This week and last I made two quick trips to Washington DC for meetings.  Last Thursday and Friday I participated in a joint meeting for members of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Diversity and Inclusion Committee and past participants in the ARL Institute to Recruit a Diverse Workforce (IRDW) and CEP (Career Enhancement Program) programs, to review past years and discuss the future of the IRDW program.  While I was there I followed up on behalf of our Library’s Committee on Diversity with ARL’s Mark Puente, to see about Mark coming to Iowa State to work with us on programming and staff development. I am hopeful we can schedule Mark’s visit for this fall.

Early Tuesday morning I traveled back to Washington DC, this time with colleagues Kim Anderson, Chris King, and Hilary Seo for a workshop on creating a digital scholarship center, sponsored by CNI (Coalition for Networked Information).  For an overview of the workshop you might check the trip reports on CyPoint. My intent for attending was twofold: to learn more about digital scholarship centers in general and also to build on information we gained from the earlier library-site visits undertaken by Kathy Parsons and others in the past few years. This workshop and site visits will be informative as we begin to work with the architectural firm to consider library spaces at Iowa State.  More on the library spaces study soon.

After two quick trips in the span of 7 days it is good to be home in Ames!  And now that I am back on campus it seems like a good time to tidy up, clean up, wrap up (you get the idea), so in this post I will revisit items from previous posts, to bring you up to date.

From Feb. 26: As of May 14, the IT Solution Center has moved to 192 Parks Library. The center is managed by permanent ISU staff with many student employees to support their efforts. Two walk-up desks are stationed outside the “call center” for people to get on-the-spot assistance. Visit the IT Solution Center website for current information about hours of operation. On Monday, May 16, the University Library and the Solution Center hosted a joint open house – to thank all who were involved in the move and to invite everyone to take a tour of the new space.

Also from Feb. 26: The Library sponsored an Iowa State Women’s Basketball game on March 1. This was a fun way to reach out our library colleagues around Iowa and invite them to Parks Library, introduce them to some of our programs and services and then cheer on the Cyclones at the game. We submitted our video, created for the March 1 basketball game, to the ARLies (a new film festival to inspire ARL member engagement) category of Development/Fund-Raising. Because they had so many submissions, all videos were reviewed prior to the meeting and some (including ours) were selected for showing in Vancouver. While we didn’t win this year (in our category Cornell was the winner), I heard many positive comments and I hope if the ARLies take off we’ll have the opportunity to participate again.

From April 26: Turns out, if you keep the library open around the clock, students will come and utilize the spaces and resources. The 24/7 pilot was a complete success and we are now planning for the fall semester and making the necessary adjustments so we can claim victory then, too.  ICYMI: On May 2, the first day of Finals Week, KHOI Community Radio did a live broadcast from Parks Library. Gail Seiler, associate professor in the School of Education & with KHOI and discussed the 24/7 open-hours pilot with me, students shared thoughts on finals and the 24/7 open-hours pilot, and Senior Vice President and Provost Jonathan Wickert discussed finals week and offered students some advice. Marie Carlson, ISU police dispatcher, and Keith Morgan, Story County Emergency Management Coordinator, discussed public safety…all live from Parks Library. I hope you will take some time to listen to the archived broadcast.

From March 10: President Leath has approved the ISU Strategic Plan FY 2017-2022, and it’s headed to the Iowa Board of Regents for approval. The priorities of University Library strategic plan tie in well with that of the University, and we continue to make strides to ensure ongoing progress. Some new committees have been formed and meetings are taking place around the library. We want to ensure that library users and staff have superior experiences, and our efforts in strategic planning have us well on our way to achieving our goals.

Please contact me with questions, suggestions or comments.