Resource Sharing

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Planning a summer vacation?

Wednesday, July 5, 2017

If your WISCAT library participates in ILL, and will be temporarily unable to process lending requests due to holidays, vacations, staff shortages, etc., you should suspend lending service. This will prevent lending requests from sitting in your pending file and expiring without a response. It's very easy to do using the Holiday List.

To update your Participant Record with a Holiday:

• Click Staff Dashboard to access the administrative modules
• Under the ILL Admin menu choose Maintain Participant Record
• Click the Holiday List link at the top of the page or scroll down to that section in the record
• Enter the Start and End dates using the format MM/DD/YYYY
• Click the Submit button at the top right or bottom right of the record

It is suggested you begin your holiday suspension the day before the last work day you will be gone. This ensures that any requests caught in between the current day and the holiday may be moved along while staff is still available. Please check Pending requests at the end of your work day. NOTE: Your staff and patrons can continue to request items while the suspension is in effect.

Suspending ILL service is completely separate from holdings updates. You can continue to add, change, and delete holdings in the WISCAT database regardless of your ability to participate in ILL.

Enjoy that vacation!

Written by: Christine Barth, Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning

Updated Proxy Configuration Help

Thursday, July 6, 2017

The BadgerLink team recently updated our proxy recommendations in the BadgerLink Set-Up Guide. We were able to determine that, when set up correctly, a proxy both works with and overrides our own authentication. This is good news, as it ensures that usage is attributed to your institution’s account for the purpose of collecting accurate statistics, and also ensures that your users don’t need to both log in to your institution’s platform and the BadgerLink authentication. Special thanks to Katherine Fish of the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and Sue Crouch and the IT department at Southwest Wisconsin Technical College for giving us an inside look at their proxy configurations.

The BadgerLink team recommends sharing the IP address of your proxy server via the Contact Us form, and using the authenticated URLs listed in Column E on the BadgerLink Resource URLs Google Sheet to build your proxy URLs.

Please contact us with any questions, and check out the BadgerLink Set-Up Guide for more information on integrating BadgerLink with your technology to provide better access, whether you’re at a K12 school, public library or library system, academic or technical college library, health science library, or other organization.

Written by: Elizabeth Neuman, Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning

Gail Murray Joins the WISCAT Team!

Wednesday, June 21, 2017

The Department of Public Instruction's Division for Libraries and Technology is very pleased to announce that Gail Murray has accepted the position of WISCAT Technical Coordinator at Resources for Libraries and Lifelong Learning. She will officially begin transitioning to her new role on Monday, June 26th.

The WISCAT Technical Coordinator is responsible for administering, configuring, supporting and maintaining the statewide Interlibrary Loan platform, comprised of union and virtual library catalogs and an interlibrary loan management system, for use by public library system staff and library staff in public, school, special, and other types of libraries. Gail will also be responsible for compiling and reporting statistics, creating WISCAT documentation, and investigating and implementing enhancements to improve resource sharing in Wisconsin.

Gail has worked for the Department of Public Instruction since June 2015 as the Content Management and Outreach Librarian for the BadgerLink program. In that role, she provided technical support, training, and contributed to the overall vision of the program. Because BadgerLink uses the same underlying software as WISCAT for user authentication and federated searching, Gail is already very familiar with the software and configuration of WISCAT.

Before working at DPI, Gail earned her Master's of Science in Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. While there, she was a supervisor at the Ikenberry Library as well as working on marketing, outreach, and assessment in the Residence Hall Libraries. She also worked as an outreach intern for electronic resource vendor Credo Reference, where she worked with libraries across the country to increase visibility of their online resources on their websites and discovery layers.

Gail grew up in a small town in central New York. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics at SUNY Binghamton and worked for several years in hospitality and customer support roles while volunteering at local libraries prior to beginning her graduate studies.

Gail will be an outstanding addition to the WISCAT team and will help continue to improve resource sharing in libraries throughout Wisconsin. Please join me in welcoming her to this new role!

Gail can be reached at (608)224-5394, gail.murray@dpi.wi.gov.

