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70's THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA LIBRARY
IN THE SEVENTIES
The Report
of the
University Librarian
to
Senate
64th Year
1978/79
Vancouver
December 1979 TABLE OF CONTENTS
I.     INTRODUCTION
THEMES OF THE SEVENTIES
COLLECTIONS 4
IV.     PUBLIC SERVICES 9
Circulation Division 10
Information & Orientation Division 13
Humanities Division 17
Social Sciences Division 20
Government Publication & Microforms Division 22
Map Division 25
Special Collections Division 26
Fine Arts Division 30
Asian Studies Division 33
Interlibrary Loan Division 34
Science Division & Mathematics Branch Library 37
Woodward Biomedical Library 39
Biomedical Branch Library 41
Animal Resource Ecology Library 43
MacMillan Library 44
Sedgewick Library 46
Wilson Recordings Collection 47
Music Library 48
Curriculum Laboratory 51
Law Library 53
Marjorie Smith (Social Work) Library 57
Data Library 60
Crane Library 65
Reading Rooms Division 67
V.     TECHNICAL SERVICES 70
Acquisitions Division 72
Serials Division 75
Catalogue Records Division 76
Catalogue Products Division 79
Systems Division 82 TABLE OF CONTENTS
(continued)
VI.     TRENDS FOR THE EIGHTIES 85
APPENDIX A Size of Collections - Physical Volumes 87
B Growth of Collections 88
C Library Expenditures 89
D Recorded Use of Library Resources 90
E Interlibrary Loans 92
F Reference Statistics 93
G Computer-Assisted Reference Searches 94
H Library Organization 95
J Library Supported Reading Rooms 98
K Senate Library Committee 102 CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
This report is unlike its predecessors.  In the first place, it is more than an
annual report, covering instead the activities and developments of a decade.  In
the second place, it reviews that decade from the vantage point of the many administrative units of which the Library is comprised.
The Library is necessarily complex in its operations: it must deal in a great
variety of materials, in great quantities, on behalf of a large body of users with
myriad interests.  Previous annual reports have attempted to render the complex
simple, describing the Library's situation in general terms and usually focussing
on a few areas of concern.
The purpose of this report is to provide its readers with a more detailed account
of the Library, and to assemble in one place information essential to an understanding of its history.  It is not expected that many persons will read it in its
entirety.  However, it will allow faculty members, students and others to know more
about those Library branches and divisions which they patronize.
For the most part, reports from units are in the words of those who direct them,
and reflect their individual perceptions and reflections. Summary sections have
been provided for those who prefer them. - 2 -
CHAPTER II
THEMES OF THE SEVENTIES
In one of the following reports, a division head observes that the past decade has
been marked by growth and change.  These two features can be discerned in every
aspect of the Library's operations, where they are-intertwined.
In respect to growth, a collection of physical volumes that stood at a million
volumes in 1970 became one of two million volumes before the close of the decade.
At the same time, the nature of the collections changed.  Microforms, for example,
have become an increasingly more important element; and they grew in number from
under three hundred and fifty thousand to over two million, representing even more
bibliographic units.  Collections of materials in non-book formats all expanded at
rates equal to or in excess of the doubling exhibited by the conventional collection.  Some formats, such as data tapes, were newcomers.
In libraries, as collections grow in size and complexity, they grow in depth.  As
a resource for study and research, the Library is immeasurably richer than it was
ten years ago.  This helps to explain why recorded use of the collection jumped by
43%, out of proportion to increases in numbers of students and faculty.  It also
helps to explain why the Library draws increasing numbers of users from off-campus,
why our telephones ring with increasing frequency, and why traffic in interlibrary
lending mounts every year.  These developments can also be traced to the fact that
in many subject areas the University owns virtually the only significant collections in the province.
Yet despite the fact that statistics reflect higher levels of activity and output,
the complement of staff remains about what it was at the beginning of the seventies!
there were 394.5 positions in 1969/70, and there were 404.5 in 1978/79.  Effectively, there are fewer staff hours now than there were then, because of time benefits
obtained by staff members through collective bargaining.  The conflict between
work requirements and availability of workers has made itself apparent in such
things as shorter service schedules and hours of opening, and as slower processing
turnaround times and backlogs.  These have occurred despite the Library's efforts
to minimize the impact of staff shortages on its users.
The Library pioneered in the development of computer-based systems in the nineteen
sixties. Without that development, and its continuation in the seventies, it
would be fair to say that the Library could not have managed to deal with growth
and change.  As this decade closes, there is no aspect of the process of selecting,
ordering and cataloguing of materials that does not at some point touch on the
computer or its products.  Similarly, the computer was able to support increases
in public use, and even to enhance the quality of use through sophisticated information retrieval systems and the decentralization of Library records. - 3
Although the decade witnessed the opening of two major libraries, the Sedgewick
Library and the Law Library, and of a separate facility for the processing
divisions, the growth of the physical library did not keep pace with needs.
Before the next decade is through, the University will need to avert a crisis in
housing of its collections and the accompanying services. CHAPTER III
COLLECTIONS
"For the University of British Columbia Library ... the decade of the sixties was
one of progress.  It now seems that the seventies will be characterized as a decade
of paradox, in which libraries simultaneously wax and wane."
This statement, taken from the Annual Report for 1973/74, has indeed proved to be
prophetic.  For the Library, the sixties were a heady decade of entering the world
of major research libraries, of taking the collection from half a million volumes
to one and a quarter million, of worrying about how best to spend money rather
than how to make ends meet.
This unusual situation was due primarily to the MacMillan gift of three million
dollars, but also to the recognition by the University and the province that U.B.C.
needed a major research library.  The University now has the second largest library
in Canada and all those who have taken part in its growth, whether by making funds
available, by selecting materials, or by sticking labels in a never-ending stream
of books, all can take pride in a remarkable achievement.  Yet, in retrospect,
those few years of the sixties when this gargantuan jump took place were quite
abnormal, and we should not have expected that they would continue for long.
The past decade has been one of slower growth, of struggling to maintain our
purchases of current materials and of readjusting to a much slower growth rate
after the euphoria of the sixties.  The problem of remaining current finds its
root in the breadth of the academic programme, making necessary the purchase of
books and periodicals in a wide variety of fields.  During the later years of the
decade the University has been most generous in supporting the purchasing power of
the Library's collection budget through a period when the effects of devaluation
and inflation combined would otherwise have forced massive cuts in our acquisitions,
The existence of many friends who have donated books or money in larger or smaller
amounts has been a source of help and inspiration during some difficult years.
The collections which have been given to the University have spanned a wide range
of subjects, from children's literature to Russian history to medicine.  Monetary
gifts have included substantial amounts tied to equally diverse subject fields.
There are in addition a number of very faithful alumni who contribute each year to
an annual appeal, and who earmark their donations for the Library.  Another type
of gift which has been fairly common in this decade has been the donation of
personal or corporate papers, materials essential to.an understanding of the
province's social and economic history.
The seventies has been a period of increasing cooperation and lending among
libraries, as they attempted to reconcile increased prices with limited budgets
while satisfying mounting demands for access to materials.  Many hoped that this period would be crowned by the recognition that the largest university libraries
were national resource institutions, deserving of direct federal support for their
collecting and lending activities.  This possibility may yet founder on the rock
of the constitutional separation of powers between federal and provincial governments.  However, some recent hopeful beginnings may be detected in a programme of
support initiated by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, on
behalf of specialized research collections.
Acquisition Methods
A major feature of book acquisition programmes in university libraries during the
last two decades has been the use of approval and blanket orders.  These are programmes under which booksellers in different countries send to a library weekly
shipments of books chosen according to a carefully drawn up profile of the
library's requirements.  Upon receipt, the books are examined by library staff to
verify their worth, and any unsuitable titles are rejected and returned.  The use
of these programmes has saved U.B.C. a great deal of staff and faculty time in
various stages of the ordering process; if they had not been available to us we
would have had difficulty in handling the volume of individual orders which would
have been placed.  However, approval and blanket programmes are not without their
drawbacks.  Advance information about selections and shipping dates is not always
available, and dealers sometimes underestimate their need for copies of a given
title.  The continued use of these programmes requires constant assessment in terms
of costs and benefits.
Exchange programmes are another special component of the acquisitions process.
They are not a substitute for the purchase of standard, commercially available
material, but they do allow us to obtain material which we could acquire by no
other means.  They are particularly useful in dealing with countries which lack
a well-established foreign sales network, as in the case of some eastern European
countries and Asian countries.  We hope to improve our existing exchange arrangements with Russia and China.  Perhaps our most successful exchange is one of our
largest: through agreements between the national libraries of Canada and Japan,
U.B.C. is the repository for an extensive collection of Japanese government publications .
A great many government documents come to us as gifts through depository or mailing
list arrangements.  The proposal of the federal government to curtail the free
supply of documents to university and other libraries would have caused us many
problems, and diminished public access to information.  Fortunately, protests of
libraries, library associations and the academic community caused the government
to reverse its decision.
Prices
The prices of both periodical subscriptions and books have risen steeply during
this decade; so have the prices of other commodities.  It does appear, however, that - 6
inflation in the world of publishing has been rather more marked than in the
economy in general.
Price increases of U.S. periodicals considered in U.S. dollar terms (1)
i.e. not taking account of the Canadian dollar devaluation.
Category of Average annual percentage
periodicals of increase, 1970-79
general & humanities 9.9
science & technology 14.3
social sciences 11.8
Consumer price index, year to year percentage change (2)
1970 3.4
1971 2.8
1972 4.8
1973 7.6
1974 10.9
1975 10.8
1976 7.5
1977 8.0
Average                         _Zi2
In the study by Brown and Phillips, the average price of several thousand U.S.
periodicals is recorded.  In 1967/69 the average price was U.S. $8.66.  By 1979
the average price had risen to U.S. $30.37, about 350% of the original.  These
are U.S. dollar prices; in 1967/69 the U.S. dollar was worth an average of $1.08
in Canadian dollars, but in 1979 it was worth about $1.18.
The effect of the devaluation of the Canadian dollar has been most noticeable in
relation to purchases from European countries and Japan.  For example, in the
period 1967/69 the average cost of a German book was Dmk. 18.60.  By 1977 it had
risen only to Dmk. 21.87.  However, even if the internal price had not risen at
all, the cost of the average book in Canadian dollars would have been $5.02 then
and over $11.53 now, a 229% increase.
Funds
The University's allocation to the Library for its collections has increased very
substantially during the past ten years, as have expenditures, which have gone
from $988,414 in 1968/69 to $2,527,017 from University funds last year.  Unfort-
(1) Brown, Norman B. and Phillips, Jane.  Price indexes for 1979: U.S. periodical
and serial services.  Library Journal, September 1, 1979, p.1629.
(2) Bank of Canada Review, October 1978, p.522 - 7 -
unately, this increase of 253% does not represent an increase in purchasing power.
During this tidal wave of inflation, one can only swim rapidly to remain in the
same place; in the middle of the decade we were being swept backwards, but
increases to the budget since then have allowed us to maintain our annual rate of
acquisition.
One of the casualties of this situation has been the purchase of retrospective
materials.  Although we have allocated over $250,000 to the purchase of retrospective books and periodicals in the current budget, this is now less than 10%
of the total.  About the only hope of improving this situation lies in such
external sources as special grants and gifts.
The Collection
The sixties saw the growth of the collection from less than half a million volumes
to one and a quarter million.  Growth during the current decade has been at a
slower pace, but two million volumes were achieved in 1979.  At this point we can
truly say we have a library capable of supporting graduate research in most major
fields.  Such a broad statement must be quickly qualified by stating that we have
many gaps yet to fill, and subject areas of interest to the University yet to
cover in depth.
In the middle of the decade a combination of restricted budgets and soaring
periodical prices brought about a crisis regarding the proportion of the budget
consumed by periodical subscriptions.  Since the value of the Canadian dollar was
declining, it was necessary to severely restrict new subscriptions, cut back on
existing ones, and curtail book purchases for two different periods of several
months.  Now that the dollar is more stable, and expenditures are more evenly
balanced between books and periodicals, we can look back and reassess the effect
on the collection of our fluctuations in purchasing during the past few years.
In both 1975 and 1977 we suspended purchasing for several months, and although we
subsequently tried to fill the resulting gaps, we did not always have the funds to
do so.  During the same period our blanket orders for foreign language materials
were made more selective.  Hopefully, the items we did not acquire in those years
were less essential ones, but undoubtedly some will have to be obtained as
retrospective purchases, at higher cost.  Similarly, to the extent that cuts
occurred in inactive subject areas, a future change in research interests or the
addition of new faculty members could leave us scrambling to remedy deficiencies.
Had we not restricted our subscriptions to periodicals during the seventies, that
form of publication would have continued to consume an increasing proportion of
our budget, to the detriment of the book collection.  But now that we have
expenditures under control, it is worth reflecting on the part that the periodical
literature plays in the research collection.  It would probably not be an
exaggeration to say that the periodical files are the major component, if not the
very backbone of a research library.  Whether in the sciences or the humanities, - 8
periodicals play a major role, though the type of use may be different.  In the
sciences, the emphasis tends to be on the more current issues; in other subject
disciplines, long backfiles may be more significant.  In any case, we continue
to receive urgent requests for more periodical materials.  Since these represent
a major continuing cost, we must strike a balance between our ability to support
research and our need to control expenditures.
In building a good research collection over the past fifteen years we have
unquestionably raised the expectations of our users.  Now they legitimately expect
such a large library will have all the basic materials in their fields of interest.
Their expectations are not always met, due to the way in which the collection was
assembled.  In the middle sixties, the Library was given three million dollars by
the late Mr. H.R. MacMillan and instructed to upgrade the collection in just three
years.  The only way of doing this was to engage in bulk purchases, and to rely
on what the marketplace could offer by way of large collections.  During the
seventies, time was not available to go back and systematically fill any lacunae,
nor, as it turned out, were funds available for retrospective collecting.  There
remains a job to be done in this connection.
In the decade to come, as in the one we are now leaving, it seems likely that
the staff of the Library will be stretched to capacity.  We will continue to
encounter difficulty in keeping abreast of current materials.  It will be essential that academic departments give us two to three years advance notification
before moving into major new teaching or research fields which our collections
do not adequately cover.
Personnel
A number of significant changes have taken place in the composition of the
Collections Division during the last ten years.  The creation of the full time
positions of Life Sciences and Slavic Bibliographers expanded the staff of the
Division to deal with rapidly developing areas.  The greatest changes, though,
have come near the end of the decade with the retirement of the two most senior
members of the Collections Division.  Bert Hamilton, who led the bibliographers
through the period of great growth in the collection, retired in 1977.  Bert's
bibliographic knowledge and keen eye contributed much to the richness of the
material collected during those formative years.  Eleanor Mercer succeeded
Bert Hamilton for two years as Assistant Librarian for Collections before herself
retiring in 1979.  Eleanor, the most senior Library employee, devoted over forty
years to the University, through both the bad and the good times.  It was fitting
that she was able to give her attention over the past fifteen years to building
one of the best collections in the country. CHAPTER IV
PUBLIC SERVICES
The pattern for U.B.C.'s decentralized library services was set in the nineteen
sixties.  New divisions for maps, government publications, microforms, recordings,
and orientation were organized, and around the campus, branch libraries were
established for mathematics, ecology, social work, forestry and agriculture, law,
music and the life sciences.  At the close of the decade, the system was extended to
include over thirty departmental reading rooms.
The nineteen seventies have, in many ways, been equally dramatic as the extensive
system of branch libraries, specialized Service divisions and reading rooms began
to achieve its real potential in serving a growing and increasingly varied
clientele.  Through the development of collections and improvement in access, the
library system itself helped to create new and greater demands for service from
both the U.B.C. and outside communities.  The past ten years have been characterized by a struggle to meet and reconcile those demands in the face of rising,
service costs.
If proof were needed, the nineteen seventies clearly showed that the availability
of good libraries creates and attracts new library users.  An expanded Woodward
Library (1970) , a new Law Library (1975), together with specialized services and
collections developed for other scientific and professional programmes at the
University, have provided resources essential to the University community, but also
of great value to those engaged in practice, research, and continuing education
outside the University.  Open access to the central stack collections in the Main
Library (since 1970) and the existence of outstanding facilities for undergraduates
in the Sedgewick Library (1973) have encouraged students from other post-secondary
institutions to usfe the U.B.C. Library as a supplementary resource.  At the same
time, reference services and collections in such areas as music, religious studies,
genealogy, business, ecology and health care have led to greatly increased use of
U.B.C. libraries by the general public.  In the last few years, U.B.C.'s Crane
Library has even become involved in the creation and distribution of taped recordings for visually handicapped children in the B.C. school system.
In order to measure and evaluate the impact of increased use of U.B.C. libraries
by the extra-mural community, the Library undertook several studies in the early
seventies.  Traffic studies showed that a large proportion of those using U.B.C.
libraries on the weekend were students from neighbouring institutions.  An
intensive survey of reference services in 1975 indicated further that about 17%
of the questions answered were for non-U.B.C. patrons, and that these required
25% of available reference staff time.
At the same time, the Library was obliged to become more conscious of the cost of
service.  Staff reductions made it necessary for service divisions to cope with 10 -
increased demands while attempting to save time and money through reductions in
hours of service and staffing.  Hours of service per week have declined from a
total of nine hundred and forty seven in 1969/70 to nine hundred and eleven and
a half in the past year.  In 1976 the Library was obliged to begin charging other
libraries for interlibrary loans.  Subsequently, it was necessary to re-examine
and limit policies which provided free borrowing privileges to large numbers of
outside users.  Charges were introduced in other areas, such as computer-assisted
reference services, in order to limit demand and recover costs.
While demand for service has continued to exceed our ability to provide it, a
kind of balance has been achieved which permits the Library to give some priority
to its primary clientele, without turning away requests for service from the outside community.  For example, many of the costs previously borne by the University
for interlibrary loans to post-secondary and public libraries in B.C. are now
covered by cost-sharing arrangements.  In this, as in other service areas, the
Library has attempted to provide continued support to the outside community, but
to regulate such demand so that it does not adversely affect service to the
University.
In the following reports by divisions and branches, it will be apparent that the
Library is justifiably proud of its collections and services.  The record of the
seventies is outstanding: during a period in which enrolment increased by about
10%, the lending of library materials grew by 4 3% over ten years, and reference
statistics showed a 26% increase over six years.  If there are shortages of staff
and space, these are the result of growth rather than neglect.  And where there
have been new challenges, as in dealing with machine-readable data bases, or in
serving the handicapped, these have been met.
Circulation Division
Borrowing Trends
In 1969/70 the number of recorded loans from the Main stacks reached the highest
level in the library's history.  Since then, borrowing has declined to the level
of the mid-sixties  and appears now to be leveling off.  The causes are many and
varied.  Ironically, the decentralization of library services has contributed to
the apparent decline in borrowing from the Main stacks.  There was, for example,
a perceptible decline in borrowing the year the new Sedgewick Library opened.  This
reflects the fact that the old quarters were inadequate, forcing many of Sedge-
wick's clientele to use the Main Library.  When the new building opened, these
borrowers left the Main Library in favour of the more spacious study areas in the
new building.
The introduction of extended loans also caused a change in borrowing statistics.
A long loan period eliminates the need for several renewals, each of which would
have been counted as a loan.  Hence, extended loans reduced the number of renewals 11
by at least 25%, even though there was no actual decline in use.
In the Reserve Book Collection, where the decline in borrowing has been much more
pronounced than it has been with the general collection, the trend seems to have
been spurred by changes in teaching methods, the growth of reading rooms and the
availability of photocopying.
Borrowing from the Extension Library increased steadily during the seventies,
reflecting the doubling of the number of correspondence courses offered by the
University as well as an increase in other off-campus programmes.
Growth of the Collection
One of the most pressing problems of the seventies was that of finding space for
the rapidly growing book collection.  The decade started with the first removal
of books from the open stacks into a storage area closed to the public.  Borrowers
must request such books and wait up to a day for their retrieval from storage.
Moreover, they lose the ability to browse among the full collection.  Not only is
this detrimental to the borrower, but because of the cost of record keeping and
retrieval, it is very expensive for the Library.
In 1970/71 approximately 37,000 volumes were removed from the main stacks to
closed storage.  In 1972 a similar number of serials was removed.  The space
formerly occupied by the Museum of Anthropology was converted to storage for books
in 1976, and a third batch of books was removed from the stacks.
The departure of the processing divisions to their new building forestalled the
need for additional materials to be removed this year, but only for the time being.
The collection will be very close to overcrowded again by the time the departure
of the Asian Studies division provides more space for the main stacks book collection.  Even that space will probably be filled within a few years.
Sometime during the next decade we will probably have to resort to a further
storage move to reduce serious overcrowding.
Improved Access
The 1960's saw the beginning of a trend which became one of the features of the
seventies, namely the gradual extension of access to the book collection.  It
started during the sixties with several piecemeal changes to the rules governing
who would be permitted to enter the stacks.  By 1968, all registered borrowers
were being admitted to the stacks but those without library cards were not.  The
last barrier was dropped in January 1970 when the stacks were opened to all comers,
Now, not only UBC students and faculty, but also students of other universities
and members of the general public, have free access to the book collection housed
in the main stacks. - 12 -
Access to the collection was also improved by extending library hours.  In 1967
the Main Library began opening on Sundays during winter session, and until midnight on weeknights.  After a few years, financial constraints necessitated
retrenchment on the midnight closing but the Library is still open Sundays in
winter session.  Also in the seventies library hours during May and June were
twice extended to service students enrolled in spring inter-session evening
courses.
Another means of improving accessibility is to alter loan regulations.  In 1971-72
the loan categories were revised.  The full impact of this was not initially felt
by most borrowers, but gradually as implementation progressed it became possible
to borrow hundreds of books which had previously been marked for use in the library
only.  Likewise, many hundreds of volumes which had been available on a very short
loan period were changed to a category which permitted longer loans.
Another change, made possible by improved equipment, was the institution of the
extended loan.  This is a longer than normal loan period which is granted on art
individual basis.  It was introduced in recognition of the fact that while loan
regulations are valid for the bulk of the material in a collection, there are
always some items which warrant exceptional treatment.
In January 1976 completely revised loan regulations were introduced.  Although the
main thrust of the changes pertained to penalties for late return, loan periods
were affected as well.  Extended loans became more widely available to on-campus
borrowers, and undergraduate students were granted longer loans on serials to match
those available to graduate students and faculty.
Access to the collection has also been extended through adjustments in borrower
eligibility.  Since 1976 students in a broad range of diploma courses and in-service
education programmes have become eligible for complimentary library cards.  Furthermore, a special low fee has been introduced for senior citizens and people enrolled
in non-credit courses.
While each of these changes may seem to be of limited importance, the cumulative
effect is a significant improvement in accessibility.
In 1970, the automated circulation system still employed much of its original
configuration of equipment.  Transactions were recorded centrally on punched cards;
procedures for creating the central record were time-consuming and equipment
became increasingly unreliable.  Moreover, the record of loans printed daily by
the computer consisted of hundreds of pages of computer paper for each library
branch.  It was limited to five copies, four of which were barely legible carbons. - 13 -
Today, none of that remains.  Minicomputers, acquired in 1972, record the day's
transactions on a single roll of magnetic tape, and the mountains of paper have
been replaced by microfiche available at service points throughout the library.
In 1976, the system was improved further by the introduction of small, reliable
and versatile terminals.  The capability of the new terminals has permitted more
flexible loan periods and the operation of a suspended borrowers list, which allows
further loans to be blocked on stolen cards which are being misused or on cards
held by borrowers who have failed to return books needed by other patrons.  Attachments to the new terminals will make other improvements to the system possible,
such as updating of loans renewed by telephone and, eventually, better and more
readily accessible information on the location and availability of books.
Technological developments have not resolved all of the problems of the seventies.
During this period, the Circulation Division's staff was reduced by four full-time
positions and the number of hours available from student assistants has decreased
considerably.  Changes in working hours and vacation entitlement have also affected
the amount of staff time available.  Although borrowing has levelled off, the
collection has nearly doubled in ten years and the time required to keep it in
good order has increased accordingly.  Additional staff time is also required in
the record-keeping and retrieval of materials from storage.  While the automated
circulation system has allowed the Division to cope with a greatly increased volume
of loans, it does impose additional work in training, coordinating and problem-
solving for the Main Library and its branches.
Finally, during the past decade the Library has become more aware of the growing
problem created by the deterioration of paper used in most books published in the
later 19th century and in many books published in the 20th century.  In recent
years, more and more books requiring repair or replacement have come to our attention, and the day is not far off when their numbers will exceed our ability to deal
with them from present resources.  The fact that all large libraries face the same
problem gives hope that cooperative effort may provide a solution.
