c o n n e c t i c u t ’s
r e s e a rc h e n gi n e
V o l um e 1 1, Is s ue 3 A pr i l 2 0 1 2
THE ICONN TIMES INSIDE THIS ISSUE:
iCONN Excels in Focus Groups
P.1
What Users are Saying
P.1
iCONN Budget Cuts
P.1
iCONN Testimonial
P.1
Direct Linking to iCONN
P.2
Audiobook Updates
P.2
Images & Readers’ Advisory
P.2
Promoting Awareness
P.2
Audiobook Training
P.2
reQuest Billing
P.2
iCONN Testimonial The benefit to the ultimate users—researchers, recreational readers, business people—is incalculable. - Brian Rogers, Frank L. McGuire Maritime Library, Custom House Museum, New London
iCONN Excels in Focus Group Results Based on LSTA-related focus group meetings with public, school and academic librarians conducted in 2010 and 2011, iCONN, including the statewide library catalog, consistently ranks in the top tier of State Library services most important to libraries. In the most recent survey, a large percentage of respondents gave high scores (and many testimonials) to iCONN for: the degree to which the program has had a positive impact on library services in their library the degree to which the program has had a positive impact on library services statewide In the 2010 focus groups, when asked to state which three Connecticut State Library services were the most important to them, public, school and academic librarians designated iCONN, reQuest and the Connecticar delivery service as the top three.
What Users Are Saying About iCONN Access to the databases through iCONN has had a tremendously positive impact on the quality of information our students now use for their studies and research projects. - Nancy Florio, Library Director, Canterbury School, New Milford iCONN brings information to my desktop that I would not have access to unless I had an expensive subscription to an information aggregator. iCONN definitely increases the value of a CT library card, indeed it is the most valuable resource available through my library card… - Dr. Peter Kramer, patron iCONN is fantastic! Thank you! - Tiffany Cunningham, patron
iCONN Budget Cuts—Again In FY 2012, the iCONN database line item absorbed a mid-year 5% budget cut of $81K—with no loss of resources by using a combination of surplus money and LSTA funds. The reQuest line item wasn’t cut. The budget proposed by the Governor for FY2013, which combines the iCONN and reQuest line items into a single line item, was also cut 5% ($110K). To address this shortfall, we: secured commitments from all vendors to hold FY 2013 rates to current rates, even though all contracts allowed for increases secured a commitment from Gale to further reduce fees by $25K by eliminating Books & Authors plan to eliminate all cover art & professional reviews from reQuest ($33K) Together, these actions reduce the shortfall to $30K. If there aren’t sufficient federal funds to absorb the 30K, it may be necessary to cut another database.
Page 2
OneClickdigital Audiobooks Training Below are free training opportunities for staff and patrons from Recorded Books: Staff—1 hour Tue, May 8, 2012 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM EDT
Tue, May 29, 2012 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM EDT Patron—45 minutes Tue, May 1, 2012 3:00 PM - 4:00 PM EDT To register click on the links above.
reQuest Billing Invoices for 2012/2013 reQuest services will be mailed: After July 1 for public, academic, and special libraries. After September 1 for school libraries. reQuest fees will remain at the current prices for the coming fiscal year. To change any of your services, please contact Gail.Hurley@ct.gov by June 15. Renewal forms will not be sent. The iCONN Times is a quarterly publication of iCONN— Connecticut’s research engine. Find it on the Web at:
http://is.gd/uuzZnu under “Promotional Materials” iCONN 786 South Main Street Middletown, CT 06457 (860) 704-2220 or toll free (888) 256-1222
V o l um e 1 1, Is s ue 3
Direct Linking to iCONN Did you know that it's possible to link directly to iCONN's databases? For example, the young school searcher can go directly to Kids InfoBits or Discovering Collection with direct links. In public libraries, HeritageQuest is a link your genealogical searchers will appreciate. And academic libraries may want to link directly to CINAHL with Full Text for nursing students, and the ABI/Inform suite for business majors. These are only a few of the databases you can link to in iCONN. The links are stored in documents (Word or PDF, your choice) linked to from this Web page: http://www.cslib.org/iconnsitemap/staff/urltable.aspx They are divided up for academic, public, high school, middle school, and elementary school libraries. Questions? Contact Eric Hansen at 860-704-2224 or Eric.A.Hansen@ct.gov.
Recent Updates to iCONN’s Downloadable Audiobook Service Recorded Books has recently made improvements to OneClickdigital, iCONN's downloadable audio book service: In the OneClickdigital Media Manager for Windows, users can now see which title is downloading and the progress of each title, and they can download one title at the same time as they listen to playback of another. In the OneClickdigital web site, users can now limit searches to only titles that are available for checkout. This is available in the Advanced Search tab and in the results/filter area of search results. OneClickdigital has released a Media Manager plugin specifically for the Mac. OneClickdigital Apps for the iPhone, iTouch and iPad are now available in the iTunes store. It requires OS 10.6.x or higher to download, install and use.
Coming Soon—Images & Readers’ Advisory To partially compensate for the previous loss of AP Images and the anticipated loss of Books & Authors on July 1, we worked with the iCONN Database Committee to develop two directories of freely accessible resources: Images—searchable libraries of images and photos with an emphasis on “kid safe” and copyright-free resources Reader’s advisory services—matching readers to what they want to read
Promoting Awareness of iCONN A link to iCONN’s Testimonials was added to the main iCONN landing page at iCONN.org. A 60ft. iCONN banner was placed in front of the State Office Building (near the Bushnell and State Capitol) during April 9-16. It will be placed in the same location during May 28 – June 3. iCONN and the Connecticut Association of School Librarians (CASL) shared an exhibit booth at CEA’s New Teachers Conference on March 31.