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Tentative Timeline for U.S. National Libraries RDA Test
January 25, 2009: The Library of Congress, National Agricultural Library, and National Library of Medicine hosted an invitational meeting during ALA Midwinter Meeting to present initial plans for the RDA testing project and solicit feedback and expressions of interest.
February-March 2009: The US National Libraries RDA Test Steering Committee, co-chaired by Beacher Wiggins, Dianne McCutcheon, and Chris Cole, refined the test methodology and the criteria for selecting test partners.
March 19, 2009: The US National Libraries RDA Test Website is launched. All parties who attended the kickoff meeting at ALA Midwinter Meeting and others who have contacted the Steering Committee receive an email announcement that the Website is available and are encouraged to submit applications to participate as test partners.
April 13, 2009: Deadline for individuals and institutions who are interested in participating in the test to send their expressions of interest to Susan Morris at smor@loc.gov using the fill-in PDF form [PDF, 309KB] available on this site.
May 1, 2009: The US National Libraries RDA Test Steering Committee completes the selection of 20 test partners and informs them as well those who could not be selected.
July 12, 2009: The Library of Congress, National Agricultural Library, and National Library of Medicine host an information session during ALA Annual Conference for the twenty selected test partners. The session will be Sunday, July 12, from 1:30 to 3:00 pm, place to be announced.
The test period will begin after the test partners receive access to RDA Online.
Test Days 1 through 90: Test partners use this three-month period to become familiar with the content of RDA and with navigating RDA Online.
Test Days 91 through 180: Test partners produce records in the test and share them with the US National Libraries RDA Test Steering Committee.
Post-Test Days 1-90: The US National Libraries RDA Test Steering Committee analyzes the results of the test and prepares its report to the management of the three national libraries.
After Post-Test Day 91: The report is shared with the US library community.