Information and Orientation Division
The Information and Orientation Division was established in 1968 primarily to
supervise and assist at a general enquiry desk in the Main Library and to coordinate and help implement the Library's orientation and instruction programs.  The
need for these services had become obvious because of the Library's rapid growth
and decentralization during the 1960's.
When the Division began operations in July 1968, the staff consisted of three
librarians.  A full-time graphic artist was hired in September 1968 and a senior
library assistant in September 1971.  In 1977 one of the professional positions
was reduced to half-time.  To compensate for this reduction and to absorb a growing
quantity of both clerical and semi-professional work, the Division has made in^
creasing use of student and library school student assistants over the past few - 14 -
years
The Division's responsibilities fall into four areas: the information desk,
orientation and basic instruction, library publications, and graphics.
Information Desk
Before July 1968, the functions of a general enquiry desk had been handled by the
Humanities Reference Division, simply because that division was located in the
Main Library catalogue area.  Humanities moved into the Ridington Room in the
summer of 1968 and I & 0 established an "official" information desk in the main
concourse.  Its functions were and still are: to provide general information about
the Library, to assist users with the catalogue, and to refer patrons to specialized branches and divisions.  The Desk is staffed during all the Main Library's
open hours.
Initially, the Information Desk was staffed by librarians and senior support staff
from Main Library divisions, with ISO and the Cataloguing Division providing the
largest percentage of weekday hours.  Staff members from Cataloguing have gradually been withdrawn because of the increasing workload in their own division, but
fortunately I & 0 has been able to replace them with library school students and a
growing number of volunteers from,outside the Main Library.  (In 1978/79, staff
from Law, Ecology, Fine Arts, Woodward, Sedgewick, and Social Work, as well as
from the Library Administration and the School of Librarianship appeared on the
weekly schedule.)  This wider representation has served a double purpose: the
level of staffing at the Information Desk has been maintained, and a larger percentage of the Library staff has been kept in touch with developments which, since
they affect service at the Information Desk, usually also affect public service
policies and procedures throughout the system.
In 1975, I & 0 was able to upgrade and extend evening and weekend service at the
Information Desk by hiring two part-time librarians.  These replaced library school
students who had been working on Sundays and made it possible to extend hours of
service both on weekday evenings during Winter Session and evenings and (in 1979)
on Saturdays during Spring Session.
Although the number of questions answered each year at the Information Desk has
not increased substantially in the last decade, the effort and time required to
answer them has.  Several factors have contributed to this trend:
(1) Increased complexity and fragmentation of the Library's records
(2) Greater use by non-UBC patrons who require more assistance than
experienced campus users
(3) Increased awareness among other libraries and the general public that
UBC's resources are available to them both as extramural users and
through interlibrary loan.  This trend has contributed to an increase
in the number of telephone inquiries received at the Information Desk. - 15 -
In the past two or three years, the I & O Division has taken on a new responsibility
that was probably unforeseen when the Division was established in 1968.  Because of
the staff's considerable experience with library patrons using library records, the
Division has played a prominent role in public service liaison with technical
service divisions, particularly in regard to the closing of the card catalogue and
the introduction of COM.  The Division has been active on several joint committees
investigating and evaluating new technical services developments.  An awareness of
each other's problems and a healthy working relationship have resulted.
Orientation and basic library instruction
Until 1975, I & 0 concentrated on orientation programs which focussed on the Main
Library.  These programs were aimed primarily at students who came voluntarily to
audiovisual presentations or guided tours scheduled at the beginning of each
session.  Orientation tours (now including both Main and Sedgewick) have remained
a feature of I & O's program.  Attendance at these tours has risen in the past few
years, primarily through wider advertising.
In 1975, I & 0 and the Sedgewick Library implemented an orientation program in
conjunction with English 100, a course which every beginning student must take.
The program has continued in various forms since 1975 and has proved to be an
effective method of introducing new students to the organization, resources, and
services of the library system generally and Main and Sedgewick in particular.  In
1978/79 librarians in I & 0 and Sedgewick conducted 84 sessions for English 100
classes, reaching approximately 1,700 students.
In the fall of 1979, I & 0 introduced a Library Workbook, intended as either
an alternative or a supplement to the English 100 classes.  The Workbook uses the
Sedgewick Library as a model, emphasizing the fact that the organization and
procedures for finding material there are the same as in all campus libraries.
Students can proceed through the five units of the Workbook at their own speed;
librarians from ISO and Sedgewick will mark the short exercises at the end of
each unit.
Sedgewick and I & O have also worked together on basic bibliographic instruction
for Arts One and Home Economics students.  The recent enlargement of the conference
room at Sedgewick will make more programs like this feasible.
When I & O was first established, a great deal of time and effort was devoted to
audiovisual instruction, principally in the form of slide/tape programs designed
both for group and self instruction in the Main Library.  In recent years, very
little staff time has gone into audiovisual instruction, since the Library has been
able to hire students on summer employment grants to design specific presentations.
Slide/tape presentations are now being used successfully in the Woodward and Sedgewick libraries; almost all of these are brief explanations of specific indexes or
research procedures. - 16 -
Course-related bibliographic instruction for upper year students has remained the
responsibility of the specialized branches and divisions.  I & 0 has had little to
do with these programs, other than to offer advice and assistance with publications
and audiovisual presentations.
Since 1975, I & 0 has tried to build up contacts with high school teachers and
librarians so that groups of prospective UBC students can be introduced to the
Library in the spring before they register. With the assistance of the Student
Services Office, the project is meeting with some success. During the 1978/79
academic year, approximately 300 students were given orientation tours of Main
ahd Sedgewick.
Publications
Since the establishment of the Division, one librarian in I & O (since 1977 a
half-time librarian) has been responsible for the writing, editing, design, printing and distribution of all library publications.  The result of this coordination
has been consistency in content and design and efficient, economical procedures
for printing and distribution.
During its first few years, the Division concentrated on producing substantial,
fairly expensive publications, like the library handbooks for both students and
faculty, and lengthy subject bibliographies in the reference guide series.  Rising
printing costs combined with the rapid rate of change in the Library have made it
difficult to continue these kinds of publications.  Thus the handbooks have given
way to a number of one-page information sheets, each describing a specific library
service or research method; only one reference guide has been published in the last
two years, but twenty one-page Start Here's have appeared.
Also because of rising costs, the UBC Library News, distributed to faculty members
and other libraries, has been cut back from five per year in 1974/75 to two per
year in 1978/79; one of these issues is the Faculty Library Guide.
A staff newsletter, the Library Bulletin, was established in 1968 "to keep staff
informed of new administrative developments in the Library."  The Bulletin, now
published approximately six times a year, keeps staff informed of all kinds of
developments (not just "administrative") both within and outside the library system.
Graphics
The 1968 decision to employ a full-time artist in I & 0 was an unusual one, since
most academic libraries rely on a print or audiovisual unit which serves an entire
campus.  The results of that decision are the most visible manifestation of I & O
activities.  Throughout the library system, typically institutional signs have
been replaced by colourful, easily changed, less expensive library-produced signs.
Because the artist is able to work so closely with the professional staff, sign
production can be immediate and wording tailored to the needs of library users. 17 -
To a certain extent, the artist has also been able to influence the design and
decoration of library space, particularly in the Main Library.
Since 1968, the workload in Graphics has increased annually. Changes in organization, policies, and physical space, as well as increased system-wide awareness of
the utility and instructional value of signs and displays have contributed to this
increase. In 1968 the artist alone could meet the demand for signs; in 1979, the
Graphics unit consists of the artist, a virtually full-time Library Assistant III,
and twenty hours of student assistant time per week. The unit produces an average
of two hundred signs and graphic displays per month.
Humanities Division
The three S's, space, staff, services are essential features of any reference
library, and it is mainly under these categories that one might examine the Humanities Division in the 1970's.
Space
The reference collection (co-housed with the Social Sciences Division) expanded
considerably during the seventies, and three major rearrangements of location and
increases of shelving have been necessary during the decade.  Removal of the Colbeck
Collection, in 1975, from the sixth floor mezzanine to Special Collections occurred
at a fortuitous time, allowing the Humanities Division to convert this mezzanine
into office space and free valuable Ridington Room space for collection expansion.
New material continues to arrive, however, and even with weeding, space in the
Ridington Room is again tight.  A further loss of seating will unfortunately accompany any future shelf expansion.
Staff
The level of staffing in the division has remained at six full-time equivalent
positions for the entire decade.  We have been fortunate indeed to have been able
to function efficiently during this period without additional staff.
The conditions which have made this possible should, I think, be mentioned as they
illustrate the positive results of library administration planning in the 1960's
and subsequent inter-branch and division co-operation.
(1) In the late 1960's the Humanities Division moved from its position in
the busy main concourse to share space with the Social Science Division
in the Ridington Room.  Over the years this has resulted in staff
savings (especially in the labour costs of re-shelving reference books)
and also eliminated duplication of many titles in the reference collection.
(2) Administration decisions to expand the degree and nature of services to
undergraduates in the arts led to the building of the new Sedgewick
Library.  As part of the overall plan it was envisioned that Main Library 18 -
reference divisions (especially Humanities and Social Sciences) would
be relieved of pressures accruing from the providing of routine material
and services to large numbers of undergraduates.  Concentration on
service to faculty, graduate students and undergraduates demanding
material and services of greater sophistication and depths than Sedgewick could provide then became the primary concern of the division.
(3) Conversion of one full-time librarian position to two half-time position;
has allowed greater coverage in subject specialization than would
normally have been possible.
(4) A separate Interlibrary Loan Division was established in 1971, and the
formal verification of requests was no longer the responsibility of the
Humanities Division.
In addition we have been fortunate in having the services of a senior library
assistant and a librarian, both of whom speak and/or read several languages
(including Hebrew, Arabic, Hungarian and Polish).  Without these conditions and
people, we simply could not have given the same quality and level of service without an increase in staff.  (It is interesting to note that despite the increasing
ability of Sedgewick to help lower year students and the concomitant diminished
use of the Humanities Division by many of these students, our total number of
reference questions increased about 7% over the period 1973 - 1979.)*
Unfortunately, in the last year or so staffing has begun to show some signs of
being a problem.  This is basically because of the increased liberality of vacations.  (For the six full-time equivalent positions in the division there has been
an increase in vacation period from 20 to 34 weeks).  We have offset this loss of
14 weeks to some extent by reducing our services at the general information desk
by a few hours per week.  There is no doubt, however, that increased vacation
allowances and increased librarian participation in administration-sanctioned
activities in professional development, inter-library co-operation, community
services, and participatory management will present further problems in the future
for library staffing.
Services
During the seventies the division provided reference, information and bibliographic
services to faculty, students and the general public in the subject areas of
classical studies, history, language and literature, linguistics, philosophy,
religious studies, theatre and cinema, and was responsible for the development of
reference and periodical collections to complement these services.
r1972-73 statistics are the earliest reliable ones for the decade. 19 -
Queries are made by telephone, by mail, or in person, and can be broadly classified
into:
(a) specific questions.
(b) interpretation of, and instruction in, the use of indexes, abstracts,
bibliographies.
(c) bibliographical verification.
(d) location of material, documents and collections in other depositories.
(e) interpretation of library service.
Individual or group services to faculty and students include computer-assisted SDI
profiles, current awareness literature searches, journal and review searching services, and subject and/or bibliographic lectures.  Of these services, only bibliographic lectures were available at the decade's beginning.  Bibliographic guides,
reference guides or "Start Here" guides have, in many cases, been prepared at the
suggestion or request of faculty.
The last two years have seen also the advent of data-bases for on-line searching
in many of our subject areas.  While these are, as yet, not as sophisticated in
scope or depth as those in the sciences or social sciences, we are now able to
give service in some subjects and expect an increased potential for these in the
next few years.  The expectations of unlimited marvels in tapping the on-line data
bases and communication networks have to be tempered with the knowledge that in the
humanities this may not be the boon it appears to be in the other disciplines.
Even allowing for the overcoming of certain problems inherent in humanities subject
analysis, the resultant products are often only citations to information and not
information itself.  We must be wary, as our ability to use these bases increases,
of the urge to provide citations rather than information.
Two situations exist for the humanities, which do not necessarily obtain in the
sciences:
(a) the current document is not as often of more importance than an earlier
one, and will often be of less significance.
(b) the study of an original work is in itself the research and the search
for a document is itself a major aspect of the research.  In this sense
the library is a laboratory for the humanist.
Subject knowledge will, therefore, always be important for the humanities librarian,
and what experience we have had with on-line searches indicates that the new technologies will demand more, rather than less, subject expertise.
This brief summary, might appropriately close with a few words about the changing
nature of humanities patrons and their interests.
There has been a general trend in the seventies toward a greater use of university 20 -
libraries by the general public.  This, of course, has affected the Humanities
Division ... for the most part in the areas of genealogy and language translations.
We predict no diminution of these interests in the near future and we hope that we
can provide useful service to the public without undue strain and pressure on our
staff in these two rather "open-ended" areas.
Public concern about proliferating and controversial religious cults has, of late,
been prompting many calls to our division.  We hope that this will prove to be a
short lived interest as the subject is, of course, fraught with far more difficulties for libraries than areas such as genealogy.
Both the university community and general public have exhibited changes in their
fields of interest during the seventies.  From both we have seen an increasing
interest in linguistics, film, television, mythology, religion and archaeology.
Interest in Canadian history and literature has increased significantly at the
expense of American and English.  Interests in China and Asia now prevail over
Russia and Slavdom.  Through the seventies then, we have had to maintain and develop
reference and periodical collections, taking into account these dynamic changes —
no easy task in a period of rising costs and dwindling dollar values.  A year of
this decade saw us involved in a serials cancellation and evaluation project of
considerable magnitude, necessitating some sensitive negotiations with faculty.
One would hope that a major review would not occur frequently, but diminishing
budgets and exchange rates may unhappily make a similar exercise necessary again
in the future.
There is little doubt that for the division to achieve maximum results and economy
in collection building in the future it will be necessary for the library to develop
clearly understood collection policies.  Without the co-operation of the faculty,
planning office, and university administration these goals and policies will mean
nothing.  For effective and economical collection policies, these agencies and
individuals must eventually work more closely with the library management.
Social Sciences Division
Collections Development
1950 saw the emergence of two landmark reports on the state of bibliographical
services in the social sciences.  These reports were the results of two major
surveys, one conducted by the University of Chicago Graduate Library School together
with the Division of the Social Sciences, and the other by UNESCO/Library of Congress.
Both surveys revealed important deficiencies in social science bibliography and
served as catalysts in the formation and publication of new services.  The fifties
and sixties witnessed an increase in the production of new bibliographical services
but the "information explosion" of the seventies represented, in part, a multitude 21
of new titles in the social and behavioral sciences, many of a highly specialized
nature, and some specifically Canadian.  From the reference viewpoint, publications
such as the Social sciences citation index, the Canadian business periodicals index,
the Canadian newspaper index, Women's studies abstracts and Environment index
dramatically enhanced the provision of reference service.  Current awareness
services in the field made their appearance, and strides in microform techniques
meant that unpublished documents could be made available, and large collections
such as university calendars could be reduced to a manageable size.
Reference and other services
Coupled with the new array of specialized bibliographical services was the advent
in March 1977 of on-line interactive searching of bibliographical data bases in the
social sciences.  This signalled the most revolutionary transformation in our traditional reference experience, and has been the single most important development
in accessibility of information.  Speed of access to information and currency of
output tend to make the service popular.  (36 searches were recorded for the Division
in our first year of operation - and for 1978/79 we ran 188!)  The appeal of this
innovation sometimes masks its limitations and vigilance is essential to ensure
that the service is used to advantage.  Many patrons expect far more from computer-
assisted information retrieval than is possible in the social sciences at the
present time.  And some users remain unconvinced that a manual search would serve
their purpose better.  For those engaged in reference service there is a prevalent
and very real worry about the disproportionate amount of time spent with the user
seeking a machine search in contrast to the conventional user who approaches the
desk for assistance.  In addition, for an on-line service to receive maximum use,
and be of most benefit, it should be an integral reference function, to be accessed
whenever an inquiry would most appropriately and quickly be answered by a machine
search.
The Periodicals service area handles the thousands of current periodicals and newspapers in the social sciences and humanities, maintaining records and preparing
volumes for binding.  It is also a heavily consulted service point.  Since the work
area has been enclosed, security of back file issues has been improved.
Several services designed to improve communication with faculty emerged during the
seventies.  Subject-related interest profiles - lists of catalogued items added to
the collection - are a popular monthly service.  In 1972 the librarians in the
Division prepared newsletters for their respective faculties, a-nouncing new
reference items and journal titles acquired, and mentioning special services.  These
were well received and are now issued three or four times a year.  Usually new
faculty members are visited or approached with offers of familiarization tours of
the Library and/or discussion of services. 22
'Start here' guides continue to be popular and are fashioned in response to perceived demand.  Bibliographical lectures to classes are very much in demand,
especially in the fall term, and in some years seventy to eighty lectures were
conducted.  Informal arrangements are made with individual faculty members whereby
the librarians watch for incoming material (e.g. journal articles, reports) that
might be of interest.
Our statistical records do not provide for isolating the number of outside users
but following the survey of 1975 (16.7% of the total library users seeking reference
aid were non-U.B.C., but consumed 25.4% of reference librarians' time)  this
Division perceives no diminution of outside requests, and suspects an actual increase.  It is felt that this is in keeping with the University's community outreach
philosophy.
Automation of library processes
The closing of the card catalogue and the computerization of various library records
has had a forceful impact on the reference divisions, but public service involvement
in the planning of the new systems meant the transition period was acceptably smooth
Problems common to most institutions when changing over to machines are evident in
the Library, such as the slowing down of the modified processes themselves, but many
prospective benefits are anticipated and the up-to-date COM fiche catalogues and
serials records are a boon.  One serious problem still confronting Social Sciences
is the delay in receipt of journals, particularly those weekly services consulted
on a systematic basis.
Physical space
The Ridington Room has changed appearance but little in the last decade, most notably in the acquisition of more shelving and the concomitant reduction in study
space.  Virtually all available space for shelving has been used, so weeding the
collection for relegation to storage is a priority item.  Renovations are planned
for the Bibliographic Centre to accommodate bibliographic sets duplicated when
Cataloguing moved to its new quarters.  Provision of a room to house the computer
terminal and user manuals affords a quiet interview office as well.
The seventies, then, for the Social Sciences Division, were notable for the welcome
proliferation of specialized indexes and abstracting services in the field, and the
availability of more and more Canadian-oriented publications.  In addition, they
heralded computer-assisted bibliographic searching which has revolutionized aspects
of traditional reference service.
Government Publications and Microforms Division
The work of our division covers two separate, though often interrelated, collections
and encompasses both reference and processing activities associated with both of
these collections - government publications, and microforms.  (Many microforms are 23
also government publications, but many more are not.) In several respects we are
almost a separate library, handling all aspects of the work from ordering, through
processing, to reference. Because we order and process virtually all of the government publications in the library system we have the advantage of being constantly
reminded of the kinds of materials used by almost every other part of the system.
This knowledge enhances the quality of the reference service which we can provide
by helping us to think in terms of the total resources of the library rather than
just of those in our immediate area.
Our reference services are heavily used and complex in nature.  Because our collections cover every conceivable subject (from space technology to Spanish drama) our
reference work often extends beyond our division and the co-operation of our
colleagues throughout the system is gratefully acknowledged.  A measure of the
volume of business which we do is the fact that during the 1978/79 academic year
our staff members answered almost 30,000 reference questions.  The fact that we
work with two collections obviously contributes to the volume, and the number of
questions relating to microforms is fast approaching the number relating to government publications.
Our reference work in both areas is very dependent upon the level of bibliographical
control available.  The bibliographical control of the government publications
collection has improved steadily with an increase in the number of publications
given full cataloguing, with an improvement in the quality of the printed catalogues
of their publications produced by the various governments, and with the move to
automation of our records.  Unfortunately the situation with respect to the microform collection is not as satisfactory.  We have acquired large collections in
microform but we have not always been in a position to provide the cataloguing
support necessary to ensure that the individual items in these collections were
represented in the Library's card catalogue.  This is a universal problem among
large research libraries and the solution, when it comes, will have to be an international one.  It is hoped that the next decade will see this come to pass.
When the Government Publications Division became a separate reference division
(in the mid-sixties) the library's collection of government publications was already
extensive and well developed.  Over the years since then our efforts have been
directed toward building on this excellent foundation.  Our collection of government
publications covers every level of government, from municipal, through provincial
and state, to federal and international.  We collect worldwide.  Our acquisitions
over the past ten years have averaged well in excess of 60,000 items per year.
The microform collection has increased dramatically in size from some 337,548
"pieces" in 1969 to a total of 2,157,802 "pieces" in 1979.  Our collection is now
well established as the largest collection of its kind in Canada and one of the
largest in North America. - 24 -
In addition to the microform collection itself we have concentrated, over the past
ten years, on acquiring the kinds of equipment necessary for the effective use of
the collection. We now possess an excellent selection of equipment for reading and
for making prints from all of our microforms.  We can make duplicate microfiche from
our collection.  We have equipment for cleaning our microfilm and microfiche.  And,
perhaps best of all in terms of promoting the use of the collection we have acquired
a stock of handy, portable viewers which are available on loan for home use.  These
have proven to be extremely popular and have converted many a patron determined,
initially, to reject microform out of hand.  A comparison of the number of prints
made from microforms over the last ten years gives some idea of the increase in
the use of the collection.  In 1968 we made 2,800 prints; in 1978 we made over
35,000.
Since 1965, the Division has ordered almost all of the government publications for
the library system.  Processing has not kept pace with acquisitions, although the
gap between publications received and publications processed has narrowed steadily.
The past ten year have also seen the move from a manual to an automated ordering
system.  Accounting procedures for deposit accounts are now largely automated as
well.
The most important project of the last few years has been the automation of our
serials and we are now fast approaching the stage where we can embark upon an automated check-in system.  A COM listing of our serials, together with a printed title
listing, have been among the first benefits. We are all anxious to have our collection as readily accessible as other library materials, and automation has taken us
a long way toward the realization of this goal.
Relationships with the community
Because of the size of our collections, because we are a depository library for the
publications of a number of governments and international organizations, and because
of the specialized nature of both the government publications and microforms
collections, we serve as a resource not only for materials but also for information
on how to administer collections of this type.  We frequently provide consulting
services to departments of the university, to government departments and ministries
(both provincial and federal), to business firms, and to other institutions, from
schools to universities.  Over the last decade staff members have given many
lectures and workshops, both inside and outside the university community.  We have
worked closely with the School of Librarianship here at UBC; giving guest lectures
during the winter session and teaching during the summer session.  The division head
designed, and has taught for two years now, a course on microform librarianship.
Physical space
The one area, in all senses of the word, where progress over the past ten years has
been distinctly less than satisfactory is that of physical space.  On page 12 of his
annual report for 1968-69 the University Librarian noted that "The Government - 25 -
Documents and Microforms Division with its rich resources is reshuffling its
collections in a final attempt to maximize the use of its space, which in any case
is fundamentally ill-adapted to effective access."  Almost ten years later in the
annual report for 1977-78, page 14, he said, "Renovation of the seventh stack level
for the Government Publications and Microforms Division, now in cramped quarters,
is planned.  That division will vacate part of stack level six, making space for
an additional 140,000 volumes available."  Unfortunately this renovation was not
to take place and we remain, as we have from the start, on stack level six, likely
to remain here for the next ten years - the length of time which will probably pass
before we acquire a new library building.  That two such important and heavily used
collections should be housed in so obviously ill-suited an area seems indefensible,
but there seems to be no alternative for the present.
Despite the frustrations noted above, in balance the past ten years have been good
ones.  They have seen our collection grow and mature.  They have seen great improvements in the access to our collections, both bibliographically, and physically in
terms of the provision of sophisticated hardware to facilitate the use of our microform collection.
The comming decade, if it sees us move to the kind of area our collections and our
patrons merit, will indeed by a vintage decade!
Map Division
In 1969 the Map Division occupied the reading room of the Special Collections
Division and had two adjacent rooms for office and storage space.  In this limited
space, maps had to be piled on top of map cases and no large tables could be
provided for the use of maps.  A move to more adequate quarters became imperative
when it was learned that the load bearing structure of the reading room was inadequate to support the weight of additional cabinets.  At this juncture, the opening
of the new Sedgewick Library made it possible for the Map Division to move to more
adequate space.
Along with the move in January, 1973, a major reorganization of the collection was
undertaken.  Topographic map series and nautical charts were separated from the
rest of the collection, providing easier access to single sheet maps.  Superseded
maps worth keeping were filed in a separate storage area within the Division
together with some of the more valuable or fragile maps.  Unfortunately, the move
revealed that a great many additional cabinets were needed to reduce overcrowding
and possible damage to maps.  Since 1973, cabinets have been added at the rate of
six a year, but it has been difficult to keep up with the rapid growth in map
production.
During the past ten years, the staff of the Division has been remarkably stable.
