Document Delivery

University funding supports document delivery services from several vendors--articles are requested locally, but billed centrally. In 1997-1998, Brooklyn College was the top CUNY user of these services-- $15,898 bought 1,071 articles for our faculty and graduate students, at an average cost of $14.62. The Library also spent $4,971 in local funds for 402 documents from the British Library and other institutions that charge for copies and loans.

This represents a more than three-fold increase over last year's 334 articles ($4,824) and is directly tied to readers' increased access to electronic indexes and databases and the Library's 1996-1997 journal cancellations.

In the spring 1998, the University sponsored a reader-initiated document delivery pilot project during which CUNY faculty ordered journal articles directly from commercial suppliers via PC or fax, receiving them electronically at no charge to themselves. In May when faculty participants and librarians met to evaluate the project, Betty Levin (Health and Nutrition Sciences) and Paula Whitlock (CIS) were very enthusiastic.

In the coming year, when suppliers introduce the capacity to limit orders (either by number of articles or some dollar amount) the pilot will become a bona fide University-funded program. (The University feels controls must be in place before it can budget for such a service and open it to all faculty.)
 

Interlibrary Loan

In 1997-1998 the Library acquired 3,398 books and articles items for faculty and students, a 30% increase over last year's 2,628 items. 96% of all requests were filled. The greatest growth came in journal articles (versus books). Brooklyn also provided 2,963 photocopies and books to other schools. We remain a net lender, as 1,158 of the items acquired for Brooklyn College affiliates came from commercial document suppliers rather than other libraries.
 

Library Web Page Activity

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/library/bclib.htm
Beth Evans, Elizabeth Miller
Brooklyn College Library top page

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/ait
Gilbert Midonnet
Academic Information Technologies top page

Elizabeth Miller and Beth Evans continued as the Library's Webmistresses. In the summer, Gilbert Midonnet joined the AIT staff as our Web Development Specialist and began to expand and redesign the AIT pages. Web page projects included:

• Increasing the visibility of E-journals (Webmistresses)
• Adding "subject specialist" pages with recommended Web links and resources in the various disciplines (Bibliographers)
• Loading librarian-recommended bookmarks onto every Web browsing station (Jocelyn Berger, with assistance from other librarians)

The Cataloging unit began to order books "shelf ready" from our principal vendor for new English-language monographs. (These books arrive with labels, date-due slips, and security strips.) This service is sponsored by the University, where staff have also begun to process materials for which the vendor is unable to supply a catalog record. Brooklyn continues to use a variety of suppliers for special materials (foreign language, music), or where more substantive discounts or rapid service are available.