On April 25, our Spring Meeting will be held at Cairn University in Langhorne. The Continuing Education committee is preparing a program with topics of direct interest and practical use to many of our member libraries. I look forward to seeing you there, either in person or online. As always, the biannual meetings provide a unique opportunity in the region to gather with fellow theological librarians for mutual support and interesting conversations within a welcoming and collegial community. Please see the meeting invitation for details.

Please note that we have multiple leadership opportunities opening up within SEPTLA, all of which will be voted on at the Spring Meeting:

• President (one-year term)
• Secretary (one-year term)
• Treasurer (four-year term)

Nominations and self-nominations are equally welcome. I highly recommend volunteering, or accepting a nomination, for one of these roles, which include serving on the Executive Committee. Such service to SEPTLA is not only worthwhile and gratifying but also an excellent way to gain practical committee experience and gain leadership skills that will be beneficial for the remainder of your career.

Note in particular that serving as president doesn’t require previous service on Executive Committee. Ample support is built in to the SEPTLA leadership structure,  including the fact that the outgoing president serves in the official capacity of past president, thereby providing assistance, guidance and institutional memory along with the rest of the Executive Committee.

This issue of TeamWork is my last as president of SEPTLA. It has been a pleasure and a privilege to serve the SEPTLA community in this capacity for the last two years.

With all best wishes,
Greg

Gregory Murray
Princeton Theological Seminary
April 13, 2023

You Are Invited

SEPTLA Spring Meeting 2023

Tuesday, April 25

Cairn University (in person and virtual)

Please see the full meeting invitation for details.

Business Meeting Minutes

SEPTLA Fall Meeting 2022
November 11, 2022
Wright Library, Princeton Theological Seminary

The meeting was called to order at 2:47 by Greg Murray (Princeton Th. Seminary), SEPTLA president.

Approval of minutes from Spring 2022 business meeting

One correction was made online. Motion to approve minutes as distributed and amended passed by acclamation.

Treasurer’s Report

Greg reported on behalf of Deanna Roberts (New Brunswick Th. Seminary), SEPTLA treasurer. The previous treasurer has been removed from the SEPTLA accounts. Patrick Milas (New Brunswick Th. Seminary), SEPTLA past president, is already on the accounts. Greg and Deanna have been added to the accounts. Balances: Money Market $8,798.73, Checking $3,766.07

Deanna has created an online ledger – a Google spreadsheet in the SEPTLA Google Drive – which will preserve the data digitally and make it searchable. Currently the data goes through April 2018; subsequent time period still to be added.

Committee Reports

Continuing Education Committee: Victoria Jesswein (United Lutheran Seminary) and James Humble (St. Charles Borromeo Seminary) reported on behalf of Evelyn Frangakis (Princeton Th. Seminary), chair of the Continuing Education Committee. Jim thanked his colleagues for a great job. There is still one vacancy on the committee. The bylaws call for three members plus the chair. Victoria asked everyone to consider topics for future meetings and provide suggestions to the committee. This question is also on the post-event survey that Patrick will send out.

Communications Committee: No updates at this time.

Task Force Reports

Jim reminded everyone that there is a task force to digitize the SEPTLA paper archives. Jim, who is SEPTLA archivist, is chairing, and Greg has offered to help. Other volunteers are welcome. Work on this project has not yet begun.

Interest Group Reports

Cataloging and Metadata Interest Group: Report given by Vic Broberg (Reformed Episcopal Seminary), chair. The group discussed serials, including how to best use funds based on use, etc. Publisher embargos for online titles; would rather get print and online (to bypass embargo) instead of paying for unused popular magazines. Difficulties with reporting for statistics which don’t match up with what’s requested.

Research Services Interest Group: Patrick reported on behalf of Deanna Roberts, chair. The group reaffirmed Deanna as chair. Ongoing project in Virtual Reference, with Sep-Oct-Nov 2023 as potential trial of VR software LibraryH3lp.

Institutional Updates

Greg called attention to the need for written updates from member libraries. Please send to Greg or to Sarah Danser (Princeton Th. Seminary), SEPTLA secretary. This will ensure accuracy of your institutional update.

United Lutheran Seminary: Victoria Jesswein: United Lutheran Seminary has had many staff changes. We have just hired a new Public Services Librarian at the Philadelphia campus. At the same time, our longtime Cataloging Librarian has retired. The Temporary Processing Archivist at the Philadelphia campus has been there over 3 months now is handling the task of tackling that largely unprocessed collection admirably. The Library Director position is being finalized and will be posted soon. In the meantime, Robert Flynn is serving as Interim Library Administrator. Cody Swisher (Librarian) and Victoria Jesswein (Archivist) remain the staff at the Gettysburg Campus and are helped by student workers.

Missio Seminary: Shaelagh Martin: At Missio Seminary, many classes have remained online, although professors are encouraged to offer hybrid sessions. As a result, the library is increasingly focusing on connecting remotely with students. Although fall enrollment numbers were encouraging, the seminary is under financial strain and all departments, including the library, have been asked to make significant budgets cuts.

