The Library’s Buzz

Dani Guzman, Product Marketing Director, Ex Libris

Librarians are congratulating each other over the nomination of Dr. Carla Hayden as the United States Librarian of Congress, seeing as she would be, perhaps surprisingly, the first actual librarian in that position since the early 1970’s. Her confirmation would also mark a few other dramatic firsts.

Other novel developments in the library sciences – and academia generally – are the Open Syllabus Project and open access digital publication. The strengths, weaknesses and future of both are addressed in two very good articles. Finally, we listen in on part of a discussion about how libraries can secure their future by venturing down some new roads – with a passion.

Obama Has Nominated Carla Hayden to Head the Library of Congress (video)
On 24 February 2016, President Barack Obama nominated Dr. Carla Hayden, currently the CEO of Enoch Pratt Free Library in Baltimore, to head the United States Library of Congress. In reaction news of the nomination, Aimée Lutkin wrote on the Jezebel website, “She just wants everyone to read, I’m actually weeping now.” As the President commented, “Dr. Hayden has devoted her career to modernizing libraries so that everyone can participate in today’s digital culture.” If confirmed, Dr. Hayden will be the first woman and the first African-American to serve as Librarian of Congress. Is it a coincidence the nomination took place during Black History Month? Read more>>

The Open Syllabus Project, Altmetrics, and a New Dataset
In a Scholarly Kitchen article, Joseph Esposito extols the virtues of the Open Syllabus Project (which we referred to in our Initiatives blog just this month). He also defends the metrics it uses, although noting that it needs refining. More intriguing are the unexpected and valuable possibilities Esposito sees in the Open Syllabus Project. Read more>>

Simplify open access by moving towards a unified policy

Jisc, the UK’s education-focused nonprofit for digital services and solutions, carried an interesting article on its website regarding open access academic publications. The author, Torsten Reimer, asks: “Is open access complicated?” If so, he argues, it is because of a lack of consistency across systems and policies. But it need not be so. Reimer provides some insight for a more unified open access ecosystem. Read more>>

New Routes to Library Success

Elisabeth Doucett, director of Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick, Maine, looks to the future of libraries in “a technology-driven, digitally dominated future.” As part of her out-of-the-box approach, Doucett discusses “what libraries can learn from the rest of the world” with Margot Atwell, publishing outreach lead at Kickstarter. They focused on the need to convey, enthusiastically and broadly, the role of the library as a source of human interconnectedness. Doucett lays out some suggestions. Read more>>

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