LAUC-B Executive Committee Meeting No. 9 (1998/99) June 16, 1999, 10-11 A.M. Krouzian Room, The Bancroft Library MINUTES Present: Michaelyn Burnette (secretary), Barbara Glendenning, Marlene Harmon, Ann Jensen, Jim Larrabee, Andrea Sevetson (chair), Virginia Shih, Deborah Sommer, Jack von Euw, Beth Weil Absent: Chuck James, Phoebe Janes, Michael Levy Guests: Suzanne Calpestri, Mari Miller Handouts: agenda; draft minutes (meeting no. 8, April 14, 1999); Public Service Priorities, the summary report by the LAUC-B Public Service Task Force to Gerald Lowell; Future of Townsend Library Fellowship, a document by the current and five former Library Townsend Fellows; Report on "Alternative Models for Scholarly Publishing in Higher Education" 1. Announcements (distributed through email by Sevetson) A. Sevetson notified LAUC-B that, on recommendation from Gary Handman, the Library is purchasing the following items: Sony Mini Disc recorder (MZR 55) $319 Sony FV 610 microphone ($52.95) Atlas DS 7 microphone stand ($16.40) Package of 5 minidisks ($15.50) After the equipment arrives, it will be housed in the Media Resources Center and will be available for checkout. This is digital technology which means that material can be put on the internet for listening on PC's. B. Pat Flowers Memorial at UCR. On behalf of LAUC-B, Andrea Sevetson wrote a personal check to "Friends of the UCR Library" as a memorial for Pat Flowers. Michael Levy has the receipt and is processing it to reimburse Sevetson. LAUC-B will be credited for the gift. C. The 1999 Fall Assembly will be held at UCSC Nov. 18-19. The Executive Board will probably meet the 19th and the Assembly the 19th. 2. The minutes of April 14, 1999, were amended and approved. 3. Sevetson gave a brief summary of the LAUC Statewide Assembly, held in Riverside. Myron
Okada from UCOP attended and discussed the current status of the proposal for additional steps
in the librarian series. The five recipients of the LAUC professional development grants were
announced. 4. Reports The brevity of the meeting precluded the usual reports from the chair and vice-chair. 5. New Business A. Memo on the Townsend Center Library Fellowship (Calpestri) Calpestri, the current librarian fellow, and five former librarian fellows (G. Handman, T. Huwe, M. Snow, J. Tsou, K. Vanden Heuvel) met to discuss ways to promote and revitalize librarian interest in the program. Faculty and graduate student interest in these fellowships is widespread, and the Townsend Center receives many applications for the fellowships. Each year the Center looks at the applicants to balance interests and compose a group which will be vital and exciting. ExComm discussed their recommendations and decided that the best way to address the issue was to include a former fellow in the membership of the Research and Professional Development Committee (RPDC). Calpestri will solicit the Townsend fellows for a name to forward to the Nominations and Elections Committee for inclusion in next year's membership; she will send the name to Sevetson, who will forward to Cris Campbell, N&E chair, with the information that ExComm requests the inclusion of a fellow in the membership of RPDC. ExComm members agreed that a future RPDC program on the Townsend Fellowships would be useful in stimulating librarian interest. ExComm thanked Calpestri and the former fellows for their work on the report and their thoughts on stimulating participation in this program. B. Proposal from Research and Professional Development Committee about the purchase of equipment (Miller) One item requested, the tape recorder, has already been taken care of (see Announcements, above). ExComm examined the request for the purchase of another portable computer; one was just purchased this year and is available to the membership for LAUC related activities. After discussing the purchase of an additional computer, ExComm decided to defer the issue until next year while collecting further information on the need for another laptop. Sommer will explore old LAUC-B minutes and documents to find the existing guidelines for the use of the LAUC-B laptop and will email her findings to members of ExComm for further discussion. Miller will send the information to the LAUC reflector. C. The Report on "Alternative Models for Scholarly Publishing in Higher Education" was not addressed. D. ExComm discussed Lowell's June 2 draft, Launching the Councils within the UC Berkeley Library. E. Harmon graciously agreed to coordinate LAUC-B lunch participation in the late July interviews of candidates for the Occupational and Environmental Health Librarian position. 6. ExComm members should email Sevetson with notice of their availablity for Wednesday
meetings from mid-July through mid-August so she can schedule the next ExComm meeting.