St. Tikhon's Orthodox Theological Seminary: Brian Cardell: St. Tikhon's library once again has a full-time librarian as of Jan. 2022. We are open normally for in-person visits 0830-1630 M-F, and other times by prior arrangement. Access to the OPAC can be gained externally through a link on the seminary's web page. ILL is available only for SEPTLA-network institutions, and requires direct communication with us.

Westminster Theological Seminary: Bob McInnes: Experiencing budget problems. While our online enrollment is increasing, our on-campus enrollment is decreasing. This is problematic for the library, as on-campus students pay fees that online students do not pay, and these fees go toward financing library operations.

Reconstructionist Rabbinical College: Alan LaPayover: Enrollment steady. Almost completely back in person, a few holdouts. Still virtual classes on Mondays, on campus Tue-Thu. Staffing changes throughout college. Self-study portion of Middle States accreditation is beginning. Final implementation of new curriculum. Next year first real cohort of students doing fieldwork away from the college. VP of Academic Affairs just finished 1st year and reaffirmed commitment to library and raising its profile; good working relationship. Completed early summer implementation of OpenAthens – seamless and pleased with EBSCO’s participation in helping them through that. Has begun looking into switch from SirsiDynix to WMS. Contract with SirsiDynix finished in 2 more years – very expensive. Already using pieces of OCLC for other things – might be best choice for them, but asked for advice from other members on WMS.

Reformed Episcopal Seminary: Vic Broberg: Approved by ATS and PA Dept. of Ed. to not only offer classes online, but approval to continue to offer online. Now offering two MA programs online only; MDiv prefer one year be residential. Brings in students from different locations, and helps with enrollment numbers. Students are excited.

Princeton Theological Seminary: Report by Greg with help from Virginia Dearborn on behalf of Evelyn Frangakis: PTS announced a new incoming president: Jonathan Walton, a two-time alumnus of PTS (MDiv and PhD) and former member of Board of Trustees. He starts at beginning of calendar year. He will be the first African American and first non-Presbyterian president. Starting 2 new programs: MA in Theology and Ecology, and MA in Theology (Justice and Public Life). Center for Barth Studies recently celebrated 25 years. PTS starting overall website redesign (last redesign was 2016), migration to new platform and including library website. We’ve been using CraftCMS – a niche platform, hard to find developers to support. Coming soon: tighter integration between Sierra catalog and Summon discovery system.

New Brunswick Theological Seminary: Patrick Milas: Library is home to Reformed Church in America archives. Seeking an archivist; position is open another five days, but search going well. Going to get a dumbwaiter again; has been broken for 4 years. Looking forward to 150th anniversary in 2025. Got out of offsite storage. Migrated LMS (Brightspace), SIS (Campus Cafe), upgraded ILS to latest version of TLC. Until August, library was open only to NBTS community, had ~50 users in a month. September hit 500, now 200+ per week – Rutgers undergrads using library for study space. Services geared toward seminary students, but “inundated” with Rutgers students because surrounded. Crowding out the population that will use the resources. Rutgers had largest freshman class in history.

Cairn University: Stephanie Kaceli: Cairn University went live on FOLIO hosted by EBSCO on June 28, 2022. Things are going well. We are in the midst of implementing RapidILL which will complement our RESHARE implementation in June 2021. In addition, the final phase of the library renovation was completed this fall. Our usage has been up over 300% compared to FA18.

Clarks Summit University: Sharon Gardoski:

• The Murphy Memorial Library at Clarks Summit University is back to full operations and activities on campus. It is good to see more students using the library again. We have begun working on the Middle States Self-Study process.
• This year we began promoting our newly created Murphy Memorial LibGuide to assist students in finding and using library resources. We are also updating our Staff LibGuide with detailed procedures for all tasks. We started using student Team Leaders to train new student staff and manage some library projects.
• This fall, we added Business Source Premier to our library databases to support the growing business program, and we made the transition from self-hosted EZproxy to hosted. This not only makes it easier for students to access databases off campus, but it also provides support from outside our school and takes that burden off our IT department.
• Pastors and professors donated quality commentaries, Bibles, and theology books to our library which we sold at a fall book sale. Alumni, pastors, and students were thrilled to get inexpensive resources for their ministries, donors were pleased that their books will be used, and sale proceeds will be used to purchase new books and ebooks for the library.
• Ongoing projects include identifying outdated books for discarding, copying chapel messages from the 1980s from cassettes to mp3, and making our students’ dissertations discoverable in the online catalog.

Conclusion

Greg thanked everyone for coming and closed the meeting at 3:35.

Respectfully submitted,
Sarah Danser

SEPTLA Executive Committee Meeting

January 11, 2023 11 a.m.

Attendees: Evelyn Frangakis, Christina Geuther, Greg Murray, Myka Kennedy Stephens, Patrick Milas, Vic Broberg, Jim Humble, Sarah Danser and Myka Kennedy Stephens

Greg called the meeting to order at 11:05 a.m.

Approval of Minutes from last meeting

Deferred due to the minutes not having been distributed yet.