Written by: Ben Miller, Resources for Libraries and Lifelong Learning

4th Annual Great Lakes Resource Sharing Conference

Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Guest Post by Margaret Chambers, Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois

Great Lakes Resource Sharing Conference logo

Join your resource sharing colleagues in Oak Brook, IL on June 8-9 for the 4th Annual Great Lakes Resource Sharing Conference on June 8-9, 2017. Register by May 26 to take advantage of the early registration fee of $95.

This conference is designed to support resource sharing efforts in public and academic libraries throughout the region and offers a cost-effective way to gather ideas for collaboration, marketing, streamlining workflows, and staying on top of changes in resource sharing.

Sessions will include:

· Cross-Training Established Staff in Interlibrary Loan Procedures

· Enriching Your Wealth of Resource by Marketing ILL

· Talk Amongst Yourselves: Improving System-to-System Communication to Speed Request Processing

· People Can Make the Difference: Staff Roles in Resource Marketing and Education

· Trying to Jump-Start Collaborative Collection Development: Finding Simple Methods for Effective Cooperation

Corey Seeman, Director of Kresge Library Services (Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor) and manager of A Library Writer’s Blog, will deliver the keynote address: History Has Its Eyes on You: Lighthouses and Libraries Weathering Storms of Change.

To register, or for more information, visit the conference website.

Written by:
Margaret Chambers
Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois

Customize WISCAT Patron Email Notices and more

Tuesday, January 3, 2017

WISCAT logo

WISCAT can help notify your library patrons when their interlibrary loan items arrive.

Up to five interlibrary loan (ILL) statuses may be selected to initiate automatic email notices to patrons. Staff may customize the message for each status selected such as Received in the Patron Notification Set-Up section of the library's WISCAT Participant Record.

Then,when an ILL request is updated to Received status by staff, a notice is automatically sent to the patron’s email address.

Your message may be entered above or below the following pre-set fields (limit 1400 characters):
- Name: #Patron's First Name# #Patron's Last Name#
- Pickup at: #Pickup Location#
- Title: #Title#
- Author: #Author/Creator#
- Edition: #Edition#
- Description: #Physical Description#
- Series: #Series#
- Request Date: #Request Date#
If desired, the Due Date field may be added to display in the email notices.
- Enter the label you want the patron to see and then the field code such as Date Due: #Due Date#

Customized email message sent to patron stating: The following item is available for pick up at the Circulation Desk — See the Patron Email Notification Set-Up Guide for more information.

New Feature Coming -- Customize ILL Request Tracking Messages

Starting January 11th, staff will be able to customize the messages patrons see in their ILL Request Tracking accounts. This new feature will also enable staff to configure the text that displays to guest users when setting up an ILL Request Tracking account.

If a library chooses not to configure their own messages, the standard messages will continue to display by default.

Items from Other Libraries - Standard message for request in Awaiting Approval status displays as: This request is awaiting approval by staff — My Account -- Patron ILL Tracking

Patron Tracking option available in ILL Admin menu on Staff Dashboard — ILL Admin Menu

ILL Admin Patron Tracking screen shows text boxes for customizing — Patron Tracking Admin Screen

Questions? Contact WISCAT Staff

Written by:

Vickie Long, Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning Team

Create Links in WISCAT for Your Library Users

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

WISCAT Support Form Link for Staff

Recently, the Link Page function was used to make the WISCAT support form readily accessible to all staff logged into their libraries' WISCAT. Be assured, only WISCAT staff can create and add a Global Link Page to every library's WISCAT.

WISCAT Support link displays in toolbar above Staff Dashboard and image shows partial view of support form — Staff access link to WISCAT Support form

Why a WISCAT support form?

The form should ensure your messages go to the right place and are responded to as quickly as possible. WISCAT staff monitor the inbox Monday-Friday 8:30-4:30.

Library staff are welcome to:

Ask questions about WISCAT features and functionality
Report issues encountered using WISCAT
Upload an image (gif jpg jpeg png) to assist in troubleshooting

Local Link Pages

WISCAT staff aren’t the only ones who can add helpful links for their library users in WISCAT, local library staff are able to create customized links, called Local Link Pages, to display in one or more of the user environments in the library's WISCAT: Guest, Patron, Staff

These links will be accessible above the Home page, Staff Dashboard, Advanced Search, Search Results (Gallery, List, Grid views), and in a full record display (View Details).

