All Kentuckians will have equitable access to quality library and information resources and qualifiedwell-trained staff to support the Kentucky Virtual University as well as meet broader needs for learning, working, and living.
The KYVL resources and services level the playing field for all KYVU students and Kentuckians in their pursuit of lifelong learning. All 4 million citizens of the Commonwealth can use the KYVL through the KYVL Gateway or the following libraries:
The cost savings realized through statewide purchasing and management for electronic resources and services is significant. In the licensing of electronic databases alone, the current contracts would have incurred $20 million more if libraries subscribe to these 30+ databases individually.
By setting up an infrastructure to undertake the digitizing project, the statewide courier service, a common library system, and other services, the KYVL makes it possible for Kentucky libraries to offer these services to their users at very little cost.
KYVL is an easy, convenient one-stop shop for quality information resources and services. Working with librarians in the state, the KYVL uses the vast collections housed in Kentucky libraries and the selective electronic resources on the Internet to meet Kentuckians’ information needs.
More than 30 databases with close to 5,000 full text journal titles are available to any KYVU student or Kentuckian from home, office, school, or local public library. The only requirement is to be a registered user of any participating library. Some of these databases are available in Spanish, French and German. Through October 2000, KYVL users have conducted a total of 4,621,828 searches against these databases, an average of 385,152 searches a month.
With hub sites at the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville, the KYVL Endeavor Consortium allows public institutions to use a common library system and share the server administrative costs. It also presents a unique opportunity for small libraries without adequate information technology support to automate their operations. This past year we saw the implementation of Endeavor Voyager system not only at the eight public universities and the Kentucky Community and Technical College System, but also at Lexmark, Norton Hospital, St. Catharine’s College, and the Kentucky
Department for Libraries and Archives.
As part of the KYVU Call Center staff, two reference librarians work closely with other librarians in the state to provide high-touch assistance for the user community. Through December 2000, the Help Desk has answered a total of 1,728 questions, an average of 101 questions a month.
This self-paced online tutorial is designed to help users use the Internet and library collections to find and evaluate information, conduct research, and use these resources responsibly. From March to August 2000, this tutorial has received a total of 122,311 hits, an average of 20,385 hits a month.
Digitizing special collections and archives housed in Kentucky libraries and making these treasures available online to schoolchildren, researchers, and the world is a long-term project. This past year we have set up the server and software, established a statewide metadata standard to describe digital objects, digitized 1,500 finding aids from 11 libraries, selected target collections to be digitized at the central lab, trained 34 archivists, and released the official Web site.
To make the vast collections housed in Kentucky libraries more readily available, the KYVL has brought 16 libraries’ online catalogs together and given them a common look and feel. One only needs to type in a search once and it will show which of these libraries has what’s needed.
Fifty-one libraries have the Ariel Internet faxing system to share journal collections. From August to October 2000, these libraries have transmitted a total of 14,618 articles for their users, an average of 4,872 articles a month.
The KYVL statewide courier service extends to186 libraries all over the state. This delivery service, inaugurated in August 2000, puts all library collections at the disposal of all citizens in a timely manner. From August to October 2000, a total of 17,826 items have been trucked among these libraries for their users, an average of 5,942 items a month.
To promote the use of KYVL services, the staff designs face-to-face training sessions and takes them to all corners of the state. For this past year, the KYVL staff has conducted a total of 58 training sessions with 1,167 participants. These participants include school teachers and students, college faculty, librarians, and citizens.
Working with librarians in the state, the staff selects, annotates, and organizes Web sites to complement the licensed databases and library collections. Through December 2000, a total of 691,370 searches have been conducted against these Web sites, an average of 49,383 searches a month.
Partnering with the Kentucky Department of Education and teachers, the KYVL is building a portal for teachers. It includes tools, curriculum guides, lesson plans, Web sites, and electronic databases. Work groups are gathering information resources and defining design principles for portals for kids and parents.
Library users will be able to initiate an online request for books they find through the online catalogs on the KYVL Gateway and will be able to pick up these books at the library near them as quickly as 24 hours.
Users will be able to simultaneously search external Web sites selected for KYVL portals along with library catalogs and electronic databases.
A comprehensive portal for Web sites that contain Kentucky statistical information will prove useful for students and researchers.
Young children and their parents will learn research skills and how to look for information on the Internet. The design will be kid-friendly and the content will help with classroom lessons.
KYVL will work with the Department of Adult Education and Literacy in building an all-in-one portal for resources, databases, curriculum products, and tools to be used by instructors and adult learners.
House Bill 1, the Kentucky Postsecondary Education Improvement Act of 1997, places responsibility for the development and operation of the Kentucky Virtual University with the Council on Postsecondary Education with advice from the statutorily established Distance Learning Advisory Committee. The virtual library is a unit of the virtual university. Building on a solid foundation of collaboration established by the Kentucky Library Network and the State-Assisted Academic Library Council of Kentucky, the KYVL was officially launched November 1, 1999.
The building of a statewide virtual library depends on a large group of librarians, state network administrators, university chief technology officers and policy makers to come together with a common vision. This we did with the Virtual Library Advisory Committee, formerly Steering Committee, and 10 work groups, each with one area of responsibility and with representations from all user communities. The staff works closely with these groups to improve and increase KYVL services.
For 1998-2000, the state legislature allocated $3.5 million bond fund to set up the technical infrastructure. This includes the purchase of library workstations, Internet faxing systems, server hardware and software, library management software, the Kentuckiana Digital Library’s server hardware and software, and its digitizing contracts.
For 1998-2002, the KYVL annual operating fund is $2.5 million. The participating libraries contribute $1.018 million towards the total licensing fee of $1.8 million for electronic databases. The operating fund also supports server maintenance, statewide courier service, Kentuckiana Digital Library, and information literacy programs.
Last updated 2/14/01.
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