Canadian universities’ resource sharing agreement extends from coast to coast

Toronto, Ontario: Effective January 2, 2008, Canadian university faculty, students and staff will now be supported by one Resource Sharing Agreement amongst institutions. The new agreement will extend standardized reciprocal interlibrary loan / document delivery privileges across Canada. The agreement includes:

- loan of books between participating universities at no charge
- four day turnaround time from receipt of the request to the date the item is sent
- three week loan period for books and other material that has to be returned to the supplying library
- a standard charge for provision of photocopied articles and other material that does not need to be returned to the supplying library

As a basic principle, all parties have agreed to exhaust local resource sharing opportunities before borrowing from each other.

The four signatories are Council of Prairie and Pacific University Libraries (COPPUL), Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL), Conférence des recteurs et des principaux des universities du Québec (CREPUQ), and Council of Atlantic University Libraries / Conseil des bibliothèque universitaires de l’Atlantique.

This agreement builds on the past collaborative success of these four regional library consortia. Since May 2002 most Canadian universities have supported a reciprocal borrowing agreement to extend university-level library resources across the country, enabling in-person borrowing on the part of faculty, students and staff at participating institutions.

“This resource sharing agreement reflects the commitment of university libraries in creating the best possible educational opportunities and advancing Canada’s research and innovation agenda. Successful researchers tend to be intensive readers. Yet, no single university can provide all the materials required by their faculty and students. Thus the success of Canadian research is heightened by the collaborative efforts of university libraries to supply requested resources.” (Cynthia Archer, University Librarian York University and Chair of OCUL)

New ANTS Tutorials - November 2007

Five new tutorials have been added to the ANimated Tutorial Sharing (ANTS) website since October:

1. Art Index (Wilson Web edition) by Richard Baer (Camosun College).
2. Sociological Abstracts (CSA) by Paul Betty (Regis University) - ANTS
first U.S. contributor.
3. CINAHL Advanced Search Tutorial (EBSCOhost) by Duncan Dixon (Trinity
Western University).
4. CIHAHL Headings Tutorial (EBSCOhost) by Duncan Dixon (Trinity Western
University).
5. A Model for the Process of Informational Research (ANTS first Inforamtion
Literacy Tutorial) by Bill Badke (Trinity Western University).

The ANTS site is located at http://ants.wetpaint.com

The ANTS Team

NISC Databases on EBSCOhost

COPPUL has sent out an invitation to members to participate in an offer for the following NISC databases on EBSCOhost:

Arctic & Antarctic Regions (new)
Child Development & Adolescent Studies
Family & Society Studies Worldwide
Gender Studies Database
Left Index (new)
Middle Eastern & Central Asian Studies
Wildlife & Ecology Studies Worldwide
Women's Studies International

COPPUL currently subscribes to several of these databases on the EBSCOhost platform. In conjunction with the renewal of these databases, this offer is extended to non-participating members to join if they are interested.

This offer includes two new unsolicited offers from EBSCO for Arctic & Antarctic Regions and the Left Index.

Deadline for replies:
December 14, 2007 for Child Development & Adolescent Studies, Family & Society Studies Worldwide, Gender Studies Database, Left Index, Women's Studies International.
January 18, 2008 for Arctic & Antarctic Regions, Middle Eastern & Central Asian Studies,Wildlife & Ecology Studies Worldwide.

For more information about this offer, contact Debbie Braun at debbie.braun@accesscomm.ca

Royal Society Journal Packages

COPPUL has sent out an invitation to members to participate in an offer for the following Royal Society Journal Packages:

Package S: Excellence in Science Collection

Package A: Physical Sciences Collection

Package B: Biological Sciences Collection

Package H: History of Science Collection

Online access to the Royal Society Digital Journal Archive, dating back to 1665 and containing more than 60,000 articles, will be exclusive to Royal Society Journal Package subscribers as of January 2008.

PRODUCT DESCRIPTION: (from vendor)
The Royal Society Digital Journal Archive is easily the most comprehensive archive in science and contains some of the most significant scientific papers ever published. The development of this digital resource means that the Society's online collection now contains every paper ever published in the Royal Society's journals - from the very first peer-reviewed paper in Philosophical Transactions in 1665 to the most recent interdisciplinary article in Journal of the Royal Society Interface. Seminal research papers include accounts of Michael Faraday's groundbreaking series of electrical experiments, Isaac Newton‚s invention of the reflecting telescope and the first research paper published by Stephen Hawking. For further information visit http://www.pubs.royalsoc.ac.uk/archive

Deadline for replies: November 30, 2007.

For more information about this offer, contact Debbie Braun at debbie.braun@accesscomm.ca

New ANTS Tutorials

Four new database tutorials and one new "Using ANTS" tutorial have been added to the ANimated Tutorial Sharing (ANTS) website since August:

CBCA from Richard Baer at Camosun College
JSTOR from Richard Baer at Camosun College
CINAHL from Duncan Dixon at Trinity Western University
NCJRS from Richard Baer at Camosun College
"How to Upload Camtasia Studio files to DSpace" by Richard Baer at Camosun College.