7. Reports from members of ExComm on activities of other divisions was done by email. Reports
from Shih (UCI), James (UCSF), and Glendenning (UCR) follow.
Summaries of LAUC Minutes Prepared by LAUC-B ExComm Members UC Irvine (V. Shih) Dear Colleagues, Here are a few topics of interest extracted SELECTIVELY from LAUC-I minutes FYI: 1) Evaluation of the Two-Year Delegation Pilot Program 2) Librarian Review Process: Interview with Director of Academic Personnel and Associate Executive Vice Chancellor 3) Librarian Recruitment Process 4) Discussion of Professional Development with UCI new University Librarian ***************************************************************************** 1) Evaluation of the Two-Year Delegation Pilot Program (Quoted from Minutes of Sept. 25, 1998) The Pilot Program is to delegate the authority to the University Librarian for normal merit increase actions and "No Action" cases. -Parallels were made between librarian and faculty reviews. Some members commented that the librarian peer process should be analogous as much as possible to the faculty/academic process or model for reviews. -Some members pointed out that we are different from faculty - it may make more sense to have the UL make the final decision. A UL might be able to make a better decision based on a more informed reading of the file. -Some members stated a preference for having the ultimate decision made outside of the library. -Normal merit or "no action" files went from the Review Initiator, to AUL, to LRC, to UL. -Other files going through the full review process went from the Review Initiator, to AUL, to UL, to LRC, to the Executive Vice Chancellor. -LRC can appoint an ad hoc committee - ad hoc necessary for certain steps. LRC sees Ad Hoc comments. LRC doesn't make their recommendation until after seeing Ad Hoc comments; also LRC can act as the ad hoc committee. Issues: if UL makes final decision, what would the Academic Personnel 's role be? What would be the appeal process? -Is it a good idea to have the final signature from an EVC who may not know us well? -Does EVC rubberstamp? Or does EVC provide objective viewpoint? -Should the EVC be the final signature - now Academic Personnel acts as a watch guard for the process? -How can we continue to bring in expertise of Academic Personnel in some meaningful way to make the process more successful? -Some concern was expressed if the UL was the final decision-maker. For example, if it is a busy year, the UL might just defer to the AULs decision. -Useful to have Academic Personnel meet with librarians to answer questions. -Who is the final signatory? What's the process? It is more important for a clear delineation of the process and that there is an opportunity for outside input. -If the UL is the final signatory, we run the danger of losing that outside oversight. -Currently the relationship between LRC and AP is consultative, and interpretative. -Differences between two models - LRC gets to see UL letter - should LRC/UL sees file at same point? -One suggestion - all uncontested actions go to UL; contested actions go through path with EVC; the only problem is that the AP will only deal with problem cases & would not have experience with normal cases. -LRC should meet with new UL and recommend that all levels review the entire file not just the recommendations. -Proposal - keep pilot project for one more year, but have a discussion further regarding whether to extend the project to all cases--having one more year of pilot project gives us some more experience--afterwards revisit entire issue and extension of authority. ************************************************************************************** 2) Librarian Review Process: Interview with Pat Price, Director of Academic Personnel and Associate Executive Vice Chancellor Herbert Killackey (Quoted from Minutes of Oct. 12, 1998) Q: A UL will know more about librarianship and librarian responsibilities, so this would make the UL a logical final signatory. However with contested cases, who would make the final decision? And if AP only saw contested cases, what standard would AP be able measure these cases by? Or in the situation where all cases were decided by the UL, what would be the role of AP? AEVC: What we want to do with the UCI Libraries is not unique. As the campus gets bigger, we all need to decentralize these personnel decisions. Also during this current year, we are going to start developing procedures to have probably all non-senate files reviewed at the Deans level. We think it can be done well at this level. The decision made by the decision-maker will stand, but we will review files. If there are any patterns that show it is not working, then anything that can be delegated, can be "undelegated". Q: What is the status of the administrative stipends? AEVC: They have not been funded, and they are still under review. The EVC is still very new and has not addressed this yet. PP: It should be addressed very soon--in the next week or two. Q: The UCI Libraries staff is in the high ranks (many senior members), what does this mean