GENERAL DISCUSSION WITH GLORIA WERNER
Committee on Library
Lise Snyder reported that she had already received a positive response
to her January 18th letter concerning resumption of LAUC-LA participation
in meetings of the Academic Senate Committee on Library to the committee
Chair, Prof. Donald McCallum. A key point is that the current bylaws
of the Committee on Library (see http://www.senate.ucla.edu/committee/Library/COL.htm)
do not include the LAUC-LA Chair as a committee member. That being
the case, he or she could perhaps be granted "permanent guest
status." Per Prof. McCallum's invitation, Lise will be presenting
this idea, and the case for LAUC-LA inclusion, at the next COL meeting,
on February 14th.
Library Communication
Lise reviewed the discussion concerning enhancement of intra- and
librarywide communication that took place at yesterday's "Lunch
with LAUC." Topics addressed including restructuring the LAUC-LA
Executive Board to include more committee chairs, and having regular
meetings with the University Librarian. [Secretary's note: Lise posted
a very full report of this forum to LAUCTALK-L on February 5th.]
Lise pointed out that today's meeting with Gloria, and all those
to come, are part of the monthly LAUC-LA Executive Board meetings,
and therefore open to all LAUC-LA members. Gloria stressed that she
welcomes the attendance of additional LAUC-LA members at these meetings.
Discussion continued, concerning the value of reinstating the State
of the Library Address; the need for regularly issued ORION2 status
updates that are straightforward and free of arcane, technical jargon;
and, for all Library administrators, the importance of sending certain
types of messages out directly to all staff, and not depending on
Unit Heads to forward everything (that does not always happen).
As a timely and "value-added" communication vehicle, the
Library Staff Newsweb does not seem to have reached its fullest potential.
Gloria stated that she has charged Library Human Resources Director
Charles Batey with revitalizing the Newsweb; ideally, it should be
UCLA Library employees' "information gateway," or portal.
She would also like to see the Associate University Librarians use
the Newsweb as a "mass communication tool" far more than
they have done. Marion Peters noted the drawback of the only available
archive being Web page print-outs kept in the YRL Periodicals stacks.
It was suggested that the Newsweb URL, along with article headlines,
should be e-mailed to everyone (using the "Library Staff and
Private Files" e-mail address) each time a new issue comes out.
The Newsweb might also include links to Committee meeting minutes.
Athough these are currently centrally accessible from the Library
Staff Information Center site (see http://www.library.ucla.edu/admin/staffserv/infocent.htm),
that fact may not be as widely known as it should be.
Time constraints prevented the start of a discussion of the other
major agenda item, staff development-that will instead be the focus
for the next LAUC-LA Executive Board meeting with Gloria, which will
take place Tuesday, February 20th, from 1 pm to 2 pm in the YRL Administrative
Conference Room. The second half of the meeting, from 2 pm to 3pm,
will deal with other LAUC-LA business. To reiterate, these meetings
are open to guests, and LAUC-LA members are welcome to attend.
