CRPLSA

Council of Regional Public Library System Administrators

Tag: Minitex

Minitex to enhance eBook app

Library users will more easily access eBooks across multiple systems thanks to SimplyE, a free app from phones and tablets that is being further developed at Minitex.

SimplyE, developed by the New York Public Library, eliminates the need for a user to switch between multiple eBook vendor apps to access collections from a single library.  Minitex developers will enhance the functionality to allow users to access eBooks from their public library, their college library, and other shared collections. The work is funded by a $695,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

ELM Expo

PrintJoin fellow librarians from across southern Minnesota to learn more about ELM – the Electronic Library for Minnesota.

This day-long training event will provide the chance to explore in-depth all that ELM has to offer.  Minitex librarians will  provide training on the specialized databases and participants will discover which database is best for what. Learn with the experts about how to best search, save, and share the  results as well as how to teach accessing the database resources to users back home. Various database vendors will also be on hand to talk about new resources, interfaces, and features.  All levels of experience welcome!

Saturday, November 5, 2016 | 9:30 am – 3:30 pm
Minnesota State University Library – Mankato
601 Maywood Avenue, Mankato, MN
$25 per person registration fee – Participation limited to first 100

Sponsored by Traverse des Sioux Library Cooperative, SAMMIE, SELCO/SELS, Minitex, and Minnesota State University-Mankato.

MNLINK Discovery Layer

All new this week — the MNLINK discovery interface.

This easy to navigate new search tool provides library users access to library collections around the state, as well as the Electronic Library for Minnesota, Ebooks Minnesota, Minnesota Reflections and much more.  In celebration of this new service, Minitex created a fun and informative video introducing MNLINK to library users.

Libraries may add a link or embed the video on local websites so patrons can learn more about the new MNLINK.  Enjoy!

Coming Soon – New MNLINK Interface

MNLINK Logo - 2016MNLINK is getting a face-lift this  fall!

Sporting a new logo, the greatly improved user interface will feature responsive functionality, allowing users access on the go and from any device.  While a bigger launch announcement will come at a later date when the interface goes live, some pre-launch items have been created for library staff.

The MNLINK Marketing Committee has prepared information for distribution to patrons and staff which you can download, print, and cut as needed.  The announcement to patrons conveys the message about the change to the user interface that is coming soon.  The committee has also created a FAQs document to assist your staff in responding to user queries.  We expect to update the FAQs as we hear more from you about the information users are seeking.

Please access the links below for these materials:

MNLINK quarter sheet 

MNLINK FAQ

Share the FAQs with staff so they’re prepared and share the quarter sheets with the public so they know what’s coming.  The MNLINK Marketing Committee is currently working on new brochures and bookmarks that will be made available prior to the implementation of the new system.  Training webinars will be provided to alert staff of the functionality that the new interface brings.

MNLINK Marketing Committee Members

  • Nick Banitt (Minitex)
  • Carrie Braaten (Anoka County Library – MELSA)
  • Marjorie DeJong (PLS)
  • Sarah Hawkins (ECRL)
  • Zach Miller (Minitex)
  • Becky Ringwelski (Minitex)
  • Reagen Thalacker (SELCO)

Leap Day Launch Ebooks MN

ebooks MN logoEbooks Minnesota launches today!

Ebooks MN is a collection featuring content from Minnesota’s independent publishers. Today’s opening-day collection includes about 2,500 titles, and Minitex plans to add more soon.

Ebooks from ABDO, Lerner Publishing Group, and Cherry Lake Publishing make up a significant part of the school-age collection. Ebooks MN also includes scholarly and literary titles from the University of Minnesota Press, Milkweed Editions, Coffee House Press, and Arcadia Publishing/The History Press. These independent presses publish ebooks on a wide variety of topics and genres from sharks to the black death and from graphic novels to literary fiction. Ebooks MN also includes titles about Minnesota, such as Twins Baseball and Legendary Locals of Crookston, that were published outside the state. There is no limit to the number of titles that can be checked out at any time and readers can keep titles as long as they wish.

