The ALCTS Metadata Interest Group will meet on Sunday, 24 June, 8:00-10:00 AM at the Hyatt Regency Orange County, Grand Ballroom E.
This year’s meeting features four presentations centered on the changing role of the cataloger. Presenters and summaries are described below.
MIG will hold its business meeting from 9:30-10:00 following the presentations. The group will also be electing a new Vice-Chair/Chair Elect, program co-chair, publications chair, and Blog Coordinator. Interested parties may contact Michael Dulock at michael.dulock@colorado.eduby Friday 15 June 2012.
Amy Jackson & Rebecca Lubas – University of New Mexico
Cataloging Partners: Collaboration Across the Library
This presentation will provide practical advice and strategies for becoming more effective partners with your colleagues and leveraging cataloging expertise. The presenters will examine first the relationships and potential with other technical services partners such as acquisitions and collection development, branch out into public services collaborations, and finally address how catalogers can take an active role in the growing area of digitization services.
Debra G. Skinner – Georgia Southern University
The Ever Changing Role of the Cataloger and How Catalogers Manage the Changes
We hear conflicting opinions about the relevance of cataloging constantly. Cataloging is obsolete. Rich metadata is more important than ever before. With the change in technology, how do catalogers manage all the changing roles expected of them? And, how do catalogers maintain enthusiasm for a career that many administrators and colleagues tell them can be better handled through outsourcing?
Of course, not all catalogers face the same situations, but many are taking on roles such as managing discovery services, managing institutional repositories, batch loading and editing records, in addition to cataloging responsibilities and managing and training staff. This presentation will cover some of the issues involved in the changing role of catalogers as well as how catalogers can manage the changes in the cataloging profession.
Anna Craft & David Gwynn – University of North Carolina Greensboro
Thinking outside the search box: Redefining the roles for catalogers in an academic library
In 2011, the UNCG University Libraries began a realignment that involved shifting several positions from cataloging and technical services to other departments. The reorganization continued a trend toward a more collaborative approach within the library, where catalogers and archivists are increasingly working side by side with IT librarians to process unique and rare items and produce metadata for digital projects based on these materials. Driven both by budget constraints and a new emphasis on interdepartmental project teams, roles and expectations are changing within the Cataloging Department and among its expatriate staff in other departments. In many ways, this process can be seen as extending the impact of cataloging rather than reducing it. This presentation will discuss this still-evolving process, and in particular its impact on the Cataloging Department’s work with Digital Projects and with Special Collections and University Archives.
Sandra Lahtinen, Julie Swann & Pat Headlee – Northern Arizona University
21st Century Cataloging, Changing Priorities
The cataloger has always played a significant role, providing access to library content through well-established processes and helping to ensure a consistent researcher experience. In libraries today, titles are often acquired as collections, and priorities have shifted to accommodate the need to provide access to large quantities of information in the most expedient manner while still maintaining a reliable user experience. Expertise developed through working with bibliographic records leads to an understanding of the structure of records, the function of data fields and the interaction of data elements, and this knowledge is integral for manipulating records and delivering information in a manner that facilitates use and analysis. Since many of the processes associated with delivering content require related skills-the ability to search, interpret and accurately identify records, to pay attention to details and maintain consistent processes-staff with traditional cataloging skills have proven to be successful at cross functioning. Cline Library combined Technical Services units with units dedicated to Interlibrary Loan and Reserves, and staff contribute to each area as needs warrant. Catalogers have proven the value of their experience, performing different but related responsibilities and shifting focus to deliver content when and where it is needed.
For more information, contact Michael Dulock, Chair of the Metadata Interest Group, at michael.dulock@colorado.edu.