The academic backgrounds of the staff and their familiarity with the collection 26 -
have helped in providing good reference service where most patrons are unfamiliar
with maps and the types of information that can be found on them.
Since 1969, the collection has grown from 63,220 maps and 1,539 books to 111,823
maps and 5,207 books.  Circulation of maps during the same period increased from
4,249 loans to 10,870 last year.  In 1972/73, staff answered 3,690 reference
questions; in 1978/79, 3,702 reference questions were answered.  One possible
explanation for the dramatic increase in use relative to reference activity is that
the arrangement of the collection now permits students to find their own maps much
more frequently.  More staff time can be devoted, as a result, to providing assistance with more complex "research" questions.
The physical relationship of the Map Division to other library services and to the
map collection maintained by the Geography Department remains less than ideal.  The
Special Collections Division (five floors away) has a large collection of historica
maps.  The Government Publications Division (three floors and almost the width of
the building distant) has maps and information that must be used with maps.  The
Social Science Division, which provides reference service in geography and cartography, is in the opposite end of the building.  Locked doors, which permitted the
old Sedgewick Library to operate as a separate unit, add to the inaccessibility of
the Map Division.
On several occasions, the possibility of combining the Map Division and the map
room of the Geography Department has been discussed.  Relocation of the two service
to a separate building has not been feasible, however.  Through cooperation, the
two collections have been developed to complement each other in many ways.  Access
to the Geography Department's holdings is more limited, particularly during the
summer when the curator may be on vacation.
Recent developments in the Map Division include the acquisition of a large size
copier for maps and other oversize materials.
Special Collections Division
The Special Collections Division has undergone dramatic changes in the second decad
of its existence.  During the first decade, from 1960 to 1970, there was a gradual
definition of purpose and goals, a collecting together of materials that had been
housed in various parts of the library, additions to these materials, settling in
and self-identification.
By 1970 it was obvious that we were beginning to accumulate manuscripts as well as
books and that we needed more professional staff, not only to give direction to the
manuscripts policy but also to cope with the amount of work that needed to be done
in order to provide acceptable service.  To this end, we were fortunate in 1970 to
be able to add to the Division two new professional archival positions, one to take 27 -
charge of the general manuscript collections and the other for the University
Archives.  This change allowed the Division to pursue more actively its responsibilities in the field of collecting and making available manuscript materials.
Collections
(a) Books and other materials.  From the beginning our collecting policies have
been based on the Howay-Reid and Northwest collections and have therefore been
traditionally in the fields of British Columbiana and early Canadiana.  These areas
have gradually been enlarged, mainly because of significant gifts, but also because
of demand.  Special emphasis is nOw also being placed on the collection of contemporary Canadian poetry, due partly to heavy use of the main stacks collection and
partly to its slightly ephemeral nature, making it difficult to preserve in open
stacks.  The Colbeck Collection of nineteenth century English literature was moved
into the Division in 1974, together with a librarian whose responsibility is
the upkeep and servicing of this collection.  Continuing emphasis is being placed
on the acquisition of early children's books for the Arkley Collection, while we
continue to watch out for significant additions for the Donaldson Collection
(Robert Burns) and the Yakovleff collection (early Russian materials).  A large
percentage of the book budget is spent on in-print books; the budget is not
sufficiently large to permit the purchase of many significant out-of-print additions
to already excellent holdings in our specified fields.  The historical map collection is a significant one, complementing that of the Provincial Archives of B.C.
Most of the collection has now been catalogued and properly housed, and additions
are made from time to time as the budget permits.
(b) Manuscripts.  By 1970 our two most heavily used manuscript collections were
the Angus Mclnnis Collection of C.C.F. materials and the Malcolm Lowry Collection,
During the 1970's our policies to build on strength continued in the fields of
British Columbia labour and socialist history, as well as Canadian literary manuscripts.  Increasingly heavy use of the left-wing materials would indicate that
these policies are appropriate.
(c) U.B.C. Archives.  The University Archives, consisting in 1970 of all U.B.C.
graduate theses and a small accumulation of University publications, has grown to
over 1000 linear feet of manuscripts and records, as well as a collection of about
20,000 photographs, nine filing cabinets of uncatalogued faculty publications and
a collection of monographs and serials.  The collection of tape recordings, which
grows at a steady rate, includes recordings of the Vancouver Institute, Cecil Green
lectures, University ceremonies, and other events.
Theses
In 1965 we began sending all Ph.D. theses to the National Library to be microfilmed.
This was followed by a decision in 1974 to send in addition all Masters' theses.
The implementing of this policy has increased vastly the staff time required to
handle the approximately 1000 copies of these which are presented each year.  As - 28
the National Library's standards for acceptance have gone up year by year, so also
has the amount of time spent by Special Collections staff, not only in advising
students on procedures, but also in preparing the theses for microfilming, binding,
cataloguing, and shelving.
Use of materials and services
Circulation and reference statistics have risen gradually over the ten-year period.
Many University departments have shown an upsurge of interest in Canadian and local
studies.  This is evident in the concentrated use of our rare and unique materials,
many of which are old and fragile and are showing signs of wear.  Bibliography
classes in the School of Librarianship and in the English Department are making more
use of our rare book collections.  Heaviest use of the manuscript collections is, of
course, in the fields of socialist and labour history and in the fishing industry,
and there is also a steady demand for some of our literary collections.  Demand for
materials in the University Archives is heavy and consists to a large part of requests by people undertaking fairly extensive research projects on very specific
topics, such as Women in Higher Education, or a study of cliff erosion in the
Endowment Lands.
The number of users in Special Collections, particularly of the non-book materials,
includes a greater percentage of non-U.B.C. clientele than other Divisions.  The
Union List of Manuscripts in Canadian Repositories, published by the Public Archives
of Canada has drawn users to U.B.C, while the reference guide Theses on B.C. History
and Related Subjects, published in 1971, with occasional supplements, has drawn
attention to a valuable source of information in theses, not only attracting visitors, but also increasing interlibrary loan requests.  The reference guide Canadian
Newspapers in the UBC Library, published in 1974, has helped the student find his
way through the complex maze of newspapers in various forms and locations.
Processing
Since our accessions of manuscripts during the 1970's were increased, it became
apparent that the permanent staff could not keep up to date with the processing of
these materials.  We have been lucky, therefore, each summer since 1974, to be able
to procure the services of a number of students to work in a semi-professional
capacity.  These students have been funded through the auspices of the Provincial
Government's Youth Employment Programme.  Among the projects they have completed
are cataloguing manuscript collections, cataloguing photograph collections,
translating and summarizing Japanese and Russian materials, and indexing small
magazines.  As a result of this work, many of our collections are in good order,
readily accessible, and are being substantially used.
Relationships with other institutions and the community
With regard to the policies for acquisition of manus/cripts, informal agreements have
been made with the other B.C. institutions — Simon Fraser University, University
of Victoria, Provincial Archives and Vancouver City Archives.  U.B.C.'s agreed policy 29 -
is to actively solicit manuscripts and records in the field of labour and socialist
history of British Columbia, literary papers and non-English-speaking ethnic groups,
as well as materials relating to the University and its members.
As long as satisfactory conditions can be met regarding security, environment, etc.,
we lend materials to other institutions for exhibition purposes.  Over the past
decade we have sent materials to the Public Archives of Canada, National Library of
Canada, Norman McKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, University of Alaska, Centennial Museum,
Vancouver, as well as numerous departments within the university including the Art
Gallery and Museum of Anthropology.
Special Collections librarians and archivists take an active part in various archival, library, historical and map organizations, both local and national.  They have
spoken to groups and published articles relating to the activities and holdings of
the Division.
Conservation
Of particular concern to Special Collections is the problem of conservation.  We do
have the basic facilities for storage and security — an air-conditioned vault —
but over the past decade we have had to house in less advantageous facilities our
manuscript collections, newspapers, theses and early Canadian text-books.  Environmental conditions are poor in these other areas and are leading to rapid deterioration of these materials.  Our first need is for totally air-conditioned facilities
to house all our materials.
Since the beginning of the decade we have been fortunate to have been given a small
budget , out of the Binding Fund, for conservation.  This fund was increased in 1979
to $10,000, enabling us to increase the amount of books, documents, and maps that
we send outside for deacidification and repair.  Ideally, however, the services of
a conservator within the institution are vitally needed to oversee the physical
condition of the library's entire collection and to make and carry out recommendations.  (In 1973 the Canadian Conservation Institute carried out a survey in the
Special Collections Division, and reported at that time that it would take 28 years,
5 months to restore our collections to stable conditions.)
Space
As we continue to develop our collections it is obvious that space is one of our
prime needs, not only more space, but space of the right quality.  As our collections, particularly in the field of labour history and U.B.C. Archives grow, more
and more materials become available for the asking.  It would be unfortunate if the
lack of suitable space prevented us from accepting relevant research materials.
Present problems
A microfilm programme would seem to be the only reasonable approach to problems of
preservation and space.  Several early newspapers, including the Ubyssey, should be 30
filmed before they disintegrate; some of the manuscript collections would also be
suitable for microfilming.
In regard to the University Archives, consideration should be given by the University authorities to a records management programme, to document the policy and
history of this university.  At present, many records, such as the Board of Governors records, President's Office records, as well as the records of Deans, Committees, etc. are not easily available to researchers.
We look forward to the implementation of a computer programme for indexing some of
our more fugitive materials — pamphlets, university and faculty publications and
British Columbia theses.
The seventies have been good years for Special Collections, with many interesting
developments.  We have been able to accomplish much, due to the efforts of an
excellent and cooperative staff.
Fine Arts Division
During the 70's the Fine Arts Division has experienced constant growth in most
aspects of its operations.  This has led to severe crowding of all facilities from
time to time and a continuing space problem in the staff work areas.
The division now has two full time and one half-time librarians, a decrease of
one-half a position since 1975.  This is creating some problems of service to the
Community and Regional Planning students and faculty, since it is the librarian
who is responsible for planning materials who is now a half-time appointment.
The Division has gained a Library Assistant I, originally appointed as a shelver.
During the winter session, a sessional Library Assistant I and more student help
have permitted the Division to cope with the increased circulation, shelving and
day to day clerical work over the ten year period.
One of the Library Assistant III positions was reclassified in 1975 to Library
Assistant IV, which means that there is a senior library assistant on the staff
who can supervise circulation, reserving and student assistants.
The Fine Arts Division has had either one or two students working each summer
since 1974 on government-sponsored summer work projects.  The students have assisted with up-dating Canadian biography files, mounting pictures and working with the
Planning materials.  The government support of this kind is greatly appreciated by
both the students involved and the Library.
During the winter of 1978/79, an additional 10 hours of student time per week was
provided under the new government project for student support.  This extra student 31 -
help permitted backfiles of periodicals to be sorted and moved to the new storage
area and a very large quantity of Planning materials which had been accumulating
for some years to be sorted for use as well.
Reference was made earlier to crowded staff quarters.  The office space has been
extremely crowded for at least five years, despite the addition of a third office
in 1973.
Although office space is at a premium, an adequate amount of student study space
has been provided by the addition, in 1978, of a large study area, formerly attached to the reserve book room.  This additional space has permitted the number of
allocated carrells to be increased to 71 in 1979/80.  There is still adequate space
for those students in the lower years and visitors who are not assigned to a
specific study space.
When the Museum of Anthropology moved, additional storage space was added to the
Fine Arts stacks.  During this past year, 1978, the rooms have been shelved and
the more valuable materials and unbound journals moved to the area for storage.
This has resulted in more space for materials on the open shelves.
The seminar room attached to the reading area is used to capacity during the winter
session by the Fine Arts Department for its senior seminars.  Several night classes
are also scheduled there as a rule.  This room has been a boon to the library and
department since the use of restricted items is very easily controlled when the
room is a part of the library.
The collection has continued to grow by approximately 5000 catalogued items per
year.  Constant additions are also being made to the photograph collection and
clipping files.  The Library has purchased the iconographic index to the Art of
the Low Countries (D.I.A.L.) and has also acquired a number of sets of photographs
from the Courtauld Institute and Alinari.  These are essential reference tools for
both our undergraduate and graduate students.  Much of the material now being
purchased, apart from books in print, is for research and is extremely expensive.
However, the Division supports a well established Master's program and a PhsD
program which has been accepted but is not yet in full operation.
The Fine Arts collection at UBC is recognized as one of the three major research
collections in Canada.  This became apparent after a recent survey was completed
by the National Library of Canada: Fine Arts Library Resources in Canada, (1978).
However, as the collection and use of it has increased so also has the mutilation
and theft of valuable items.  To help counteract theft, the Check Point book
detector system was installed in 1972.  This has cut back considerably on the
ordinary theft so that it is well below 1% of the total collection per year.  However, serious losses still occur on occasion to the more sophisticated art thief,
in spite of all precautions. - 32 -
Some consideration should most certainly be given to reverting to closed stacks
for at least a portion of the public using our stacks.  The added expense of staffing could be partially offset by reductions in the cost of replacing mutilated
and missing items.  Our library is not unique in this - all major fine arts libraries are suffering similar losses and look to more closely supervised stack areas
for the solution to what is becoming almost an intolerable problem.
Some services in the division have developed during the 70's as our circulation
has increased.  We are helping more students in all of the faculties which we work
with directly and there is an increasing number of students and faculty  from other
disciplines  using our materials.  To meet the demand we have increased our hours
of opening so that, except for Sunday, we are open during inter-session for two
nights a week and this year, 1979, on Saturday afternoons as well.  Fine Arts
courses are being offered at all sessions now, and Planning is beginning to offer
extra-sessional courses as well.
A fairly extensive reserve collection is established each year to meet the demands
of students taking courses related to our subject areas.  Most of the books on short
term loan are kept in our stack area, but we do have the 2-hour loan items at the
desk so that they can be controlled and serviced manually.  At the height of the
winter session, there are between two and three thousand books on reserve.
Fine Arts librarians give reference service to students, faculty and an increasing
number of off-campus patrons.  Students and faculty at SFU, Capilano College and
Vancouver Community College also use the collection extensively.  All of these
institutions are teaching undergraduate Fine Arts courses.  For our own faculty
members we have compiled a number of profiles based on our current acquisitions lis
advising them on a regular basis of new titles added to the collection.
Lectures to classes on the Fine Arts Division and its collection are given as
requested by faculty.  Liaison with the School of Architecture and Graduate School
of Planning was lacking for a while, but in the past two years we have been able
to reestablish good working relationships.
In 1977/78, all of the first year students of the Emily Carr School of Art visited
for short tours and talks on the collection.  Fine Arts 475 has been taught by the
division head since 1967.  This is a three unit course which usually has at least
twenty students.  As a result of this course being offered to the Fine Arts
students, we find that the majority of those going into the major program or the
master's have a fairly good working knowledge of the library and its procedures.
This results in a very efficient use of the collection by these students.
Several bibliographies, theses lists and "Start Heres" have originated in the
division.  These are in response to student or faculty demand.  We have also
developed extensive files of information on Canadian artists and, in the last three 33
years, files about fashion designers both Canadian and international. The latter
was a direct request from the Home Economics department which required the information for a specific course.
The use of the library by extramural card holders and through interlibrary loan
has increased significantly in the past two or three years.  Several artists and
Planning consultants use the library very extensively.  There has also been a great
increase in the outside loans to the regional libraries.
Asian Studies Division
From a total of 149,111 volumes in 1970, the Asian Studies collection has grown to
214,846 volumes,  of which 153,743 are in Chinese, 57,481 in Japanese, 1,333 in
Korean, 2,222 in Tibetan, and 67 in Vietnamese.  Current serial subscriptions have
increased from a total of 345 to 377 titles, plus 13 newspapers and 1,912 serial
titles of Japanese government publications.
The latest survey (1975) shows UBC's as the twelfth largest among ninety-five Asian
collections in America.  Besides LC's Asian Division, fifteen libraries had a
collection of over 100,000 volumes (as of June 30, 1975), of which Canada claims
two, UBC and the University of Toronto.  By number of volumes, UBC rated twelfth
(UT rates sixteenth), but by current serial subscriptions, it ranked twenty-third
among the ninety-five.
Affected by inflation, devaluation of the Canadian dollar and rising book prices,
Asian Studies' annual acquisition rate is lower now than in the early 1970's.  Had
it not been for the receipt of donations and exchanged materials, the collection
2
could not have attained its present size and significance.
Early in 1973, the Asian Studies Division was relocated from an area within the
Main stacks to part of the space formerly occupied by the Sedgewick Library.  The
new quarters provided much easier access for patrons, and use of the collection
and services increased accordingly.  This was followed by a major reorganization
in September, 1973, when four of the nine staff positions were shifted to the central processing divisions so that Asian Studies materials could be acquired and
catalogued centrally.
Total volumes include all bound volumes in bookform plus reels of microfilms and
units of microfiches, each reel/fiche being counted as one volume.
2
Donations of funds were received from Mr. Harry L. Chin ($20,000 in ten annual
instalments starting in 1972) and the Mellon Foundation ($75,000 in 1974); and
gifts of books were received from the Japan Foundation (worth $7,000, 1975/79),
Tamagawa University (worth $1,500, 1970/75), the Sokka Gakkai (worth $1,000, 1978),
etc. 34
Fiscal constraints faced by the Library in the mid-seventies made perennial
problems more acute for Asian Studies.  Hours of operation were reduced, first by
ten hours a week in 1975, and subsequently by a further three hours.  It was also
necessary, in June, 1976, to discontinue publication of the List of Catalogued
Books, which had been appearing since 1964.  In keeping with general reductions
in the Library, the number of periodical subscriptions was reduced by 8%, and new
subscriptions could be added only at the expense of existing titles.  The most
serious problem faced by the Division, however, has been the extreme shortage of
space for collections.  Delays in completion of the Asian Centre have meant that a
large part of the collection remains in closed storage, limiting access by patrons
and imposing added workloads on reference and circulation staff.
The Asian Studies Division now serves a much larger public than it did at the
beginning of the 1970's.  Faculty and students from twenty-five departments use
the collection, and it attracts many visiting scholars.  Since 1974 a variety of
programmes have been arranged to introduce school students and members of the
Chinese and Japanese communities to the Library's resources.  The level of referenc
activity has increased steadily each year.  External loans were highest in 1976/77.
Circulation totals in the past two years have been adversely affected by the
quantity of material in storage and the inability of users to browse and retrieve
materials for themselves.
Many of the problems encountered in the seventies will be resolved when the Divisio
moves to the new Asian Centre. This important collection will then be seen for the
first time in an appropriate setting.
Interlibrary Loan Division
Perhaps more than any other library service, interlibrary loan was the subject of
controversy and change in the seventies.  Originally intended as a means of sharing
scholarly research materials, arrangements for lending among libraries have come to
be used to obtain more general publications that are not immediately available in
local collections.  Pressure of rapidly increasing volume and service costs in the
early seventies forced many larger academic libraries, which were lending far more
than they borrowed, to seek ways of limiting loans and recovering costs.  While the
immediate effect of such measures at U.B.C. was to reduce the volume of loans by
more than one-third, by the end of the decade the U.B.C. Library was once again
lending heavily to other libraries, but with significant differences.  The pattern
of lending has changed, with most loans going to libraries within B.C.; service was
improved and the cost of lending greatly reduced by acceptance of more systematic
procedures; and the Library was now being compensated in one way or another for
most lending costs.  Some of the major developments affecting U.B.C.'s interlibrary
loan service are described below:
In 1971 an informal organization of the three university libraries in B.C.
(TRIUL) was formed.  TRIUL libraries developed an interlibrary loan agreement - 35 -
that extended service to undergraduates, allowed for less restrictive borrowing of materials, and improved service through more efficient procedures.
In 1974 libraries belonging to the Canadian Association of Research Libraries
(CARL) agreed to lend materials to undergraduates at other CARL institutions
for a trial period of six months.  Since the number of requests from undergraduates proved to be a relatively insignificant part of the total inter-
library loan traffic, the practice was continued.
In 1974 the UBC Library became a participant in the Federated Information
Network (FIN), an interlibrary loan network developed and coordinated by the
Greater Vancouver Library Federation to facilitate resource sharing among the
eight Greater Vancouver public libraries.  Later, the UBC Library extended
service via this network to 17 government libraries in Victoria.  From the
outset, arrangements were made for reimbursement of lending costs to U.B.C.
In 1975 B. Stuart-Stubbs, M. Friesen and D. Mclnnes completed a survey of
interlibrary loan activities in Canada for the National Library.  Two reports
entitled Interlibrary loan in Canada; a report of a survey and A survey and
interpretation of the literature of interlibrary loan were submitted to the
National Library.  Although the report is the most comprehensive study of this
topic to date, it has not received wide distribution.  However, the survey
showed that a relatively few resource libraries in Canada provided the
majority of loans to other libraries in Canada, that the major resource
libraries lent far more than they borrowed, that this service was becoming an
increasing financial burden to the major lenders and that financial assistance
from federal and provincial agencies was needed to continue the service.  No
such subsidies have been provided on the national level.
In 1976 interlibrary lending fees were introduced.  The University of Toronto
Library began by imposing a fee of $8.00 per completed transaction.  During
the following month, interlibrary loan requests arrived in huge numbers at UBC,
the highest number of requests ever received in one month.  But the UBC Library
was also experiencing financial problems at the time and could not add staff
to deal with the increased workload.  UBC was therefore obliged to introduce
identical fees one month after Toronto had led the way.  Many libraries protested the policy, and lending volume dropped by 36% the following year.  In
B.C. the strongest protests came from college libraries, and the matter was
brought to the attention of a provincial coordinating committee, reporting to
the Ministry of Education.
In September 1977 the B.C. Post Secondary Library Network (NET) came into
being.  The Ministry of Education provided the initial grant to set up an
efficient interlibrary loan network, with the three B.C. university libraries
funded as resource centres for loans to B.C. colleges, institutes and the
David Thompson University Centre.  Computer-output-microform (COM) catalogues
of the individual university library collections, together with the equipment
needed to consult them, were distributed at government expense to all public
colleges and universities in B.C.  Telex machines were installed at most of 36
the colleges.  A network manual was prepared, describing lending policies of
the universities, routines to be followed, and protocols to be used in sending
telex messages.  In the Lower Mainland special arrangements were made for
truck delivery among two universities, four local colleges and one technical
institute.  In 1977/78 almost 17,000 items were lent to other post-secondary
libraries in the province.  UBC Library supplied 73% of these.  In 1978/79
this figure increased to over 20,000.
Borrowing and lending trends
Although interlibrary loan activity accounts for only 1% of total circulation, it
is an important barometer of UBC Library's role as a resource library in the province, in Canada and in North America and of UBC Library's dependence on other
libraries for materials not held in the collection.
The peak year for borrowing was 1972/73, when over 8,000 items were received from
other libraries.  Since then borrowing has stabilized at about 6,000 or 7,000 items
per year, increasing slightly during the past three years.  Prior to the establishment of NET, only 10% of the items borrowed by U.B.C. came from within the province;
now almost 20% of our loans come from other post-secondary libraries in B.C. Lendinc
volume has fluctuated in the 1970's, from over 21,000 items lent in 1971/72 to a
high of over 25,000 in 1974/75.  After the lending fee was imposed, volume decreasec
for two years, down to 16,000 in 1975/76 and 14,000 in 1976/77.  With the establishment of NET, lending volume increased again to over 23,000 in 1977/78 and 1978/79.
The major change in lending is the geographical distribution of requests.  Prior
to 1976 over 50% of items lent were sent to libraries outside the province; now
only 18% are sent to libraries outside the province and 60% of all items lent are
sent to post-secondary libraries in B.C.
Ten years ago, all lending costs were absorbed by the UBC Library.  Today about
80% of the lending services are provided on a cost-recovery basis.  The remaining
20% are loans to libraries which have reciprocal and mutually beneficial borrowing/
lending arrangements.
Other developments
In 1975 the Centre for Research Libraries in Chicago expanded its acquisition of
journals to include coverage of all currently published journals in science, technology and the social sciences.  Special protocols were set up for a document
delivery service, called the Journals Access Service.  UBC Library's requests are
transmitted by telex to CRL using an abreviated message format.  If CRL cannot
supply the journal article, the request is transmitted to the British Library
Lending Division.  The service has been successful - UBC Library's requests to CRL
have increased by 200%.
In 1977 the Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information (CISTI)
introduced an improved document delivery service called CAN/DOC.  Citations that 37
are verified in the CAN/OLE data base are ordered on-line via the computer terminal.
The turnaround time from CISTI has improved significantly.
Future developments
The key to improved interlibrary loan services in the future is to be able to verify
citations quickly through access to bibliographic data bases, to be able to locate
materials quickly through improved union catalogues, and to continue the development
of efficient provincial, national and international interlibrary loan networks and
delivery systems.
