VIVA Special Collections Committee
Minutes

The March meeting of the SCS convened at 10am in Special Collections at Alderman Library with the representatives of VT (Gail MacMillan), UVA (Ned Berkeley), GMU (Paul Koda), W&M (Kay Domine) and VCU (Betsy Pittman) present. The agenda followed up on items discussed at the March meeting.

1. Gail McMillan drafted notes on institutional SC homepages. It was emphasized that what will be available in May for the ECC will be preliminary materials only, a skeleton. Homepages, items included, structure and overall presentation are subject to change as the project matures.

   As now envisionsed, the VIVA home page would have a link called (probably) Special Collections that will take people to a list of the VIVA libraries' Special Collections' home pages. We discussed what these might look like, in general, as follows:

   Brief paragraph about the Special Collections Dept. with a link to a more in-depth "about."

   Brief collection descriptions with labels linked to the individual finding aids. These labels might be:

   • Digital Images
   • Finding Aids available electronically
   • Electronic Publications
   • Theses and Dissertations
   • Electronic Journals

   • ________________Papers
   • ________________Collection
   • _______________ Collection

     Search-this-collection button

   • Join the Friends of the Library (link to form)
   • Return hyperlinks to: VIVA home page,
   • Library's home page, "Back"

2. Ned will investigate the possibility of training for scanning (the finer points, not the actual process of scanning itself) in early June. Each SCS member will invite a guest for training, if space allows.

3. HTML software is available to run with WP 6.1 but no one has actually seen it. Any references to further information would be appreciated.

4. Betsy will check with Carol about the LVA representative and to submit budget proposals as requested. She will also confirm plans for the May demonstration at Sweet Briar.

5. Draft letter for high school teachers is attached.

6. Calendar for the 95-96 year confirmed:

   May 1995

   Demonstration of SCS finding aids, photographs, and other materials from each institution (homepages, etc.).
   

   Sept. 1995

   Completion of significant portion of finding aids, links and representative sample of materials (variety) in VIVA repositories that are uniquely "Virginian".

   Oct. 9-13, 1995

   Institutionally coordinated demonstrations of VIVA with appropriate publicity.

   Jan 1996

   Availability of SC VIVA for General Assembly in conjunction with presentation of 1996-1998 budget proposal.

   May 1996

   Committee gives presentation at MARAC with demonstration.

The next meeting of the SCS is tentatively scheduled for early June. Time normally spent at the meeting in May will be devoted to the development of institutional VIVA SC projects. The meeting adjourned at 1:00 pm.

Respectfully submitted,
Betsy Pittman