The ANTS Team

ANimated Tutorial Sharing Project Announcement

The ANTS Working Group would like to announce that we have a new site and new location for uploaded tutorials (in addition to DSpace).

The new ANTS site (which integrates the Web Page and Wiki onto one site, is now found at:

http://ants.wetpaint.com

Anyone can register to make postings to this wiki or receive RSS feeds from it. In addition, you can also set up you own personal profile so people can learn more about each contributor.

Beyond this, you should notice that we expanded our repertoire of potential tutorials so that we now have a listing of Information Literacy Tutorials identified for development. Many institutions are creating some wonderful ones, and we now welcome contributions for tutorials that are not strictly e-resource tutorials. People have been asking us whether we would accept different types of tutorials and we always said yes. Now we have an official list for them.

Another new development is that we now have an additional site that you can go to in order to view tutorials and locate source code. It is located at our Screencast.com site which Techsmith so graciously allowed us to test this year for free. The Screencast.com site is a step forward as it (1) displays some tutorials – especially Camtasia ones – better than DSpace, and (2) as it provides people with the code they need to embed tutorials on Web Sites or blogs. This new site is located at:

http://www.screencast.com/users/ants/folders/Database%20Tutorials

One last bit of news: ANTS is currently doing some Beta testing on BLIP.TV. We like it as it has some wonderful push technology that would enable us to notify people of the existence of any new tutorial via some very popular Internet sites.

Both the Screencast.com and the Blip.TV sites allow people to embed source code for each tutorial. Both sites allow creators to retain ownership and assign creative commons rights so that others can use your tutorials. We still require people to upload files to DSpace initially for security and archival purposes. But we will then be moving files to sites where embedding code is available - as several people have requested it as a feature they would like to see added to the project.

The ANTS Team.

Portico Webcasts - CORRECTION

Portico has just notified COPPUL that there are unique meeting IDs for each webcast.

Here is the logon information by session:

Friday, October 26th at 1:00 pm PDT

https://www.gotomeeting.com/join/205845405
Meeting ID: 205-845-405

Conference number to use: 800-747-5150
Use access code: 4551128

Monday, October 29th at 11:00 am PDT

https://www.gotomeeting.com/join/222674870
Meeting ID: 222-674-870

Conference number to use: 800-747-5150
Use access code: 4551128

Portico apologies for any confusion.

Portico Webcasts Confirmed

The two Portico webcasts announced previously have been confirmed for:

Friday, October 26
at 1:00 pm PDT (2:00 pm in Alberta and Saskatchewan; 3:00 pm in Manitoba)
Monday, October 29
at 11:00 am PDT (12:00 noon in Alberta and Saskatchewan; 1:00 pm in Manitoba)

All COPPUL staff are welcome to join either webcast. The login information is:

https://www.gotomeeting.com/join/205845405
Meeting ID: 205-845-405

Conference number to use: 800-747-5150
Use access code: 4551128

The webcast is expected to last approximately 90 minutes.

Please note that Ken DiFiore who is the lead for the Friday session will not be available for the Monday webcast. If you have a choice of days, you may want to consider attending the Friday session for more in-depth information.

Nominations Sought for the COPPUL Outstanding Contribution Award

Nominations are now open for the COPPUL Outstanding Contribution Award. (Apologies for any duplication in posting).

This new award will be given to an individual or team, working in a member library, that has made an outstanding contribution to the consortium.

Eligibility:
Individuals currently employed by COPPUL member institutions. Note: COPPUL Board members and COPPUL staff are not eligible.

Criteria:
Contributions should enhance service in multiple COPPUL libraries, i.e. have an impact within the region.

Procedures:
Nominations can be made by staff of any COPPUL member library, and should be no more than two pages in length.

Nominations must include:
* Name of individual being nominated, and home institution
* Description and impact of the exemplary contribution
* Contribution to the COPPUL mission
* Other supporting/relevant documentation
* Name of nominator and home institution
* One letter of support (the ‘seconder’)

Deadline for nominations:
January 31, 2008.

Nominations are to be sent to Sandy Slade <coppul@royalroads.ca> at the COPPUL Office. A decision will be made by the Directors at the spring 2008 meeting. All nominations will remain confidential to the COPPUL Directors and staff.

The award will consist of a plaque and a gift certificate for $200.

Portico Webcast Offered for COPPUL Members

Portico is inviting COPPUL members to participate in one of its webcasts to learn more about the Portico solution to e-journal preservation.

Portico is proposing webcasts on either:

Friday, October 26 at 1:00 pm PDT
Monday, October 29 at 11:00 am PDT

If you would like to participate in a webcast on one of those dates, please contact Sandy Slade <coppul@royalroads.ca> by Friday, October 19. Invitation details will follow if there is enough interest to proceed with these sessions.