Science Division and Mathematics Branch Library
The Science Division of the Main Library provides reference services in the pure
and applied sciences, excluding the biomedical sciences, forestry and agriculture,
which are served from separate branch libraries.  The Mathematics Branch Library is
located in the Department of Mathematics, where it houses the mathematics part of
the science collection.  Together the Science Division and the Mathematics Library
form one single administrative unit.
A reference division's major responsibility is to act as the interface between the
Library and its patrons.  Ten years ago we might have used a different word, but
this is the age of the computer, which in the past decade has done more than change
our language: it has changed our work.
Of course, science librarians have continued to be instrumental in assisting
bibliographers and others in building the Library's collection, but their most
obvious and, in fact, major function has not been to put books and journals into
the Library, but to assist patrons in getting information out of it.
To this purpose there always have been indexes and bibliographies listing items in
larger or smaller subject groupings, but as the body of published information grew
—and we all know that there has been and still is a "publication explosion" —so
did the indexes to a point where using them became a major task by itself.  Recent
developments in computer technology have now made it possible to store the information contained in large indexes on magnetic tape and to have these so-called
"data bases" searched by the computer.  Depending on the nature and level of the
search, this can be done in a fraction of the time needed to check printed indexes
and will result in a printout, listing references to scientific and technical
literature appropriate to a user's needs.
At the start of the decade this was done as a "batch process" and users' needs were
expressed by a librarian in the form of an "interest profile" which was sent by
mail to a distant computer facility which in response would produce a "current
awareness service" alerting its customers to new literature in their field.  In
Canada this service was pioneered by the National Science Library in Ottawa. - 38 -
Now, ten years later, UBC Librarians can go "on-line" and key a patron's request
directly into a computer terminal, which through a network of appropriate data
bases, some of which are thousands of miles away, can produce instant bibliographies.  To this purpose the UBC Library now has contracts with a number of major data
base distributors.  Among these the Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical
Information (CISTI), which is the successor to the National Science Library,
continues to play an important role.  Others are BRS (Bibliographic Retrieval
System) in Scotia, N.Y., Infomart in Toronto, Lockheed Information Systems in Palo
Alto, California, and QL Systems in Kingston, Ontario.  Together they provide
instantaneous access to millions of citations, generally covering the scientific
literature of the past ten years.
Magnificent as this development may be, it still does not provide library users
with information, but with references to information, which may or may not be
available in the UBC Library.  And this so called computerized "information retrieval" will sometimes create expectations which the Library cannot immediately meet.
In other words "the information age" has brought us the first step, giving us
information about information, but not immediate access to the information itself.
To this end we still need old-fashioned library skills with which the Library has
always assisted all comers, as well as the help of other libraries through inter-
library loan arrangements.  Our assistance has taken two forms: library instruction,
teaching our numerous users how to use the library and thus to help themselves; and
also direct help to faculty and students, as well as members of the general public,
business and industry.
Where this traditional type of library service used to be free, and still is,
financial exigency has forced the Library to make the user share at least part of
the cost of the computer search.  This has resulted in a two-tier pricing policy
with the Library subsidizing UBC-related computer searches by paying 40% of the
external costs, providing its own services free, but charging the full cost of a
search, including UBC staff time, to off-campus users.  Students can also make use
of a so called "Student Special" which for $5.00 provides UBC students with a
limited search.  So far this pricing policy has been well received and appears to
have been no impediment to the success of the new service.
At the same time increased library use and complexity of reference service have
created the need for more specialized subject knowledge on the part of the reference staff.  Even if most librarians still have to be able to work as "generalists"
a good deal of the time, it has become increasingly important to have a subject
specialist available for more demanding questions.  The Division now has a professional staff whose combined postgraduate degrees pretty well cover those physical
and applied sciences for which we are responsible.  In numbers the combined staff
of the Mathematics Library and the Science Division has remained constant over the
past decade. 39 -
In summary: a decade of exceptional growth of the literature of science and
technology has been reflected in a similar growth of the Library's science collection, an increase in library use, and in the complexity of reference services
required.  So far we have managed to cope with the resulting growing pains with
some measure of success.  Growth, however, will continue and where we have been
able to handle its related problems with the help of a specialized and dedicated
staff, not to forget the ubiquitous computer, the physical space available in our
Library Buildings is now stretched to its limits.  Books and journals need shelves,
staff and even computers need working space, library patrons need room as well as
peace and quiet.  To be able to provide all this is our challenge for the eighties.
Woodward Biomedical Library
During the past ten years the Woodward Library has sought to develop its role as a
resource centre for printed materials and information in the life sciences, not only
at the University of British Columbia, but throughout B.C. and Western Canada.  As
funds and staff time have allowed there have been extensions, and additions, of many
types of service.  The imminent prospect of a tertiary care hospital and research
centre a few yards distant from Woodward, branches at St. Paul's and the Shaughnessy
Hospital sites, and continued service through the Vancouver General Hospital branch
will undoubtedly alter the character of what has been a library facility providing
sophisticated and specialized service for the life sciences community.
Since 1969/70 Woodward's collections have increased from 128,600 volumes to 217,000
in 1978/79.  Every effort has been made to maintain the Library's strong journal
collections, and in 1978/79 subscriptions to 5100 journals were held in Woodward
alone.
The volume of many public services has climbed steadily, in some cases dramatically
External loans have increased by 67%, from 112,025 in 1969/70 to 187,425 in 1978/79
Though precise figures are not available, it seems likely that in-house use of
collections has also increased in view of the greatly expanded seating capacity.
The use of reference services has increased as well, with 43% more questions
answered in 1978/79 than in 1972/73, the first year for which figures are available
During the decade, the staff establishment grew from 7 librarians and 18 support
staff to 11.5 librarians and 26 support staff, while changes in hours worked and
vacation entitlements have reduced any real gain in the library's capacity to offer
new and improved services.
A survey in 1975 indicated that almost twenty per cent of reference queries answered
were provided to off-campus inquirers, including students and faculty from other
institutions, both educational and governmental; health and other professional
business employees or managers; and lay inquirers.  The lay group now constitutes
one of the most avid and demanding groups, reflecting growing general interest in
such areas as ecology and health care.  Because many of the members of the general - 40 -
public or inquirers from other institutions arrive at Woodward with little library
skill, experience or knowledge of the U.B.C. Library, the assistance required is
frequently extensive and time-consuming.
Two areas of particular public service emphasis have been the provision of computerized bibliographic reference services, on a pioneer basis as far as UBC is
concerned, and a rapid expansion of orientation programs.  The computerized services
which now provide access to more than 30 data bases, began in 1973 as an eighteen-
month pilot project for the single MEDLINE data base.  Funds were provided by the
Mr. & Mrs. P.A. Woodward Foundation.  Provincial government funds extended the
period for provision of free province-wide service for a further 2 years.  By 1976
full charges were instituted for off-campus users, and subsidized charges for
University users.  Orientation programs, which were presented ten years ago by the
Biomedical Librarian as a public relations introduction for basic health science
courses, now are replaced by subject specific presentations to more than 1000
biology and professional school students each year.  A series of review or self-
instructional tapes based on the audio-visual portions of the orientation programs
have been provided for individual instruction.
The physical facilities originally provided in 1964 by the generous gift of
Mr. & Mrs. P.A. Woodward (and a matching federal Government Health Resources Fund
allocation) were almost doubled in 1970 through funding from the same sources.
Credit for encouraging the provision of Woodward Foundation (and other) funds and
for guiding the operation and planning of facilities as Chairman of the Biomedical
Library Committee for over twenty years, belongs to Dr. W.C. Gibson, Head of the
History of Health Sciences until his retirement in 1978.  Dr. Gibson had a vision
of a biomedical library facility at U.B.C. equal to other outstanding facilities
in North America.
Doubling of physical facilities and proximity to the Instructional Resources Centre
opened the way for growth and expansion of services.  The growth of worldwide
academic and research interests - in this case for the life science areas including
ecology, environment, and pollution; and the growth of the student body in areas
such as medicine, pharmacy and nursing - have resulted in a demand for improved,
complex and sophisticated services.  Tripled seating capacity has resulted in
greatly increased in-library use and has also helped to attract users at all levels
and from all areas of the University.
During the past ten years the Memorial area, which houses the rare and historical
material, has become known on and off campus as an outstanding special resource.
Many aspects of the collection, including manuscripts, have been expanded and
catalogued in a manner which has rendered this collection readily accessible to a
variety of enquirers.  The limited staff and funding available have been directed
toward physical organization and preservation of the priceless collection housed
there. - 41 -
As Woodward Library looks forward to a program of greatly expanded public service
demands coupled with ever-present economic restraints, it faces the continuing
problems of shortage of staff, work-space, and funds for collections.  The challenges of the 1980's will make that decade as exciting as the last one.
Biomedical Branch Library
During the past ten years the inadequacies of the physical space occupied by the
Branch and the consequent effect on collection development have become more and
more apparent under the pressure of increased use by more borrowers with increasingly diverse interests.  1979 will be a benchmark year in the history of the
Biomedical Branch.  After many years in inadequate quarters some relief is in sight
in the form of an extensive renovation and expansion of the Branch in its present
location.
In 1966 the collection in the Biomedical Branch was approximately 13,000 volumes.
In the past year in anticipation of the move into expanded quarters the collection
has been allowed to grow to over 19,000 volumes of books and bound journals.
It is appropriate that the collection at the Branch should be relatively small,
intensively used, and supplemented by a fast, efficient delivery service from campus
However since 1973 it has been necessary to limit the size of the collection
because there was not room to store even some still useful material.  In September
1973 an inventory established the size of the collection at the Branch at 17,496
volumes and by the end of August 1979 this will have increased by about 2400
volumes - a net increase of 13.5% during a period when the collections of the
University Library as a whole will have increased by over 25%.  However, concealed
within the net increase is the fact that during this period over 6200 volumes have
been added and nearly 4,000 withdrawn to storage or discarded.
The Biomedical Branch serves a dual role - as a Branch of the University Library
oriented to serving the needs of undergraduates and faculty in Medicine, and as the
Library of the Vancouver General Hospital and the Cancer Control Agency of B.C.  It
has been estimated that as many as 2500 to 3000 people may turn to the Biomedical
Branch as the library of first choice, but anyone with a valid UBC Library card or
any of the approximately 5000 employees and medical staff of VGH and CCABC would be
entitled to borrow books if they so desire.
The principal University-affiliated users of the Branch are undergraduate students
and faculty of the UBC Faculty of Medicine.  Statistics available from samplings of
,-irculation indicate that borrowing by undergraduate students has increased by about
75% since 1973/74.  A major change in the undergraduate curriculum in 1975 may have
been the cause of this increase in use.  Student use of the Branch will continue to
grow as enrolment in the Faculty of Medicine increases and this has made it mandatory that the library be expanded.  Since medical students are heavy 'in house* users 42
of library materials it will be interesting to see if the renovations nearing
completion will provide enough seating and stack capacity to serve their needs
adequately.
The Branch, in its role as a hospital library, has changed in the last ten to
fifteen years from use mainly by physicians - the so called "Doctors' Library" - to
serving a wide variety of health professionals.  In the year 1973/74 about 1500
books were borrowed by professionals other than physicians employed by the hospital.
Now - five years later - this group has increased their borrowings by over 100%.
Increased demand for library materials by allied health professionals - particularly
nurses - has created serious difficulties for the library in that they often require
material on subjects that have not in the past been heavily stocked by the Branch.
The same materials are often difficult to obtain from campus because of heavy use
there.
In 1975 the Cancer Control Agency of BC (the third partner in the financial support
of the Branch along with VGH and UBC) appointed a full time librarian of its own
and began building a library collection in Oncology.  The initial impact was to
increase their demand on the Branch's collection under the guidance of their librarian, but as their own collection has improved the Cancer Control Agency's use of
the Branch's collection has leveled off at about 2800 to 3000 borrowings annually.
A hospital, of course, operates twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.  Even
though the Branch is open up to 92 hours a week, there is pressure from users for
twenty-four hour access to the books.  Much of the use of the collection is 'in
house' use by House Staff studying and preparing for rounds during the time when
they are 'on call'.  A sampling in 1973 indicated that at least 2.5 items were
shelved after 'in house' use for every item returned after being removed from the
premises.  That 'in house' use is increasing still further is suggested by the 65%
increase in the public use of the Branch's copy facilities between 1974/75 and
1978/79.
Since most of the information seekers at the Branch are physicians or other health
professionals seeking information often directly related to patient care, it has
been the custom at the Branch to try to provide a high quality reference and bibliographical service - often gathering the information rather than just directing
patrons to the proper indexes or sources.  The extent to which this service is used
is limited more by the staff time available than by demand.  Between 1972/73 and
1978/79, the number of questions answered annually increased by 65%.  The Branch's
half-time reference position was increased to full-time in July, 1977.
From the inception of computerized bibliographical searching until October, 1978 it
was necessary to have searches for Branch users carried out by the Woodward Library
on campus.  Since October, 1978 a CRT has been available at the Branch for searching
of the Elhill data bases, and the immediate availability of the service has resulted 43
in a threefold increase in a single year in the number of searches for Branch users.
Although it is easy to enumerate the library's shortcomings it would be misleading
to suggest that no progress has been made.  On the positive side - even in the face
of serious inflation - the collection has been maintained and indeed improved to
the extent that space permits.  By using more efficient methods (vide automated
circulation) service has been maintained at the same level as in 1970 with essentially the same number of staff despite an increase in the number of people being
served.  Finally the renovated space that is nearing completion will substantially
improve the capacity of the library and its effectiveness.
Animal Resource Ecology Library
Like every other library and division in the UBC Library system, the Ecology Library
has grown and expanded its services during the 1970's.
Stack and study areas were more than doubled in 1977 when the library moved to new
quarters.  At that time, the collection was reorganized with journals arranged by
main entry rather than by country.  With a binding allocation finally available,
progress has been made in having all journals catalogued and accessible to campus
users through the central UBC Library catalogue system.
Since 1970/71, when the Ecology Library was established as a branch library,
external loans have increased by 473%, from 1,997 to 11,441 last year.  During the
same period, the number of reference questions handled annually grew by 334%, from
1,566 to 6,799.  Several factors have contributed to increased use of collections
and services.  Since the number of faculty and students in the Institute is comparatively small, library staff members have become familiar with their research
interests and have been able to develop a highly relevant collection for their use.
Special efforts are made to locate information and materials held elsewhere in the
library system.  In recent years, faculty members have been using the Ecology
Library more and more as the main location for reserve materials for courses and
seminars.  Use by other faculties on campus has grown also as a result of increased
involvement in interdisciplinary research.
While the Ecology Library's collection is strongest in fisheries and hydrobiology,
materials are also acquired to support the Institute's interest in the ecology of
natural resources, systems analysis and experimental field biology.  Although the
highly specialized and varied teaching and research interests of the faculty cannot
be fully represented in a small branch library, access to resources of the UBC
Library system permits the Ecology Library to be flexible and selective in its
approach to collections.  Strength in aquatic sciences can be maintained, along
with carefully selected materials from other subject areas where these appear
particularly useful. - 44 -
From 1970 to 1978 the Ecology librarian served as liaison between the W.C.U.M.B.S.
Library in Bamfield and the U.B.C. Library.  This involved ordering furniture for
the library; collecting books and journals, which were acquired and catalogued by
U.B.C; setting up the library; revising the card catalogue; and arranging for
interlibrary loan service.  The librarian still administers a small fund for out-
of-print material required by Bamfield.
Using programmes written by Dr. N.J. Wilimovsky, the Ecology Library has been able
to create a data base of 11,000 references to materials in the library's extensive
reprint collection.  The result is a rapidly developing, in-house, student-oriented
retrieval system.  The considerable task of entering data for the system has been
accomplished through the assistance of students working for three summers under
Youth Employment Project grants, students working under the B.C. Work Study programme and during the past summer under the Youg Canada Works programme.  Much remains
to be done, but the data base is already valuable since it includes many of the
classic papers in fisheries, some of which are not available elsewhere at U.B.C.
MacMillan Library
During the last decade the collection has evolved in several ways, sometimes in
response to the development of new courses or institutes, sometimes in response to
changes or expanding needs in existing courses.
Food science, for instance, was established as a department about the beginning
of the decade and now has the largest graduate enrolment in the Faculty.  While
the whole food collection could not be transferred to MacMillan, a compromise was
reached whereby the main collection was transferred to Woodward and the responsibility subsequently divided between the two branches, with Woodward looking after
the nutritional aspects and MacMillan the technological.  (An interesting point,
established during the storage project this summer, was confirmation that our food
science collection was quite easily the most heavily used in the branch).
Forest recreation and parks, and more recently, landscape architecture are other
late-comers on the scene which come to mind.  Interest has been growing rapidly in
these areas over the last ten years.  As much as time and money permits, collections
have been developed, duplicating Main Library materials quite heavily when necessary
especially those relevant to landscape architecture.
Again in response to a perceived need, materials on tropical forestry and agriculture have been acquired.  At the same time it has been necessary to maintain or
improve the support given to courses already offered, many of which have themselves
changed direction or emphasis over the years.  There is now, for example, more
emphasis and certainly more interest in forest ecology and forest management than
before, and this may mean buying two or three copies of a book where one would have
sufficed previously. - 45 -
One trend, resulting from lack of space, has been the concentration on English
language materials at the expense of the less used foreign language books and
periodicals, which should have a place in a research library.  However, close examination of the collection just selected for storage would appear to justify this
emphasis, for with few exceptions foreign language books have hardly been used.
Circulation has more than doubled in ten years, increasing more or less each year.
Reference questions answered, however, have fluctuated, going down from 1972/73 to
1974/75 then rising again, especially in the last two years or so.  Since the upswing was already on the way before the introduction of computer-assisted searching
it cannot be attributed entirely to the attractiveness of this innovation.
The computer search has proven attractive to both students and faculty, though it
demands additional time for the reference librarian (previously, extended searches
were usually done by the patrons themselves).  Apart from the obvious benefits,
such as speed of retrieval, enquiries about computer searchers have provided opportunities to introduce students with little or no previous training in bibliographic
research to some of the basic printed indexes.
During the past ten years, the lack of space for growth in MacMillan has been a
constant problem.  Ten years ago it meant that about 6500 backfile volumes were
retained in the Main Library, and that each summer for the next few years some
small expedient was effected to accommodate a few more shelves for new accessions.
In 1972, however, various major changes occurred.  The Main Library, also in need
of room, retired some of the collection to storage, including backfiles belonging
to MacMillan.  At the same time MacMillan selected and retired about 2000 monographs
which, added to the periodicals already there, brought holdings in storage to approximately 8,500 volumes.
In 1975 the library was again overflowing.  On this occasion the pleasant faculty-
graduate reading room was commandeered and stacks took the place of coffee tables,
still leaving, however, room for six readers.  The unbound government publications
collection was then moved in, freeing two sides of one aisle, or one fifth more
space, in the stacks for books.
By summer 1978 it was evident once again the another major storage project was required.  It is still in progress.  When completed some 7000 - 8000 volumes will have
been retired.  The selection is mainly of monograph materials - little used English
and foreign-language books, superseded editions, and other outdated materials.  Some
foreign-language periodicals and foreign government publications were also included,
but generally the periodical collection was left as it was with the thought that a
substantial block of periodicals could form the nucleus of the next retirement a few
years hence. 46
Very little seating space has been sacrificed during all this time - in fact, the
number of seats remains the same, though they are rather more crowded than in early
days.  But as the microcatalogue grows and as long as the card catalogue must also
be retained some reader space may have to be dedicated to microfiche readers.
The lack of space for both books and people (staff and students) is the single most
pressing problem.  The removal to storage this year will temporarily satisfy the
need for more space, but it will increase the workload for staff, here and in Main
Circulation as well, since stored materials are paged through that division.  Though
it would increase workloads further for MacMillan staff, it may prove more efficient
in future to retrieve materials directly from storage in the Library Processing
Centre.
Sedgewick Library
Sedgewick Library began the decade of the seventies in trouble.  Enrollment, books,
staff and services had long since outgrown the undergraduate library quarters, and
it would be three years before the new undergraduate library building could be
occupied.  Servicing a collection numbering just over one hundred thousand items
and providing a home-use book circulation of better than a half million, there were
two dozen staff squeezed into a space designed for six.  Undergraduates over-ran
the four hundred and fifty seats available in the reading rooms, while only thirty
seats were available immediately adjacent to the collection.
The new Sedgewick Library opened in January 1973, providing almost twelve hundred
study seats, over three hundred and fifty casual reading seats, space for two
hundred thousand volumes and room everywhere for staff, services, amenities and
traffic flow.  The Wilson Recordings Collection, relocated to the new building,
provided an additional eighty-four audio carrells as well as the first access that
many undergraduates had to the Library's excellent collection of sound recordings.
Awarded the 1970 Best Design Award of the Canadian Architecture Yearbook, and the
1973 First Award of the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada as the best building
of all kinds built in Canada in that year, Sedgewick Library had come of age.  International recognition followed in a variety of publications and the Sedgewick
Library was hailed as a "seminal influence in the design of new library buildings
during the coming years". (1)
The success of the Sedgewick design lay in the careful planning and consultation
process that librarians and architects shared.  Most important, students were
surveyed and questioned, and their activities were monitored so that a library
could be tailored to their needs.  The effort put into that process has been well
(1)  Ellsworth Mason, "Underneath the Oak Trees: the Sedgewick Undergraduate Library
at U.B.C", The Journal of Academic Librarianship, January 1977, p.292. - 47
rewarded.  Students are attracted to use Sedgewick at a high rate; the close of the
decade will mark the seventh anniversary of the new Sedgewick and will see the ten
millionth user pass through the turnstiles.
Nor do those users merely pass through.  Headcounts which have been taken over the
years have shown a consistently heavy use for study, reading and related library
activities.  A one-time, high count of building occupants of over one thousand four
hundred has been recorded.  Those using only the undergraduate facility, exclusive
of the Wilson Recordings Library, numbered twelve hundred and thirteen hundred,
respectively, at noon in November, 1973 and March, 1978.  Nine hundred were using
the undergraduate library at eight on a Monday evening in November, 1974, while more
than six hundred have been counted on various Saturday evenings at eight.  In a word
this library is used.
At the same time, Sedgewick is also a more useful library than it was at the opening
of the decade.  The collection is bigger by half.  It has also been weeded of older,
unused material, and it is shelved in roomy, readily accessible stacks with hundreds
of seats immediately adjacent to the collection.  That means that students no longer
have to charge out every item they wish to read.  It also means that reshelving is
more efficient and much faster than before, and the net result is that students are
saved much effort and time.  Home-use circulation has dropped from a half million by
approximately thirty percent, while in-library use increased to three hundred and
fifty thousand in the first year in the new building, and is currently more than six
hundred thousand items, or four times the in-library circulation of the old Sedgewick.
As students have been better able to serve themselves in the new Sedgewick, staff
have been able to improve the quality and types of reader assistance.  No longer
facing a daily backlog of circulation, librarians have been freed to reach out with
new programs to aid students in their discovery and use of library materials.  New
student orientation programs are offered, where, for a time, none were given in the
old Sedgewick.  Over eighty first year classes are provided with bibliographic
lectures and tours each fall.  As well, a Term Paper Clinic is offered wherein participating undergraduates are provided with an individual tutorial showing them how
to conduct library research.  Additionally, staff have been able to provide new
services, such as the newspaper clippings file, which place more printed materials
at hand for students in the new Sedgewick.
Wilson Recordings Collection
Of the many changes this division has experienced during the past ten years, the move
to the larger quarters in the Sedgewick building was probably the greatest. The
increased area has allowed the Collection to more than double in volume, and has
provided an expansion of in-house facilities.  The listening area now has 84 carrells
compared with 24 prior to the move. - 48 -
Conversion to the automated circulation system has enabled us to handle more than
four times the loans made ten years ago.  In the near future, this division will
be the pilot project for bar-code scanning, which will speed circulation procedures
and reduce the amount of routine work involved.
The majority of our 2,165 paid subscribers are UBC students, faculty and staff.
Currently we have 145 full-rate extra-mural borrowers, 20 reduced rate (O.A.P.!
borrowers, and 50 faculty and graudate student borrowers from other British
Columbia post-secondary educational institutions.
When requested, we reserve materials for course use.  Last year we reserved course
materials for the Music, Education, French and English Departments.
In the early 1960's this division pioneered the library's use of computers for
catalogue support.  The first paper lists then produced bore little resemblance to
the sophisticated microfiche catalogues of today.  Except for a very few areas,
recordings are analyzed so that each item on the disc will appear in the appropriate catalogue.  We now produce an Author/Composer catalogue listing nearly
100,000 separate entries, a Distinctive Title catalogue, a catalogue by classification number and a performer index.
