Bar Veinstein, Ex Libris President
I hope this update finds you and your families healthy and well.
In these tumultuous times we find ourselves digitally connected, searching for new ways to work and interact. Today, Ex Libris is launching a series of initiatives to help institutions affected by COVID-19 maintain their relationships and connections. I hope that these initiatives can play a part in helping institutions adapt to some of the challenges these extraordinary times present.
5 Digital Initiatives to Improve Library Services during COVID-19
1.RapidILL Resource Sharing Initiative
Ex Libris and the RapidILL community are committed to helping the larger library community, which is why we are offering libraries the opportunity to join a special RapidILL, interlibrary loan software borrowing service for electronic articles and book chapters. Existing RapidILL libraries will act as lenders to fulfill requests through a special RapidILL lending “pod.” This is a true community effort in the face of the global pandemic. The “COVID-19 pod” is free to join and open to non-RapidILL members in many locations. Learn more here.
2.campusM Engagement for Mobile Student Outreach
The campusM team has created the campusM Engagement offering, which is a free offering that allows institutions to quickly go live with a native mobile app on iOS and Android, as well as a matching web interface, ensuring immediate access to communication with students, faculty, and staff. campusM Engagement can be implemented quickly and is designed to be easy to manage.
3.Leganto Now for quick implementation of online learning
Leganto Now is a list management system an Ex Libris initiative for fast implementation and rollout of Leganto, the Ex Libris course resource list solution, to support transition to online learning and help libraries with essential aspects of delivering course resources. With Leganto Now, institutions will be able to support online learning at scale in the upcoming academic term.
4.Research Professional and Pivot — free access to COVID-19 news and funding
Due to the importance of communicating timely information during this crisis, Research Professional News is providing free access to all of its Coronavirus (COVID-19) related research coverage. At the same time, the Research Professional and Pivot teams are making all relevant funding opportunities related to Coronavirus (COVID-19) publicly available in a single file.
5.Services for our customers — Best Practices and Content Access during COVID-19
We have created a series of webinars for each of our solutions, discussing best practices for the transition to remote learning and online classes in the higher education sector.
The Ex Libris, integrated library system Content Operations team is also working to give our community the best and quickest access to the materials freely available during this period, with a list of COVID-19 and Temporarily Free Resources, for Alma-library management system, SFX, 360KB, Summon and Primo, library discovery service (CDI/PCI).
You can visit the dedicated page to learn more about these initiatives: “COVID-19: Remote Learning & Research Assistance.”
I welcome you to take advantage of any of these initiatives that will benefit your institution.
If you have more ideas regarding how we can support customers during these times, please email COVID19-Info@exlibrisgroup.com.
Stay safe and be well,
Bar Veinstein
President, Ex Libris Group
