New Business —

1. The committee members and visitors introduced themselves.
2. Carol Smith, Dean of Libraries – Vision for KU Libraries
   1. Carol reinforced that this should be a shared KU vision for the libraries. She has been at KU for about 4 months and has experience with forming and carrying out a strategic plan at her former institution. The Provost is using a strategic alignment calendar to guide progress, so Carol wanted to get the libraries on schedule, as this is also part of a budget request process. KU Libraries’ strategic planning began at the beginning of September and is a bottom-up process, involving all the libraries. The mission and vision are 95% complete. We have identified 3 high level strategic goals, which align directly with the Jayhawks Rising goals. We are currently fleshing out objectives and actions. Carol should be able to share this out by the next committee meeting.
   2. Carol presented 3 key areas where she thinks this committee can most effectively contribute.
      1. Advocate for mission-critical capital library projects. KU has 3 major libraries, 3 branch libraries, and an annex. We can take these identities further.
         1. Watson is going to turn 100 in September 2024 and has not been updated since the late 70s/early 80s. There are updates needed. Carol just met with KUEA and has learned that the Watson renovation is not in their capital campaign plans. This will be a $100 million renovation and so we need KUEA support. We need to raise 50% of the funds for KUEA to embrace it. Watson already has elements that focus on research and discovery, but it is all in one part of the library on the 4th floor with poor signage.
         2. The Watson renovation should be presented in link with Anshutz, which provides lots of student success support. We need to lean into that identity. Faculty expressed through COACHE that they need a place to meet, so Anshutz could have a faculty lounge, coffee shop, and full-service café. It could be a meeting grounds for faculty and students.
         3. The program plan for Watson was finished 2 years ago but needs to be revisited and updated. Anshutz needs a program plan and will likely to be an iterative ongoing phased improvement, in contrast to Watson. Provost will find funding for both program plans.
         4. Monographs have been moving out of Watson to the Annex, which is quickly filling up. 3 out of the 4 bays are built. The 4th bay is a $16 million project. 3 bays will be full in 4-5 years, so we need to start the 4th-bay build 2 years out (1 year from now). We can’t wait for fundraising and KUEA, so Carol will be meeting with the Provost and the CFO. The Annex can also serve storage needs for other areas of campus.
      2. Half, if not more, of the libraries is digital, but physical space still matters. We need the voices of faculty and students to get the funds needed.
   3. Advocate for a more robust collections budget. For the past 15 years, the libraries have been steadily losing purchasing power. 85% of the budget goes to electronic resources, while there is a growing need to support teaching and research endeavors across campus. Carol will bring this up with the CFO as well, specifically the need for mandated budget increases matching inflation, additional ongoing funding to make up what has been lost, and separate buckets in the budget for 1) funding to support new pilots; 2) funding to support new programs at KU.
   4. Coordinate stakeholder sessions in the libraries’ strategic planning. The committee can reach out to individual schools and departments to bring in people to provide feedback. Carol has met a lot of senior admins, but less faculty and students. She also wants departments to reach out if they want her to come present.
3. Discussion of charges and committee plan
   1. Caty Movich shared the charges and how to access them on the Governance website and the committee Teams site.
   2. Open access
      1. Researchers at KU can publish in open access journals, but many people are not familiar with this opportunity and which journals provide this option. Several committee members expressed surprise upon learning of the open access agreements. Ray suggested a list be put together of open access journals.
      2. Carol noted that this could be broader and include all places that researchers can publish without processing fees.
      3. There is a KU website that hosts all the agreements, but it does not have a simple list of specific journals. Putting together a list is complicated because the different journals would have different types of agreements.
      4. Carol suggested that we identify a future meeting with open access folks. She will also be speaking at an upcoming Faculty Senate meeting.
      5. Caty suggested that Governance co-host an informational session on open access. Carol seconded that this would be an opportunity to provide more detailed information, including about upcoming developments.
4. Next steps
   1. Caty will work on scheduling another committee meeting during finals week.