in terms of advancement? We all can't be at the top level, but more people are eligible. What guidance would you share with the UL? AEVC: I'm only vaguely familiar with the problem (if it is a problem). I know we have more librarians at the highest level than any other campus. I can't comment on the justification of that or not. The way I look at it, as time goes on, more and more professors will be in the higher ranks. And that's good, as long as people are active and functioning. The peer review process allows that to happen--and as long as it is done appropriately, then it can be justified. Q: It is increasingly difficult to make comments on people's reviews based on the information that we are supplied with and it is enormously time-consuming. For example, samples of people's works should be submitted. The process can be improved, if there is fuller documentation. Also as people closest to a person being reviewed are asked to write letters, this limits the number of available people to serve on ad hoc committees. What do you think of the role of outside reviewers? AEVC: I'm not now familiar with procedures for Ad Hoc. PP: The numbers of ad hocs has been only 4 last year, and the number of ad hoc committees has declined even for faculty. Yes, you do limit the population who can serve on ad hocs, if you have sought letters of support from all the obvious people within the library. PP: On some UC campuses, promotions for faculty senate to step 6 or above scale automatically necessitate an ad hoc committee. Our Senate waived that procedure, and the LRC parallels this waiver (LRC can choose not to request an ad hoc committee). Q: Would you comment on the perceived impact (if any) on open or redacted letters? AEVC: Again I can't comment specifically on the context within the libraries, I haven't served long enough to comment. But based on my experience with Academic Senate, it hasn't affected the quality of the academic review. It is harder to write those letters. Q: There is a distinction between librarian and faculty reviews. Faculty are able to comment on the quality of work without identifying themselves, while we usually need to contextualize our comments (e.g. explain that we served on the same committees in order to establish authority/credibility). It is a much more personalized process. It is having a more negative impact in the library. AEVC: We hear this a great deal, but we have to uphold this. This is UC-wide policy. PP: It is difficult for the faculty, as well as librarians, to obtain objective and critical/analytical letters. We have noted this since 1990, when redacted letters were approved. The smaller the unit, the more difficult it is. There are only about 2 or 3 campuses that use a short form without requiring letters at every move. The "key" is to hold off requesting letters until you need it for promotion or significant advancement. Q: What happens if a candidate under review finds out that someone, who they work closely with and who can write a fair statement, has not been asked to be a reviewer, even though this person was mentioned on the list they submitted to their review initiator. AEVC: It is up to the discretion of the review initiator to choose who is contacted for letters. People under review are asked to list people to write letters. In my experience, these people tend to be discounted more. Letters from people not on the list are usually given more credence and weight. PP: Usually there is a balance of letters from the candidate's list and letters from outside that list. Q: With the faculty dossiers, you are looking for a balance of letters. Is there anybody in the Library that is looking for balance and equity across files and across departments? AEVC: Well, a good review should include a review of the review initiators. Q: Is there is a faculty tradition of submitting a list of names that the person does not want to be contacted? AEVC: Yes. But the review initiators should know whom to contact without you telling them. People should spend time cultivating their department chair (or review initiator) and let them know which people to contact. Q: Is it really a different culture? PP: There is a different situation with faculty, you don't need to know the individual as much as how the body of their work impacts the field. Q: What do you see as the things that are the same or different between library and faculty reviews? Is there any information that would help assist in the evaluation of the files? What's your outside perspective? AEVC: At this time, I don't have a big enough sample (I've only seen 8 files). PP: The more analytical the files can be, the better. At all levels of review, we ask--What does it all add up to be? What's the import within the library and outside? I believe the quality of the files has increased -you are doing a good job. Q: There is some frustration and vagueness about the criteria for a distinguished librarian (e.g. Librarian 5). Can you comment on this? AEVC: I don't know why there isn't a level 6, 7, and 8. There are 2 major bars in the faculty senate: Professor 6 