Collecting recordings for circulation is quite a different matter from collecting
books.  The fragility of discs is readily apparent; they scratch easily, the grooves
are damaged by blunted styli  and abrasive dust particles, and sunshine and other
heat sources cause them to warp.  Consequently they must be replaced far more
frequently than other library materials.  When older records have suffered one of
these fates and we attempt to replace them, we often find that they are no longer
in the manufacturers' lists.  Used record shops, unlike used book shops, are few
and far between and a catalogue of used records is a rarity.  This predicament
forces us to rely heavily on private collections for replacement copies.
During the last ten years the Collection has grown from 20,000 to 30,000 discs and
we estimate similar growth, about 10,000 discs, for the next ten year period.
Music Library
The Music Library, located on the fourth floor of the Music Building, was opened
in the Fall of 1967.  Prior to this date books, journals and microfilms concerning
music and musicology as well as scores were handled by the Fine Arts and Music
Division in the Main Library.  Eight-thousand five-hundred scores and books were
moved from the Main Library to the Music Library in 1967; twelve years later this
collection has grown to 40,000 volumes, a 370% increase.  In addition to the library
collection the Department of Music moved its phonorecording collection into the
Music Library.  This collection has been the responsibility of the Music Library
ever since. 49 -
The backbone of a strong academic music collection is its holdings of complete
works and historical sets.  In order to build as complete a collection as possible
in these fields, reprints of indispensible 19th century complete works were purchased.  When a reprint was not available a microfilm copy was obtained.  Rare
first editions of complete works were also bought for the microfilm collection.
In addition, subscription orders were placed for complete works in progress.  Thus
a musician interested in Mozart can compare the music in several printed editions:
the famous first edition of 1798 on microfilm, the 19th century edition edited by
Brahms amongst others, and the new edition which was begun in the Mozart bicentennial year 1956, as well as several circulating editions in the stacks.
Special emphasis has been placed on the purchase of facsimile editions of manuscripts.  Again, if a manuscript is not available in book form a microfilm copy
is obtained instead.  This means that the musician interested in Mozart is able to
study the manuscript as well as the printed editions.  The same steps were followed
in building up the collection of historical sets.
Many of the complete editions and historical sets were purchased with special funds
such as the Otto Koerner fund or the Canada Council fund.  However, the largest
part of the Canada Council funds was spent on a special project, namely the acquisition of European music manuscripts on microfilm.  With the assistance of the
Music faculty, a desiderata list was compiled and numerous libraries all over
Europe were approached and asked to make film copies of their invaluable manuscripts.  Most of the libraries responded positively and the Music Library now
has an outstanding collection in this field, covering all areas of music from the
Middle Ages on.
Special efforts have also been made to improve the Music Library's score collection.  Works of well-known composers were completed, while representative works of
lesser-known composers were acquired.  No specific area was given preference in
order to acquire as wide a collection as possible: Medieval music was purchased
as well as 20th century music, Renaissance as well as Baroque, Classical as well
as Romantic.
Special attention was also given to books and journals in English and translations
into English, with books in French, German and Italian a close second.  Special
funds again made possible the acquisition of costly reprints of scholarly books
and backfiles of important journal titles.  Orders for current journal titles were
placed, resulting in the acquisition of a wide range of publications not only in
English, but also in French, German, Italian and other languages.  Every effort
was made to acquire out-of-print books and journals in microform.  Of the rare
material purchased, special mention must be made of the Musica Sacra part of the
Gatti-Kraus collection.  It comprises 66 items, including many manuscripts and
early editions.  This purchase was also made possible by special funding.  Several
of the items are housed in the Special Collections Division of the Main Library for
security and special protection. 50 -
The UBC Library System already supported a phonorecording collecting, the Wilson
Recordings Collection now housed in the Sedgewick Library, when the record collection of the Department of Music was transferred to the Music Library in 1967.
Special funding, this time generous support from the office of the Dean of Arts,
helped to improve the quality and quantity of the recordings.  As the library
already supported a large circulating collection on campus, it was decided to make
the collection in the Music Library a small, non-circulating teaching collection.
There has been an enormous increase in the use of our resources.  Between 1967-68
and 1978/79 the use of the record collection increased by over 322%.  The increase
in 2-week loans of books and scores and in the use of reserve material grew by
336% in the same period.  Comparing these two figures with the increase in Library
holdings it seems apparent that the money spent on collections was spent on
material which is being used.  It would have been impossible to cope with the large
circulation increase without an automated circulation system.  Although Library
staff and the public seemed reluctant to accept automation when it was first
introduced, no one can imagine being without it now.
Reference questions in all areas of music and musicology were answered at an
average of 11,500 per year.  Of these questions, about 20-25% came from non-UBC
clientele.  Lack of staff makes it impossible to work on extensive bibliographies.
Talks to classes and guided tours of the Music Library for first-year students have
helped to familiarize newcomers with the Library.  On these occasions, students
are invited to bring their library problems to the reference assistant.  With the
introduction of the automated catalogue system, special care is taken to assist
the user in adjusting to the new method of finding material.
One need only compare the number of advertisements for musical events in local
newspapers ten years ago and now to understand the reasons for the heavy use of
the Library by local musicians.  Ten years ago concerts were few and the fare
routine.  Now concerts are frequent, often two or three on the same day, the music
performed ranges from the Middle Ages to the avant-garde.  And more often than not
the music performed is from the collection of the UBC Music Library.  There is no
other library in town that can provide the full range of music from the very early
to the 20th century, to the same extent.  On many occasions a local musical group
consults our resources (reference sources, thematic catalogues, etc.) in order to
decide on programming for its concerts, and it is from the Music Library that the
music is selected once the group has made its decision.  The Music Library has
received grateful acknowledgement from many musicians and musical groups for its
services, none nicer than the one from the Towne Waytes, a group specializing in
Renaissance music, who thanked the Music Library on the jacket of one of their
recordings: "... without the Music Library's resources our instruments would be
mute." 51
When the Music Library was in the planning stages, space was provided for a collection growing to its physical capacity within ten years.  This estimate could not
have been more accurate: after exactly ten years of operation it became obvious
that more shelving had to be installed.  Shelving has subsequently been added to
the closed-in area housing the recording collection, complete works and historical
sets as well as against the east wall, at the expense of seating space.
The measures taken will solve the space problem for about five years, at the most
optimistic estimate.  More shelving could be installed by removing the periodical
shelving against the east wall and replacing it with book shelves.  In its present
quarters, other space-finding measures for the Music Library are unacceptable as
they could only be implemented at the expense of seating accommodation.  Without
a long-term solution, one-half of the 100,000 volume collection anticipated by the
end of the 'eighties will be housed somewhere in storage and out of reach of speedy
retrieval.
Curriculum Laboratory
Since the Curriculum Laboratory opened in 1956 to serve the new Faculty of Education it was the first campus branch in what was to become a complex Library system.
During its first years, however, the facility operated with very limited aspirations, reflecting the stereotyped textbook oriented teaching so prevelant then in
our elementary and secondary schools.  Presumably this unit was to have facilitated
the demonstration and development of new curriculum materials in British Columbia.
Despite its name and its founders' intentions, it became, not a "laboratory" but
a "book room" stocked with multiple copies of the prescribed K-12 texts.  These
saw only moderate use except during practicum periods when throngs of student-
teachers mobbed the collection, creating a scene that is still remembered as a
"bargain basement sale".  The Lab's prime function during these years was to remove
the burden from local school boards of supplying books and pictures to UBC students.
By the end of the 1960's, however, some faculty were demanding something much more
useful.  As a result the Library begart to move an assortment of professional books
and a handful of journals across campus.  By 1969 this piecemeal and erratic
approach was getting out of hand.  Some longer range plans were needed.  By this
time, in fact, both the Faculty and Library were counting on a major resources
centre where all the professional and curriculum materials needed by educational
researchers and students could be brought together.  On the assumption that planning for such a facility would soon be under way a decision was made to move as
many materials to the Education Building as could be housed in the available 9,000
square feet.  Thus, by the early 1970's those professional books and journals that
dealt primarily with classroom practice, t^e "current affairs" of teaching and
low-level research had been moved from the overcrowded Main Stacks.  At the same
time a decision was made to expand the picture collection to include as much non-
print media as budget, space and staff would permit.  Books and journals supporting - 52 -
the more theoretical aspects of education were now isolated in the Main Library
until the expected new building became a reality.  The most pessimistic estimate
for that date was some time before 1980.
Unfortunately, one of the continuing disappointments of the 1970's was the failure
to obtain this facility, which would have made so much possible.  It would, for
example, have provided a genuine laboratory where teachers, students, technicians,
curriculum theorists and librarians could have worked together on new and exciting
materials.  It would have provided the space needed to bring most of the traditional
book and journal resources together.  These are presently scattered in various
locations across campus.
It would also have provided adequate working space needed by a staff which, in
the future, will not only have to deal with a student body of 3,000 but also with
30,000 practising teachers.  The fact that the Curriculum Laboratory operates out
of a noisy, third-floor study hall with none of the amenities of a modern resource
centre continues to limit the ways in which UBC's Faculty of Education can respond
to the need for innovation.
Despite the restraints created by inadequate facilities and scattered collections,
the 1970's were most certainly ten years of exhilarating challenge and gratifying
progress.  It was, of course, a time when teaching patterns in the schools underwent a genuine revolution.  In reflecting the changed heeds of teachers the
Curriculum Laboratory experienced a period which was sometimes stressful and
difficult but always interesting.
Today's classrooms are stocked with a vast array of print, electronic and manipulative learning devices.  School and district resource centers now are central to
the educative process and administer substantial budgets.  Professional training
for teachers now consists of many radically different graduate and undergraduate
programs which use a vast array of print and non-print material.  Educational
research before the mid 1960's was virtually unknown in this province.  Today
hundreds of faculty, graduate students, teachers and officials are routinely involved in sophisticated projects that depend on an efficient system of information
retrieval.  These developments have been mirrored by the evolution of the Curriculum
Laboratory's collections and services.
Gone, for example, are the 20,000 uncatalogued textbook editions and the emphasis
on providing practicum aids.  Instead, there now exists a carefully selected
collection of some 60,000 volumes which, in separate sub-locations, includes
professional books and journals, K-12 textbooks of all sorts, and children's
literature in both English and French.  A weeded and expanded picture collection
still exists but there are also some 20,000 other items or sets comprising nearly
a dozen different media.  A pamphlet file of curriculum materials is gone but, in
its place, are a much larger file of professional reprints, pamphlets and clippings 53 -
and a course reading file of reserve materials.  Although borrowing for school use
still takes place collections are being developed to back up on-campus teaching
and research needs.  This change in policy has altered a pattern of borrowing which,
in the late 1960's, saw some 140,000 loans concentrated during a few months to one
in which some 240,000 loans are spread much more evenly throughout the academic
year.
As in all branches and divisions, the 1970's witnessed the harnessing of computer-
based procedures to library processes.  The print-outs, special files, microfiche,
computer-produced catalogues, and machine searches have drastically altered the
services available to patrons.  Automation has certainly done much to accentuate
the difference between the Curriculum Laboratory and several of the "reading rooms"
run by Faculty departments.  In the late 1960's there really was not a very great
or obvious distinction.  Today, even small branch libraries enjoy the enormous
advantages which come from being part of a large, complex library system.
During the past ten years low turnover in staff positions and additional professional staffing have created a stable and competent core group to serve users of the
Curriculum Laboratory.  As hours have been extended, more materials loaned, collections enriched and new services offered, the Curriculum Laboratory has been
fortunate in adding staff during the 70's to support the development of an improved
library service.
Today it is fashionable to be cynical about most government services and bureaucracies.  In the case of the libraries at UBC and certainly the Curriculum Laboratory
there is no doubt that progress has been real.  The improvement and growth of
collections, the introduction of modern technology, and the development of a more
committed staff have made possible a resource that is incomparably better equipped
to deal with the needs of a great faculty than was the "book room" of the 1960's.
Law Library
1970 marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of the founding of the Faculty of Law at
U.B.C.
In its first year, the full-time teaching complement had numbered two with 86
undergraduate students (the majority being recently-returned veterans), operating
out of two army huts, which also contained a hastily-assembled library of 5,000
volumes supervised by one of the professors.  By the end of the 60's the faculty
had grown to twenty-five, the student body stood at 539, and its library - numbering
59,000 volumes - had completely taken over the new all-purpose law building, erected
in 1952.  One by one the three lecture halls had been inundated by this growing
collection and, by the mid 60's, faculty and students found themselves banished
once more to their humble beginnings.  The two huts had now become five, dilapidated
derelicts strung together to form a complex housing most teaching and office 54 -
functions.  The law 'building' was now the law 'library'.
By the beginning of the 70's, planning for a much-needed facility to consolidate
all Faculty of Law activities had been in progress for two years.  By that time,
the Law Library had become hopelessly overcrowded in terms of both collections
and people.  The permanent staff now numbered three professional librarians and
eight library assistants.  Two of the assistants ran the circulation department,
then housed in a locked room ("Law South") and containing a reserve collection -
from which books could be requested - and an open-stack arrangement holding the
entire circulating monographs collection.  The card catalog, the key to that
collection was also located there, contributing to the general traffic congestion.
Another room housed the bound journals; another, the American collection of law
reports and statutes; and the Main Reading Room held most Commonwealth law reports
and reference texts.  The corridors themselves were lined with a myriad of series,
often in disarray, and always in need of cleaning.  Locations lists, including
room and shelf designations, were constantly - and laboriously - being updated by
hand for these scattered, and growing collections.
The acquisitions and catalogue maintenance staff (one librarian and five assistants)
were in similar desperate straits.  A report to faculty in 1971 emphasized their
plight:
Within this space (400 square feet) are located 7 desks (6 with typewriter
wings), 7 typing chairs, 2 filing cabinets, a shelf-list unit measuring 33
square feet, and usually two book trucks.  On one of these desks are kept 4
or more filing drawers containing book ordering records.  Onto 2 of these
desks are stacked all catalogue cards to be sorted, alphabetized and eventually filed.  Into this area are delivered all office supplies.. Here all
books are assembled in cartons or on book trucks prior to cataloguing..
Traffic patterns are, at best, a series of detours.. As student numbers have
increased so naturally has the general bedlam, particularly in the entrance
vestibule where the library staff is situated..
A result of this outcry was that, in 1972, renovation of the central core of the
building was undertaken, providing expanded space for that part of the staff.
Over the years it had become increasingly clear that the Law Library would benefit
immeasurably from better records of its holdings.  (Only after 1964, when the Main
Library assumed full responsibility for its direction, did Law begin developing
a full card catalogue.  Prior to that - except for an alphabetic shelflist - the
only access to the collection was an antiquated and cumbersome vertical file which
one scanned for particular items in the collection.)
The alphabetic arrangement of legal materials was standard procedure in law libraries until the early 70's, there being no 'official' classification schedule before
"KF" (United States law) was published by the Library of Congress in 1969.  Although 55
modification of the schedule was considered possible - and indeed was adopted by
several Canadian law libraries - U.B.C chose, in 1970, to classify its collection
using a comprehensive scheme, compatible with L.C schedules, and devised by
Elizabeth Moys, a former librarian at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies in
London.  Classifying our retrospective collection was the major development in the
Law Library during the early 1970's: the entire card catalogue (so recently
assembled) had to be systematically replaced; all books had to be labelled as
fresh cataloguing copy emerged, circulation cards matched and inserted, and -
during the summer of 1973 - reshelved by call-number.  Still remaining, however,
were the untouched and vast areas of the collection: statutes, law reports,
journals and legal digests.  These were neither catalogued nor classified and between 1970 and 1974 doing so became a major focus of library operations.  In doing
all this, besides the obvious benefit of easily identifying and pulling together
'like' materials for the users at Law, the Main Library was finally able to integrate the law collection into its own shelflist, Law was able to take advantage of
the automated circulation system (1974), and the planning of a 'one-move' relocation
of the collection into the impending new building became a reality.  Automated
ordering and acquisition of books had been introduced at Law in 1971.  With the
completion of the retrospective cataloguing project in 1974, this library became
the only fully-catalogued and largely-automated law library in Canada.
The trials familiar to all those involved in planning for any new public building
were well-known to the Law Library staff in the early 70's.  From the beginning
the Law Librarian was a member of the Faculty Planning Committee and its first
facilities list was submitted in February 1969.  It called for collection space
for 150,000 volumes and accommodation for 545 readers (75% of a projected student
population of 720).  Over the following six years much happened that was ultimately
to affect the nature of the building that emerged: controversy over siting problems
(resolved by tying in the old building with the new, but relocating faculty and
students at Fort Camp for two years during construction); disagreements vis-a-vis
faculty-student spatial relationships (a resolution from the Law Students Association to the Board of Governors resulting in delays for architectural revisions);
a lengthy strike of the construction industry, and the resultant devaluation of
capital funds.  The library came out of it all with a good building in terms of
size and shape, but minus 11% in seating and no conference, microforms or typing
rooms.
The library portion of what was to become the George F. Curtis Building was finished
first and on January 6, 1975 - the day students arrived back from Christmas vacation
- a force of six library staff and thirty-one temporary recruits, working in three
teams, began to move the collection by hand-truck from the old building to the new.
The route led through still unfinished construction and, in all, over 900 trips
were required to move the 85,000 volumes to the three floors of the new library.
The transfer was essentially completed in five days and law students and faculty
were deprived of library services for only two of them.  In the process only one 56
truck of books was temporarily mis-shelved.
In the years since the advent of the new library building, our energies have been
expended in several directions.  Concern over the aesthetic impact of the library's
decor has now been overshadowed by continuing problems with over-lighting,
irregular air-conditioning and noisy copying machines.
Collection development has become a major consideration.
In 1968-69, the Law Library commanded 3.64% of the total Library collections
budget, providing support at the rate of $62.00 per law student.  In 1979-80,
this has risen to 6.36% of the collection budget, or $293.00 per student.  Unhappily, inflation prevented noticeably expanded acquisitions statistics: in
1970-71 we added 4,853 volumes, in 1978-79, 4,965.
We have benefitted by frequent grants of money from the Law Foundation of British
Columbia, enabling us - over the past decade - to purchase all American state
codes and, as well, considerable legislative materials from the Caribbean and
Pacific Rim nations.  In addition to these traditional book materials, the
Foundation has provided funding to purchase closed-circuit television production
and viewing equipment.  Through its generosity, we were able - in 1978 - to
acquire a CRT computer-terminal and printer.  This will directly support our recent
designation by the Canadian Law Information Council as a 'service centre': to
provide access for the university community and the practising bar to computerized
legal information from various data banks.
Much as the introduction of automated library procedures typify the major changes
during the 1970's, atuomated legal data retrieval - still in its infancy, will
provide an added dimension to our rapidly-expanding reference services and will
likely be the 'new wave' of the 1980's.
Ten years in the life of as complex an institution as a library is a short time
indeed, but it seems like a very distant time ago when the annual tricycle race
began and ended in the Main Reading Room, when footballs were on two-hour reserve,
and - after borrowing "Salmond on Torts" from the circulation room - one could
easily pop into the Student Common Room next door and pick up cheese-on-rye.  It
is actually only five years. 57 -
Marjorie Smith (Social Work) Library
The history of the Social Work Library during the 1970's is best described as a
continuing struggle to offer the collections and services befitting a branch library
from a physical setting more suitable for a large reading room.  This pattern was
visible very early in the life of the new branch, as indicated by its first mention
in the Report of the University Librarian to Senate; 1965/66:
Three new branch libraries came into existence in the course of the year.  The
Social Work Library, an outgrowth of the Social Work Reading Room, was set up
in a wing of Graham House.  The collection was quickly increased in size and
organized for convenient use.  At the end of the first year of operation over
eight thousand books had been loaned, and the study facilities were continually
crowded.
In 1965 the School of Social Work (numbering 128 graduate students and nine faculty)
was the largest in Canada .  It had recently moved to the former F. Ronald Graham
mansion, something over h  mile from the nearest major resource library.  The School's
distance from related library collections and support services has been a major factor
in all branch operations ever since.
Since 196 7 all library services have been offered from an area made up essentially
of converted recreation rooms in the basement of Graham house.  In the mid-70's some
additional floor space was added, bringing the total area to its present 1,850
square feet.
The makeup and library requirements of groups served by the branch have altered
over the past few years, sometimes radically.  Ten years ago every student undertook
the same program: a two-year MSW requiring a graduating thesis.  By 1971 the thesis
had been phased out, and the mid-70's saw the introduction of the first undergraduate
degree in the School's history.  In 1978/79 enrolees could choose between a two-year
"regular" undergraduate BSW; a one-year concentrated CBSW for field workers who had
not recently attended university; and an intensive one-year MSW requiring the BSW as
a first degree.  In addition, over 1,500 practicing social service workers enrolled
in extension courses giving credit toward provincial registration as professional
social workers.  The requirements of these diverse groups - not to mention their
faculty and field instructors - make branch service in 1979 immensely more complex
than it was in 1970.
Two other user groups must be mentioned: UBC faculty and students from other disciplines with a social services component, such as nursing, planning, home economics
Currently the School has 134 full-time students, 29 faculty, and over 60 field
instructors. 58 -
and law; and off-campus social service personnel who purchase borrowers' cards
because the branch represents the major centre for professional literature in B.C.
Although material is not purchased specifically for these patrons, their use of the
branch has probably doubled since 1970.  They now account for 20 to 25% of all loans,
and because they are less familiar with the collection, tend to require more personal
assistance from staff.
The branch has always operated with a permanent daytime staff of three: a librarian/
branch head and two library assistants.  Evening and weekend service has usually
been provided by student assistants.  Demands for ever more extended hours have been
a regular feature of life in the School, as all students are required to do off-campu
field work two full days out of every five.
The 1970's have seen cutbacks in service as well as extensions.  Until 1972 the
branch was open six days a week for a total of 78 hours.  Later this was reduced to
66 hours by eliminating all but two evenings.  Since 1974 hours have been increased
gradually to the point where the branch can offer service 87 hours a week.
Despite dramatic book price increases combined with library budget restrictions, the
branch's collection has doubled in the past six years.  Holdings now number roughly
12,000 bound volumes, over 200 audiotapes, and several thousand vertical file items
(mainly pamphlets, government reports, and clipping files).  The library's status as
a resource for B.C. social service agencies ensures a rgular flow of current publications as gifts, while its practice of exchanging acquisitions lists with other North
American libraries in the field helps bring new titles to light before reviews are
published.
The journal collection continues to be a problem.  Subscription rates have skyrocketec
during the 1970's, and UBC Library serials funds have been left far behind.  Frequently it has not been possible for the branch to order even titles of major
importance.  Nevertheless, we expect to add the 100th journal title sometime in the
early 1980's.
Recorded use of the collection reflects changes in the teaching program and course
requirements during the 1970'S.  From a high of 10,000, circulation dropped off in
the early 1970's after theses were phased out.  During the last three years, however,
it has increased by nearly 50% as new degree programs have been introduced.  A rough
idea of circulation volume in Social Work as opposed to other campus libraries can
be obtained by dividing annual loans by the number of full-time winter session
students.  For the library system as a whole, this figure was 51 loans per student
in 1970/71 and 101 in 1977/78.  The Social Work Library's figures for the same two
years were 128 and 188. - 59 -
The library staff has always taken an active part in helping patrons make the best
use of the collection.  However, this function has assumed far more importance as
the collection has increased in size and complexity, and as users unfamiliar with
either the library or the subject field arrive in the branch.  Some measure of the
growth in reference services will be seen by the number of questions the three
permanent staff have answered annually.  In 1971/72 this figure was about 600; since
1974/75 it has never dropped below 2,000, and reached a high of 3,079 in 1978/79.
A variety of services have been set up to meet the need for more information on
library resources and research techniguqes.  Formal orientation sessions are given,
both within the branch and in other major libraries used by Social Work students.
The librarian maintains an index to items in the collection not covered by commercial
indexes, and a second file matches reference questions to source material or bibliographies already drawn up by the staff.  Services to faculty include preparation of
SDI profiles listing new books on particular subjects as they arrive at UBC and
routing of xeroxed contents pages from all new journals plus selected books.  The
branch's bimonthly acquisitions list is distributed widely throughout the School
and mailed to over 100 outside individuals and agencies.
Microfiche catalogues now give branch patrons and staff access to the full UBC
library catalogue, order and serials records.  In addition, Social Work's cumbersome manual circulation system has recently been replaced by an automated system,
speeding up the borrowing process for users and freeing staff for other jobs.  Book
losses, although never high, should be further reduced with the recent installation
of a Tattletape exit control system.
Like some other UBC libraries, Social Work carries out a heavy volume of business in
quarters never designed for the purpose.  Currently one book in every 12 is in storage
in order to conserve stack space.  Study space is also at a premium.  The recommended
figure for patrons from the School alone is over 1,350 square feet; we have 430.
Quarters for the staff are equally cramped.  They consist of one small, unventilated
office shared by the two library assistants; the librarian has no private working
space apart from the reference desk and one filing cabinet.  As might be expected in
a converted house, wiring is totally inadequate for the demands placed on it by out
increasingly mechanized systems.  Such conditions cripple attempts to offer the
quality of service which students and faculty have a right to expect from their
library.
