First Contact:Establishing the USC Digital Library

Catherine Quinlan, Dean of the USC LibrariesHugh McHarg, Executive Director, Communications and Public Programming

Outline The USC environment

The Essential Library

Mission and vision

The USC Digital Library

Philosophy, infrastructure, practice

A look into the USC Digital Library

Basel Mission Image Archive, mashups, and outreach

The USC Environment Academic units

College of Letters, Arts, and Sciences

Graduate School

17 professional schools

Student profile Undergraduate: 16,500

Graduate and professional: 17,000

International students: 5,900—most of any U.S. university

Faculty and staff profile Full-time faculty: 3,200

Staff (50% time or more): 8,500

Examples of Major ResearchCenters and Institutes

Center on Public Diplomacy

Center for Religion and Civic Culture

East Asian Studies Center

Institute for Multimedia Literacy

Shoah Foundation Institute for Visual History and Education

U.S.-China Institute

The USC Libraries 22 libraries and information centers

200 faculty and staff members

250 student worker FTEs

4 million volumes

103,275 serial titles (print and electronic)

316,000 electronic books

3,192,538 visual items

Collections Highlights California and history of the American

West

Cinematic and performing arts

East Asian studies

Iberian and Latin American studies

Natural history

Philosophy

The Essential Library

The USC Libraries will be an innovative, inspiring, and integral partner in the scholarly achievements of USC faculty, students, and staff.

In so doing, we actively contribute to the development of knowledge and the advancement of society.

The USC Libraries’ Vision

We will build:

A dynamic intellectual and physical environment that will attract and retain top-tier students, faculty, and staff and encourage the creativity necessary to support the global ambitions of USC.

The USC Libraries’ Vision (cont’d)

We will build:

Vital partnerships, through which we will develop interdisciplinary collections that support faculty teaching and research, student learning, and the cultivation of critical-thinking abilities.

The USC Libraries’ Vision (cont’d)

We will build:

An agile, progressive culture of ubiquitous service that connects our users with relevant information.

The USC Libraries’ Vision (cont’d)

We will build:

An appreciation of the value of past knowledge, in all its forms, and its role in informing the scholarship of the future.

The USC Libraries’ Vision (cont’d)

The USC Libraries’ Mission

The USC Libraries actively support the discovery, creation, and preservation of knowledge. We develop collections and services that support and encourage the academic endeavors of faculty, students, and staff; build a community of critical consumers of information; and help develop engaged world citizens.

Imperatives and Objectives

To ensure ready access to existing resources and to develop focused collections that support effective learning, exceptional teaching, and innovative research at USC.

Review digitization activities and develop a plan for future growth.

Digitization objective

Collections imperative

Task Force Findings Digital projects and services in silos

The Digital Archive

USC Institutional Repository

AIMS—Archiving, Indexing, and Metadata Services

Discrete faculty-driven projects; result of actively seeking to engage

Task Force Findings Needed a deeper relationship with

collection development, including:

Formal mechanism for review

More subject librarian participation

Unified framework for green-lighting projects—collections, technology, funds, faculty advocates

Task Force Findings Persistent questions among our users

What is the approval process for digital projects?

What are the libraries’ responsibilities? What are my responsibilities as a content owner?

Will you build—and maintain—a custom interface?

When I donate a collection, is it automatically digitized?

The USC Digital Library

Digitization Philosophy A program of digitization, rather than a

digital archive

Digitized collections must be accessible through our primary catalog

Project decisions must be transparent and communicated to partners and within the libraries

Focus on accessibility and sustainability vs. customization, however…

Digitization Infrastructure

…build so that assets are retrievable from secondary interfaces

Currently using Documentum

Technical

Organizational

Formal Digital Library unit and with a director

Reports to the associate dean for collections

Digitization Practices Digital Library Selection Advisory Committee

Technical expertise

Subject knowledge

Metadata specialists

Established selection criteria Relevant to educational and research mission of USC

Legal right to provide online access

Inventory and metadata available

Feasible with existing or potentially obtainable resources

Status and documentation published online

State of the USC Digital Library2007 Digital

Archive Records: 125,307

Assets: 155,897

2009 Digital Library Records: 200,500

Assets: 255,93517 New Collections, Including:

Basel Mission images

Los Angeles Examiner

Russian satirical journals

Sea of Korea maps

A Look into the USC Digital Library

Basel Mission Image ArchiveDistributed Content ContributionMashups, Outreach, and Community

1.

USC Digital Library

digitallibrary.usc.edu

2.

BaselMissionPhotos

3.

BaselMissionPhotos

4.

DistributedContentCapture

5.

DistributedContentCapture

7.

AlternateInterface

8.

VisualInterpreterby Rahul Mehrotra, Sharada Dwivedi

9.

VisualInterpreterby Emmanuel Akyeampong

10.

RussianSatiricalJournals

11.

RussianSatiricalJournals

12.

RussianSatiricalJournals

13.

GoogleMapInterface

14.

Google-FlickrMashup

15.

TwitterOutreach

16.

MediaResource

17.

MediaResource

18.

PrintExhibitions

Special ThanksMatt GainerDirector, USC Digital Library

Chris MendezWeb Applications Developer

Joyce OuchidaSenior Web Developer

Wayne ShoafHead, Technical Services

Tim StantonProject Manager

Jon VidarMultimedia Services Developer

Questions