Vol. 13, #2 Spring 2008

News from the Field

Texas Christian University

TCU welcomed Melissa Fairfield as our new Government Information Reference Librarian in December 2007. Melissa comes to us with a strong subject background in government (she has both a BS and an MA in government). She will be the coordinator for our federal, Texas, and EU depository programs and also be a member of the Reference staff and work as a subject liaison to the Political Science Department at TCU. We are excited to have Melissa working with us!

--Brenda K. Barnes

Texas Tech University

The Texas Tech University Library is undertaking some new initiatives. During the Fall 2007 and Spring 2008 semesters, some improvements are being implemented:

  • Beginning Spring semester, faculty will no longer work day, evening, or weekend service desks but will be on call. Students will staff all public service desks and the Reference Desk will be replaced by a 2nd Circulation Desk in the Reference Room. Online chat will be handled by trained SAs with back-up from librarians. Staff from Information Services will also be moved around within Information Services and OutReach to better meet our goals.
  • Library faculty will be making unprecedented outreach to their liaison areas, establishing regular contacts with faculty, establishing office hours in departments, meeting regularly with graduate students, and working on a more pro-active basis to provide library instruction to their departments when research assignments are given.
  • The print Reference collection and the separate Career, Scholarship, and Writing Resource Collection with the Texas public school textbook collection will be moved to Stacks to provide more study areas and room for computers. Important resources from this collection will be documented on the subject librarians' websites.
  • The Documents Space Recovery Committee continues to work closely with GPO and our Administration to solve the space crunch of our physical collection. The Committee is looking at a combination of off-site storage and digitization of non-depository material.
  • As part of our Strategic Plan, Texas Tech is interested in providing outreach through the regional depository. I would be interested in hearing how Texas Tech could facilitate training and other services to our Selectives and also the many non-depository libraries in our area. I believe we have funding to assist in hosting and underwriting outreach programs throughout our Region and in cooperation with Sue Troyan and the Texas State Library.

--Tom Rohrig

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