Minitex will manage access to Ebooks MN using the familiar IP-range method used for the Electronic Library for Minnesota. No digital rights management (DRM) is required. Minnesota will have permanent access to these titles, there is no limit to the number that can be checked out at a time, and readers can keep them as long as they wish.  As with ELM, there is no additional cost for libraries to use the collection. Be sure to watch and share our introductory video, and download the app from iTunes, Google Play, or for your Kindle Fire.

Ebooks MN is a two-year pilot project of the Minnesota Department of Education, State Library Services and Minitex. The collection is made possible in part by funding from the Minnesota Department of Education through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services and by Minitex. The initiative originated from the 2014 Explore eBooks MN Summit and from the contributions of librarians across the state.  

Ebooks MN Training

Minitex Ebooks MN no txtEbooks Minnesota webinar with Q&A

Date:  February 17, 2016
Time:  11:30 am – 12:30 pm

Ebook MN Registration

This webinar will provide a detailed overview of Ebooks Minnesota on the BiblioBoard Library platform. Attendees will gain an understanding of the parameters and focus of the program from a Minitex team member, followed by a demonstration of the navigation and content on BiblioBoard, the PatronsFirst mobile library.

OCLC Reclamation Webinar

Staff from libMnLink Logoraries  interested in the reclamation offer for the MnLINK Gateway transition to OCLC WorldCat Discovery are strongly encouraged to attend a 60-minute OCLC webinar to learn more about the project. The webinar will take place on Thursday, October 29 at 1:00 PM and will be recorded for later viewing. This webinar will cover the same material as the OCLC Reclamation webinar that took place on October 6. All locations currently represented on the MnLINK Gateway are eligible for the reclamation. For more information about the project, please review articles previously published on Minitex News or contact Becky Ringwelski.

No registration is required.

MnLINK OCLC Reclamation Webinar
1:00 PM CDT, Thursday, October 29, 2015
Follow this link to join the meeting
Join by phone: 1-877-668-4490 (toll free) or 1-408-792-6300
Phone access code: 716 748 480

Go Back to School with Schoolhouse Rock!

MinitexJoin Minitex and the University of Minnesota Libraries Regional Depository Library in new webinar series, Go Back to School with Schoolhouse Rock!. This series will focus on the three branches of the U.S. federal government.

Tuesday, October 13, 2015
2:00 PM–3:00 PM (Central Time)

This webinar will focus on the legislative process and locating legislative resources. Before the session, learners will watch Just a Bill from Schoolhouse Rock!. Riegelman and Beck will elaborate on the content in the video and use it to test your knowledge. By starting with this video intended for an elementary audience, we will layer on more advanced content about the legislative process as well as guidance on tools that are available. Meet us in this liminal space as we transition from novices to experts.

Attendees will be able to identify the steps that a bill takes to become a law (and the pitfalls in between!). An understanding of the legislative process as well as an awareness of the freely available and fee-based tools will help attendees tackle challenging patron inquiries about legislative information.

Presenters:
Amy Riegelman
University of Minnesota Librarian of Government Information, Psychology, Educational Psychology, and Child Development

Lynne Beck
University of Minnesota Library Associate, Access & Information Services

Total Boox and New Ebook Pricing Models

MinitexTotal Boox and New Ebook Pricing Models
Wednesday, September 30, 2015
11:00 AM–12:00 PM (Central Time)

The shift to ebooks has wrought many changes in the library market. Most of them haven’t worked to our advantage. But there are some interesting new business models. In this webinar, presenter Jamie LaRue focuses on a company called Total Boox, which allows for unrestricted downloads, multiple use at the same time, no holds, no waiting, for all titles. How do they make money? The library pays only for what gets read (not what gets checked out). But this means that libraries (and publishers) get a rich new source of data: what percentage of books do people actually finish? Does it vary by genre? What might this mean for collection development?

Presenter:  James LaRue writes, speaks and consults about the future of libraries, with a focus on organizational and leadership development. As the former director of the Douglas County (Colo.) Libraries, he established a library managed ebook content delivery platform that garnered international attention. He is also author of “The New Inquisition: Understanding and Managing Intellectual Freedom Challenges” (Libraries Unlimited, 2007).

