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PCC Participants’ Meeting Summary
Gonzales Convention Center, Room 217B
Program for Cooperative Cataloging Chair Mark Watson, University of Oregon, called the meeting to order with a general welcome to a standing room only group. He gave a quick introduction to the nature , structure, and current personnel of the PCC–officers, committees, working groups, and LC staff. State of the Program In the past fiscal year, the PCC membership topped 500 institutions. Among these are the Harvard Yenching Library in BIBCO, the National Indian Law Library in NACO, and a new NACO and SACO funnel centered on the University of the West Indies. Statistics, too, were good for the past fiscal year. Those for the first two months of the current fiscal year are ahead of last year. For details, please visit the PCC Statistics. PCC Strategic PlanningWatson introduced to the general membership the current draft PCC Strategic Directions for 2006–2010 with a brief review of past efforts. A home page called PCC 2010: Planning for the Future has been created and outlines the strategic directions and contains relevant documents. Significant among these documents are five vision statements authored by members of the PCC Policy Committee: Andrew MacEwan (BL), Judith Nadler (University of Chicago), Carlen Ruschoff (University of Maryland), Roxanne Sellberg (Northwestern University), and Beacher Wiggins (LC). A quote from each of these papers was used to introduce each of the new Strategic Directions:
Each of these five Directions was discussed in some detail with related goals. Watson asked members to continue discussion among themselves, on the PCC lists, and to make comments to PCC officers. The final version, with tactical goals, should be completed at this November’s Policy Committee meeting. Keynote Speaker Chair emerita Roxanne Sellberg introduced featured speaker Karen Calhoun, Assistant University Librarian for Technical Services at Cornell University Library. Her topic was entitled "On Competition for Catalogers". Calhoun deliberately used an ambiguous title. While her discussion did deal with some of the competition faced by catalogers in preserving their profession, it also refers to the competition that could exist for catalogers and for their services if the profession adapts to the new "global infosphere". She had no doubt that catalogers, the most flexible people in the profession today, would be able to do so. The challenges facing catalogers include the affordability and scalability of our services; the competition within libraries for resources to develop library services; changes in information seeking behavior; the slow disappearance of catalog librarians; the reduced significance of the catalog in information seeking; and the debatable future of the discrete individual library catalog. At one point, Calhoun mentioned that 89% of college students begin looking for information using popular search engines while two per cent start their searches on library Web pages. Catalog use represents some subset of that 2 per cent. These obstacles to the continuing life of the profession can just as easily be seen as opportunities for professional development. One of the great contributions of catalogers to researchers is that the cataloger enables the searcher to work independently, without intervention. This great savings in time and trouble to the user must be re-directed from the inward-looking ILS containing only one institution’s holdings outward to the global infosphere as a whole. In this re-direction, some catalogers will find that they can continue much as they now do, in the anticipated expansion of special collections, archives, and other areas that will require familiar workflow. Other catalogers will find that, with a little skills training and perhaps new thinking, they will become the sought after metadata specialists of this new information world. Their skilled is still needed and still appreciated (if unknown to the general populace of users). In closing, Calhoun reinforced her contention that catalogers must re-think their role and not identify the product (a catalog, a bibliographic record) with the actual service of providing information directly to the user. In a discussion moderated by Mechael Charbonneau, PCC Chair Elect, with the participants, Calhoun agreed with audience members that there is more to catalogers’ survival than their own re-tooling. While catalogers might re-tool, re-position, and prepare themselves for the changed world, library management must also adapt to new conditions while allowing staff to do so. Further information from this stimulating discussion can be drawn from the draft paper on which it is based, at DSpace at Cornell University: Item 1813/2231 This presentation given at the MidWinter ALA meeting entitled "On Competition for Catalogers" is also provided here as a PowerPoint file. Et in Acadia Ego
At the very end, Mark Watson, PCC Chair, presented a special gift from the entire PCC, a selection of choice Oregon state wines and made a token presentation of two special bottles. A small reception followed, rapidly augmented by others in the information community whose other ALA duties had prevented their attendance at the participants’ meeting.
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With the conclusion of this Participants’ Meeting, John D. Byrum, chief of
the LC Regional and Cooperative Cataloging Division and the PCC Secretariat,
brought to a close a career of almost thirty years at the Library of
Congress. A warmly appreciative panel of professional friends spoke of his
many and lasting contributions to the library world. Present and former PCC
Chairs Mark Watson, Karen Calhoun, Michael Kaplan, Carlen Ruschoff, and
Brian Schottlaender (through remarks read by Beacher Wiggins, LC Director
for Acquisitions and Bibliographic Access) reminisced of the lessons learned
and wisdom derived from Byrum.
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