A few possibilities for links:

Guest and/or Patron users
- Overdrive
- BadgerLink
- Your library website home page
- Library Social Media page(s)

Link to BadgerLink home page displays in toolbar of library's WISCAT — Library created a link to BadgerLink for Guest users of its WISCAT

Patron users (logged into WISCAT)
- Local guide to creating interlibrary loan requests
- Login screen for your library licensed resources
Staff users (logged into WISCAT)
- Book Kits and/or In Constant Demand lists
- Login page to your library's Staff Only tools
- SCLS statewide Delivery Network List

Book Kits link in toolbar displays only to library's staff and opens to current list of kits libraries are willing to lend through interlibrary loan — Library created a link to Book Kits list for its staff logged into WISCAT

Ready to get started?

See the step by step guide for staff to Create Local Link Pages

Personal Note:

Another reason I want to encourage staff to use the WISCAT support form is my upcoming retirement from state service. For over 26 years it has been my privilege to assist library staff in using WISCAT. Thank you and best wishes for the great work you do serving your library communities and beyond through resource sharing.

Written by:
Vickie Long, Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning Team

Posted by Vickie Long

Resource Sharing Statistics in WISCAT

Thursday, February 16, 2017

Statistics demonstrate the value of interlibrary loan (ILL) to funding sources and management, help to improve ILL services, and measure effectiveness of those improvements.

The Statistics menu on the Staff Dashboard provides various ways for libraries to monitor their interlibrary loan activity and other WISCAT usage. Some of these reports are described in this post.

ILL Statistics:

Activity and Request Reports - generate detailed reports on your library's borrowing and lending activities

Reports are based on origination date of requests.
Status of these requests continue to change from day to day until all activity on the request has ceased; therefore, numbers in an earlier report will be inconsistent with a later report covering the same specified time period.

Activity reports (your library as borrower and as lender, and net activity per library trading partner) -- provide total numbers of ILL requests per status; Filled column is number or completed requests (all activity has ceased).

Request Records (your library as borrower) and Lender Response Records (your library as lender) reports -- provide detailed information for each ILL request

Activities and Request Reports screen shown with Select Format menu open to choose HTMP, PDF, or EXCEL — Activities and Request Reports screen

To produce reports:

select the start and end dates
choose a format
1. Activity report options are HTML, PDF, or EXCEL
2. Request Records and Lender Response reports in EXCEL only
select the report type, then Submit

CONTU Copyright Tracking Reports - shows the number of article copies your library requested from specified journal titles and whether each request was filled or not.

To produce report:

enter year such as 2016
select one of the Summary reports or the Detailed report then Submit

Borrower Statistics* - shows the number of all active and completed ILL requests created and processed by your library as a borrower for a specified week or month.
Lender Statistics* - shows the number of all active and completed ILL requests received and processed by your library as a lender for a specified week or month.

* These Borrower Statistics and Lender Statistics reports:

count actions taken on active requests in the specified time period
after the specified time period has passed, these numbers do not change (in contrast to the Activity and Request Reports)

Lender Days to Supply - provides historic data on the time taken to fill ILL requests by your library as a lender during a given report period (for the borrowing library to receive the requested material). Each report period is one month long.

Database Statistics:

Database Field Stats - shows general information on the number of bibliographic and locations (holdings) records in the WISCAT Union Catalog, and if your library holdings are in the Union Catalog, provides detailed MARC Field statistics for your library.

Statistics Report - generate reports on the number of logins to your library's WISCAT, number of searches by guest/patron/staff, and if your library has holdings in the Union Catalog, number of locations added to records by staff (not by batch update).

More information?

Use the Help from within each statistics report page in WISCAT.

Access the User Guide: Statistics Version 5.0e from the Documentation menu on the Staff Dashboard by selecting User Guides and then the Statistics guide relevant to the SHAREit product -- This guide does not currently cover some recent changes to the Statistics module; therefore,

for a detailed description of the Activity and Request Reports option, select Bulletins in the Documentation menu, then open the Preliminary Software Update Bulletin for January 2017 Release of Version 5.0.18 for SEARCHit/SHAREit , see pages 47-63 in the Addendum to that bulletin.

