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Attendees: Paul Hicok, Jeff Cannell, Phil Ritter, Pat Nonamaker, Barbara Nichols Randall, Deborah Canzano, Lenny Zapala, Jo-Ann Benedetti

Discussion centered on Rachel’s report on the Online Databases for 2004. Regarding the trial databases, Barbara said that members of the Adult Services Advisory Council (ASAC) should discuss the options as a group and make their recommendations to CLAC. Rachel said that a meeting to do that had been set up for this past June, but revision of the iPAC took precedence. It was reported that some members of the Youth Services Advisory Council (YSAC) would prefer that the trials not take place during the summer due to the Summer Reading Program.

§ It was agreed that Books in Print Online, EBSCO, InfoTrac, and Reference USA should be retained. These products are heavily used, and libraries depend on them for reference use.
§ Grolier should be reconsidered due to inadequate use. The question came up about whether an online encyclopedia is really necessary. The reasons given were that new computers come bundled with an encyclopedia, free encyclopedias are available
on the Internet, and member libraries have their own resources.
§ Hoovers should be reconsidered because the vendor could not provide statistics on use and we may already have adequate business resources with EBSCO, InfoTrac’s Business and Company Resource Center, and Reference USA.
§ Grangers should be reconsidered because the statistics seemed out of proportion with poetry as a research topic. It was felt that schools may be the primary users of Grangers.
§ Learnatest should be reconsidered because use is concentrated within just a few libraries, there is a conflict with the statistics provided by the vendor, and the database cannot be used on the Gates computers.

The suggested additions – Oxford Reference Online, Children’s Literature Comprehensive Database, and World Book – the group referred to the two advisory councils to discuss. APLM is interested in Heritage Quest and EBSCO’s Auto Repair Reference Center.

It was agreed that both the ASAC and YSAC should meet and discuss the options and report back to CLAC with their recommendations. The groups should take into consideration the costs of all options and whether coverage of the topic areas is already available through another resource.

Another consideration is the databases that the member libraries purchase on their own: TROY buys ValueLine. APLM buys NoveList. EGRN buys WilsonWeb. BETH buys EBSCO’s Academic Search Elite, Business Source Elite, Health Source Consumer Edition, Newspaper Source, and Computer Source; Grolier’s America the Beautiful, Lands and Peoples, New Book of Popular Science (and Biographies); WilsonWeb Biography Reference Bank; Facts on File Curriculum Resource Center and World Atlas; Gale Literature Resource Center and Student Resource Center Junior; and ProQuest Historical New York Times.

Both advisory councils should also recommend their preferred month for trials of databases to take place.

The next meeting will be held Thursday, October 23, 2003 at 9:15 AM at APLM