EBooks, Patrons, Libraries, and Consortia

Minitex grahicEbooks, Patrons, Libraries, and Consortia: Past, Present, and Plans for the Future

Tuesday, September 22, 2015 at 1:00 PM–2:00 PM (Central Time)

Greg Pronevitz, executive director of the Massachusetts Library System and stakeholder in a statewide ebook platform servicing over 400 libraries, will discuss consortial ebook platforms and their history, present, and plans for the future among library consortia. Our patrons who have patience have grown accustomed to state-of-the-art library platforms and can navigate the maze of links and authorizations required to check out ebooks. Those without patience buy their ebooks from commercial providers. Greg believes that libraries can succeed in serving current ebook patrons and many new ones as the years go by if they work together.

Presenter:  Greg Pronevitz is the founding executive director of the 1,600-member Massachusetts Library System (MLS). He has 17 years experience at the CEO level at MLS and one of its pre-merger components. He spent nine years managing the provision of services to libraries in a consortial environment at OHIONET.

Greg is an advocate for consortial services. He has written and spoken frequently on library delivery service. He was a key player in the formation of the Digital Commonwealth of Massachusetts (one of the Digital Public Library of America’s founding hubs). At MLS, Greg has worked with main partner the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (the state library agency) and other stakeholders to pilot a statewide ebook platform that has been expanded in beta and has grown to more than 400 subscribing libraries called the Commonwealth eBook Collections with access to some 170,000 titles.

And Greg has a Minitex connection: He was co-author/editor with Minitex director, Valerie Horton of the 2015 ALA Editions book Library Consortia: Models for Collaboration and Sustainability.

MnLINK Gateway RFP Committee Chooses OCLC

Minitex grahicThe MnLINK Gateway RFP (Request for Procurement) Committee successfully concluded its process by signing a contract with OCLC for their discovery and interlibrary loan solutions on July 2, 2015. The patron interface, OCLC’s WorldCat Discovery, is being customized to meet the needs of libraries and users in the Minitex region. For the next few years, the interlibrary loan function will continue to use the VDX ILL software currently used on the MnLINK Gateway, and will be replaced by WorldShare Interlibrary Loan when OCLC completes the customizations required to meet Minitex needs.

OCLC’s discovery system will be a major improvement for users searching for books, digital images, electronic content, and ebooks using the MnLINK Gateway. Minitex hopes to implement this interface in January 2016. All libraries on the MnLINK Gateway must have their holdings catalogued on OCLC in order to be included in search results. Holdings for all locations need to be up to date in order for WorldCat Discovery to be an effective tool to search library collections. A one-time batch loading reclamation is included in the contract at no extra charge for libraries with either OCLC Cataloging or CatExpress subscriptions. The reclamation must be completed by June 2018, and Minitex encourages libraries to do this as soon as possible. The contract also includes a mechanism to enable the four non-OCLC cataloging libraries currently on the Gateway to be represented in the catalog.

Minitex thanks the committee members who dedicated their time, energy and expertise to this project. We also want to acknowledge the many institutions that generously supported their participation on this committee.

MnLINK RFP Committee Members

  • Nick Banitt – Minitex
  • Ken Behringer – Dakota County Library
  • Mary Lou Dresbach – Minnesota Office of Higher Education
  • Ruth Dukelow – CLIC
  • Sonja Eilertson – PALS
  • Raquel Franklin – Minitex
  • Cheryl Hill – SELCO
  • Ann Hutton – SELCO
  • Karen Kilbride – Hennepin County Library
  • Emily Kissane – Minnesota State Library Services
  • Nicole Murphy – Lake Agassiz Regional Library
  • Dixie Ohlander – Augsburg College
  • Becky Ringwelski – Minitex
  • Greg Sauve – Rochester Public Library
  • Jill Smith – Anoka County Library
  • Darla Sorenson – Traverse des Sioux Library System
  • Paul Swanson – Minitex

More information will be forthcoming. In the meantime, please email Becky Ringwelski or call 612-624-0375 if you have questions.

MnLINK Gateway Product Demos

PrintThree vendors have been invited to demonstrate their solutions in response to the MnLINK Gateway RFP that was issued in October 2014. Each vendor will be spending one day with the MnLINK Gateway RFP Committee. Minitex has set aside two hours each day for a public demonstration of the products being considered. The sessions will all be held online via webinar from 8:30-10:30 AM.

