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Leadership |
Carolyn L. Bowman UW MLIS Portfolio |
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Leadership The Decades Project—Seattle Public Library's Science and Technology Department Seattle Public Library's Science and Technology Department (called SCT) is a cohesive, hard-working group of librarians and technical/service staff, located on Level 7 of the Book Spiral in the downtown library. My project focuses on the periodicals collection housed there. During the move from, and then back to, permanent housing, Seattle Public Library’s periodicals collection moved at least seven times. Most of the periodicals ended up on Queen Anne Hill at the facility where I start and end my day. There I began a conversation in 2003 with librarians and other staff members about the collection—its extent, how weeding proceeded, and how the collection is tracked. I discovered that the periodicals collection was being enumerated for the first time. Little did I know that my project would begin with the Excel spreadsheet, PERSTACKS2003, developed during that project. Initiation, Planning and Organization I started talking with Howard Fox, the managing librarian in SCT, about doing some fieldwork with the department in April 2005. I was impressed by the phenomenal amount of work done by such a small staff. I was surprised to learn that Howard and Dona Bubelis, the periodicals librarian, had never had the assistance of a fieldwork student. Because their time is so tight—and their responsibilities extensive—I think they hesitated to take on anything additional. I was determined to find a project that would lighten their load and provide a positive experience for the department. The Library has a periodicals collection of over 6000 titles; of these, holdings of approximately 1500 titles have a beginning publication date prior to 1930. To facilitate patrons who wish to browse periodicals, a previous project pulled together a list of titles and date ranges. The titles are arranged in a Word document (The Decades List) according to the decade in which SPL’s holdings begin. For example, the Library holds American Anthropologist from 1888 to present; this title would be listed with other titles with runs starting in the 1880s. An obvious problem with this arrangement is the fact that each title is listed only once. Thus, patrons who browse the paper document have no way to find all the periodicals published during the 1880s—just those with a starting date in the 1880s are listed in the 1880s section. Further, the titles are not organized by subject (nor are subjects indicated for any of them on the document). In order to solve these and some other problems, I organized a project to design and create an Excel spreadsheet for this archive of titles, Periodicals Archive, Decades 1710-1920. I determined the general steps in the project and how they would progress. The spreadsheet includes six searchable fields—"title," the "decades" in which SPL has holdings for each title, three subject fields ("place," "topic," and "misc"), and a "where published" field for city/state/country of publication. I also wrote a set of instructions about how to use the Excel "Filter" feature to search these fields. Critical decisions Probably no one, with the possible exception of me, understood the breadth of this project. The librarians clearly trusted my knowledge and attention to detail, leaving me to make decisions regarding the structure of the spreadsheet. I made some executive decisions with respect to dates: I wanted the entire run of a periodical included in the spreadsheet, but the existing PERSTACKS2003 spreadsheet did not include the most recent dates of titles, as these periodicals were on display in the main library (and not in storage). I also made decisions relative to data entry, establishing, for example, a hierarchy of subject headings for the creation of subject heading strings. In addition, I made critical decisions about subject heading assignments in order to facilitate searching. Specificity of subject headings is preserved in the spreadsheet by separating the headings in a subject heading string; in general, Library of Congress subject heading main fields and subfields are placed in different columns (fields) in the spreadsheet. Collaboration with staff—taking a long-term view While gathering information for the decisions noted above, I consulted with SCT staff constantly. After initial conversations, I sent an email to SCT staff to start a conversation about fields. I ended up talking individually with many staff members about how they use the Decades List (the original Word document mentioned above). During these conversations I determined what patrons most often wanted: periodicals from particular time periods pertaining to fairly general subjects. (For example, “Can you help me find periodicals about agriculture published in Seattle in the 1920s?”) Again and again, in times of trouble with fields, data entry, and searching, I consulted the users, SCT staff, in order to insure that their needs were met. I also spent a considerable amount of time with librarians and staff in the SPL’s cataloging department to gather as much information as possible before making some tough decisions about entering subject heading data. After discussing citation order and consulting the LC Subject Cataloging Manual: Subject Headings (especially the chapter on Local History and Genealogical Source Materials), I spent time studying serials cataloging on the Cataloger’s Desktop online. I was particularly interested to talk with the serials cataloger, Alice Rickey. Her intimate knowledge of SPL’s catalog and bibliographic records was invaluable to me. We had some interesting discussions about the different perspectives of database designer, user and cataloger. Alice also critiqued the spreadsheet and instructions, offering a perspective unique among those I sought. She was surprised and flattered that I wanted her input. Alice helped me understand that the finding tool should supplement—not replace—the catalog. Staff in SCT are so busy that I have a genuine worry that unless instructed, they will not learn to use the Archive. To facilitate education and use, I sent a second email to staff asking them to test the instructions for using the finding tool and to tear it apart. Initial responses and conversations have occurred and I am in the process of revising the instructions. I continue to solicit comments about the Archive and the instructions. A staff member asked me to train her to use the Archive; she in turn will train others. SPL is short-handed. I gently encouraged the use of students doing directed fieldwork as one way to address the backlog of projects, many of which include data entry or clean-up. Because this approach requires long term planning, I documented my thinking and recorded it in "Conventions for entering data into the Periodicals Archive." This document briefly outlines the thinking behind each field and sets standards for data entry, serving as a clear set of instructions for continuing the project. As the process of education continues, I am confident that the department will find the tool useful and develop strategies to maintain it. Conclusions An illustration of how I see the progression of this project is below: initiate -> include - > organize -> include -> design -> include -> discuss -> include -> revise -> include -> teach Include, include, include (include, include). Although I initiated and organized the project, I think my efforts to solicit a variety of perspectives, both professional and paraprofessional, demonstrate the most leadership. A substantial proportion of public service work at SPL is done by non-librarians; this tool will be used by staff at all levels. While the nature of this project required collaboration, I made a concerted effort to receive input from as many perspectives as possible. As a result, my understanding of the issues improved. I was delighted (though not surprised) to discover that staff also increased their understanding of the multiple considerations that go into the creation of a finding tool—such as consistent data entry, foresight and thoroughness in design, design simplicity, ease and usefulness of searching, and compatibility with other tools. They asked as many questions about my perspective as I asked about theirs. I believe they understand more about how effective finding tools are designed than before the project, partly because of my efforts to educate them. This is important because one or more staff members will likely maintain the Archive. <<back to Intellectual Growth<< >>go Home ! >>
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