and 8. Professor 6 is an easier one to define since it has somewhat objective criteria. For example, does this person have an international reputation and impact? But Professor 8 does indeed get fairly subjective. People try to grasp at objective criteria. There are unwritten criteria (e.g. elected to Academy of Science, Nobel Prize). The University defines the overall criteria, but as we develop procedures, we can put addendum and codicils that will help individuals--both individuals being reviewed and individuals writing review letters. Q: Re the Pilot Project--if we proceeded with full delegation to the UL, what would be the role of AP? AEVC: There would have to be some though given re the procedures. AP will remain the office of record, all files housed there. The Library Personnel office would have to play a role. A place for LRC to meet and review files would have to be found. Appointing ad hoc committees will happen, but who will do the appointing? Many procedural details need to be thought through. Q: There is a consideration and proposal to add steps to the librarian series. Can you comment? AEVC & PP: AP hasn't formally seen the proposal. We hope that when it comes out of LAUC system-wide and when it comes out to the campuses for input, that it will go forward. The UCB Faculty are asking for further steps (8.5 or 9). The desire to keep careers active is important; there is merit to this proposal. Q: Two issues that LAUC is grappling with: 1) adding steps; 2) if they added steps, whether Librarian 5 would be a super-step. PP: I remember when Librarian 4 used to be the top step. We wrote local procedures so that people who already had achieved this super-step wouldn't have to do it again. Munoff: The ULs recommend seeking a different route. The ULs were not opposed to this proposal, they just felt that this proposal needed to be approached along a different route. Q: How are faculty reviewed? Is it mainly based on primary responsibilities or additional activities, and shouldn't librarians be reviewed the same way? AEVC: Faculty are reviewed primarily on their research and teaching. Q: Librarians might be superior in their primary responsibilities, but they might not be promoted if they are not successful in other areas. AEVC: All the areas (research, teaching, and university participation) reflect back on their primary responsibilities. I would assume that somebody who only did his or her primary responsibilities would hit a ceiling and not get advanced. Kaufman: It might not be fruitful to compare librarians to faculty. All the job positions state the criteria for advancement. Comment: Especially at higher levels, there are some frustrations at not being able to reward people, if they are superior in their primary duties but are not active in other areas. PP: This is true of faculty too. There are faculty, who are wonderful teachers, but who are not as active in research as in the past. And this does affect their career advancement. Comment: These are professional career choices. Q: What happens when a person is not in management, and doesn't have input on their managers' review? PP: They don't have anything like a chair's review. AEVC: I'd like to emphasize that we are moving in the direction of trying to improve the review process--to make it more equitable and fair. Our office is not in any way stepping away from the review process. ************************************************************************************** 3) Librarian Recruitment Process (Quoted from Minutes of Nov. 9, 1998) Two concerns: a) Our searches take approximately 9 months to a year to complete. It would be interesting in finding a way to conduct searches more quickly so that we can be more competitive in making offers to the pool of applicants. b) The amount of effort is put into the searches. Are there ways to speed it up and control/shape/reduce the amount of time that is spent on the process? Specifically in terms of the period when we appoint a search committee to the time an offer is made. Here are some comments from UCI membership re what delays happen and what can be done to make searches occur more expeditiously: -Schedules for interviews may conflict with schedules of those that need to be there, sometimes delays occur for this reason. -There may be things that we should look at: How customized do the questions for each position need to be? Can we reuse position descriptions (tinker with past descriptions rather than reinvent the wheel)? Where does this happen--within the department or within the search committee? -Search committee members - Does everyone need to be there for every meeting? Search committee members' time availability need to be factored into the process. -If there were set time schedules and time limits then people could give more priority to serving on a search committee. It is also the responsibility of individuals to turn down appointments if they know they cannot be there. -The large number of people on a search committee can slow it down; perhaps limit the number of people serving on a committee. -Specify meeting