, Associate Director of the William A. Wise Law Library and Head of Resource Access and Discovery, and , Technology and Web Services Librarian, traveled to London, UK, at the end of September to present on sharing a library services platform (LSP) with the University Libraries at the (WOLFCon). They were joined by D. Marin Dell from Barry University School of Law, whose library also shares an LSP with their university鈥檚 main library.听
In the summer of 2023, the William A. Wise Law Library and the 麻豆影院鈥檚 University Libraries to modernize services for their communities. The 2023-24 academic year marked the first year these libraries operated within the same systems, requiring collaboration and compromise.听
In their presentation, Seney and Ciota discussed the benefits and challenges of sharing an LSP and associated public-facing catalogs.听
鈥淥ne of the main benefits of sharing an LSP and catalog as the smaller library is that the University Libraries does most of the heavy lifting,鈥� said Ciota. 鈥淲ith a staff about one-tenth the size of the University Libraries鈥�, we appreciate that they handle much of the system administration, allowing us to focus on other mission-critical tasks.鈥澨�
Ciota detailed an additional benefit being that Law School patrons have been able to more easily access the University Libraries鈥� catalog and have their titles delivered to the law school. Ciota and their co-presenters then went on to address challenges the Wise Law Library face as the smaller library sharing an LSP and catalog with a larger library鈥攁nd how to resolve those challenges.听
One such issue was concern over the Wise Law Library鈥檚 materials being unfindable.听听
鈥淲e were concerned that our quarter of a million records would be overshadowed by the University Libraries鈥� 8.5 million, making it difficult for Law students, faculty, and staff to find our materials,鈥� Ciota explained. 鈥淔ortunately, by working with the main campus and our vendor, we implemented a pre-filtered search that retrieves only Law Library materials. We鈥檙e really pleased with this feature.鈥澨�
Given the difference in catalog size and staffing between the two libraries, it has been essential that Wise Law and University Libraries continue to collaborate and compromise. The libraries have established a shared internal communication structure that includes all stakeholders, and regularly meet with their staff to ensure the process continues to go smoothly.听听
In addition to their presentation, Ciota was able to attend multiple sessions, including but not exclusive to 鈥淔olio Reporting: Using Multiple Methods to Meet Reporting Needs鈥� and 鈥淏eyond FOLIO 鈥� Leveraging LDP/MetaDB to Its Fullest鈥� both about data reporting for libraries, while at WOLFcon.听
鈥淚 was actually quite pleased with this conference,鈥� said Ciota upon their return. 鈥淚 work in a niche area of librarianship 鈥� library systems and technology 鈥� which isn鈥檛 really catered to by most library professional conferences. So, I was pleasantly surprised to have a preconference and multiple sessions per day at the conference which were directly applicable to what I do on a day-to-day basis.鈥澨�
Since its inception in 2016, WOLFcon has brought together members of the Open Library Foundation鈥檚 project member communities, as well as users of their products. was created in 2016 as an unbiased, independent not-for-profit organization to ensure the accessibility and sustainability of open source and open access projects for libraries.听听
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