CR2 Blog

Atlanta, Ga., November 9, 2021: Equinox Open Library Initiative, a trusted leader in open source technology development and support for libraries is pleased to announce that Galen Charlton, Implementation and IT Manager, will be presenting at the Virtual VuFind Summit 2021. Charlton will be presenting “Updating the VuFind ILS Driver for Evergreen ILS'' on November 15 at 3:00 pm UTC / 10 a.m. Eastern. Registration is free and information can be found here: https://vufind.org/wiki/community:conferences:summit_2021

VuFind is a user-friendly, customizable, open source discovery layer designed to support searching and browsing all of the library’s items, including print and digital collections, institutional repositories, bibliographies, and other resources. It is a replacement for the traditional OPAC, providing faster search functionality, similar resource recommendations, and much more. VuFind is developed and maintained by Villanova University’s Falvey Memorial Library with contributions from many developers world-wide, and is suitable for libraries, museums, and archives. Equinox offers implementation and support for VuFind for Evergreen and Koha.

“Connecting the VuFind and the Evergreen ILS communities expands the capabilities of both open source projects and builds an important bridge to increase library capabilities for communities,” said Galen Charlton, Implementation and IT Manager. “I am looking forward to being a part of this year’s VuFind Summit to discuss the improvements we're making to the Evergreen connector for VuFind.”

Charlton is an active contributor to open source library communities, including Evergreen ILS, which announced the release of Evergreen 3.8.0 this week.

“Galen brings a wealth of experience and strong commitment to his work in open source communities and in libraries. His presentation at the Virtual VuFind Summit will showcase recent initiatives and present the opportunities of VuFind and Evergreen.” said Lisa Carlucci, Executive Director of Equinox Open Library Initiative.

Follow Equinox Open Library Initiative on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and Vimeo for the latest updates.

To receive news directly in your inbox: https://www.equinoxOLI.org/#signup

For more information:
Laura Barry
Communications Coordinator
Equinox Open Library Initiative, Inc.
EquinoxOLI.org
laura.barry@equinoxOLI.org
877.OPEN.ILS (877.673.6457)

About Equinox Open Library Initiative
Equinox Open Library Initiative is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization and is the successor to Equinox Software, Inc. Equinox's mission as a nonprofit is to promote and support a thriving ecosystem for open source library communities in order to provide libraries worldwide with innovative, affordable, and sustainable open source solutions. We are devoted to reducing barriers to library technology and services, expanding library access to open source software, and providing high quality technology, consulting, and support services.To learn more, please visit https://www.equinoxOLI.org.

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Exact Editions has partnered with Jisc to provide a new deal for further education (FE) colleges across the UK that is available until the end of March 2022.

The deal includes discounted prices on more than 70 prestigious titles across the platform that can be used as part of on-site teaching and home study. This partnership comes in recognition of the unprecedented financial repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic and represents a joint initiative to provide affordable subscriptions to FE institutions.

The bespoke collection was created as a result of feedback from the further education and skills (FES) sector and includes distinguished titles such as The TLS, Foreign Affairs and Le Monde Diplomatique and covers a wide range of topics from contemporary music to international politics and fashion.

Exact Editions transforms periodicals into fully searchable, intuitive digital editions, enabling staff and students to make the most of the extensive archives.

Institutional subscriptions are authenticated by IP-access for a seamless browsing experience, and there are also advanced remote access options that are particularly important in these challenging times. The archives are also accessible across web, iOS and Android platforms, and integrate into library catalogues with MARC records and KBART data.

See the available titles included in the deal here:

https://subscriptionsmanager.jisc.ac.uk/catalogue/2687

Louise Auckland, Licensing Manager at Jisc, said: “We are looking forward to working with Exact Editions on this exciting opportunity for FE colleges in the UK to expand their digital resources and to aid in teaching both remotely and in the classroom.”

Daryl Rayner, Managing Director of Exact Editions, said: “The archives covered in the agreement include hordes of important articles spanning decades and a variety of subjects. We are delighted to be able to facilitate the sharing of these rich collections of recent and back issues with FE colleges across the UK.”

About Jisc:
 
Jisc’s vision is for the UK to be a world leader in technology for education and research. It owns and operates the super-fast national research and education network, Janet, with built-in cyber security protection. Jisc also provides technology solutions for members (colleges, universities and research centres) and customers (public sector bodies), helps members save time and money by negotiating sector-wide deals and provides advice and practical assistance on digital technology. Jisc is funded by the UK higher and further education and research funding bodies and member institutions.  

For more information, please visit: https://www.jisc.ac.uk/

About Exact Editions:

Exact Editions is a digital publishing company based in London. It is a team of producers, developers and designers that turns periodicals with archives into dynamic, user-friendly digital editions. Exact Editions specialises in digitising content, selling subscriptions and providing streaming solutions across web, iOS and Android platforms. Exact Editions are also the innovators of ‘Reading Rooms’ technology, so publishers can provide streaming, time-limited, access to digital editions.