times & setting dates/times can expedite the search process. Easier to cancel meetings than to schedule new ones. -Unscheduled problems can cause delays. -For junior positions we still need to post in national publications. There is a long lead-time needed to post these advertisements. -For filling vacancies in general, use previous job descriptions tinker with descriptions rather than starting from scratch. -Send out a brief ad to get into the national publications pipeline with a longer online description following later. . -Search committees are given draft job descriptions and often spend a long time editing them. JK mentioned that often there are issues about the position, and the job ad becomes the stage on which these issues get argued. The qualifications are often discussed at length, because they serve as the legal criteria for who gets interviewed and how qualifications are weighed. -How far into the interview do you know when a person is good for the interview? We are so pressed for time and we also wear the candidates out with long interviews. -Can we get on more regular schedule for recruitments? -L. Shahid recommended that we focus on the person. We do not give the person sufficient information about the system and what is involved in the position. Instead of a long series of interview meetings, we should devote some time afternoon devoted to sit down and talk to them about the position--give them a better feel for what they will be doing. -Sally mentioned that she did a Powerpoint presentation to some recent candidates and demonstrated some online records, but that there was not enough time to cover everything. -Dooley seconded Wilson's suggestion of limiting the number of questions during interviews, because the candidate's comments and questions are quite informative. -JK mentioned that both the Engineering/ICS and Serials Cataloger search committees tried a new way of interviewing the candidates. They decided ahead of time what questions they wanted to address, but they didn't list them out--instead they had a dialogue with the candidates. Each search committee member was assigned to make sure that the issues were covered in this discussion. Search committee members also met between their two sessions with each candidate and agreed what issues still needed to get covered. Both search committees found this useful. -There might not be some disadvantages. Sometimes it might be difficult to compare candidates' answers, especially if their responses are anecdotal; some candidates do better having questions laid out for them. -For entry-level positions, the group agreed that people not be required to give a formal presentation on a set topic. For other, more senior recruitments, it was suggested that rather than assign a topic, the candidate should be permitted to talk about something they are passionate about that was job-related and reflected their professional interests. Use the faculty model for doing presentations on the person's area of interest. -J. Sisson asked whether we could make the search committee questions open (e.g. can the questions that the search committee ask be known or shared?) Apparently, search committees used to gather questions from all groups involved in the on-site interviews and would try to minimize the duplication of questions. -It was noted that the corporate culture is way too rigid about everything involved in search committees. The guidelines really help in laying out the relationship and responsibilities of the search committee vis-a -vis the supervisor. It is importance for both the candidates and the supervisor to spend more time together to get a better sense of the job at hand. -For entry-level positions, how important is it to have an open forum meeting? Currently, there is always a presentation or question-and-answer session that is open to all library employees. There was some discussion about whether these open sessions were necessary given that: *Some of the recent library-wide sessions have had low attendance *We want to make the interview process less grueling *We want to provide the candidates with more time to get a sense of the job they will be doing; perhaps spend more time talking to the immediate supervisor *Be more welcoming; limit the number of repetitive questions It was recommended that we empower the search committee to make a decision about whether library-wide sessions are necessary, and to have faith and trust in the search committees judgment. Judy summarized the informal proposal: -Change the present guideline, so that library-wide meetings with the candidate are not mandatory for every recruitment. For some positions, an open forum or library-wide question-and-answer session is not necessary. Search committee should be trusted to determine when this is appropriate (e.g. department head position). Library-wide presentations or question-and-answer forums should be an option left to the discretion of the search committee. ************************************************************************************** 4) Discussion of Professional Development with