The schedule of companies and dates for the public demos are:

  • Wednesday, February 25, 2015 – Relais International
  • Thursday, February 26, 2015 – OCLC
  • Friday, February 27, 2015 – Innovative

The product demonstrations will also be available for later viewing for those of you who aren’t able to attend the live session(s). Information on accessing the demonstrations will be provided in the coming weeks.

LARL, SELCO and TdSLC currently have staff members serving on the RFP Committee.  For more information contact the Mintex office.

Minnesota Electronic Health Library

Minitex outreach logo

Supporting a Healthy Minnesota: Introducing the Minnesota Electronic Health Library

Reliable, high-quality health information is costly, resulting in uneven access across our state. This system of unequal access contributes to significant health and health care disparities. To address this problem, the Health Sciences Libraries at the University of Minnesota have developed an initiative called the Minnesota Electronic Health Library, or MeHL for short.

Our vision for MeHL is to support a healthier Minnesota by providing 24/7, online access to evidence-based, clinical care information to people throughout the state: health care providers, particularly in rural areas; students in health-related programs; and citizens who need to make informed decisions about their own care. Join us to learn more:

Webinar:  Supporting a Healthy Minnesota: Introducing the Minnesota Electronic Health Library (MeHL)

Date and Time:  Monday, December 15, 2014, 2:00 PM–2:45 PM

Register now!  There is no fee to attend this webinar.

This presentation will:

  • Explore the need for MeHL and the types of resources that it could include;
    discuss the critical role that public and academic libraries play in connecting people to health information;
  • outline a current legislative request to fund MeHL; and
  • offer ways in which you can actively support it.

Presenter:  Janice Jaguszewski, Associate University Librarian and Director, Health Sciences Libraries, University of Minnesota

New ELM eRources

PrintMinitex recently finalized negotiations with LearningExpress, LLC for

  • Learning Express Library 3.0
  • Computer Skills Center
  • Job & Career Accelerator 4.0

These online resources are part of a larger suite of eReources made available through the joint efforts lead by Minitex with participation from the Minnesota Department of Education – State Library Services, the Minnesota Office of Higher Education, Online Dakota Information Network, the North Dakota State Library, South Dakota Library Network, and the South Dakota State Library.

Minitex announcement of the complete suite of eResources

Minitex seeks public libraries for digital project

PrintMinitex is looking for public libraries with collections of historic images or 1- or 2-page documents (maps, etc.) that would be of sufficient quality and interest to digitize for inclusion in the Digital Public Library of America (DPLA ).

Minitex has been awarded a DPLA grant from the Gates Foundation. The grant will  provide training and support for public libraries to participate in DPLA through Minnesota Digital Library (MDL).

Following the parameters of the grant, Minitex will host three training sessions in upcoming months to prepare and enable public libraries to contribute content to the DPLA through the MDL. In these workshops, public library staff will learn how to work with MDL to select content for digitization and/or identify existing digital content and have MDL digitize and provide metadata and contextualization for that content, and determine potential themes for DPLA Exhibitions. The training will be free and costs for scanning and much of the metadata creation will be covered by the grant.

In Minnesota, most local historic and archival collections are held by local historical societies. Minitex needs information about local library resources. Specifically — Does a library have:

  1. Historic or archival material that would be appropriate for this sort of project?
  2. A close relationship with the local historical society such that someone from the library might be able to facilitate a collaborative project with the historical society and their materials?

For more information or to suggest a library with historic items to contribute email Carla Urban, at Minitex/MDL or contact her via phone, 612-624-4002 or 800-462-5348.

Minitex Minutes

Minitex Minutes logoLooking for easy info on statewide library services?

Minitex,a frequent collaborator with CRPLSA, offers a new video series, Minitex Minutes on the Minitex YouTube channel.  Minitex Minutes provides a brief opportunity to meet the staff behind the scenes, learn about about current projects, and hear about partnerships with other statewide and national groups.  Recent Minitex Minutes  include: Minnesota Digital Library and MnLINK.

Check them out!

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