For more information, please visit: shop.exacteditions.com

New Learning Centers Provide Comprehensive Teaching and Learning Support of Primary Sources For Faculty and Students to Further Develop Digital Literacy and Critical Thinking Skills

FARMINGTON HILLS, Mich. – November 2, 2021 – Gale, part of Cengage Group, is helping faculty and students enhance their digital literacy and critical thinking skills. The company has launched its new Learning Centers for Gale Primary Sources. Built with the student researcher in mind, the Learning Centers orient new users to the content and topics available in a digital archive, spark inspiration for new research topics and provide guidance and best practices for searching, browsing, citing and reusing primary sources. The Learning Centers also provide faculty and librarians with an invaluable, all-in-one instructional tool that helps learners get acclimated with a primary source database, saving educators’ time creating teaching material. Now students can develop their digital literacy and critical thinking skills through practical examples and advanced search strategies, enabling better learning outcomes.

Read The Gale Review blog about how user feedback drove the development of the Learning Centers: https://bit.ly/3mEtIfK.

With fake news at an all-time high, the Learning Centers comes at a time when digital literacy has never been more critical. Stanford researchers found that 98% of high school students are unprepared to judge the credibility of information on the internet. The new Learning Centers provide equity of access into digital scholarship to build digital literacy skills that prepare students for their post-college careers.

“Exploring primary sources can be an empowering experience for the student researcher, allowing for open-ended inquiry and the development of critical thinking skills,” said Seth Cayley, vice president of global academic product at Gale. “The Learning Centers will help set students on that path, as well as provide instructors with tools to help tailor classes that are engaging with digital archives for the first time.”

The Learning Centers are organized in four key workflow steps: 1). Conceptualize 2). Find 3). Read 4). Use. The steps are based on the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL) and Society of American Archivists (SAA) Guidelines for Primary Source Literacy learning objectives. Each workflow section features detailed instructional content that’s engaging and accessible. The content in each individual Learning Center is tailored to the digital archive it supports. Content includes topic overviews, sample searches, essays by subject experts, step-by-step search strategies, case studies and discussion questions to encourage further exploration.

Gale Primary Sources that currently have Learning Centers enabled include:

• Crime, Punishment, and Popular Culture, 1790–1920
• Daily Mail Historical Archive, 1896–2016
• International Herald Tribune Historical Archive, 1887–2013
• The Mirror Historical Archive, 1903–2000
• Public Health Archives: Public Health in Modern America, 1890–1970
• Punch Historical Archive, 1841–1992
• Refugees, Relief, and Resettlement: Forced Migration and World War II
• Religions of America
• Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection
• Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Nichols Newspapers Collection
• The Telegraph Historical Archive, 1855–2016
• The Times Digital Archive, 1785–2019

For institutions who already have access to these archives, the Learning Centers are automatically enabled at no additional charge. More Learning Centers will be enabled in phases over time into all Gale Primary Sources.

For more information on the Learning Centers for Gale Primary Sources, visit: https://www.gale.com/academic/learning-centers.

Attending the 2021 Charleston Library Conference virtually, November 2-5? Sign up for a demo of the Learning Centers at the Gale virtual booth.

About Cengage Group and Gale
Cengage Group, an education technology company serving millions of learners in 165 countries, advances the way students learn through quality, digital experiences. The company currently serves the K-12, higher education, professional, library, English language teaching and workforce training markets worldwide. Gale, part of Cengage Group, provides libraries with original and curated content, as well as the modern research tools and technology that are crucial in connecting libraries to learning, and learners to libraries. For more than 60 years, Gale has partnered with libraries around the world to empower the discovery of knowledge and insights – where, when and how people need it. Gale has 500 employees globally with its main operations in Farmington Hills, Michigan. For more information, please visit www.gale.com.

Follow Gale on:
• Twitter - @galecengage
• Gale Blog - https://blog.gale.com/
• Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/GaleCengage/
• LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/gale/

The Koha Klassmates program was introduced back in 2015 by ByWater Solutions as a way to provide hands-on experience for Library School students before they enter the workplace. Koha Klassmates offers free hosted installations of the Koha Open Source ILS to library school instructors for use in their classrooms. Today, we celebrate six years and more than 40+ school programs that have implemented Klassmates.

William Helling, Associate Program Director, IUPUI Department of Library and Information Science, recently shared some feedback with us about the program and how his students have gained valuable knowledge from the program.

Many years ago, I decided to use the Klassmates program in my Library Systems class in order to give some hands-on experience to my students, many of whom had never seen an integrated library system interface before. I have continued ever since, building on this model, to have students involved in all aspects of creating a library with Koha from the ground up. Students are very grateful for the opportunity to learn how a system works at all levels, especially since they can use this knowledge in their careers. The Klassmates program allows me to educate current and future librarians in skills that they would not otherwise be able to gain.

Klassmates
ByWater Solutions supports libraries using Koha around the globe through our first rate support services and via the Koha Klassmates program.

