifts of collections, and architecture. responsiblity for managing the materials as well as gifts of money. Various departments house small twenty acquisitions budgets, in Other units of Acquisitions utilize collections at University Park, but consultation with collection commercial software packages to they are supported only in part by development administrators. analyze and manipulate data in the library system, if at all. Each Staff in Receiving handle support of their various functions. campus location also has a library bibliographic control of serials which reports both to its campus and maintain serials holdings administration and the library information in the online catalog. administration. Librarians have faculty status and participate in Five librarians oversee the faculty governance. Penn State acquisitions functions. Their is a member of RLG, OCLC, positions are: Chief, Acquisitions and the Pittsburgh Regional Department; Head, Ordering Library Center. The current Section; Head, Receiving Section; organization of the Libraries is Acquisitions Librarian, Approval structured around three divisions: Plans and Gifts; and Preservation lAS (Information Access Librarian/Serials. The preserva­Services), CRS (Collection and tion responsibilities have just Reference Services), and PAS recently been assumed by an (Planning and Administrative Acquisitions Librarian, although Services). preservation functions are distributed throughout the Acquisitions profile: Acquisi­Libraries. tions resides in lAS, along with Cataloging, Access Services, and the campus libraries. Ordering, The Libraries rely heavily on approval plans for domestic and 14 Against the Grain / November 1990 • Collection development profile: CD responsibilities are dispersed am()ng the librarians in all divisions. At University Park, almost all librarians are selectors in a given subject area. At the branch campuses, the head ~ librarian is responsible for collection development. The Coordinator for Collection Development serves in the Collections and Reference Services Division of the Libraries. Humanities and social sciences subject selectors at University Park are aligned in subject clusters with leaders. One selector functions part-time as coordinator ~ of the clusters. Science and continued on page 42 Library Profile continued from page 14 technology librarians manage their own branch libraries and function as an independent "cluster." Automation profile: LIAS (Library Information Access System), locally developed, is the Libraries' online catalog, and supports cataloging, circulation, fund accounting, and electronic mail. MicroLIAS, an IBM PC­based version of LIAS , can be used to create and maintain databases by downloading records from LIAS or by manual input of data. Recently Acquisitions implemented the Fund ****Some tips on attending the Frankfurt Book Fair**** Hotels are full for miles around, and prices go up about 25% for the duration of the fair. The Book Fair office can help find private home accommodations in and around Frankfurt. Many people stay in Weisbaden or Heidelberg, which are less than an hour away by train. Moderately priced hotels in Frankfurt are about $125. Germany, indeed all of Western Europe, is expensive. Restaurant prices are comparable to better restaurants in large US cities. Some Thoughts continued from page 23 opted out of some years ago when schools of library science became trade schools imparting only vocational training. The obvious and natural avenue of re-entry is to address the problems and relationships of the organization and management of the products of scholarship across space and time in a scholarly way. The obvious and natural time for re­entering the realm of active scholarship is now, a time when scholarship is in a fundamental disarray. Accounting control System (FACS) As the first step, I submit that of LIAS , which allows online access Busses and trams run to the fair, a small cadre oflike-minded book to and manipulation of acquisitions and cost about one dollar. Taxis people, prepared to commit to budget data for twenty library are comparable to prices in the the long, arduous and often locations. FACS is available to all States. discouraging course which this collection development personnel transformation of the role of and library administrators. Library There are 10 halls the size of a scholarly librarianship and of the Computing Services, part of Penn typical ALA convention. You scholarly enterprise will require, State'scomputingdivision,isinthe will do a lot of walking. People band together in a committee to process of migrating LIAS from wear business attire at the Fair. formulate a position and an action Honeywell to DEC computers. The weather is comparable to our program aimed at bringing this . When this project is completed, northeast in October. Don'tarrive transformation about. The i LIAS development will focus on the day before the Fair; give CharlestonConferencehasproved the acquisitions component. Library yourself a couple of days to get itself to be an enduring gathering personnelworkcloselywithLibrary overjetlag. The Fair will exhaust of book people prepared to Computing Services in developing (and exhilarate) you. ~ consider and investigate radical and implementing each LIAS I--------------i departures from the presently component. ~ The Nemesis accepted dogmas oflibrarianship -A-n-d:"'T-h-e-y-W-e-r-e -T-h-e-re-----f continued from page 12 and the placeoflibraries. !submit continuedfrom page 36 Schools, non-profits and that a handful - 8-12 - of people who have over the years proved For librarians, Frankfurt could government agencies get a price themselves to be the backbone be an important experience. You break: $95.00. $495.00 outside f h C £ th th can meet with book suppliers from North America (Only $8.33 per 0 t e on erence ga ertoge ~ to explore the way to proceed. ' many countries. There is a issue more for foreigners - have librarianslbooksellers meeting area they been watching the British or reserved for this purpose. You can what?) and a special corporate talk to the top people in larger price of $200.00 each for 10 or publishing houses (by appointment more_ subscriptions. Hey Katina, only, and usually for just a few take apagefromthis group, break minutes), expressing your views our newsletter down by "type" of on issues of professional interest. subscriber and you could really You can see, by country, what is make some money on Against being published. There are halls the Grain. For 12 pages (this first devoted to art books, children's issue's size) 12 times a year (144 books, and other specific subjects. pages in all) the bargain rate for For anyone with an interest in the Europeans et. al. works out to book world, and I do mean world, $3.44 a page. There are lots of Frankfurt is a worthwhile quotable quotes in the Newsletter experience. and they fit all sizes.~ 42 Against the Grain I November 1990 •