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On
February 2, 2004, ASERL began providing approximately 84 hours of chat-based
reference service to users at nine participating member libraries.
The complete project
proposal is available, as well as a
summary of project
benefits and costs. Additional
information about the project is available at
www.ask-a-librarian.org.
Participating Libraries
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College of William & Mary
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Florida State University
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University of Alabama
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University of Central Florida
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University of Memphis (beginning Ocotber 2005)
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University
of Mississippi
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Mississippi
State University |
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University of North Carolina at Charlotte
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Virginia Commonwealth University
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ASERL's
Virtual Reference Steering Committee met on October 16th to discuss initial
project planning needs. Please see the meeting
minutes. Other meeting materials:
The virtual reference program was developed based on several sources of information:
1. In December 2001, ASERL
surveyed our members to document current practices and determine the need for
a cooperative service. The survey form, executive summary, and
full survey results
are available online.
2. In May 2002, ASERL created two working groups to address our
primary interests for v-Ref programming: Software Review and Best
Practices. Meeting notes from these groups are available
online:
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June 17, 2002
joint organizational meeting of the two Working Groups.
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July 10,
2002 Software Review Working Group conference call meeting. In
July 2002, the Working Group evaluated 10 virtual reference software
packages. Click here to view the software evaluation worksheet. (NOTE: The ASERL software evaluation
worksheet draws upon previous work from the State
Library of Washington, University of Waterloo, and Steve Coffman's upcoming book, "A Virtual Reference
Primer." Many thanks to those resources for their
assistance!)
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Based on this review, ASERL selected OCLC's
QuestionPoint service for a group licensing offer through June 30, 2003. ASERL
members may learn more about this offer and subscribe to the service by
contacting John Burger.
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August 7,
2002 Best Practices Working Group conference call meeting.
The group interviewed representatives from a dozen virtual reference
services to identify best practices in several key areas. Click here
to see the interview
worksheet.
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May 2, 2003
meeting of ASERL directors and interested staff to review final proposal,
interview OCLC staff about software capabilities, and seek participation
commitments.
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Questions about this program may
be submitted to John Burger (jburger@solinet.net).
ASERL
The
Association of Southeastern Research Libraries
1438 West Peachtree Street, N.W., Suite 200
Atlanta, Georgia 30309-2955
404.892.0943 -- voice
404.892.7879 -- fax
800.999.8558 -- toll-free
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