Many of the developments outlined in this report would have been hard to anticipate
in 1970.  It is equally difficult to forecast the future.  However, it is safe to
say that the library's space problem will continue to be the main concern of both
staff and patrons unless permission and funds can be obtained for a major building
program. 60
On a more positive note, the 1980's should see the branch offering a far greater
range of services formerly available only to users of the larger libraries.  On-line
circulation, bar-coded loan transactions, access to the complete UBC Library catalogue on microfiche, and eventually access to a B.C. Union Catalogue as well: all
these should be available to Social Work patrons within their own buildings.
Data Library
The U.B.C. Data Library came into existence in June of 1972 when it emerged from
the Department of Political Science to become an inter-departmental, campus-wide
facility, jointly operated by the Library and the Computing Centre, with a mandate
to supply the data reguirements (ie. machine-readable data for secondary analysis)
of the academic community of the university.  Most other data service facilites
have been established within a survey centre, research institution, computing
centre, or academic department, with in almost all cases no involvement by the
traditional library.  The success of the U.B.C. model is being monitored with
interest by a number of institutions.
From its creation in 1972, the Data Library collection has grown from a small
collection of 176 miscellaneous public opinion and other primarily survey data
files, to one of the largest collections in Canada, and one of the larger local-
service collections in North America - exact comparisons are impossible as comparative collection-size statistics have never been collected.  The Data Library
collection now contains a complete collection of Canadian Gallup poll data, all
major Canadian surveys, the largest academic collections of Canadian census and
CANSIM data, large collections of stock-price and other financial data files.  It
includes types of machine-readable data files (MRDF) not collected by other
archives, such as representational MRDF (for example, polar-orbiting satellite
images), and textual MRDF (such as the plays of Aeschylus and Northwest Coast
Indian myths).
Collection policy, as it has evolved, can best be expressed as follows: all
significant Canadian MRDF are acquired automatically if permission can be obtained
from the principal investigator (or author).  All other acquisitions are ad hoc,
based on expressed need, though of course all dependent on budget and cooperative
departmental financial arrangements.  Memberships in the major data disseminating
consortia, initially begun by the Department of Political Science and still continuing, such as the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research
(ICPSR - at the University of Michigan) and the Roper Center (at the University of
Connecticut) facilitate access to large collections of, mainly, survey data. - 61 -
The Data Library also functions as an archive, in the strictest sense of the word,
for the University.  Original data files, created for research purposes at this
University, by other research institutions in Vancouver, and for purposes of
research by the Vancouver commerical sector, are collected and preserved.  The
library assumes responsibility for maintaining the physical quality of such data
for an indefinite period of time, for the work involved in creating copies of the
files, and for documentation required by interested researchers elsewhere.
It is difficult to quantify collection growth.  An MRDF can consist of one or more
subfiles (for example, the Digraph catalogue includes 62 subfiles).  A major database can contain any number of time series; our CANSIM at present contains 70,000,
each of which is a subfile of sorts.  Counting data files, defined as discrete
intellectual units, the rate of collection growth has been steadily increasing:
1974/75
1975/76
1976/77
1977/78
1978/79
23
27
60
94
141 MRDF
acquired:
Expreses as discrete physical units, or tape files, the size of the collection
can be more readily quantified:
1972/73     1974/75     1975/76     1976/77     1977/78     1978/79
176 558        651        785        1051     1246 MRDF
In seven years, the collection has grown by 567%.
Services consist of advising users as to the contents of the collection, assisting
them with the use of the collection, and acquiring data files which we do not yet
have.
To make easier the job of fitting the right MRDF to the user, we are converting
the printed Data Library catalogue of MRDF content descriptions, which we began
publishing in 1972, to a machine-maintained, on-line searcheable database management system, which makes it possible to search for MRDF containing specific
variables.  The SPIRES-format DATALIB file was created in the summer of 1978, and
retrospective conversion of MRDF descriptions into its special format is proceeding
- thus far all acquisitions since 1974 have been entered.  When conversion is
completed it will be possible to produce a computer-output microfiche edition of
the complete Catalogue, a cheaper and more easily updated format than paper copy. 62
In addition all MRDF are catalogued in standard library format and listed in the
main U.B.C. Library catalogue.  In this too we are unique, as the U.B.C Library
is the only one in North America to catalogue MRDF for treatment as a regular
part of traditional library collections.
In order to assist users in accessing MRDF, the Data Library keeps two copies of
all code-books (which list the internal format of each record in each tape file).
In the past years an increasing number of codebooks are computer-readable files in
themselves, so the prospective user can easily produce his own computer, printout
copy of relevant codebooks.  This year we have started to print out on microfiche
the very large machine-readable codebooks to make them available in a compact and
portable format.
Numerous internal programs have been written to simplify and make machine-assisted
many of the most tedious internal housekeeping tasks, such as copying and backing
up tape files, recording their locations, and maintaining the tape catalogue,
with the result that many of these previously time consuming computing tasks can
now be performed on a routine basis by the clerical staff.
In addition, a number of programs have been written to simplify as much as possible
the mounting of a computer tape by a user, and to maintain security so that,
for example, commercial computer IDs cannot mount those tapes containing files
to which only the local academic community may have access.  Other programs have
been written to simplify the use Of very heavily used complex files, such as
census files and economic time series data.  A great deal of intensive individual
assistance is provided to users, although complex computing problems are referred
to the Computing Centre's programmers.
Increasingly we have been invited to give introductory lectures describing Data
Library resources to classes working with statistical techniques, and expect the
demand for this to increase as awareness of the existence of the DATALIB database
increases.
From its start as a small facility serving primarily the Department of Political
Science, Data Library more and more has begun to function as a truly campus-wide
facility.  Although just over 50% of our recorded use is still from the Faculty
of Arts, the computer IDs that have mounted tapes in the past year come from a
variety of departments, including political science, economics, anthropology/- 63
sociology, linguistics, psychology, English, geography.  'Pure scientists' from
physics, mathematics, and geophysics number among our users, as do commerce
faculty, who accounted for about 20% of our recorded use, applied scientists from
oceanography, computer science, agricultural economics, forestry and animal
resource ecology for another 17%.  Other users included paediatrics, audiology,
federal and municipal government departments, and users from the commercial
sector.
What are these people using? As far as we can determine approximately 35% of
use is of public opinion poll and other survey data, 25% of financial data files
(stock prices, etc.), 20% of Canadian census data, 15% of representational
data (satellite photos, maps, etc), and the remainder, of textual and other
MRDF.
It is impossible to measure the amount of use that occurs.  The more sophisticated
the user, the fewer traces he leaves in tape mount statistics.  Ideally, the very
sophisticated user will show only two tape mount statistics per MRDF, one to copy
the code book and one to copy the tape file to one of his own disc files for
future use.  One faculty members, who has been a long-term avid Data Library user,
was taxed in 1978 with not having mounted a single Data Library-owned tape in the
past year - his reply: that he and his students had used Data Library files more
intensely that past year than ever before, an estimated equivalent of 4,000 tape
mounts, but using disc file copies of the MRDF, which he had made in previous
years.  Tape mount statistics, under such circumstances, are entirely meaningless,
and can only be used with great caution as general guidelines to usage patterns.
The only real indicator of increasing usage is the increasing demand for MRDF
that are not yet in the collection.
Users tend to be primarily faculty and graudate students, and undergraduates in
classroom situations under the direction of a faculty member controlling access
to computer IDs.  Classroom use of MRDF as a teaching tool is increasing, and the
past academic year has seen use of our files by classes in commerce, economics,
computer science, anthropology/sociology and political science, that we are aware
of.
Capacity for providing service to local non-UBC academic communities and to the
commercial sector in Vancouver is hampered by the contractual arrangements made
with many MRDF suppliers, who stipulate in many cases that the MRDF In question
may only be used by the UBC academic community.  In the future it may be possible 64
to engineer joint membership/subscription arrangements with the University of
Victoria and Simon Fraser University in such consortia as ICPSR, Roper Center,
CRSP, and COMPUSTAT, but possible arrangements have thus far been hampered by
the lack of sufficiently strong interest from these institutions.
The past seven years has seen the growth of the Data Library staff from one
part-time research assistant to the present complement of one full-time programmer, one full-time library clerical, and one part-time administrative and
reference librarian.  The present staff size allows us to fulfill most service
functions and internal housekeeping functions, but is not adequate to allow for
extensive cleaning of MRDF, codebook preparation - etc.
The physical facility has also grown, from a small room on the fourth floor of
the Civil Engineering building, to a large room on the main floor of the Computing Sciences building (same building, different name) in close proximity to
keypunch machines, terminal room, student terminal area and the Computing Centre
information desk.  The increased space has allowed for the expansion of the code-
book collection, the installation of a computer terminal, and a user consultation
area where non-circulating codebooks and supplementary documentation can be persued
at leisure.
Because data archives and libraries area new phenomenon, those administering data
files have not yet developed the kinds of universal policies and procedures that
one finds in libraries, nor the uniformity of professional training that librarians
receive, nor the tools for acquisition that libraries use.  All these functions,
now formalized and standardized in libraries, are still in data archives and
libraries performed at the 'old boy network' or invisible college' level.  Thus
extra-institutional relationships are very important for finding requested MRDF,
for following policy, procedural, and professional developments in the field, for
maintaining contact with data file producers, and to collectively act as a lobby-
zing group to persuade the academics and other producers of MRDF that the production
of an MRDF should also be geared to the requirements of a potential secondary user,
in the same way that any published book, magazine article, recording, or film, is
produced with the needs of a wider audience in mind.
Data Library is a member not only of international data disseminating organizations
such as ICPSR, Roper Center, and the now defunct Canadian Consortium for Social
Research, but also of national and international professional and policy organizations such as IASSIST and the International Federation of Data Organizations.
Information on holdings is contributed to the s s data, a newsletter which lists
the new acquisitions of selected major archives, and previously to the now defunct
Data Clearing House for the Social Sciences in Canada.  Further, copies of the 65
catalogue are exchanged with other data archives in North America and Europe.
Crane Library
Although Crane Library as such is entering its twelfth year of service, it joined
the library system in the Fall of 1969, and thus is closing out a decade as one of
the more unusual university branch libraries in North America.
Founded on the donation to the University of the private collection of scholarly
books and materials in braille of the late Charles Allen Crane - a deaf-blind
Vancouver resident who devoted his life to reading and scholarship - and intended
originally only as a reading room for blind students, this branch has grown into
a complex and far-reaching operation.  Significant developments along the way over
the last ten years were the addition of recorded 'talking books' during the first
year as a branch library.  This was to aid the increasingly large number of blind
students who had lost their eyesight later in life and did not have a sufficient
command of braille to be used as primary means of reading, and to provide faster
and less costly access for all non-print readers to current books and materials.
One year later our own sound recording facilities were added to record books on
the premises and to offer what has become one of the main functions of this
library, - the transcription on demand of student textbook and research material.
The addition later of a small high speed duplicating machine permitted us to share
materials with other libraries and institutions by making copies of our own master
recordings available.  This has led to an ever increasing amount of inter-library
lending, locally, nationally and internationally.
Talking books were read primarily by dedicated volunteers.  In 1972 however, the
first paid staff readers were employed on grant projects supported by the federal
Local Initiatives and Youth Employment programs.  Two years later, the University
administration received a special budgetary disbursement and added these positions
plus technical and clerical staff to the regular payroll.  A Librarian to oversee
the collection growth and to provide special reference services in braille and
talking book materials was also added.  In 1975, the number of loans processed by
this Division to our on-campus users and lent to other libraries and institutions
exceeded 50,000 items.  One year later a capital grant from the Provincial Ministry
of Education provided for the purchase and installation of computerized recording
equipment and a high speed duplicating facility, which made this one of the most
modern and advanced talking book centres in Canada.  In addition to the original
collection of braille materials and the recorded 'talking books' - which by now
account for almost 70% of the total collection, Crane Library also developed a small
but significant print collection of books and journals on blindness and the blind.
This collection is used by students and reasearchers in many campus disciplines.
Also, with the generous support of many off-campus organizations and individuals,
a working collection of electronic, mechanical and optical aids and appliances for
the blind were assembled.  The estimated worth of this collection is nearly $45,000, 66
and items are both on display and in daily use by library patrons.
1978-79 has provided the greatest progress yet in the relatively short history of
this branch.  A fund raising project, resulting in nearly $60,000, and a generous
grant from the University provided for the purchase and installation of four soundproof prefabricated recording studios and the renovation and conversion of a basement area in Brock into the Crane Library/Faculty of Arts Recording Centre.  Two
more recording studios with associated electronic equipment belonging to the
Faculty of Arts, were placed under our management in the same area, providing six
highly sophisticated spoken word and group recording locations and a complete
sound recording laboratory for the combined task of recording books for blind
students and a variety of materials for the Faculty of Arts.  The Recording Centre
was opened formally on December 15, 1978.  The Facility is also used on a fee-for-
service basis for on and off-campus organizations such as the Centre for Continuing
Education and the Open Learning Institute.  Since the beginning of the year, the
Ministry of Education has contracted with the Crane Library for the production of
talking text books for blind and handicapped students in the K-12 education system.
A fund drive in February 1979 brought in grants (totalling $85,000) from the 1979
Graduating Class, the Hamber Foundation in memory of Dr. Walter Gage, and the
Provincial Lotteries Fund.  These funds will be used to install three more recording studios with appropriate commercial recording equipment and to expand the
duplicating and editing facilities in our sound laboratory to meet increased demands
for talking book materials.  Part of the funds will pay for renovation and reconstruction of the premises to accommodate the additional structures and equipment.
This is the last possible physical expansion in that area.
This year also saw great progress in making this unique collection more readily
available to individuals and institutions off campus.  Inter-library lending of
materials to schools was facilitated by grants from the Ministry of Education.
Lending to print-handicapped individuals in the community via public libraries was
improved when the Provincial Library Services Branch (Ministry of the Provincial
Secretary) assumed the function of clearing house for materials from Crane.  An
agreement was reached which provided access to Crane materials for blind and handicapped students attending other post-secondary institutions in B.C. by allowing
loans of special media materials to be processed and charged to the same NET inter-
lending program as is used for print materials.  A new Extra Mural Library Card,
exclusively for use at Crane Library and valid for one year from the date of
purchase will make borrowing easier for blind and handicapped persons in the
community who wish direct service.  This year also saw an important move toward
user participation in the affairs of this library with the creation of a Crane
Library Advisory Board, with representatives from the major user constituencies
advising the Crane Librarian on administrative matters and long range planning.
It is difficult to predict what future developments will take place, since much 67
of the growth of this library and its services has been determined in the past by
demand from increasing numbers of on and off-campus users who require service.  A
major objective is to make off-campus services viable to the point where costs are
fully recovered.  At some point, consideration should also be given to relocation
of the library and recording facilities in space adequate to permit both functions
to be reunited.
Reading Rooms Division
The Reading Rooms Division came into being on July 1, 1969
Five years earlier, the President's Committee on Academic Goals suggested in its
report, Guideposts to Innovation, that "Departmental reading rooms contribute to
the intellectual life of the department and improve the conditions for student
discussion and study."
Provision was made in the Library's 1969/70 budget to establish a Reading Rooms
Division to assist academic departments with the operation of their reading rooms
and to provide funds with which to enhance their collections of books and periodicals.  The initial complement of staff was comprised of a librarian at the
Division Head level and four Library Assistants III.  This establishment has, over
the years, evolved to the point where the Division Head now supervises three
Library Assistants IV and three Library Assistants II.  In addition, indirect
supervision and advice is provided to approximately twelve (the number fluctuates)
departmental employees whose primary responsibility is the operation of the reading
room.
The Reading Rooms Division functions as a liaison between the departments and the
Library System, processing orders, seeing to the cataloguing of materials as they
arrive, expediting snags in the processing divisions and either performing such
housekeeping operations as circulation, periodical check-in and binding preparation
where a room is too small to have its own staff, or providing advice and guidelines
on these functions to available departmental staff.
At the outset, 35 reading rooms had received Senate recognition as being worthy of
Library support.  This number has since grown to 45, and there are other such
facilities which may wish to apply some day.
Collections development
In 1970, the aggregate reading rooms collection consisted of some 40,000 volumes,
of which 26,000 were uncatalogued.  During the decade, this has increased to 98,932
catalogued volumes (net, taking weeding into consideration) through the inventory
of 1978 and will undoubtedly surpass the 100,000 mark upon completion of 1979
inventories.  There is very little significant uncatalogued material.  Periodical
subscriptions numbered 1,459 in 1970; the Library now pays for 1,668 titles, and 68 -
many others are received free or at the expense of the department.  The cost of
periodicals has risen from approximately $35,000 annually to the neighbourhood of
$100,000.
Book budgets have been less linear in their growth.  The allocation for 1969/70
was $35,525, while that for 1979/80 is $44,300; the amount had fallen as low as
$27,000 for the year 1974/75.  A degree of austerity in the middle of the decade
was one reason for this, but another factor was a change in the nature of purchasing
from hole-filling in the early days to maintenance of reasonably satisfactory
collections in recent years.  The current level of expenditure reflects not so much
an increase in the requirements of the maintenance function but the difficulties
created by inflation and an unfavourable foreign exchange situation.
Services
Reading rooms operate under a variety of service situations.  Most permit circulation; some do not.  Some have full-time attendants who can provide information
services; other do not.  Some are very restrictive as to who may use their collections; others are not.  It is therefore difficult to generalize about circumstances
in the entire system.  However, a few comparisons can be made as follows: The
volume of circulation in the Architecture, Commerce and Geography reading rooms
compares favourably with that of some branches in absolute terms; in relative terms,
given their smaller collections and clientele, many other reading rooms would
compare favourably with branches.  As for information services, Anthropology/
Sociology, Civil/Mechanical Engineering, Architecture, Commerce, Economics/History,
Geography and Geology compare favourably with branches.  In relative terms, several
others would compare favourably as well.
Three reading rooms are presently receiving SDI lists based on profiles reflecting
the interests of the user groups concerned.
The advent of the COM catalogue and other bibliographic tools is of particular
significance to reading rooms.  Given the limited collections which exist within
the departments, any tool which provides readily available information on what is
held elsewhere on campus is especially valuable and we look forward to the completion of the conversion of the card catalogue and further developments of the
networks now in the nascent stage.
Physical space
By and large, the space situation is satisfactory.  Although there are some location
where crowding is a problem, in most cases both the quality and amount of space is
at least adequate.  Of the 35 reading rooms originally endorsed by Senate, 18 are
now in different locations.  Two more will be relocated when new buildings for
Psychology and Home Economics are completed.  Most departments recognize the need
for good reading room space and react accordingly. 69
Relationships
It is important to remember that the reading room is the main contact with and
source of impressions about the Library system for a great many users.  It was
therefore encouraging to note that, in response to a questionnaire which attempted to asses user perceptions of the adequacy of their reading rooms, the great
majority were well pleased.  The questionnaire, which was circulated in March of
1978, received responses from 32 departments, of which 20 considered the fulfillment of goals to be better than adequate, 8 considered it to be adequate and only
4 considered it to be less than adequate.
We have also received numerous laudatory comments about the work and helpfulness
of the staff.  It is fair to say that, to a great degree, the hopes which were
held out for this Division a decade ago have been realized and, although the
resources are never sufficient to do everything that could be done, what we have
is a useful and appreciated service. 70
CHAPTER V
TECHNICAL SERVICES
The technical processing operations of the Library are responsible for acquiring
information in all its published forms, for physically integrating books, serials
and other materials into the existing collections, and for developing and maintaining a system of records to enable users to gain access to those collections.  There
are at present one hundred and forty-seven persons employed in the centralized
Processing Divisions.  Additional numbers of employees in the Divisions and
Branches also engage in processing work on a full or part-time basis.  Thus the
business of obtaining library materials and arranging for their eventual use
occupies the time of about half the staff of the Library.
Collections development policy, and the actual selection of materials, are the
responsibility of the Assistant Librarian for Collections, his staff of bibliographers, the reference librarians, and faculty.  Processing responsibilities
follow upon the act of selection.  The primary objectives for the Processing
Divisions are to acquire wanted materials quickly, at an acceptable cost, and to
integrate receipts into the collection and catalogue as soon as possible, also at
an acceptable cost and product quality.  The collections budget of approximately
three million dollars results in the addition of about one hundred thousand
volumes each year, and additional quantities of such items as microforms, pictures,
phonographic records, audio tapes, maps and computer tapes.
Although there have been a number of organizational changes within the Divisions
over the past ten years, the functional organization of work has not changed significantly.  There are three major areas of work: procurement, cataloguing and
classification, and the physical processing of materials and records.
Procurement is a specialized purchasing operation, now organized as two separate
divisions, Acquisitions and Serials, the former being responsible for all unique
orders, mainly for monographs, and the latter for standing orders and subscriptions.
Cataloguing and classification is mainly the intellectual process of describing
the library holdings, and placing materials physically in the collections according
to the applicable subject classifications.  Physical processing involves the
labelling of books and other materials, the addition of card pockets and ownership
plates, the producing and filing of cards in various files, and the maintaining
of the catalogues provided for library patrons, now computer-produced and appearing on computer-output-microfiche, or COM.
In the following pages the four divisions, Acquisitions, Serials, Catalogue Records
and Catalogue Products, report on the current situation, and some special trends
and developments.  These reports will provide an overview of what these divisions 71
do, why they do it, and why the results, at times, are not as good as we or our
patrons would like them to be.
One fundamental truth about the processing of library materials is that it is not
possible to keep costs at a reasonable level and to provide perfect services at
the same time.  The struggle between quantity and quality compromises is constant.
Thus the overall objective becomes the provision of an acceptable level of service
with the resources available.
Methods for processing library materials have changed significantly over the past
decade, mainly as a result of technological development.  As new equipment and
techniques became available or economically viable, these have been introduced.
For example, modern photocopy machines were used to produce catalogue cards, better
methods were introduced for sharing with other libraries the intellectual effort
of cataloguing, the public card catalogue was reorganized and guide cards were
added to reduce the time and cost of maintenance.  Many small routine internal
improvements were made which are collectively significant.  The computer, however,
is the single most important technology to affect library processing activities,
as well as other aspects of library service.
From the early seventies, most record management systems relating to processing
have been automated to some extent, and the trend has been to use the computer for
more and more functions.  One exception, until recently, was the central record
for the Library, namely the card catalogue, which remained as a manually produced
record until 1978.
U.B.C. closed its card catalogue in 1978 and implemented an automated catalogue
system, in company with all other B.C. university, college and institute libraries.
Under the name of the B.C. Union Catalogue, this major and important development
was made possible by special funding provided by the Ministry of Education.  The
government's interest in a union catalogue of library holdings is related to its
programme of extending educational opportunity throughout the province, and to its
understanding that the sharing of library resources is essential to the success of
this programme.
This revolutionary change in library operations and records management has already
had an impact on U.B.C. as a resource library, as indicated elsewhere in this
report.  But participation in such a project does introduce demands on the time of
staff, and changes the decision making processes for some policies and operations,
most notably those of cataloguing.  Previously each post-secondary library operated
independently of others in respect to catalogue policies and procedures.  Now there
are common standards to be determined, maintained and used.  In the short term,
U.B.C. Library devotes considerable time and effort as a key participant in this
far-reaching development.  However, in the long term this work will yield such
important benefits as a reduction in duplication of cataloguing work among - 72
institutions, faster processing, more current records, on-line access to records,
and the rationalization and sharing of collections everywhere in the province.
Ultimately, the advantages will accrue to the user, and that is as it should be.
Acquisitions Division
The Acquisitions Division is a centralized processing operation responsible for
the procurement of monographs and other library materials that do not need to be
ordered on a standing basis.  The great majority of items in this category flow
through the Division, although some ordering is carried out through the Law Library,
the Woodward Library and the Government Publications Division.  The Gifts &
Exchanges Division, and in fact almost all divisions and branches, also receive
unsolicited materials.  The Acquisitions Division maintains a central accounting
record for all spending on collections, including that involving other units.  It
also manages the Mail Room for the Library Processing Centre, and oversees the
Prebindery and contract binding arrangements.
A computer-based system is used for the ordering and accounting functions; the
identical system is used by all library divisions when they place orders.  The
system produces purchase order forms, claim forms, reports on the status of outstanding orders, and accounting statements.  In addition, the system keeps track
of materials which have been received but remain uncatalogued; all such information
about books on order and in process is made available throughout the library system
on COM lists.  This computer-based system was implemented in 1968 to replace a
manual system which was unable to cope with greatly increased spending within a
decentralized network of libraries.
