Faculty Meeting: The Fly’s View
by Field Correspondent Mel Goff

            In last month’s Bibliofile, we were all informed that students are allowed to attend the DLIS faculty meetings, held on the first Wednesday of each month at 10:00 a.m. The meetings are normally held in the sixth floor conference room, but the November meeting was relocated to room 501 in response to expressed student interest in attending. The move was sadly unnecessary: only two students attended the meeting. In the hopes of generating more interest, Bibliofile shares some student-perspective observations.

            The students were welcomed to the meeting by Dr. Maggie Kimmel, and the faculty was receptive to our presence. The Dean gave a report on the budget and other issues from “on high” (that’s really high on this campus!), including the importance of professional websites. The financial news is “what was expected.” In other words, the budget’s tight, but not any worse than anticipated

            Digital libraries, anyone? Yes, that did come up. A new program, the Digital Libraries & Information Management, was put on the table for consideration. This program is designed as a joint venture between Pitt’s DLIS and CMU. As outlined in the proposal, the DLIM is a 48 credit-hour track in the MLIS degree program. There were quite a few questions raised, particularly in reference to the hours and how this new program would tie in (or not) with the current Digital Libraries specialization. This discussion was moved to e-mails, with the topic to be revisited at the December meeting.

            Also presented to the meeting was an eight-page report regarding the FastTrack program. This also generated extensive discussion. Questions about how the program was evaluated and procedures for admitting students “outside of a cohort” were asked. The report was sent back to the committee for revision and will be resubmitted at the December meeting.

            A committee to study questions and concerns about policies for Field Experience was formed. The needs for uniformity and designated contacts seem to be the primary motivating factors.

            The digital libraries specialization was briefly revisited later in the meeting, since it was an item on the agenda. The faculty approved having XML offered in the summer term, provided an adjunct professor agrees to teach it. During this part of the meeting, Dr. David Robins made certain the students attending had the opportunity to ask any questions or make any comments they felt appropriate. Uncertain about the status of the DLIM vs. DL specialization, this writer asked again how those two apparently distinct programs would fit together. It was clarified that this was part of the discussion that had been moved to e-mail along with the entire DLIM proposal, and would reappear on the December agenda.

            Is there something you’d like to bring before the faculty? Or would you just like to have a feel for what happens at a faculty meeting? Then take advantage of the welcome extended! If you have something in particular you want to say, it would be a good idea to write something down and discuss it with your advisor and/or Dr. Kimmel, just so room can be made on the agenda. But be advised: the December agenda has a lot of November stuff on it!