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Program for Cooperative Cataloging

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ALA Annual, Anaheim, California
Sunday, June 29, 2008
11:00 A.M. - 12:00 Noon
Disneyland Hotel, South Exhibit Hall

The semi-annual SACO-At-Large meeting opened with a report about the increasing growth and status of the SACO Program. Since ALA Midwinter, the SACO Program welcomes the Donald F. and Mildred Topper Othmer Library of Chemical History, the Pierpont Morgan Library, the University of Wisconsin, School of Library and Information Studies, and the U.S. Army Community & Support Library. SACO continues to accrue new members through institutional representatives who attend jointly-developed ALCTS/PCC training sessions in both areas of subject analysis and classification, creation of new SACO funnels as well as the expansion of existing funnels, growing interest from international participants, and the SACO Web presence.

"SACO Review File"

SACO participants have long requested the creation of a "national record exchange mechanism for subject authority records" between the Library of Congress and OCLC, in much the same fashion as that available to NACO participants. A natural by-product of this exchange would be a "national review file for subjects". The Library of Congress mentioned its desire to have OCLC create a SACO review file but no discussions have taken place yet. This topic will be pursued with OCLC over the course of the next year.

Report from the SACO Representative on the PCC Policy Committee (PoCo)

It was indeed fortunate that David Miller, Curry College, SACO representative on the PoCo, was able to attend the SACO-At-Large meeting and address those present. For the prepared remarks in case he had been unable to attend, read Miller's letter . SACO members with any issues relating to the SACO Program that should be brought to the attention of the PCC Policy Committee should contact David Miller directly.

Impact of 155 Implementation on SACO participants

Numerous queries had been arriving in the mailboxes of Cooperative Cataloging Team members inquiring about the use of the 655 blank 0 and its authorized use for BIBCO records. Cynthia Whitacre, OCLC, had confirmed that the coding was valid in OCLC. The following information is lifted directly from the Integrating Resources Manual [PDF, 6.37 MB], which is also known as Appendix A to the BIBCO Participants' Manual and Module 35 of the CONSER Cataloging Manual.

IR.15 Subject analysis and classification

Do not assign headings for the form of the resource (e.g., Online databases, Web sites) as topical subject headings. Such headings are used only for resources about these topics. If a library wants to group examples of these types of resources in its catalog, it could assign headings such as these as form headings in field 655. Use second indicator "0" if LCSH uses the term as a form heading; use second indicator "7" and "‡2 local" if LCSH uses the term only as a topical heading. In case of doubt, code as local.

655 _7 ‡aWeb sites. ‡2 local
655 _7 ‡a Loose-leaf publications. ‡2 local

This statement is what authorizes catalogers to use a 650 subject heading found in LCSH to be coded as a 655 form heading with a second indicator of "0" -as long as the heading itself is identifiable as a "form heading". There are some headings in LCSH that are inherently topical by nature and may NOT be eligible for this practice. It is incumbent on the cataloger to be prudent in assigning headings as 655-0; as the policy clearly states, in case of doubt, code as "local".

SACO Web course

The SACO Program anticipates the long-awaited debut of the SACO Web course at ALA Midwinter 2009 in Denver. ALCTS [Association for Library Collections and Technical Services, a division of the American Library Association], on whose server the SACO Web course was developed using the WebCT 4.1 software, had intended to migrate materials via the new software package (Moodle) it is using. However, retrieval of files was delayed until June 2, 2008. Mitchell has been in consultation with ALCTS about making the necessary modifications and plans to offer this long-awaited Web-course by ALA Midwinter in Denver. A small group of "beta testers" for the Web-course will work through any glitches before the course is publicly available. SACO participants should anticipate notification via the SACOlist.

SACO Funnel Coordinators Panel Discussion

The SACO-At-Large meeting held at the 2008 ALA Annual Conference featured a panel discussion by the following 4 subject funnel coordinators:

  • Penny Baker, Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute
  • Joyce Bell, Princeton University
  • Heidi Lerner, Stanford University Libraries
  • Robert O. Ellett, Jr., Ph.D., San Jose State University
Each coordinator had been requested to prepare remarks about their individual funnels and include information about these salient points:
  1. What instigated the creation of the funnel?
  2. Is there ongoing recruitment for funnel members, and how is it done?
  3. How is communication among funnel participants managed?
  4. Is there a discussion list, i.e., listserve, for your own individual funnel participants?
  5. How much time does coordination of the funnel require in your daily activities?
  6. Discuss any training issues for new funnel participants.
  7. What benefits do you see from being associated with a SACO Subject Funnel?
Each link represents the comments provided by each coordinator about the named SACO Funnel Project.

Northern New England Subject Funnel Project

Middle Eastern-related Subject Funnel Project

Judaica Subject Authority Funnel Project

Virginia Subject Funnel Project

Mitchell announced that 4 new subject projects were in the developmental stages including an ArtSACO Project, a SACO Music Project, a geographically-based subject funnel project in the Southwest region of the U.S., and a Genre/Form Subject Funnel Project. SACO participants should expect future announcements about these funnels made by the new funnel coordinators on the SACO listserve.

Training initiatives

Subject cataloging training courses continue to be offered with much regularity. The jointly developed ALCTS/PCC course entitled "Basic Subject Cataloging Using LCSH" will be modified and presented to E-CIP catalogers during a session in July 2008. The original and unmodified course will be offered again at the OCLC Eastern offices in Washington, D.C. in September 2008. The "Fundamentals of LC Classification" course will be offered numerous times during the next 6 months, including a September 2008 training for SOLINET in Atlanta, at Brigham Young University in October 2008, and at OCLC Eastern in Washington, D.C. in January 2009. Negotiations are being explored with the University of Miami to offer training in February 2009.

Other training is also being held around the country by many of the SACO-trained developers. It is indeed prudent to think about inviting those trainers in your geographic area to come and present the course materials.

Future SACO-At-Large Meetings: FRSAR

Upcoming SACO-At-Large meetings during the calendar year 2009 will focus on the impact FRSAR will or may have on the SACO Program. Athena Salaba, Assistant Professor at the School of Library & Information Science at Kent State University, has been scheduled for the ALA Midwinter Conference in Denver.

The ALA 2009 Annual Conference in Chicago will be a venue for a panel discussion about FRSAR, and will include Edward T. O'Neill, Ph.D. of OCLC, among others.

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