We spend many hours on the road during our third week of the Mortenson Associates Program. On Monday, we traveled to Springfield to visit the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Illinois State Library. The Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library, which opened in 2005, houses not only an extensive collection on President Lincoln, but also the collection of the Illinois State Historical Library, founded in 1889. The library is primarily for researchers, and operates mostly by appointment, since the majority of the collections are in closed stacks for preservation. The Lincoln collection is mostly digitized and easily accessible, but some of the other digitized collections on Illinois history and geneology can only be accessed in the library. Items owned by Lincoln and his writings are kept inside a top security vault, including a copy of the Gettysburg Address, Emancipation Proclamation, and the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Abolition of Slavery. I was excited we could look around the conservation lab and learn how items were treated for preservation and prepared for exhibitions.


In the afternoon, we headed to the Illinois State Library. The library opened in 1990, and the building was renamed in honor of Gwendolyn Brooks in 2000. One of the services provided by the library is the Talking Book and Braille Service (TBBS). Illinois residents with visual impairments can borrow audio book cartridges, or download digital books from Braille and Audio Reading Download (BARD) upon registration. The state library is also a member of llinois Library and Information Network (ILLINET), a statewide library alliance for resource sharing. The state covers all delivery costs for interlibrary loan. After an introduction to the library services, we had an interesting discussion on book banning. I didn’t know that so many challenges were made to ban certain books from libraries. But I don’t think any book should be banned due to political or religious reasons. Problematic books would be a different matter, of course. We also stopped by the Lincoln Home National Historic Site on our way back. It was fascinating to get a glimpse into President Lincoln and his family’s everyday life before his move to the White House.


The morning sessions on Tuesday were about the CARLI network and grant writing. CARLI stands for Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois, and it serves the students, faculty, and staff of 128 not-for-profit member institutions, which is around 90% of the academic and research libraries in the state. What was most surprising for me was that CARLI is a unit of the University of Illinois System Offices, so the system provides a large amount of financial support to run the consortium. The university system believed that sharing and better accessibility of resources among instutions will benefit their own students and faculty in return, so they have been passionate about “promoting the public good for the entire State of Illinois” since the 1980s. CARLI staff takes care of mostly specialized and time-intensive work such as managing the I-Share online catalog, and contract negotiations for e-resources, so that member institutions can place more focus on supporting their users and collctions. The UoI System Office provides funds for staff salaries and subscription to EBSCO E-collections. All members of CARLI have to pay an annual membership fee, which is calculated by student FTE enrollment and institution type. The 88, soon to be 96 members participating in I-Share have to pay an additional fee, and this goes directly to cover the expenses for the online catalog system (Alma and Primo VE). Members can also request subscription to other e-resources and databases, which are offered at a lower price with no surcharge. As for interlibrary loan delivery costs, it is covered by a grant from the state library. I was impressed with all the services that CARLI was providing to its members, from sharing resources and managing a centralized automated system to offer training for professional development and actively pursuing grant opportunities to promote new initiatives. Grant writing was not a subject I was familiar with, so it was also nice to learn about how to find the right opportunity and tips on writing an effective application.
After lunch, we had discussion sessions on open access, open education and AI. Sharing research findings and resources is important in that we should work on making intellectual property more accessible for the benefit of the society as a whole, which will lead to progress and innovation. As for AI and machine learning, we should think of the possible scenarios and prepare for them. We cannot predict everything, but we can try to shape the future. AI adoption is slow in libraries for many reasons: lack of expertise, social issues such as privacy, challenges including the fear of losing jobs, financial constraints, and because we tend to want stability. However, we shoule be able to keep up with the increasing impact of AI on our society. It is “only as good as the people using it,” so we need to be ready for the obstacles ahead.
The next day was full of discussions as well – and this also was a day I have been waiting for some time because there were sessions on acquisitions and technical services! The acquisitions process in the U.S. is quite different from that of Korea, and I did have a chance to learn about it during a business trip to university libraries in Boston several years ago, but I was excited to hear how it is done here in UIUC. The University Library has 45 subject selectors who are responsible for collection development, and they mostly use approval plans to purchase print books from all around the world. The collection budget is allocated by subject before the start of a new fiscal year, and selectors have to submit orders by the beginning of May. Books and other materials are also purchased by demand, and the requests from faculty and students are reviewed by selectors according to subject. But the majority of the budget is used for the purchasing and licensing of e-resources (including fees for BTAA and CARLI), which would be the same for most libraries around the world including ours. Usage statistics has always been an issue in our library, so it was interesting to find out that here they focus more on the preservation of research materials and their use in the long term, because as new fields and topics emerge, researchers may be looking for those other materials. As for cataloging, it is done in a mix of copy cataloging (from OCLC), original cataloging, receiving records with shelf-ready books and purchasing if necessary. We had a chance to talk some more about this in the afternoon. The next session on foresight strategies & techniques helped me to think more about strategic planning, how to think to the future, which will lead to making better libraries today.
Afternoon sessions included introductions to the digital services and strategies of the University Library, and technical services with a focus on linked data. Some of the emphasis on digital services were preservation of library’s collections, protecting research data, managing IDEALS, the institutional repository, and support on digital publishing. The beginning of the final session of the day provided us with general information on the library’s acquisitions and cataloging services unit and policies. The unit is the largest one in the library since it was combined in 2019. I strongly agreed that acquisitions and cataloging services are the backbone of libraries, a unit that makes it possible for information to be available to users. I was surprised to find out that cataloging materials in a certain language is only done by a librarian who has knowledge of that language. It is a bit different back home, but I thought that this was the right way to go. For languages without a specialist, the unit hires students without a cataloging background but with knowledge of the language, and uses a tool called Metadata Maker, which makes it easy for those students to fill in the basic information and catalogers could review the records before uploading them on OCLC. This was also a great opportunity for me to learn more about linked data. I only had a vague understanding of it, and this session helped me to get a more concrete idea on the subject, why it is important, the challenging issues, and how we can find a better way for libraries to make use of linked data and provide valuable information to users. It really was a meaningful session.