It is expected that during 1979/80 it will be possible to redevelop this system
so that it can provide more bibliographic information and additional statistical
and accounting reports.  Recently some large book vendors have been developing
systems whereby order information may be transmitted from computer to computer,
resulting in a saving of time and labour, and in more prompt reporting on the
availability of items.  The linking of local, national and international systems
will hopefully enable us to serve the University better, and to make the best use
of funds.  The world of acquisition is a complex one: the Library is currently
dealing with publications from six thousand eight hundred publishers, spread
around the globe.  Most of these are publishers of periodicals; there are about
four hundred and sixty book publishers providing most of the monographs of interest
to the University.
However, since we usually order only one copy of a book, we are precluded from
ordering directly from a publisher, and must rely on specialized vendors upon whom
we can depend to deliver items reliably, quickly and at a competitive price.  Some
ninety such vendors supply us with about 72% of our books. 73 -
Approval and blanket programmes are a means whereby libraries ensure a timely and
effective coverage of current scholarly publications, of national imprints or in
specific subject areas.  The vendor selects the books in accordance with designated
subject profile criteria drawn up by the Library.  The books are received, final
selections are made and processed into the system.  In 1978 the approval/blanket
programmes were increased in number from twenty to twenty-four.  These programmes
now cover imprints from the following countries: Canada (including English and
French), United States, Great Britain, the Netherlands, France, Germany, Italy,
Spain, Portugal, Russia, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and India (through the
University's participation in the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute).  Subjects
range all the way from medicine to musical scores to juvenile books.  Under these
programmes we received 15,485 titles in 1978/79.
The approval/blanket programmes are a useful guide to current book prices and the
increase in prices from year to year, the average prices reflecting the cost of a
typical trade book of scholarly interest. The following table shows those prices
and increases over the past four years:
1975/76
1976/77
Increase
1977/78
Increase
1978/79
Increase
U.S. Titles
$ 9.80
$12.02
22.7%
$14.36
19.5%
$16.90
17.7%
British Titles
13.55
14.27
5.3%
15.13
6%
19.29
27.5%
Canadian Titles
7.90
8.28
4.8%
8.90
7.5%
9.62
8.1%
German Titles
15.38
15.16
- 1.4%
16.61
9.6%
23.41
41%
Over all Blanket
10.29
11.13
8.2%
12.70
14.1%
13.89
9.4%
The dramatic increase in the costs of British and German publications was reflected
in last year's statistics, although the rise actually began in the last months of
1977, continued through 1978 and is continuing in 1979.
Expenditures on collections rose throughout the seventies, but most rapidly in
recent years, as inflation and currency devaluation took their toll.
Fiscal Year Collections Expenditures
1970/71 $1,341,807
1971/72 $1,432,902
1972/73 $1,463,130
1973/74 $1,513,856
1974/75 $1,629,797
1975/76 $1,741,021
1976/77 $1,954,121
1977/78 $2,473,368
1978/79 $2,722,614
The actual budget for 1978/79 was $2,510,556, an increase of 4.6% over the previous
year. The difference between budget and expenditures is accounted for by purchases
from grant, donated and other special funds. In the fiscal year 1978/79 the Acquisitions Division received and processed 59,227
titles in 68,945 volumes.  Over three thousand of these were received as gifts or
exchanges.
In 1968/69 the Division processed 40,739 titles in 50,718 volumes.  Thus the Division
received 45.4% more titles than it did at the beginning of the decade.
The increase in titles and volumes over 1977/78 was 12.7% and 14.9% respectively.
Considering that the budget increase was less than the inflation/devaluation rate,
there would appear to be an anomaly.  The explanation lies in the Library's
approach to dealing with a situation which became general among academic libraries
in the middle seventies.  The rate of inflation in the cost of periodicals increased
suddenly, and more steeply than in the case of books.  Projecting this trend,
libraries foresaw that unless periodical budgets were vastly increased, or unless
expenditures on periodicals were restrained, there would be less and less money
to spend on books.  The library chose the only possible, immediate course of action.
The subscription lists were reviewed, many titles were cancelled, and a quid-pro-
quo policy was established, whereby no new subscription was placed unless one of
equivalent value were cancelled.  The effects of these measures, after five years,
were to ensure that the University's need for monographs was met, while expenditure
for periodical subscriptions, including duplicates, was curtailed.  Roughly half of
the collections budget is spent on periodicals, a low percentage compared to many
libraries which did not deal in a direct way with the situation.  On the other hand,
the percentage spent on books is higher.  Since the inflation rate is still higher
for periodicals and lower for books, the outcome is that the number of titles of
monographs acquired has grown, while the number of periodical subscriptions has
increased only slightly.  This has had an impact on other divisions of the Library,
most directly on the cataloguing divisions.
It has also had an impact on binding operations, as has the general growth of the
collections programme.  The Library has a need not only to bind the journal issues
it receives, but to bind paperback books (increasingly common), to rebind worn
books and journals, and to protect a diversity of materials ranging from pamphlets
to music scores.  All materials are prepared by the Prebindery Section, where
issues are collated, indexes added, and binding instructions prepared for each
item; the material must be checked again upon its return from the bindery, and
routed to the proper destinations.  Since 1972 the Library has contracted out all
of its binding work to the commercial sector.  In that year, because of rising
unit costs, the need to replace worn out and antiquated equipment, and the unavailability of appropriate space, the University was forced to close its own Bindery
after twenty years of operation.
The significant increase in the Library's acquisition programme which began in
1966/67 with the MacMillan gift had an immediate effect on the binding requirement,
as reflected in the increase in the number of items bound from about 17,000 in 75 -
1965/66 to 28,316 in 1966/67.  The volume increased annually until a peak was
reached in 1973/74 of 47,000 units.  Volume then levelled off at about 39,000
units, but is rising again, having reached 41,481 units in 1978/79, consisting of
17,540 bound journals, 17,162 books in buckram, 5,682 books in plastic laminate,
977 theses and 120 volumes requiring special binding.  An additional 8,500 items
were encased in pamphlet folders.  The total amount spent on binding was $184,223
Serials Division
The keywords one should use to describe the Serials Division in the seventies are
"growth" and "change".  Records which used to be maintained by an early punched
card system are on the verge of being handled on-line.  Expenditures on subscriptions have increased dramatically.  So have the numbers of subscriptions, but less
markedly.  All of the staff in the various positions have changed at least once;
in fact, only two staff members have been in the Division throughout the seventies.
The Division has had four different heads during the decade, a contrast with the
tenure of Roland Lanning, who served as head for forty-two years until his retirement in 1968.
Expenditures on periodical subscriptions roughly tripled between the beginning and
end of the decade, whereas in the same period the number of subscriptions less than
doubled, attaining 22,981 last year.  The effect of inflation, a declining dollar,
and higher postal rates are well enough known to individual subscribers that they
can readily understand what their impact would be on an institution committed to
maintaining so many subscriptions.
These factors were responsible for a mid-decade crisis in the Library's operations,
when it became clear that there would not be enough money in the budget to pay the
bill for periodicals.  A freeze on new orders was required, accompanied by a cutback in active subscriptions and a rationing programme in relation to new subscriptions.  These measures, plus massive budget increases in succeeding years, rescued
the Library from a serious predicament, and has enabled it to continue a balanced
collections programme.  However, new titles continue to be published, and if the
University is to keep abreast of developments in all disciplines, the subscriptions
list must continue to grow.  It is interesting to note that many of the titles
cancelled in 1975/76 are being ordered again in 1978/79.
Over the past ten years, the serials record file has naturally grown.  It is a very
large file, and one that is in a constant state of revision as new issues arrive,
at the rate of about 135,000 per year.  This file began its life as a current
unbound file of receipts within the Serials Division.  It has now been expanded
to include serial publications received in three other locations: the Law Library,
the Woodward Library and the Government Publications Division.  Records of titles
which are no longer published, but which the Library holds, are now included.  The
objective of this expansion is to create a true central serials register, to include - 76 -
all information, including holdings, costs, payments, vendors, about all publications of a serial or continuing nature.  The advantage is obvious: ultimately there
will only be one place to look for information about periodicals.  Initially this
will be in COM format, but eventually anyone with access to a computer terminal
will be able to inspect the record.  This development too is related to the B.C.
Union Catalogue project, referred to elsewhere in this report.  Our present list,
although it is incomplete and imperfect, is widely distributed within the province,
and across Canada and the U.S., to aid in interlibrary sharing.
Concurrently with the centralizing of serials data we maintain decentralized
processing and access.  This is accomplished by standardizing work in the various
check-in locations in the system, using common coding for information to be entered
into the file.  Future plans call for 'translation' programmes to enable the
computer to pass information, once coded, to and from our local systems, such as
the acquisitions system and the catalogue system, thus reducing some of the duplicate effort that must be expended now on the maintenance of our files.  These
principles of automation and the drive for standardization are extended throughout
the post-secondary libraries in B.C.  The end result of this work will be a union
catalogue of periodical holdings in the university, college and institute libraries.
During the seventies, the staff of the Serials Division grew in number from fourteen
to twenty.  However, the effective growth was only three positions, since the other
three were added in the past year, along with their duties, as part of a reallocation of work from another division.  In terms of staff numbers only, the increase
was 21%.  In contrast, the number of subscriptions processed by the staff has
increased in the same period by 77%.  To complicate this picture, in recent years
the staff of the University has won for itself through collective bargaining
substantial time benefits in terms of shorter work weeks and longer vacations.
Taking these elements into consideration, it was to be expected that backlogs &
other processing problems would develop.  It remains to restore processing
services to an acceptable level.
Catalogue Records Division
1978 was a year of many changes in the cataloguing divisions, the product of
developments that began in the early 1970's and even before.
The most noticeable change, as far as the library user was concerned, was the introduction of the 'microcatalogue' in September 1978 as the space- and labour-saving
continuation of the rapidly-expanding card catalogues.  Like the card catalogues,
the computer-output-microform (COM) microcatalogue is comprised of author/title,
and subject sections.  A classified section, arranged by call number, has been
proposed, but not yet implemented.  Until January 1979, the microcatalogue contained
only 1978 imprints, while earlier imprints continued to be processed for the card
catalogue.  Early in 1979, the card catalogue was closed; all titles catalogued 77
thereafter, regardless of imprint date, are listed in the microcatalogue.  In
addition, card sets are still produced for East Asian materials and reading room
holdings.
The change from cards to COM was the visible effect of a massive change in processing procedures to adapt to an automated on-line cataloguing system based in
Toronto (UTLAS), and participation in a network of B.C. Libraries (the B.C. Union
Catalogue Project) to build a provincial union catalogue using that system.  COM
was not new to UBC; circulation lists, lists of books in process, and lists of
serials were all converted from paper print-outs to COM during the 70's, before
the microcatalogue was introduced.  The idea of a COM catalogue was not new either,
having been proposed first in 1973.  The impetus to start the COM catalogue was
provided by a multi-million dollar grant from the B.C. Ministry of Education to
convert the catalogues of the province's universities, colleges and institutes
into machine-readable form, so that a union catalogue of library resources in the
province could be produced.  This funding, spread over an extended period, covers
retrospective conversion of UBC's existing catalogue of 5-6 million cards, as well
as support for the transition from manual to automated procedures.
The transition process involved the planning and implementation of revised proced-
dures for virtually all the processing operations, and the training of nearly 100
people in MARC coding and/or new work routines.  It includes the conversion of the
card typing backlog that existed when the card catalogue was closed.  The typing
backlog contains nearly all of the cataloguing done on the manual system during
1978 (all pre-1978 imprints) and it is expected to take a year to clear it using
extra staff.  Meanwhile, this material is listed by author and title on a separate
microfiche set.  Cataloguing productivity suffered as a result of the training
and reorganization of procedures, but surprisingly, not as much as we feared.  The
total new titles catalogued during 1978/79 was 57,039, down only 7% from the
previous year's production.  Two extra temporary staff members were hired in January
to help us over this aspect of the transition, and productivity has returned to,
and slightly exceeded, the norm for the proceeding years.  The two-millionth volume
was added to the collection early in 1979, only 10 years after the addition of the
one-millionth volume, and the collection is growing at the rate of approximately
100,000 volumes per year.
Despite our return to a normal processing output, the amount of material to be
processed is growing and backlogs have developed, to the continuing annoyance and
frustration of library users and staff alike.  It is also taking an increasing
amount of time to arrange, control, and retrieve the backlogged material, and this
can only lead to lower productivity and the faster growth of the backlog.  As a
phenomenon, the backlog is not new to cataloguing, here or elsewhere.  We entered
the seventies with a backlog of approximately seventy thousand volumes, most of
which constituted the existing collections of the departmental reading rooms, then
recently added to the library system. We leave the seventies with a backlog of 78 -
similar proportions, but most of this backlog is composed of recently acquired
material, a majority of items being current imprints urgently needed for teaching
and research.  Two trends in the seventies have played a part in the development
of the current backlog.
First, the amount of time available for cataloguing has been reduced.  In the
middle of the decade the Library was attempting to deal with a crisis in its collecting programme, arising out of intersecting pressures of inflation and fluctuations
in the value of currencies.  This occurred at the same time that the University was
restraining its own growth.  It was assumed that the rate of accession would decline.
Thus the staff was reduced in size, from ninety-nine in 1**69/70 to eighty-six in
1978/79; and of these, five were transferred to cataloguing from the Asian Studies
Division, when the Cataloguing Division assumed responsibility for processing
Asian language materials in 1973/74.  In terms of staff members alone, the reduction amounted to 18%.  It should also be noted that these same staff members work
fewer hours per week and per year than they did in 1970.
Second, the anticipated decline in the number of titles to be catalogued did not
take place.  The rate of increase in serial titles did diminish, as a result of
collections policies; but serials, as a rule, require cataloguing only once, when
the first issue is received.  On the other hand, the same collections policies
did result unexpectedly in an increased number of monograph titles, each requiring
individual cataloguing.  Also contributing to the backlog were additional items
received by other divisions, such as the Government Publications Division.  Clearly,
the work-to-worker ratio is out of balance, and is becoming increasingly disproportionate every year.
The organization of the cataloguing function underwent several changes during the
seventies.  In 1969/70 there was one large Cataloguing Division, comprised of three
subdivisions: Original Cataloguing, LC/Searching, and Preparations.  In 1970/71,
the subdivisions were granted Division status, with a cataloguing administration
group to coordinate their efforts.  In 1973/74, the Added Copies Section moved
from Original Cataloguing to LC/Searching, allowing more variety in the work performed by the derivative cataloguers and increased flexibility in the assignment
of duties to cover shifting workloads of pre-order searching, cataloguing, and
adding.  1978/79, the Year of Change, saw two more reorganizations of cataloguing
staff.  In April 1978 the LC/Searching and Original Cataloguing Divisions were
combined to form the Catalogue Records Division, with responsibility for the
intellectual content of the catalogue.
The former Catalogue Preparations Division became Catalogue Products Division, with
responsibility for the physical catalogue and preparation of materials for the
shelves.  Catalogue closure in January 1979 resulted in more changes: the transfer
of monograph holdings maintenance to Catalogue Products Division; the transfer of
serials holdings maintenance to Serials Division; the reassignment of card catalogue 79
maintenance staff to Catalogue Records Division to undertake the extra coding work
required for the automated system; and the creation of a RECON (retrospective
conversion) unit as the fourteenth cataloguing unit in Catalogue Records Division.
The working conditions for processing staff were a matter of much concern during
the decade.  The seventh floor of the Main Library, where Processing resided
during most of the sixties and seventies, was designed for bookstacks, not people,
and it was simply not large enough to accomodate adequately the processing operations and staff.  While planning for new space proceeded slowly and with many
setbacks, we eased the situation a little by moving the Preparations Division to
the first floor of the Main Library.  Eventually a site for a Library Processing
Centre was approved and planning for the new facility began in earnest.  There was
(and still is) concern on the part of both the Main Library and processing staff
that communication and consultation will be impaired by the physical separation
between the LPC and the Main Library.  In April 1979 we moved into our new quarters,
a happy conclusion to nearly a decade of planning, and the final change in a year
of changes.
We look toward the eighties with the hope that they will bring steady development
of, and improvement in the services we can obtain from our automated catalogue.
Specifically, we look forward to automated authority control, an area not covered
by the system at present, and on-line access to the catalogue and holdings records.
We hope to see the RECON project brought to a successful conclusion.  And we hope
that a balance can again be struck between the acquisition and processing rates,
so that we can maintain reasonable currency in cataloguing new materials for the
Library system.
Catalogue Products Division
A recent but major event for the library during the seventies was the closing of
the card catalogue and start of a computer-produced catalogue.  This event had
special significance for the Catalogue Products Division because the work of over
75% of the staff positions was related to the card catalogue.  The seventies are
best divided into two periods: the first was preoccupied with the solution of the
card catalogue problems; and the second, the development of a superior catalogue
in terms of currency and fullness of information, cost and size.
In 1969, the division had thirty-one full-time people working on the card catalogue
- typing, sorting, filing, revising the cards filed, and making corrections to the
cards.  And yet, it had a tremendous backlog in work.  There was a card production
backlog of over 45,000 card sets and a filing backlog of several years; maintenance
work was also behind.  Because it was so out-dated, the effectiveness of the card
catalogue as a bibliographic tool was adversely affected. - 80
During the following years, all possible measures were attempted to battle the
crises: extra typists and revisers were added, card production methods mechanized
and card preparation procedures streamlined.  Also, the entire technical processing
staff was called upon to share the sorting, filing and filing revision workload.
Finally in 1974, the backlogs were cleared.
However, by that time, the Library had already begun to recognize that it could
afford neither the staff time nor the physical space to maintain a card catalogue
permanently.  In addition, there was a growing desire among the B.C. libraries to
develop a provincial union catalogue for the purpose of collections sharing and
rationalization.  In 1974, the Catalogue Project Task Group, composed of both public
and technical services members, was formed to design a computer-output-microform
(COM) catalogue.  Representatives from B.C. university and college libraries began
working together, as an ad hoc pressure group called the B.C. Catalogue Action
Group, to obtain funding from the Provincial Government to build a computerized
union catalogue and to convert retrospectively the card catalogue to machine-
readable form.
Further developments in the following years made the closing of the catalogue a
necessity rather than an option.  First, due to budgetary restrictions, the division had to give up several staff positions although the volume of work had not
decreased.  As a result, a typing backlog started accumulating again.  Second, a
new Library Processing Centre was being planned, and with its completion the entire
technical processing staff would be physically separated from the card catalogue.
The prospect of having over seventy people travelling to the Main Library to do
filing and filing revision was considered unworkable.
In 1977, the B.C. Union Catalogue project was formed with funding assistance from
the Ministry of Education and decided to use the University of Toronto Library
Automation System (UTLAS) facility for a catalogue support system.  UBC Library,
as a key participant to this project, implemented a catalogue closure and started
to use the UTLAS system in 1978 along with the other B.C. universities and colleges.
Immediately, local card production was halted for works published in 1978 and
these were catalogued on U.T.L.A.S.  Instead of cards these records would be listed
in a computer produced microfiche catalogue supplied by U.T.L.A.S.  The design of
this "Micro-catalogue" was based on the recommendations made by the Catalogue
Project Task Group in 1974.  The public saw the first issue of the Microcatalogue
in September 1978.
In October, the long-awaited provincial funding, required to finance the retrospective conversion of the existing catalogue, finally came through.  During the
following months, the Catalogue Products staff worked ferociously towards the
closing of the catalogue.  Finally, in March 1979, the card catalogue was officially
declared closed, which meant that no more cards are to be filed. - 81
Unfortunately, the closing of the card catalogue did not solve card production
problems immediately.  We still had to deal with a card typing backlog of over
15,000 card sets.  A transitional unit, supported with the special funding from
the B.C. Ministry of Education, was set up to edit and input these manual catalogue
records into the automated catalogue.  We are very anxious to eliminate this backlog with the least delay.  However, with the existing staff and equipment, this
project will take the better part of a year to complete.
The Retrospective Conversion Project (RECON) will take more than five years to
complete and until then, a library user will need to refer to several catalogues
and listings before he can establish whether a work he needs has been catalogued
or not.  Also, the closed card catalogue will become more and more out of step with
the new microcatalogue since no catalogue maintenance work will be done to the
Author/Title and Subject Files.
However, these can be viewed as temporary problems.  We must look forward to the
day when there is one central catalogue file stored on a computer which contains
the complete record of the Library's holdings.  This catalogue data base can be
used to generate microcatalogues and also to provide on-line access to information
about library holdings.  Since COM is compact in size and inexpensive to duplicate,
it will be possible for all branches, reading rooms and even departmental offices
to have a copy.  As on-line access becomes economically viable and more terminals
become available throughout the campus, the Library's holdings will be accessible
using this technology.
The replacement of the card catalogue with the microcatalogue has had immediate
impact on our division's staff requirements and organization.  From the Card
Preparation Unit, we were able to transfer eight typist positions to the RECON
effort, retaining only four typists to keyboard original catalogue records into
the automated catalogue system and type Asian-language cards.  The Catalogue Maintenance staff was also reduced from twelve to five, again transferring staff from
card-related operations to the new computer-based catalogue development.  The staff
required for the corresponding functions in 1969 was 31, which is 21 people more
than the existing staff.  Our division also gained a new unit of ten members, the
Added Copies/Volumes Section, transferred as part of the organizational change
for the new catalogue.  This unit is responsible for maintaining the monograph
holdings record, a function formerly performed in the Catalogue Records Division.
The closing of the card catalogue is a significant event not only in the history
of the U.B.C. Library but also in the development of library service in British
Columbia.  Without the support of an enlightened government, our Library could not
have accomplished a project of such magnitude with such confidence and speed.  We
hope this is the beginning of a long history of co-operation between the provincial
government and the B.C. libraries in improving the library services for the people
of B.C. 82
Systems Division
The last half of the sixties was a period of rapid systems development for the
library, implementing three major records management systems: for circulation
control, book and periodicals ordering, accounting and inventory control.  As well,
a number of small applications were implemented.  Development continued through the
seventies beginning with some major changes in approach early in the decade, partly
because of the burden for maintenance of the conventional computer software developed in the sixties but also to begin using state-of-the-art methods and to begin
preparing for anticipated on-line operations.  The beginning of this change was the
installation of mini-computers in the library to provide a facility primarily for
data collection.
The mini-computer approach was chosen because it would provide a powerful facility
which would be used to support many library data entry applications and also provide
a base to prepare for on-line operation.  There has been continued expansion to add
more applications of data entry as well as to implement comprehensive data communications links to a number of different 'host' computers.  As of this writing there
are nearly a hundred remote terminals of various kinds attached to the library
mini-computers, and through the mini these terminals can and do connect to computers
on-campus, in Toronto, Ottawa, Washington, D.C, and California.
During the early seventies the library was also faced with a major conversion of
application systems from one make of computer to another, when the Data Processing
Centre replaced Honeywell computers with an IBM 370 system.  This conversion, in
retrospect, was non-productive in that it necessitated the adapting of programs
written for the Honeywell to operate on the IBM system.  The process took over a
year, and the end result was the same old programs; the time could have been better
spent developing new and better systems, taking advantage of the facilities of the
IBM 370 system.
This process, however, forced some re-assessment of software development generally,
and it was determined that some changes to the design and architecture of applications software should be made.
Following a comprehensive study of Data Base Management Systems, which at the time
proved to be inadequate for bibliographic data bases, the decision was taken to
develop in-house support for managing the growing number of bibliographic data
bases.  With the prospect of a Data Management approach also came two general-
purpose programs, one for file maintenance called General Input (GI), and another
for report production called DMReport.  These general purpose packages were intended
to replace the many separate and custom programs developed for each of the various
library records management applications.  The transition to these new facilities
has been largely completed, and the payoff is significant.  Demands on time to
maintain systems has been sharply reduced, and there is a great deal more flexibility - 83 -
in all of the applications now on the new facilities.  The transition from batch
computer operations to on-line is also beginning to emerge as a reality, and the
foundation of Data Management and generalized software is beginning to be more
fully realized.
Another significant change brought about by the decision to install mini-computers,
was the move to replace keypunch machines and paper tape typewriters with Cathode
Ray Tube (CRT) terminals directly connected to the mini-computer.  These CRT's were
installed in the various operating divisions of the library, and the central pool
of operators was transferred with the new equipment, effectively decentralizing
the data entry process and placing the responsibility and function at the source.
This approach has continued to be successful and the data entry function has become
solidly integrated with the regular operation of each part of the library.  The
next phase, already begun and expected to continue into the eighties, is to introduce more on-line enquiry and operations within each library division.
As the number of library applications continued to grow, the number of printed
pages of information also expanded, and at an alarming rate.  When the price of
paper increased sharply during one rather short period in the mid seventies, the
Library took steps to 'leap' into a relatively new method, at least for libraries,
that of Computer Output Microfilm or COM.  The transition was made with some boldness, converting virtually all printouts at once.  Almost a hundred microfiche
readers were installed and COM introduced nearly overnight.  There were some traumatic pre-implementation jitters, but the installation went smoothly and was
surprisingly (to some) accepted by everyone with hardly any hesitation.  There are
still those that don't 'like' COM, but most acknowledge that it is usable.  Some
points in favour of COM are its potential for wider availability of information at
more locations, and the easier-to-read formats which would have been prohibitively
expensive on paper.  COM continues to be a mainstay for distributing information
about library holdings and operations.
