F e d e r a l    D e p o s i t o r y    L i b r a r y    P r o g r a m

 

                                                      ADMINISTRATIVE NOTES

                                      Newsletter of the Federal Depository Library Program


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                                                         July 15, 2001
                                                       GP 3.16/3-2:22/11
                                                       (Vol. 22, no. 11)

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                                                        Readers Exchange

                                                    Award Acceptance Remarks
                                                      By Sheila M. McGarr
                                            Director, National Library of Education
                                                 CIS/ALA GODORT Award Breakfast
                                           San Francisco Hilton Continental Ballroom
                                                         June 18, 2001

                      Good morning, friends. I know so many of you through inspecting your depository
                      operations and your attending Interagency Depository Seminars and Federal
                      Depository Library Conferences. To quote Mark Twain, "The report of my death was
                      an exaggeration." All I did in January 2001 was change jobs. With the various
                      encomiums such as the ALA commendation during its midwinter convention and the
                      Depository Library Council commendation at its April meeting, I've been witnessing
                      my own memorial service (and a very nice one it is). Over the last several months,
                      I've been the subject of many e-mail messages and accolades and to be honest, I'm
                      really not comfortable with such praise for just doing my job. As a Federal
                      Government employee, it's "your tax dollars at work." During the winter, I enjoyed
                      the flattery. Now I'm just embarrassed.

                      At GPO, I did not work alone. There is little room for a virtuoso performance in
                      an operation as complex as the Federal Depository Library Program. No one can
                      master it all! There is an under-appreciated team at the Library Programs Service
                      and some of them are here today: Gil Baldwin, Tad Downing, George Barnum, and
                      Bonnie Trivizas. Robin Haun-Mohamed is inspecting a library today. Others are back
                      at the office, including Laurie Hall, Colleen Davis, Marian MacGilvray, and many
                      more that you do not know by name. To set the record straight from the June 2001
                      DTTP announcement of this award, Joe McClane began the Interagency Depository
                      Seminar in 1988 and the Federal Depository Library Conference in 1992. Starting in
                      1993, I built on his foundation, remodeled it, and added on a lot. The conference
                      started out as a Cape Cod and now it's a tract mansion. Sandy Schwalb, John Tate,
                      and Willie Thompson were key players in the success of these continuing education
                      programs.

                      In order to accept this award, I had to undergo the Department of Education's
                      version of "20 Questions." Thank goodness for the GODORT Web site where I could
                      obtain the nomination form and list of previous award winners to prove that the
                      award was not dreamed up just for me. Some of the myriad questions included, "Was
                      ALA paying my transportation?" As if! "Did I hold any office in either ALA or
                      GODORT?" I never have held an office in GODORT due to a possible perception of
                      conflict of interest. In the government, perception becomes reality. The check has
                      been made out to the U.S. Department of Education, not to me personally.

                      The National Library of Education (NLE) is an umbrella organization that includes
                      the department's library, ED Pubs, and ERIC. In over 5 months at my new position,
                      I have been surprised at the number of times I have spoken at internal meetings
                      about the Federal Depository Library Program. I have also discovered there are
                      "fugitive" documents, especially from awardees of grants and contracts, that are
                      not in either ERIC or the NLE's collection. So NLE will be evangelizing at
                      principal offices and with contract staff to gain access to these information
                      products.

                      At NLE, we're in the 3rd year of level funding and the proposal for 2002 is
                      identical to previous years. With a new Assistant Secretary in the Office of
                      Educational Research and Improvement, I hope that our allotment can be increased.
                      There are several unique collections of education materials at NLE that are
                      paper-based and non-circulating. I plan to use this award as "seed money" to
                      determine the procedures and costs of digitizing a discrete group of materials.
                      Then NLE will have the data to justify requesting more money in its budget for
                      digitizing and mounting education information on the Internet.

                      Thank you.