Technical Infrastructure Committee. Catalina’s last day of work will be October
12. Discussion focused on both what we
need to do before she leaves and how we will cope afterward. The newspaper loading is coming along
well—with three schools that now have at least some
issues that are public. Catalina
has been working with library staff on the loading process. Kenyon in particular will need some help in
that regard. Since
Omeka isn’t that great as a portal, Catalina is working on establishing a
WordPress presence on Bluehost that will
function as a portal for the project. We
will need to decide what we want Matt to accomplish and who will supervise
him. He’s just recently finished some
DRC work for Oberlin. Catalina plans to make final campus visits next
week.
The portal should be able to handle the
organization of information related to the grant report. Mark noted that we needed to get as many
reports on faculty projects submitted as soon as possible. Catalina will send a list of the reports that
have been completed so far. We will have some extra money in the current grant
from the lines for both Catalina and Matt and also surpluses in individual
projects. We have until March to do the
final report. We can work on spending
out project funds until then. For
projects involving classes that have not yet been taught, we can ask faculty to
describe how the collection will be used in teaching. Our basic goal will be to
have all projects completed except for final reports and the final stipends by the end of 2012.
Staff Development Committee. The faculty videos are the one remaining
project. An Oberlin student is editing
them. Three videos are finished, two are
in final stages, and three more are in the pipeline. All schools are represented except for
Kenyon.
Campus Updates. Oberlin has recently hired a catalog
department student assistant to assist with one project. Mary just met with the Denison liaison
librarians to review the status of projects and a timetable for reports from
faculty and librarians. Wooster is
working to recruit two projects—one from the art department and one from the
museum.
Deans’ letter of support for the next grant. The deans will be meeting at Ohio Wesleyan on
October 24 and will need to put together background information related to the
letter of support for discussion with them at that meeting. Ray summarized the points that need to be
addressed in the deans’ letter. We need
to have an overall summary of how the current grant has changed campus
climates. It was agreed that each school
will prepare summaries with specific examples and quotes from participating
faculty. The summaries, which can be
based on project reports, videos, and contact with faculty, should be sent to
Ray by October 12. He can then develop a
summary for the deans’ letter.
We also need to define the digital scholarship
position carefully and we will want the deans to express support for the
position, as we define it, in their letter.
Cathi mentioned an example of a digital humanities position at Yale that
she will circulate. She and Mark will
draw on it to create a first draft of the position description. We will share discuss the description with
the deans at the October 24 meeting.
The background we provide the deans for the
meeting will also need to get them thinking about the question of the grants’
impact on the faculty reward system and about strategies for sustainability.
New grant proposal discussions with staff. Alan will trim down the précis of the grant
that we sent earlier to Mellon—and we can use the shortened version in
conversations with library staff to both inform them about and engage them with
the new grant proposal.
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