2020-4-30 Resource Access Meeting Notes

Date

Attendees



Discussion Items

TimeItemWhoDescriptionGoals
2minHousekeeping 

Notetaker Andy Horbal

CirculationImplementers Process of putting it all together 


Topics we like to take to the Monday Meeting

Not naming/renaming the fixed due date schedule data entry table (Frage) 



Notes 


  • Permissions for Circulation set up (Covered 2/20)
  • Patron Groups (Covered 2/20)
  • Locations (Covered 2/20)
  • Loan Types(Covered 3/2)
  • Material types (Covered 3/2)
  • Overdue Fine Policies (Covered 3/2)
  • Lost item fee policies(Covered 3/2)
  • Request Policies (Covered 3/2)
  • Request cancellation reasons (Covered 3/2)
  • Patron notice policies (Covered 3/2)
  • Patron notice templates (Covered 3/2)
  • Fixed due date schedules (Covered 3/5)
  • Staff slips  (started on 3/5)
  • Loan policies (Covered on 4/16)
  • Circulation editor (Covered on 4/23)
  • Process of putting it all together (4/30)


Brian & Brooks talked about their first meetings when they discussed what they wanted to do with circulation in FOLIO. Brian notes that he had a lot of help from a colleague who suggested a conceptual layout for how the rules were going to work: Simmons’s rules are dependent on patron groups + location. Knowing what categories to pull out of the system was a massive help. Brooks had a higher-level conceptual charge of trying to normalize + simplify existing loan rules. Lots of small variations that require a complex matrix of rules which they wanted to simplify. Missouri State system is similarly based on location + patron group. Didn’t want to create complicated-to-read circ rules in FOLIO, so they shifted from location + patron groups to loan types + patron groups, since many locations shared same based loan patterns. Easier to modify loan types than locations in FOLIO.


Brian: first task for me was to create a full mapping of how loan rules were set in existing ILS and put them on a spreadsheet. Brooks: created a matrix that identified patterns in patron group IDs and loan policy IDs. Next step for both: eliminated redundancies, consolidated loans, simplify as much as possible.


How did Simmons + Missouri State handle “politics” of consolidation? Simmons had conversations with staff around the issue. Largely stayed with what they had in place already. Staff were pretty united in what they wanted to do, so there wasn’t much conflict.


What were the hardest + easiest things Simmons + Missouri State needed to do around circ? Simmons: easiest was eliminating overdue fines. Popular with patrons, and eliminated a lot of settings work for staff. Work was done in old system to ease migration burden. Missouri State: eliminating overdue fines as well for same reasons. Wrapped up in decision to move to FOLIO. Others on call note that they are considering moves like this as well. Discussion of how replacement costs work in FOLIO. Hardest thing for Simmons to figure out is relationship between different patron types and shipping options: how do you get all the necessary delivery info into a staff slip? Online students pose a particularly difficult challenge. Hardest thing for Missouri State was selecting loan types.