Written by:

Vickie Long, Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning

Posted by Vickie Long

Show how libraries share

Thursday, February 23, 2017

Guest Post by Maureen Welch, Indianhead Library System

As public libraries finish submitting their annual reports, it's time to use the numbers you have gathered along with any pictures you take to tell the story of how your library is serving its community. (See blog post on WISCAT statistics https://goo.gl/obLBmo ) A large part of the story is showing how libraries and library systems work together to share resources. You have interlibrary loan stories to tell!

What have you received from other libraries this year? Books, DVDs, CDs, microfilm, photocopies, and more books. Paint the picture with a few details:

Picture books for story time.
Research books for a National History Day project.
Large print mysteries, westerns, and romance.
Maker kits for programming.
Doctor Who
Microfilm to research the town's history.
Diabetic cookbooks and exercise DVDs.
Extra copies of a title for a book club.
A copy of an obituary for a genealogist.

What have you loaned this year? Books, DVDs, CDs, and more books. Take a picture:

Book club kits.
A local author's new book.
Prince & Wham CDs.
Biographies and political histories.
Gluten free holiday cook book.
Mysteries, westerns, and romance on CD.
Fake book of wedding music.
Civil war history for a re-enactment

It's time to show off how your library serves its community by providing access through sharing. Plus, remember to include a picture of the incoming/outgoing courier bins to show Wisconsin has a statewide delivery network that helps all our libraries share in a more cost effective way.

Celebrate completing your annual report. Share your stories. Keep painting that picture for next year's report.

Written by: Maureen Welch, Indianhead Library System

Posted by Christine Barth

Document Delivery - an important part of ILL service

Wednesday, March 29, 2017

For those unfamiliar with Resource Sharing, an important part of this service involves Document Delivery. Full text scholarly journal articles are rarely freely available online. They live behind pay walls that make these articles inaccessible without a subscription. With increased visibility online, patrons are easily finding citations, but are unable to obtain the article. A single article can cost anywhere between $30-$50. Enter Interlibrary Loan. Patrons can create an ILL request for a photocopy of an article through their local library – all at no direct cost to them. Provided the photocopy complies with copyright law, articles are sent via OCLC’s Article Exchange or via PDF email attachment. In many cases turnaround time is 48 hours.

This service supports many diverse individuals and institutions in our communities. It helps students succeed, small businesses to grow and create new jobs, supports research in state agencies and more. From a few satisfied customers…

WITC logo

The Wisconsin Indianhead Technical College:

“Wow! I have to tell you I have had incredible luck getting these requests filled. I can say that out of the last 50 requests I have had one turned down. That is amazing!

Thank you for this incredible service you provide for our students.”

The Eastern Shores Bookmobile

"I'm Chris, an R&D Chemist at a Wisconsin plastics company. When I started working there 8 years ago, the company had 56 employees. Now we have over 600. Part of that success is due to the development of new products, which is my job. The most important tool I have for new product development is my library card.

Over the years I have acquired many primary literature articles through interlibrary loan through the
Eastern Shores Bookmobile. Using that data as a foundation for my research, my company has filed for several patents and created hundreds of professional jobs during one of the worst recessions in America's history. Knowledge is power, and your library card is the key; all you need to do is find your lock."

Green Bay West High School

Green Bay West Wildcats logo

"Our students are completing internal assessments for International Baccalaureate and the extended essay. The assignments range across the curriculum.
We would not be able to support their research without ordering articles full text through interlibrary loan. We REALLY appreciate this service.
Thanks so much!"

Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources

Wisconsin DNR logo

“Thanks very much for the quick acquisition of these studies. Great work as always. We certainly appreciate it.”

Written by: Christine Barth
Resources for Libraries & Lifelong Learning

Posted by Christine Barth

Planning a summer vacation?

Tags

Updated Proxy Configuration Help

Tags

Gail Murray Joins the WISCAT Team!

Tags

4th Annual Great Lakes Resource Sharing Conference

Tags

Customize WISCAT Patron Email Notices and more

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Create Links in WISCAT for Your Library Users