Librarians & new faculty services

AALL has been hosting discussions online about new faculty services. It has not really gone very far yet, but it should be interesting to watch. In the meantime, I was struck by an article that appeared in the Chronicle of Higher Education recently, Nov. 21, 2008 Faculty column. If you have a password, you can use that link to read the full article, by Jennifer Howard, titled "for Advice on Publishing in the Digital World, Scholars Turn to Campus Libraries." It appeared on page A8, for those who want to see it in print.

The article describes the role of the "university librarian for scholarly resources" at Brown University. The position combines advice on copyright, fair use, open-access, digital publishing and dissemination options, as well as assistance from a top-notch reference and research librarian. The article reports other libraries' naming similar positions "Scholarly Communications -" or Copyright- or IP-Librarians.

The Association of Research Libraries lists "Scholarly Communication" as one of its strategic directions, and I take this to include such new developments in librarianship. I think this is an important service that we can provide to our faculty. It is very labor intensive, but it will be a huge benefit to our faculty. I think we have to do it.

Once again, Super Librarians to the rescue!