UCI new University Librarian Gerry Munoff (Quoted from Minutes of Feb. 8, 1999) Q: In terms of the role of professional development, how do you see professional development fitting in. Is it to give the institution visibility (leaders in the profession)? Another goal might be to enrich one's job (e.g. enhance job activities for one's current position)? What is your view about how this activity comes back into the library? GM: I think that our objectives have to be based in the interests of the individual librarians, but if we do things in the right way they feed off of each other. I wouldn't want to fund something just for the reason of having someone be a leader in an area. There should be a synergy of interests and issues. We're not just doing this to make us feel good. It should enhance reputations and also help the library or the profession. Start from a base assumption reflected in the review guidelines - why are we even evaluating these rather than primary activities? We need to examine what sorts of training or professional development activities will allow librarians to become fully developed professionals operating in a variety of arenas. Sometimes technical in-house training will be appropriate, and at other times, professional development will help a librarian perform a job and make contributions to the university and to scholarship. We need some guidelines on what's to be done and how it is to be done. I hope we can have some flexibility. Q: One of the things discussed a lot is UC-wide funding for research, where people apply for grants. Many people apply for research in an academic area that might not reflect on their job at all, but it gets funding because it is academically oriented and the project would further something in their area. It might not be related to the specific campus. What are your thoughts about release time, etc.? GM: Somewhere in between disallowing it and giving it lesser priority. If I were looking at projects and the projects were related to their areas, I would give it a higher priority. To some extent, a case might be made about how it benefits the individual, and it is just a question of priority given the limitations on funding. For overall evaluation of criteria, if this doesn't fit into the slot for the evaluation of this librarian, can we justify the funding? But I wouldn't say that this is a determining factor, it would need to be considered on a case-by-case basis. Q: Most of us are members of professional organizations partly because we enjoy it and value the benefits we get out of it, but also because it is part of review criteria. I 'd like to hear how much you value criteria 2? GM: There are qualitative vs. quantitative aspects that need to be looked at. It should not be considered something to be checked off at review time. We should think broadly about how each of us develops as librarians, our career plans, and how this fits into the unit. For some people, qualitative participation takes the form of conference attendance, or research, etc. I'd like to be flexible enough to make the case that a particular activity fits into a person's overall development and is related to their overall evaluation. Comment: The money was given and guidelines were developed with Library Administration. Does Gerry have strong feelings about the guidelines? GM: I would approach it more on general goals and philosophy and let LAUC-I determine guidelines. Q: I have questions re the relationship between administrative vs. professional development funding. Many cases could be made that a person needs to participate in an activity that directly relates to their primary job responsibility. GM: It would just depend on the nature of the activity. There is still some discretion about attending events related to one's job description. There is still a selection and evaluation about cost benefits and what is most beneficial to the library. And of course there are separate mini-pots, but they are part of the same large pot of funds. So if there were more administrative funding, it would decrease professional development funding. At the broadest level, it doesn't matter. At a case-by-case level, it does matter. We want to have them coordinated. Ultimately it comes out of the same budget. Q: Administrative funding has always been a big mystery to me? What can we get administrative funding for? Is it not unreasonable to bring back the information it and share it? GM: Is there already a mechanism for this last point? Comment: Both the Program Committee and Professional Development Committee sponsor brown bags to share information. These meetings tend to be informal and provide a forum for sharing what has been learned at various professional meetings. GM: If there is some communication such as a written report, then this helps in the review; it gives some substance and reminds individuals about the significance of the activity. Q: It has been my understanding that for administrative funding, you need AUL approval. Often there isn't a call, rather you are approached and asked to participate. Alternatively, there