ETD PROJECT TEAM REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS ON THE PROCESSING OF ELECTRONIC THESES AND DISSERTATIONS

• Project Team: Nancy Boggess-Korekach, Mary Charles Lasater, and Jeff Taylor.

Summary of current procedure for the approval and cataloging of ETD's:

A detailed step by step documentation of the procedures are available at http://wiki.library.vanderbilt.edu/committees/pmwiki.php/Meta/ProceduresDocumentation

• ETD's are submitted by students using the webpages and software provided by the library at http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu. The student fills out the metadata form with information such as author, title, keywords, department and advisor names and sets the availability option to either unrestricted, restricted to campus access only, or withheld. Withheld ETD's are only available for viewing by the student, Liz Leis in the Graduate School, and LITS staff. The ETD's are reviewed and approved by Liz using that same software. Once the ETD is approved, Liz notifies Jeff Taylor in TS cataloging and Nancy Boggess-Korekach in LITS via email. Nancy keeps an excel spreadsheet which she updates for each ETD submitted. She records the date the ETD was approved, cataloged, CDROM created and when it was sent to the Annex. Nancy also keeps track there of how many ETD's were submitted for each department in a given year, as well as the Acorn record numbers and barcodes assigned to each CDROM copy.
• As a part of the approval process, Liz Leis sends the appropriate paperwork to Proquest so that the ETD is obtained by them and a microfilm archive copy is produced. The ETD is then available through Proquest to the public. Restricted and withheld ETD's cannot be obtained by Proquest until they are released. For restricted and unrestricted ETD's, Nancy checks to make sure that the link to the PDF file is active and that the file is indeed in PDF format. If the ETD is withheld, it is noted on Nancy's spreadsheet and no further action is taken until the ETD is released. At the present time, there is no formal method of notification to Nancy or to Jeff when a withheld ETD has been released. If the ETD is unrestricted or just restricted to campus use, Nancy updates her spreadsheet and sends the author's name and the link to the metadata page to the libthesis@vanderbilt.edu group mailbox for cataloging.
• Once TS Cataloging receives the notification from Nancy that an ETD is ready for cataloging, Jeff creates a record on Acorn, does the descriptive cataloging, and creates the call/copy for the electronic resource. Jeff then sends information to original catalogers in Technical Services and the other libraries for them to complete the authority work and add appropriate subject headings to the Acorn record. Jeff also notifies Nancy that the Acorn record is there. Nancy then creates a second call/copy for the CDROM copy that is housed in the Annex. Nancy burns the CDROM, creates the label for the jewel case, and affixes the barcode to the case. She sends the CDROM to the Annex where Annex staff add a shelving note to the Acorn record, and then shelve the CDROM as the archival copy.

RECOMMENDED CHANGES TO THE PRESENT PROCEDURE

The ETD Project Team recommends the following changes:

• When the student submits the ETD, they will also submit a form that will provide catalogers with the preferred form of name to appear on the Acorn cataloging record.
• The descriptive cataloger will add the second call/copy for the CDROM copy at the point that the Acorn record is created. The copy will have an auto-generated barcode number until the CDROM can be created and a real barcode assigned to it.
• The original catalogers in Technical Services and the other libraries will add the preferred form of the author's name and appropriate subject headings to the metadata page of the ETD. They will also correct any obvious spelling errors in the title and the author's name. This will allow for more complete access since the metadata page is the only information that is available to search engines and, more often than not, the keywords added by the students are too general and non-standard to allow adequate access.
• The withheld ETD's should be cataloged and the CDROM archive copy created as soon as they are submitted instead of when they are released. The Acorn records for these will be shadowed to prevent access by the public and the link to the ETD will not be added. Liz and Nancy will work on a method for cataloging to be notified when a withheld ETD is released so that the Acorn record can be unshadowed and the link to the ETD can be added. This will allow more accurate tracking of these ETD's, some of which have been withheld for years and are only recorded on the spreadsheet that Nancy keeps and in Liz's files in the Graduate School.
• The burning of the CDROM, the creation of the label and the barcoding of the jewel case should be moved out of LITS and performed at some point during the cataloging process. Where exactly this activity will take place will be up to the Metadata Committee to decide. The ETD Project Team sees the most likely places for this activity to be Technical Services Cataloging, Preservation, Annex or Special Collections.
• In addition to the changes in the procedures, the ETD Project Team recommends that the ETD webpages and software be updated to include more information on the conversion of Word Documents to PDF, including information about where the student can get help on campus or online, and that a concerted effort be made by the Graduate School and LITS to make sure that such help is readily available. Nancy will also add information to the submission form to explain the differences in the availability options so that students better understand the consequences of each choice.
• In order to make the information that the student supplies on the metadata page of the ETD website more consistent, the Graduate School will change their guidelines such that the student will be asked to use upper and lower case in the title of their ETD. The present practice of submitting the title information in all upper case has created problems when special characters are used, as in scientific formulas. The use of upper and lower case will also more closely mirror the standards used in cataloging the Acorn record.

All of these recommendations are made with the goal to have a more efficient method of tracking, cataloging and archiving the ever-growing number of ETD's in the Vanderbilt database. Recommendations involving the Graduate School have been approved by its representatives Liz Leis, Barry Kendall, and Richard Hoover.

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This document submitted to the Metadata Committee by Nancy Boggess-Korekach, Mary Charles Lasater and Jeff Taylor on June 2, 2006.