The equipment initially installed for library circulation control, the IBM 1030
card/badge readers, were of fifties vintage and mainly electromechanical devices
with moving switches, gears, and circuits.  When new, they were reliable and
accurate but with age they became less reliable and eventually unsatisfactory.  A
search for an alternative met with little success; nothing better was readily
available.  At the point of contracting for some custom hardware, contact was made
with a local company which had plans to develop and market a comprehensive data
collection system.  Over a period of two years UBC Library and Epic Data were
closely associated with their development of the system now used in the UBC Library,
from prototypes to first production models, to replacing the initial production
units with the newest model complete with bar-code scanners and much improved hardware and firmware (proprietary software).  The association with Epic was time
consuming but very worthwhile.  UBC obtained facilities to meet its requirements
and at the same time participated with a local company in entering a high technology 84
industry, one of the very few in B.C. to do so.  The Epic terminals are now used
in the libraries at both Simon Fraser and Victoria and for many other data collection applications in industry.
Continued development of the library mini-computer facility and recent innovations
in computers and communications have resulted in a number of interesting applications.  The various terminals in the library can be used to access remote data base
systems, with circuit switching and other communications linking taken care of by
the mini-computers.  The Library has at present the only UBC computer connection
to Datapac, and also to some packet communication facilities in the United States,
including Tymnet and Telenet.
As part of the Ministry-sponsored demonstration project of the ANIK-B satellite,
the Library mini-computer provided the facility to operate several terminals located
in the B.C. interior with simultaneous displays of data from a computer located in
California; this allowed viewers to watch video transmitted by satellite while an
experienced operator in Vancouver provided instruction in the searching of remote
data bases.  A brief test/demonstration was arranged with the Library mini-computer
whereby the data communications were transmitted by satellite, to obtain some
assessment of the method as well as to measure the inherent delay in satellite
transmission.
Systems development continues to be an important support service for the Library's
operations, and there is a growing queue for both new as well as modified applications.  The computer, with its ability to maintain records management functions
and to provide access to information, is expected to become even more important to
library operations and services as budget restraints continue, as the collections
grow in size and complexity, and as demands for service mount, on campus and off
campus. 85
CHAPTER VI
TRENDS FOR THE EIGHTIES
The division of historic time into decades is arbitrary.  Developments themselves
do not begin and end conveniently in ten-year periods.  Thus the trends which underlay events in the Library's history during the seventies will undoubtedly continue
into the eighties.
What some have called the age of information shows no sign of coming to an end.
On the contrary, every discipline exhibits signs of activity and ferment, and man's
creative and inventive impulses give rise to an ever-increasing flow of new works.
Virtually all of these, at some point, assume recorded form.  Since it is the
Library's responsibility to collect, organize and provide access to knowledge in
recorded form, it would seem that its continued growth is inevitable.
Predictions that the physical book would vanish as a means of recording and transmitting information have yet to be realized. It remains one of the most practical
and convenient means for dealing with some kinds of information, and for its use
in certain ways. However, the use of other formats will become more prevalent for
many kinds of information. It is safe to predict that the Library will be acquiring even more material in the shape of microform, machine-readable tapes, and even
video tapes. It may opt not to acquire some information, but to provide access to
it through computer terminals.
More information in more formats can only lead to a more complex Library, from the
point of view of users.  A higher level of training of the Library's users will
be needed; instruction in information retrieval may become a component of undergraduate courses in all fields.  But even if users can be taught how to contend
with the literature of their respective disciplines, it will fall upon the Library
to provide increasingly sophisticated reference services in all fields.  The very
size of the Library's present collection already imposes on staff the need for
academic specialization.
The role of the computer in supporting and enhancing Library services will continue
to increase.  On-line access to massive centralized records of holdings will be
provided.  The advent of home mini-computers and of retrieval and display systems
based on such technological developments as lasers and microprocessors may extend
access to U.B.C.'s holdings.  Community expectations will be raised, and the
University must seek the means to satisfy them.  Relationships among libraries in
the province, in the( nation and abroad, will become better defined and more significant.
The simple projection of current trends does not always lead to the correct interpretation of the future, so these guesses must be taken for what they are.  There - 86
are other factors at work, relating to depleting natural resources, strained
national economies, and political and social instabilities, that could change
radically the future of libraries, of this Library and the University.  Undoubtedly,
there are additional factors that now hide from view or have yet to come into being,
which could bring about unforeseen events.
This being the case, perhaps it is best to draw a lesson from nature, which shows
us that those species that adapt to growth and change survive.  What the eighties
will require of the Library and its staff is a flexible approach to unexpected
novelty.  What the users can reliably expect, based on a simple projection from the
seventies and all the decades before, is a continued determination on the part of
the staff to provide the highest standard of service possible within available
resources. - 87 -
Appendix A
SIZE OF COLLECTIONS - PHYSICAL VOLUMES
March 31/73
Additions
Withdrawals
March 31/79
Main Library
General stacks
764,899
29,024
1,250
792,673
Asian Studies
92,296
8,456
15
100,737
Fine Arts
71,257
3,766
14
75,009
Humanities &  Social
Sciences Reference
40,673
2,281
45
42,909
Science Reference
14,578
366
178
14,766
Special Collections
48,612
1,619
2
50,229
SUBTOTAL
1,032,315
45,512
1,504
1,076,323
Branches & Reading Rooms
Animal Resource Ecology Library
13,859
303
17
14,145
Biomedical Branch Library
19,355
1,084
31
20,408
Crane Library
6,783
245
—
7,028
Curriculum Laboratory
44,214
7,250
2,909
48,555
Law Library
108,830
3,689
29
112,490
MacMillan Library
38,076
1,976
102
39,950
Marjorie Smith Library
11,606
544
41
12,109
Mathematics Library
19,457
879
13
20,323
Music Library
27,717
1,671
81
29,307
2
Reading Rooms
108,991
5,072
1,006
113,057
Sedgewick Library
147,848
7,930
993
154,785
Woodward Library
221,636
7,683
30
229,289
SUBTOTAL
768,372
38,326
5,252
801,446
TOTAL
1,800,687
83,838
6,756
1,877,769
Storage
141,096
—
—
141,096
GRAND TOTAL
1,941,783
--
—
2,018,865
Notes:  1. Includes some minor Main Library collections
2. Includes the Data Library and new material for the Library Processing
Centre 88
Appendix B
GROWTH OF COLLECTIONS
Volumes - Catalogued
Documents - Uncatalogued
Microfilm (reels)
Microcards (cards)
Microprint (sheets)
Microfiche (sheets)
Films, Filmloops, Filmstrips
& Video Tapes
Slides & Transparencies
Pictures & Posters
Maps
*
Manuscripts
Sound Recordings
Computer Tapes
Air Photos
March 31, 1978
Net Growth
March 31, 1979
1,941,783
77,082
2
,018,865
497,572
27,938
525,510
57,513
7,842
65,355
111,976
—
111,976
986,750
24,000
1
,010,750
844,725
124,996
969,721
3,073
87
3,160
24,337
1,522
25,859
74,539
6,256
80,795
119,449
6,563
126,012
3,817
1 * 1 »
250 l.f.
4,067 1.
66,817
13,263X
80,080
287
33
320
70
—
70
* Thickness of files in linear feet.
x Includes some acquisitions from 1977/78 not previously reported.
+ The tapes were converted to 6,250 bpi during the year.  The year-end figure of
320 represents tapes in this mode. - 89 -
Appendix C
LIBRARY EXPENDITURES
Fiscal Years, April/March
Year
1969/70
1970/71
1971/72
1972/73
1973/74
1974/75
1975/76
1976/77
1977/78
1978/79
Salaries &
Wages
2,204,115
2,584,069
2,896,602
3,178,630
3,522,626
4,263,647
5,344,412
5,755,893
6,303,582
6,515,980
Collections
1,127,291
1,214,875
1,286,401
1,308,537
1,348,775
1,502,317
1,741,021
1,954,121
2,473,368
2,722,613
Binding
112,709
126,932
151,501
154,593
165,081
127,480
144,266
154,043
177,253
184,223
Supplies &
Equipment
428,873
482,787
346,378
350,455
373,302
428,391
428,696
752,810
518,360
976,638
Totals
3,872,988
4,408,663
4,680,882
4,992,215
5,409,784
6,321,835
7,658,395
8,616,867
9,472,563
10,399,454 - 90 -
Appendix d
RECORDED USE OF LIBRARY RESOURCES
September 1978 - August 1979
GENERAL CIRCULATION
Main Library
General Stack Collection
Reserve Circulation
Extension Library
Asian Studies Division
Fine Arts Division
Government Publications
Map Collections
Special Collections
SUBTOTAL
1975/76
1976/77
454,310
1977/78
425,211
1978/79
442,606
% Increase/
Decrease over
1977/78
427,094
+
4.1%
19,657
16,775
17,401
15,080
-
13.3%
4,356
5,764
5,943
8,450
+
42.2%
17,943
23,003
17,856
18,183
+
1.8%
88,359
97,055
96,747
95,700
-
1.1%
149,975
109,430
141,013
128,760
-
8.7%
9,928
12,503
11,824
10,870
-
8.1%
19,051
17,667
17,651
19,164
+
8.6%
736,363
736,507
733,646
738,813
+
0.7%
Branch Libraries &
Reading Rooms
Animal Resource Ecology
Crane Library
Curriculum Laboratory
Law Library
MacMillan Library
Marjorie Smith Library
Mathematics Library
Medical Branch Library
(V.G.H.)
Music Library
Reading Rooms
Sedgewick Library
Woodward Library
SUBTOTAL
8,447
31,293
225,261
142,628
41,193
12,603
19,251
27,469
33,624
83,907
377,882
195,110
9,773
52,700
252,129
153,440
42,956
14,017
19,283
30,390
38,279
78,642
367,927
183,053
llrI/O
51,713
254,022
138,942
44,503
19,251
19,504
32,554
40,029
76,824
344,561
191,575
11,441
46,219
209,155
140,087
47,334
18,694
18,388
36,559
42,735
73,170
339,805
187,425
1,198,668  1,242,598  1,224,656  1,171,012
+  2.4%
- 10.6%
- 17.7%
+ 0.8%
+  6.4%
- 2.9%
- 5.7%
+ 12.3%
+  6.8%
- 4.8%
- 1.4%
- 2.2%
- 4.4%
Use of Recordings
Wilson Recordings
Collection
Music Library
Record Collection
SUBTOTAL
261,278    280,150    312,375
38,976     40,756     45,672
300,254
320,906
358,047
331,756
52,393
384,149
+  6.2%
+ 14.7%
+  7.3% - 91 -
Appendix D
(continued)
INTERLIBRARY LOANS
1975/76    1976/77    1977/78    1978/79
% Increase/
Decrease over
1977/78
To Other Libraries
Original Materials
8,094
7,884
11,533
10,940
-  5.1%
Photocopies
8,263
16,357
6,609
11,705
13,258
+ 13.3%
TOTAL INTERLIBRARY
LENDING '
14,493
23,238
24,198
+  4.1%
From Other Libraries
Original Materials
Photocopies
TOTAL INTERLIBRARY
BORROWING
3,184
2,661
5,845
3,274
3,502
6,776
3,243
3,549
6,792
3,521
4,131
7,652
+     8.6%
4-   16.4%
+   12.7%
GRAND TOTAL
(General Circulation &
Interlibrary Loans)    2,257,487  2,321,271  2,346,379 2,325,824
-  0.9%
* Interlibrary Loans are presented in greater detail in Appendix E. 92
Appendix E
INTERLIBRARY LOANS
To Other Libraries
- Original Materials
,2
General -
Federated Information Network
B.C. Medical Library Service
.  4
Simon Fraser University
University of Victoria     .
B.C. institute of Technology     ,.
B.C. Post-Secondary Library Network"
6
Bamfield Marine Station '
SUBTOTAL
- Photocopies
2
General ,
Federated Information Network
.    .  4
Simon Fraser University
University  of Victoria
B.C. Institute of Technology
Colleges of B.C. ' c
B.C. Post-Secondary Library Network"
Bamfield Marine Station
SUBTOTAL
TOTAL INTERLIBRARY LENDING
From Other Libraries
- Original Materials
General
B.C. Medical Library Service
- Photocopies
TOTAL INTERLIBRARY BORROWING
Increase
(Decrease)
1975/76   1976/77
1977/78
1978/79
from 77/78
3,078     1,941
2,132
1,979
(7.2)
1,314     1,459
1,477
1,331
(9.9)
2,298
2,975
3,466
2,479
(28.5)
987
1,090
364
306
	
53
100
	
	
1,404
1,496
4,428
30
4,198
31
(5.2)
	
13
3.3
8,094
16,357
7,884
14,493
11,533
10,018
23,238
23,276
(13.1)
3,591
1,412
2,012
1,977
(1.7)
571
736
797
843
5.8
2,446
1,875
1,245
1,307
	
	
178
766
	
	
142
428
	
4,011
4,376
8,860
36
10,313
125
16.4
90
85
247.2
8,263
6,609
11,705
13,258
13.3
0.2
2,020
2,580
2,453
2,961
20.7
1,164
694
790
117
(85.2)
2,661
3,502
3,549
4,131
16.4
5,845
6,776
6,792
7,209
6.1
Because of the number of significant changes in interlibrary loan activity in British Columbia
in the years covered by this table meaningful comparisons are difficult and sometimes impossible.
Until 1977-78 loans to public colleges in B.C. were included under the heading "General" for both
originals and some photocopies. Other photocopies were handled through the SFU unit at UBC and
counted separately.
FIN, a network of public libraries operating since December 1974 under the aegis of the Greater
Vancouver Library Federation.  It provides access to the UBC collections for its own members and
for some B.C. Government libraries in Victoria.
Prior to September 1977 loans were handled by the special Simon Fraser University Library unit
at UBC.
NET, a network of B.C. public university and college libraries, since September 1977.
BMS loans were handled by the SFU unit until September 1977, since then by UBC via the FIN
telephone line. - 93 -
Appendix F
REFERENCE STATISTICS
September, 1978 - August, 1979
Main Library
Asian Studies
Fine Arts
Government Publications
Humanities
Information Desk
Map Collection
Science
Social Sciences
Special Collections
(1977/78)
Directional
Questions
Reference
Questions
Research
Questions
Total
Percentage
Increase/
Decrease
1,776
2,701
2,549
7,026
9,906
11,556
1,220
22,682
632
27,651
923
29,206
1,818
8,970
705
11,493
11,686
59,517
—
71,203
250
3,336
116
3,702
519
6,612
1,831
8,962
819
16,114
935
17,870
1,305
9,304
481
11,090
28,711
145,761
8,762
183,234
+  1.9%
(27,809)
(144,211)
(7,838)
(179,858)
Branch Libraries
Animal Resource Ecology
Crane Library
Curriculum Laboratory
Law Library
MacMillan Library
Marjorie Smith Library
Mathematics Library
Medical Branch Library
(V.G.H.)
Music Library
Sedgewick Library
Woodward Library
(1977/78)
GRAND TOTALS
(1977/78)
3,237
3,061
501
6,799
2,242
2,346
590
5,178
10,387
18,644
98
29,129
2,713
3,763
1
,701
8,177
3,170
7,183
576
10,929
562
2,269
248
3,079
1,182
1,191
271
2,644
4,072
8,055
998*
13,125
2,405
7,918
871
11,194
12,824
13,726
156
26,706
5,053
27,604
3
,322
35,979
47,847
95,760
9
,332
152,939
(42,304)
(89,889)
(6
,773)
(138,966)
76,558
241,521
18
,094
336,173
(70,113)
(234,100)
(14
,611)
(318,824)
+ 10.1%
+  5.4%
46,746 questions (48,537 in 1977/78) in Reading Rooms are not included in Appendix F
* Patrons served through computer-assisted bibliographic searches are included in
the reference statistics under "research questions".  A separate table showing the
numbers of computer searches is provided in Appendix G. - 94 -
Appendix G
COMPUTER-ASSISTED REFERENCE SEARCHES
September, 1978 - August, 1979
Total
Current
"Student
Other
Data
Awareness
Patrons
(1977/
Special"
UBC
Non-UBC
Files
Profiles
Division
Served
1978)
Searches
Searches
Searches
Searched
& Reports
Ecology Library
32
(45)
13
18
1
34
	
Lav? Library
100
(121)
37
17
46
247
	
MacMillan Lib.
72
(59)
38
33
1
135
	
Medical Branch
(V.G.H.)
165
( )
1
164
	
457
	
Science Div.
164
(154)
33
102
29
249
9
Social Sciences
Division
188
(184)
98
63
27
253
3
Woodward Library
932
(716)
63
845
24
1,562
553<d>
TOTALS
1,653   (1,279)
283
(a)
1,242
128
(b)
2,937
(c)
565
(a) "Student Special" searches are limited searches provided to UBC students at a
flat fee of $5.00.  The relatively low number done in the Woodward Library
results from the exclusion of MEDLINE searches, which are normally inexpensive,
from the* special rate.
(b) Full costs, including staff time, for computer-assisted searches are charged to
patrons not associated with the University.  The number of searches is therefore
relatively low, although the searches that are done for non-patrons tend to be
complex and often require the use of several data files.
(c) A single reference search may involve the use of more than one data file
(i.e. MEDLINE and Psychological Abstracts).  Depending on the particular combination of data files required, this may involve a substantial amount of
additional staff time.
(d)  Figure represents the number of monthly updates distributed to patrons.  Current
awareness (SDI) profiles are included in the "patrons served" total only when
they are initially established or subsequently revised. 95 -
Appendix H
LIBRARY ORGANIZATION
ADMINISTRATION
Stuart-Stubbs, Basil
Bell, Inglis F.
MacDonald, Robin
Mclnnes, Douglas N.
Mercer, Eleanor
Watson, William J.
de Bruijn, Erik
University Librarian
Associate Librarian
Assistant Librarian - Technical Processes
and Systems
Assistant Librarian - Public Services
Assistant Librarian - Collections
Assistant Librarian - Physical Planning
and Development
Assistant Librarian - Administrative Services
ACQUISITIONS
Harrington, Walter
Head
ANIMAL RESOURCE ECOLOGY LIBRARY
Nelson, Ann
Head
ASIAN STUDIES
Ng, Tung King
Head
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Cole, John
Elliston, Graham
Forbes, Jennifer
Jeffreys, Anthony
Johnson, Stephen
Mcintosh, Jack
Shields, Dorothy
Bibliographer - Science
Bibliographer - Serials
Bibliographer - English Language
Bibliographer - Life Sciences
Research Bibliographer
Bibliographer - Slavonic Studies
Bibliographer - European Languages
BIOMEDICAL BRANCH LIBRARY (V.G.H.)
Freeman, George
Head
CATALOGUE RECORDS
Turner, Ann
Bailey, Freda
Head
Deputy Head & Bibliographic Control Librarian
CATALOGUE PRODUCTS
Joe, Linda
Head
CIRCULATION
Butterfield, Rita
Head - 96 -
Appendix H
(continued)
CRANE LIBRARY
Thiele, Paul Head
CURRICULUM LABORATORY
Hurt, Howard Head
DATA LIBRARY
Ruus, Laine Head
FINE ARTS
Dwyer, Melva Head
GIFTS & EXCHANGE
Elliston, Graham Head
GOVERNMENT PUBLICATAIONS & MICROFORMS
Dodson, Suzanne Head
HUMANITIES
Forbes, Charles Head
INFORMATION & ORIENTATION
Sandilands, Joan Head
INTERLIBRARY LOAN
Friesen, Margaret Head
LAW LIBRARY
Shorthouse, Tom Head
MACMILLAN LIBRARY
Macaree, Mary Head
MAP DIVISION
Wilson, Maureen Head
MARJORIE SMITH LIBRARY
de Bruijn, Elsie Head
MUSIC LIBRARY
Burndorfer, Hans Head - 97 -
Appendix H
(continued)
READING ROOMS
Omelusik, Nicholas
Head
SCIENCE DIVISION & MATHEMATICS LIBRARY
Brongers, Rein Head
SEDGEWICK LIBRARY
Erickson, Ture
Head
SERIALS DIVISION
Baldwin, Nadine
Head
SOCIAL SCIENCES DIVISION
Carrier, Lois
Head
SPECIAL COLLECTIONS DIVISION
Yandle, Anne
Selby, Joan
Head
Curator, Colbeck Collection
SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT
Dennis, Donald
Dobbin, Geraldine
Systems Analyst
Systems & Information Science Librarian
WILSON RECORDINGS/COLLECTION
Kaye, Douglas
Head
WOODWARD LIBRARY
Leith, Anna
Head - 98 -
Appendix J
LIBRARY SUPPORTED READING ROOMS
AS OF AUGUST, 1979
Adult Education
Room 20
5 760 Toronto Road
Agricultural Economics
Ponderosa Annex D
Room 105
Anthropology-Sociology
Anthropology-Sociology Building
Room 2314
Applied Science/Mechanical Eng,
Civil & Mechanical Engineering Bldg.
Room 2050
Architecture
Frederick Lasserre Building
Room 9B (Basement)
Asian Studies
Buchanan Building
Room 2208
Audiology
James Mather Building
Fairview Crescent, Room 205
Chemical Engineering
Chemical Engineering Building
Room 310
Chemistry
Chemistry Building
Room 261
Classics
Buchanan Building
Room 2218
Commerce
Henry Angus Building
Room 307
Comparative Literature
Buchanan Building
Room 227
Computing Centre
Computer Sciences Building
Room 302 - 99 -
Appendix J
(continued)
Creative Writing
Brock Hall, South Wing
Room 204
Economics-History
Buchanan Tower
Room 1097
Electrical Engineering
Electrical Engineering Building
Room 428 (Enter by Room 434)
English
Buchanan Tower
Room 697
Extended/Acute Care
Health Sciences Centre
Room M40, Extended Care Unit
French
Buchanan Tower
Room 897
Geography
Geography Building
Room 140
Geology
Geological Sciences Building
Room 208
Geophysics
Geophysics Building,
2nd Floor, South
Hispanic-Italian
Buchanan Building
Room 2220
Home Economics
Home Economics Building
Room 210
Institutional Analysis & Planning
Main Mall N. Administration Building
Room 140
Library School
Main Library, North Wing
8th Floor, Room 831
Linguistics
Buchanan Building
Room 0210 - 100 -
Appendix J
(continued)
Metallurgy
Metallurgy Building
Room 319
Microbiology
Wesbrook Building
Room 300
Mineral Engineering
Mineral Engineering Building
Room 201
Pharmacology
Medical Sciences Building
Block C, Room 221
Pharmacy
Cunningham Building
Room 160
Philosophy
Buchanan Building
Room 3270
Physics
Hennings Building
Room 311
Physiology
Medical Sciences Building
Block A, Room 201
Political Science
Buchanan Building
Room 1220
Psychiatry
Room 22, Health Sciences Centre
2255 Wesbrook Road
Psychology
Henry Angus Building
Room  207
Rehabilitation Medicine
Hut B2
Room 26-27
Religious Studies
Buchanan Building
Room 2250
Slavonic Studies
Buchanan Building
Room 2251 - 101 -
Appendix J
(continued)
Theatre
Frederick Wood Theatre
Room 211
Transportation Studies
Auditorium Annex
Room 100 - 102 -
Appendix K
SENATE LIBRARY COMMITTEE
1978/79
Rev. P.C Burns
Mr. R.T, Franson
Ms. P. Gouldstone
Mr. A. Hedstrom
Dr. F.R.C Johnstone
Dr. L.D. Jones
Dr. H.C. Knutson
Dr. P.A. Larkin (Chairman)
Mr. F. Lee
Rev. J.P. Martin
Dr. Harvey Mitchell
Mr. J.D. McWilliams
Mr. P.H. Pearse
Mrs. A. Piternick
Dr. S.O. Russell
Dr. G.G.E. Scudder
Dr. M. Shaw
Dr. O. Sziklai
EX-OFFICIO
Chancellor J.V. Clyne
President D. Kenny
Mr. J.E.A. Parnall
Mr. B. Stuart-Stubbs
Terms of Reference:
(a) To advise and assist the Librarian in:
(i)  formulating a policy for the development of resources for instruction
and research;
(ii)  advising on the allocation of book funds to the fields of instruction
and research;
(iii)  developing a general program of library service for all the interests
of the University; and
(iv)  keeping himself informed about the library needs of instructional and
research staffs, and keeping the academic community informed about the
library.
(b) To report to Senate on matters of policy under discussion by the Committee.