Virtual Reference Desk Work Group Minutes

July 13, 2001
CPE, Room B

Present- Houston Barnes, John Burch, Bryan Carson, Frank Davis, Warren Gray, Stacey Greenwell, Mary Taylor Hunstman, Sarah Jent, Jackie Kinder, Tanzi Merrit, JoAnne Nartowicz, Miko Pattie, Missy Townsend

We talked about guidelines for selecting sites, how to submit sites, looked at the Kentucky Stats project, the current Virtual Reference Desk pages, and the workgroup's workspace for this project.

We also looked at some of the reference questions that have been answered by the KYVL helpdesk to get a feel for the types of information people who come to the site are looking for. We looked at the current programs and courses offered by the KY Virtual University to get a feel for the potential information needs of KYVU students. Last but not least, we had a tour of the Virtual Library.

We are using the Library of Congress subject headings for our broad categories. The sites you see listed on the VRD right now are the result of our KYVL staff trying to get some sites up quickly. It is by no means complete. Many subject areas have not even been touched.

If there is a subject area that you are interested in doing that is not on the current list, let me know. Or if you just want a subheading rather than the entire subject, let me know. Even better, if you know somebody who has expertise in a subject area, try to recruit them for this project.

BIO Sheets-
Those present turned in a bio sheet of information for their bio which will be linked to their subject area. For those of you who were not able to attend, please send the following information to me by July 31st. You can look at the Kentucky Stats bios for an idea of what this will look like on the website.

Name
Affiliation/Job title
Email address
Mailing address
Phone number
Fax number
Work Experience
Educational Background
Whatever else you would like to include on your bio page

PICTURES-
The lucky ones present got their pictures taken for their bio page. For those of you who were not able to attend, please send me a picture of yourself by July 31st. You can email me a digital picture or send me a real picture and we will scan it.

CONTRIBUTORS-
A list of current contributors and their subject areas was distributed. These are-

Michel Atlas- Medicine and Nursing
Houston Barnes- Military History
John Burch- Native American History
Bryan Carson- Political Science and Law, Philosophy
Lynn Cox- Geography Frank Davis- Health
Warren Gray- African History, European History
Stacey Greenwell- Women's Studies, Poetry
Mary Huntsman- Public Policy, any U.S. history areas not taken by others
Sara Jent- Biology
Anna Marie Johnson- Foreign Languages
Jackie Kinder- Genealogy, General and Reference, Tech-General, Tech-HTML
Sheril King- Education
Tanzi Merritt- Archaeology, Anthropology, Alternative Medicine
JoAnne Nartowicz- Business Administration
John Schlipp- Music Amanda Townsend- Fine and Applied Arts
Terry Ward- Religion
Patricia Wilson- Children

WORKSPACE-
We have a workspace on the KYVL website.
Go to http://www.kyvl.org
Click on About KYVL
Click on Committees/Workgroups
Click on Virtual Reference Desk

Here you will find-
Our charge- To advise the Kentucky Virtual Library in evaluating, organizing and disseminating web-based information services and resources with an emphasis on Kentucky.
A list of members
Our listserv archives
Meeting minutes
Website selection guidelines
Submission Form to submit websites
A mockup of what VRD will look like
List of Topics
Available List of Contributors and their topics

Summary of Guidelines-
(See the Guidelines posted in our workspace for a complete list.) We will add websites that have been used to answer questions at the KYVL helpdesk, or support a KYVU course, or support research on the Commonwealth of Kentucky, or support the information needs of Kentuckians.

Websites selected should meet many of the same criteria you would apply to a reference book you are looking at adding to your reference collection. Authority, Objectivity, Reliability, etc.

Include an annotation of not more than 50 words. Use full sentences. You can look at the annotations on Kentucky Stats as a guide.

Include a brief introduction to the sites on your page. Again, you can use Kentucky Stats as your guide.

Websites should not charge for the information.

Maintain your page. Check for updated information, new sources, broken links, etc. and report them to me. We run a LinkAlarm report every 2 months to check for broken links and I will send you the parts of the report that apply to your page.

From time to time, users submit website suggestions to us. I will forward these on to you for you to decide whether or not they should be included on your page.

If you leave the project, the content on your page will remain and when the page is updated it will be credited to the new contributor. You will be listed as original contributor. See Kentucky Stats/ Geography for an example.

TO DO-
By July 31-Submit bio and photo
By August 3- Look at the current KYVL Virtual Reference Desk sites under your subject and evaluate what's there. Should they stay or go? Are the annotations okay? Email your evaluation to me by August 3. My email address is jackie.kinder@mail.state.ky.us If the subject you chose does not have any sites on the current KYVL VRD then you get to skip this step.
Anytime after August 3, you can start submitting sites for your subject by using the submission form on our workspace.

Have FUN! We can't offer you much except an interesting project to work on and all of us at KYVL appreciate your interest and willingness to work with us! Without your contributions of time, talent and knowledge, we would not be able to do this.

Last updated: 7/18/01