Fall Meeting

Patrick shared the results of the fall 2022 survey. There were 9 responses.

A comment in the survey suggested asking Presbyterian Historical Society to join SEPTLA; Greg noted that he had already reached out to PHS recently, but they declined to join SEPTLA at this time.

Sarah suggested comparing the results of surveys from recent years.

Jim offered to document the surveys for the archives. Patrick will share the data accordingly.

Greg thanked the Continuing Education committee for their efforts putting together the program and inviting Michelle Wu.

The committee discussed the results of the survey, including the free-text comments, particularly the comments about the open discussion of CDL that followed Michelle Wu’s presentation.

Positions

Greg: We now have a vacancy for Treasurer; the E.C. appoints an interim person for Treasurer. Think about it for our next meeting.

Adjournment

Meeting adjourned at 11:59 a.m.

Respectfully submitted,
T. Patrick Milas

SEPTLA Executive Committee Meeting

February 9, 2023 11 a.m.

Attendees: Vic Broberg, Patrick Milas, Evelyn Frangakis, Myka Kennedy Stephens, Greg Murray, Jim Humble, and Sarah Danser.

Absent: Christina Geuther

Greg called the meeting to order at 11:04 a.m.

Approval of Minutes from last two meetings

Minutes of the 9/19/22 meeting were approved as distributed and amended.

Approval of minutes of the 1/11/23 meeting is postponed until the next meeting.

Letter re. Fall Meeting discussion of CDL

The E.C. discussed how minutes for meetings that address sensitive topics may best be handled. Ideas included redacting minutes, a separate record of discussion, and retaining a copy of the letter drafted. Greg wondered if we should consider changing the long-standing practice of including Exec Comm minutes in the newsletter. Patrick asked whether this practice is required by the bylaws. Greg later checked and found that indeed the inclusion of Exec Comm minutes in the newsletter is specified in the bylaws.

Greg suggested Patrick draft the separate record of discussion to go to the Google drive or archive. Patrick agreed.

For public minutes Patrick will indicate the EC discussed the survey feedback further.

Vacancy for Treasurer

Greg asked if we should have an interim between now and the spring meeting? Patrick said that we should be able to carry on without a treasurer for now.

Vacancy for additional member of Continuing Education Committee

The bylaws call for a chair and three members. We have a chairperson, Evelyn, and two members (not including James Humble as member-at-large). Greg pointed out that another member will be welcome. Nominations can come from Continuing Education or the E.C.

Letter re. Fall Meeting discussion of CDL (continued)

Greg introduced the topic that we have two letters. Patrick asked that the first letter draft be scrapped in favor of Greg’s. Myka who was not present asked not to sign. Evelyn asked about whether a different draft could garner approval of the E.C. as a whole.

Patrick asked about taking the matter back to the general membership. Greg thought people who wanted to add should have done so in the survey response.

Folks thought a vote by the majority would suffice for the E.C. to send the letter.

Vic thought a Bylaws change about panelists could be better. Greg pointed out that such a change would require a vote by the general membership.

Greg was hesitant to call for a vote until a fresh version of a letter is ready. Greg will prepare a Google document to carry this matter forward. And plan to have an E.C. meeting to vote on, especially for those who were present.

Host for Spring Meeting

Greg: let’s all consider a host. We can send a note to the mailing list. Thanks go to Vic for looking into Reformed Episcopal hosting.

Adjournment

Meeting adjourned at 12:01 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,
T. Patrick Milas

SEPTLA Executive Committee Meeting

February 28, 2023 11 a.m.

Attendees: Vic Broberg, Patrick Milas, Myka Kennedy Stephens, Greg Murray, Jim Humble, and Sarah Danser

Absent: Christina Geuther and Evelyn Frangakis

Greg called the meeting to order at 11:04 a.m.

Approval of Minutes from from Jan. 11 Exec Comm meeting

Revised minutes were presented and approved.

Approval of Minutes from Feb. 9 Exec Comm meeting

Revised minutes were presented and approved.

Letter re. Fall Meeting discussion of CDL

The EC collaborated to finalize the letter’s language. The motion to send the letter passed.

Possible host for Spring Meeting: Cairn

Greg reported that Stephanie from Cairn has offered to host. He will follow up about possible dates.

Program for Spring Meeting

Greg reported that he forwarded comments from the fall meeting survey re. program ideas to Evelyn. Jim Humble reported the Continuing Education Committee has not met since the last E.C. meeting.

Slack channel for Exec. Comm.

Greg noted low use of #executive-committee Slack channel and asked for clarity on its intentions. Myka said that any SEPTLA member can see any of the channels, so there’s nothing confidential in the setup. If confidentiality is a concern, the setup can be adjusted. It was decided to keep the Executive Committee channel open for communication from all members. It was also decided to forgo use of an E.C. Business (E.C. members only) channel in Slack.

Website update

Greg requested that the Officers page be updated to show vacancies for Treasurer and Research Services IG Chair. Myka made the update during the meeting.

Adjournment

Meeting adjourned at 11:59 a.m.

Respectfully submitted,
T. Patrick Milas