A trip to Ohio was waiting for us on Thursday and Friday. I was very excited to visit the OCLC campus in Dublin. I believe almost any librarian in the world would wish for an opportunity to visit. The sessions at OCLC also focused on the theme of this year’s Mortenson program, “shaping the future.” As a global network of all types of libraries, OCLC emphasizes collaboration among the institutions, because “what is known must be shared,” and “together we make breakthrough possible.” We learned about some of the recent research agendas by OCLC, including the New Model Library project, and Redefining the Library Experience, which is an area of focus this year and a full report will be released in July. Through surveys, interviews and other ways of research, OCLC was constantly trying to look ahead and lead for a better change in the future. This was also the first time I found out that OCLC had an online Community Center for users of their products. I believe the platform would be very useful for librarians around the world, because we will probably be facing similar issues. Afterward, we looked around some of the facilities inside the building before saying goodbye.




On our second day at Ohio, we visited the Ohio State University Thompson Library, Research Commons, and the Westerville Public Library. I have to admit, I was very impressed with the Thompson Library from the moment I entered the building and saw the transparent walls of the stacks. It was here that I truly realized the power of space – a space that is welcoming, a space you wish to work and study in, a space that you want to return to. Every single detail of the building, regardless of size or shape, all came together to create a meaningful space. The library building was renovated in 2009, and I could see that a lot of effort had gone into creating a space for collaboration, innovation, comfort, and engagement. It was evident that the staff listened to and valued what the students and faculty wanted, what kind of experience the campus wished to provide. Their reading rooms were a great example of privacy in the open. Students figuring out how to use the spaces on their own, finding private areas for individual Zoom meetings or to attend online classes, and more open sections for study. The 11th floor was definitely a place everyone would want to come to; outside the windows, you could enjoy a clear view of the entire campus. The Research Commons was also a good example of how to maximize space to make it a more hybrid, collaborative environment. Our journey to Ohio ended with a visit to the Westerville Public Library. It was inspiring to see how the staff were dedicated to providing various services that would benefit the entire community. You could notice that they were always putting the needs of their users first. All of their services were in line with their strategic plan for sustainability and expanding access. Their use of space was also well planned, keeping in mind the interests of the different age groups that would be frequenting the area. I particularly liked the baskets in front of the circulation desk. They have barcodes, so you can check one out to carry around with you and place materials you wish to borrow inside. In our library, it is not uncommon to see users carrying a pile of 10, 15 books just about to topple, so I thought this would be something I should take back. The trip to Ohio was definitely a great learning experience, and it gave me a lot to think about, especially in terms of space. It all comes down to this: How could I create a welcoming space for our patrons?