Learn more about Klassmates and see who is currently using the program! https://bywatersolutions.com/klassmates.

Stephanie Reid, Professor at Mohawk College for the Library and Information Technician Diploma Program, recently shared feedback about the program.

Our program really wanted to provide students with a hands-on learning cataloging experience. Klassmates does this. After learning the theory, students apply it by inputting the data within the correct fields. The feedback has been very positive. Students feel like they are not only learning the material, but even better, they are learning how to apply it. This makes them more employable. It's real world experience.

About ByWater Solutions
ByWater Solutions is a full service, high quality Open Source support and implementation company dedicated to providing libraries with a lower cost, more advanced level of support for their systems than a traditional proprietary solution can offer. ByWater Solutions has a proven track record in first rate implementation and support services with library systems of all sizes for the Koha ILS, Aspen Discovery, Folio LSP, Coral ERM, and Libki PC Management.

Our highly ranked, comprehensive support is what sets our company apart from any other vendor in the industry. Partnering with ByWater Solutions not only lowers the cost of implementation and maintenance of OSS, but more importantly empowers libraries by giving them the flexibility and freedom they deserve. For more information please visit: https://bywatersolutions.com.

For More Information
Jessica Zairo
Director of Library Sales & Outreach
ByWater Solutions
bywatersolutions.com
Phone:(888)900-8944

Library Location: Penticton, British Columbia

Library Information: Municipal public library

Library URL: https://www.pentictonlibrary.ca

Discovery URL: https://search.pentictonlibrary.ca

Library Background
The Penticton Public Library is a municipal library located in Penticton, British Columbia, Canada, a community of 33,000 people. The city is situated in the south Okanagan Valley nestled between Okanagan Lake and Skaha Lake. The Okanagan Valley is part of the interior plateau known as the Okanagan Highland, surrounded by the Cascade Mountains in the west and the Monashee Mountains to the east. Library Service in Penticton began on Sept. 18, 1909, when the Penticton Public Library Reading Room and Library was opened.

When did you make the decision to switch to Open Source?
We chose to explore new ILS options in the Fall of 2020. Our major considerations were essential features, ease of use, and high value for the cost. As we learned more about the products in the marketplace it became evident that the open-source technologies functioned at a very high level. When conducting our evaluations, one advantage with open source was how easy it was for us to learn about these tools without having to wait for a library vendor to provide a full demonstration, or relying on the word of another library with different use cases than our own.

Why did you decide to move to Koha ILS?
Of the software products we learned about through live demonstrations, testing, and interviews, Koha ILS had the most intuitive interface, and the highest number of highly sought-out features. For example, it was very important to us that the ILS be accessible through a web browser: there is no desktop software to install, staff can have multiple tabs open to perform different types of work, and we can share URLs between staff for training and other purposes. Koha has some very significant features, such as batch modification tools and staged marc records management. There are also some smaller, quality of life tools that end up making a big difference, such as checkout receipt templating, and being able to keyword search system preferences.

How has the cost-savings helped your library?
We completed our migration this past summer. Over the life of our contract, we expect to experience significant cost savings as well as efficiency. This will free-up valuable resources to dedicate to enhanced patron experience.

How has this provided new ways of working for staff?
Our technical services department in particular has benefited tremendously from switching to Koha. For example, when we load vendor records we now have the ability to automatically add holdings information. The system will also do copy-adds when an ISBN match is found in the system. It’s also frighteningly simple to add Z39.50 indexes, meaning it’s easy to find marc records when we don’t have a suitable one available. Print on demand spine labels has also saved us valuable time.

We also have a homebound delivery service. Using a custom SQL report along with Koha’s housebound module we are able to create custom homebound delivery slips.

Quotes from Library Staff:
"OMG this is so much better" - Library page performing circ tasks in Koha for the first time!

"This while you wait feature is dangerous"- Heather Buzzell, Chief Librarian with way too many books on the holds list!

What challenge(s) was your library addressing by adding a discovery layer?
There have been a number of challenges we were looking to solve by switching to Aspen Discovery, but overall our goal was to better curate our collection and services via an online catalogue.

What integrations have you tied into Aspen Discovery?
Overdrive and Sydentics Unbound. We are also looking at making Aspen become our new website. Stay tuned!

Lessons learned from the migration?
Getting dirty manipulating library data is a lot of fun, and very important, but ultimately your job as the client is to be a good coordinator. Know when every meeting is well in advance (make a schedule!), know which topics are being covered and which team members you need to work with. Make sure you really listen to the needs of the other staff. Never make decisions in a vacuum. All of this will ensure your data gets migrated properly, that you have the settings configured beforehand, and that each team member has the proper training to do their job. Also, migration day is all about triage. If circ is working and patrons can access the catalogue, you’re 75% of the way there. We decided to stay closed for the first 4 hours of our go-live date and that ended up being a lifesaver.

Quotes from Patrons
I love that I can now review my reading history

Being able to place a purchase request and get immediate feedback on my request is very helpful