might be several people expressing an interest in participating via administrative funding, but sharing of the discussion about who is selected to participate doesn't take place. Do you think administrative travel should go through the ranks of administration? The form is different. The AULs need a wide picture of the staff in order to distribute activities appropriately. GM: May of these are ex officio assignments, i.e. the nature of your position dictates participation. Another way to tie these together (I say this without knowing what occurs presently), the discussion of goals and professional development for the year are related to the expression of interest in various opportunities. Some cases are reactionary; a conference comes up unexpectedly. There will always be that aspect of it. But we could do more thinking and planning ahead of time; create a training development plan. It would help shape the thinking about this. Q: As one goes through the ranks, as one becomes more senior, is it important that people demonstrate that? Or does additional responsibilities take away time to participate in these activities? GM: There has to be a balance there. This depends on the opportunities that present themselves and a necessary and unavoidable element of fuzziness. Some dialogue or discussion should occur on whether certain career opportunities and activities are the direction to go. I'd like to move in the direction of yearly plans, would you be supportive of that? Comment: One of the things that I've experienced at other institutions is having a local group do in-house research projects. We've tried to do some things with limited amounts of money, but there might be a better way of utilizing the base money or supplementary money; collegial research seems to be missing. Perhaps we could have a brown bag every 6 months or so to figure out what in-house research projects are needed to best benefit the UCI Libraries. GM: We will see what LAUC-I comes up, and we will continue our discussion. Money will always be a factor. Professional development is something we want to support reasonably. The level of support is not too bad. As we work to do even better, we need to keep in mind that the budget allocation is reasonable. My conclusion is that we still want to do better. UC San Francisco (C. James) I can report that I contacted the UCSF LAUC once in the Fall and once this Spring. They do not write minutes from their meetings, which they hold monthly. I am told that they function much like LAUC-B in that most business is procedural and low budget stuff. They have been primarily occupied with the process for hiring a UL and with the LAUC initiative on librarian salary scales. As you know, they also organized the Fall LAUC Assembly (and provided what I thought was a pretty decent website to support the meeting). UC Riverside (B. Glendenning) LAUC-Riverside meeting notes: Minutes from Sept., Nov., Dec. 1998 and January February, March 1999 are posted. -As of Sept. minutes the UCR Library budget was projecting a deficit. -The November minutes report on UCB's Alternative Models of Scholarly Publication conference. Attending from UCR: Lizbeth, Venita, Wally and Nancy Koller. Reported that there were interesting speakers; well-run, well-organized, and that important people were there - a high-powered meeting. A resolution was passed thanking UCB for the conference. -December minutes include a comment from their UL indicating they should tell UCB's SIMS that UCR will not hire graduates of a non-accredited SIMS program. -January: report from the Statewide Assembly in December. -February: some notes regarding UCR's Academic Senate Library Committee: it's chair, Tom Morton, is very pro-Library and invited AULs to attend and report regularly. Some $604,000 for the Library's budget was not allocated by the campus. -March: The $604,000 for the Library's budget has been received. "The Executive Vice Chancellor felt that the letter from Tom Morton (UCR's Chair of the Academic Senate's Library Committee) to UCOP concerning the money was unfortunate and ill-timed." UC Davis (M. Harmon) Highlights from the "Minutes of the LAUC-D (Davis) General Membership Meeting 18 November, 1998": The UC Davis University Librarian's Report contained the information that they would soon recruit for a new "Associate Provost for Information and Education Technology". The Professional Activities Committee distributed a draft 'Professional Activities Form". A history of an "Equity Study" was reviewed. "As it applies to librarians, there was a request for a study to illuminate an observed inequity in the ability of librarians of various categories to do professional development. Discussion centered on the possibility that it could be varying workloads that result in the failure of some to progress normally through the steps of advancement." It was "noted that every point in the discussion was within the purview of the Professional Issues Committee". It was agreed to refer the issues of Criteria for Acceleration and of the Equity Study to that committee for deliberation.