OCLS Celebrates 5 Years of Milestones
February marks the official 5 year anniversary of OCLS. Although established on paper in 2009 OCLS became fully operational in February 2010. These milestones are not ours alone, we have many people to thank for helping us achieve them, not the least of whom are the library staff who serve on and provide leadership to the many committees that are represented in the timeline. We also owe HLLR, our advisor and partner in many of these initiatives, a debt of gratitude for their generous investment of time, their trust, their guidance, and for working with us to ensure that the services we provide are responsive to the needs of the college libraries. Thank you.
2010
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OCLS operational
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First research project on future of College's Union Catalogue
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2010
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First contracts for selection, acquisitions, cataloguing and processing services
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2011
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OCLS systems and network update completed
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2011
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eBook research project completed
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2012
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askON becomes opt-in service
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2012
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First eBook project funding received
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2013
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OCLS relocates
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2014
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Collect, the colleges' 1st digital repository, launched
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2014
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Strategic Planning for 2015-2020 commences
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2015
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ACE Pilot launched
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2015
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First core eBook collection purchased
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OCLS and HLLR "Envisioning the Future" Strategic Plan Update
By Maria Ripley, Strategic Planning Project Manager
OCLS has been making good progress on its strategic planning project. For the last few months the Strategic Planning Project Team has been focused on data gathering with stakeholders and key informants, while working in concert with HLLR to identify information that would benefit their strategic planning initiative. Read on.
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eResources Voting Exchange is Now Live
By Andi Argast, Services & Support Associate OCLS
Have you recently discovered a new and useful database? Do you know of a video subscription service that you think would great for other colleges? The eResources Voting Exchange has launched, enabling college staff to submit and vote on eresource products that you would like OCLS to investigate for trials and/or purchasing.
The eResources Voting Exchange (EVE) has been in the works since the summer, and the project has been informed by responses to the survey sent out requesting input on what a fair and streamlined eresources product submission and voting process might look like. Read on.
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Update on the Accessible Content E-Portal (ACE) Pilot Initiative
By Siob�n Linnen, Services & Support Associate OCLS
In 2005, the Ontario government
enacted the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) to identify, prevent, and remove barriers to accessibility. Under this act (s. 18) college libraries are required to 'provide, procure, or acquire accessible or conversion-ready formats of print -based resources (upon request).' OCLS, guided by the HLLR AODA Committee for Ontario College Libraries, has partnered with the Ontario Council of University Libraries (OCUL) and the Internet Archive to bring the Accessible Content E-Portal (ACE)
service to college libraries through a four-month pilot initiative and year-long trial. Read on.
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Single Sign On Coming Soon
By Phil Garrelhas, Systems Administrator OCLS
Do you remember all your logins? In our web-based world it's increasingly challenging to keep track of every login for every site or tool we want to use. Soon OCLS will be doing its part to help our customers reduce the number of unique logins required to access our web services.
In late March, OCLS will be implementing Single Sign On (SSO) across three of our key sites/applications: - OCLS Website (www.ocls.ca) - O3 Forum (oclservices.othree.ca) - Request Tracker (https://helpdesk.ocls.ca) Read on.
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Building for the Future: The College Libraries Central Digital Repository
By Safar Ali, Project Consultant OCLS
A College Libraries Central Digital Repository offers a consistent and coordinated approach for the capture, identification, storage and retrieval of intellectual assets. It showcases the quality of research activity within a College and provides authors with a stable, secure and professionally curated environment.
Name that Repository We can't keep calling it the "Digital Repository Project". So if you are feeling creative and can think of a name to call the colleges' new central repository please send your suggestions to Safar at [email protected]. Read on.
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Colleges eBook Consortium Project
By Thomas Guignard, eBook Project Manager OCLS
The eBook project team is happy to report that funding for the two years of the Project Execution phase was secured just before the holidays. The project is now fully funded and was able to start officially on January 1st, 2015, even though staff from the participating colleges and OCLS have already been busy working on project tasks since the Fall. Among the first orders of business was the selection of the first core eBook collection that will be shared across all participating colleges. After carefully analyzing a short list of potential products, the project's Collection Task Force came to a final recommendation, which was reviewed and approved by HLLR in early January. We are now happy to report that, with the licensing of Ebsco Academic Books (beginning March 1, 2015) and Proquest College Complete (beginning Feb 1, 2015), the project has successfully acquired the foundation of its core eBook collection. More information on the purchase of the first core collection can be found here and additional background on the ebook project is available here.
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