Minutes of VIVA Outreach Committee, February 2, 2001

Present: Ralph Alberico (chair), Jack Bales, Pat Butler, Patricia Hardesty, Berna Heyman, and Ginger Young

Ralph called the meeting to order and introduced new member Virginia "Ginger" Young from Randolph-Macon College. Ginger replaces Sharon Goad, who resigned from the Outreach Committee.

We discussed our forthcoming "VIVA Across the Curriculum" Forum during the first part of the meeting.  Betsy Wilson was a favorite speaker whom we had selected earlier, but she told Ralph that she cannot attend.  Susan Curzon's program is something of a model across the country and we selected her as our top choice,  with number two being Cerise Oberman. Ginger suggested Patricia Iannuzzi at Berkeley, a third choice. Berna added that if our first speaker cannot make it, perhaps she could recommend someone.

Discussion centered around the venue for the meeting, for we realized that before we set a date, we need to check on the availability of facilities. Possible sites were Charlottesville and Williamsburg, with May 21, 23, 24, 30, 31, and June 1 as suggested dates. Although Williamsburg is not as centrally located as Charlottesville, committee members favored this site. Not only is Berna at William and Mary, thus providing an on-site coordinator, but we hoped that the historic qualities of Williamsburg would attract meeting attendees. If the meeting were held on a Monday or a Friday, some persons might want to make a three-day
weekend out of the program. Pat Butler said that if our speaker can't make one suggested date, then maybe we could move it to accommodate her. 

Berna said that she will check on the facilities at William and Mary and will also contact Linda Lester at the University of Virginia. Once the venue is set, Ralph will contact the speaker. Ralph will also talk to Kathy Perry about possible limits on the number of persons from each institution allowed to attend, since there are
some eighty VIVA institutions that will receive invitations.

Ralph's program draft mentioned only one speaker, but Ralph said that members of the Steering Committee thought that two would be preferable. The committee felt that one speaker is enough, especially as we are having a panel of librarians from Virginia to talk about some of their experiences. Possible panel
members included Lynn Cameron from James Madison, Craig Gibson from George Mason, Karen Hartman from Mary Washington, Dan Ream from VCU, and Don Welsh from William and Mary. Discussion arose about having a panelist from a community college, with some committee members feeling that we should not be concerned about having a mix of institutions, but should be more concerned about new ideas and what each panelist can bring to our meeting.

Much discussion centered around the format of the program. In some meetings, the principal speakers have been in the morning, with discussions of their remarks in the afternoon. On the other hand, if the panel of librarians took place first, then perhaps the main speaker and participants in the break-out sessions could
address some of their comments in the afternoon. Some committee members disliked break-out sessions and the final wrap-up meeting, as they felt too little was accomplished. Berna suggested the term "collaborative planning session" instead of "break-out" meeting. Each person who registers for the meeting would be required to submit a discussion topic related to VIVA resources. The Outreach Committee will go over the topics and select ones that will be discussed at the various collaborative planning sessions. Suggested topics that the committee came up with were developing good assignments, evaluation of VIVA resources, smart
database searching, how to teach faculty about databases, faculty politics, assessment, from computer literacy to information literacy, distributive learning, and marketing.

A possible schedule for the day was outlined:

9:30-10:00 am Coffee
10:00-10:45 am Welcome, introduction, and overview
10:45-11:00 am Break
11:00-12:00 Speaker
12:00-1:00 pm Lunch
1:00-2:00 pm Panel (speaker, librarians, and moderator)
2:00-3:00 pm Concurrent collaborative planning sessions

Instead of the usual wrap-up session, a recorder for each planning session could give the committee a summary of the comments. The committee could go over these summaries, make recommendations, and put them on our Web site.

Registrants will be encouraged to bring multiple copies of handouts for distribution.

The last part of the meeting was devoted to the discussion of the VIVA Web page. Ralph distributed several pages showing how he had divided the VIVA links into several categories: "Information for Faculty and Students," "Information for Decision Makers," and "Information for VIVA Members." Some suggested
changes to the headings included "Information for VIVA Users" instead of "Information for Faculty and Students" and "General VIVA Information" instead of "Information for Decision Makers."

Ralph asked what he next step should be. We thought that it could all be put on the Web server at VCU and John Duke could handle it, but Kathy Perry needs to have a role in this as some of it is on the server at George Mason. Patricia volunteered to help with this project. She will talk with Kathy and perhaps come up with a new directory structure.

---Submitted by Jack Bales, Mary Washington College, VIVA Outreach Committee member