Bringing ERIC Documents to Light in Voyager Using Marcive

Abstract

In 2009, Auburn University Libraries began adding records for ERIC documents to the catalog. ERIC, a database of education materials produced since 1966 by the Institute of Education Sciences and the U.S. Department of Education, contains citations for over 500,000 non-journal publications. From 1966-2004, the full text of most documents was available on over 300,000 microfiche and, for documents produced after 2004, the full text was available digitally. ERIC also began a program to retrospectively digitize the microfiche collection, resulting in 70% of the collection available electronically. Despite having three different databases which indexed the ERIC documents, the microfiche usage was extremely low and staff still encountered patrons who had never heard of ERIC. Librarians had a sense that the material in ERIC could be useful, but how to bring it to users’ attention? Adding records to the catalog for the documents seemed to be a likely way to increase usage. This session will report on staff reactions to the ERIC records in the catalog, usage statistics for the records, and procedures for loading records into the catalog.