Description: This report was commissioned and supported by the National Information Standards Organization (NISO). The dynamic pace of technology change challenges all organizations to identify and select standards on which to base mission-critical programs and services. State library agencies face particular challenges because of the increasing demands that publicly supported libraries provide access to increasing quantities and varieties of networked, digital and paper-based information resources and services. State library agencies are in a unique position to influence the adoption and implementation of standards to support statewide library resource sharing. This study, undertaken in 1998, attempted to bridge the gap of information and understanding about the current situation of state library agencies' use, opportunities and issues related to technical standards.

Description: This report is on a study of state library agencies' information technology standards policies and practices. The National Information Standards Organization (NISO) sponsored this study to gain a better understanding of its target markets. As the national standards organization for the communities of libraries, information services, and publishers, NISO's goal for supporting this study was to understand state library agencies' concerns related to information technology standards. The study provides NISO with detailed information about the current use of standards by state library agencies and a set of recommendations to better serve the standards needs of state library agencies. Chief Officers of State Library Agencies (COSLA) endorsed the study since the data collected would assist its members in awareness of what each state library agency is doing with standards as well as the standards issues identified by the agencies. The study benefits COSLA by suggesting appropriate leadership opportunities for state library agencies in statewide standards policy development and deployment. The study also benefits the agencies by providing a compilation of their standards policies and procedures, and identifying barriers and best practices related to information technology standards. The structure of this report consists of a number of narrative sections and a set ...

Description: This poster discusses teaching tools, applications, and infrastructure for digital curation through the use of a virtual lab. With an increased demand for digital curation, data management, archiving, and preservation the library and information science community has begun offering new education and training in these fields. A trend in this education is the use of online virtual labs to offer students hands-on experience with the tools and methodologies inherent to these fields. At the University of North Texas (UNT), the authors are also developing a four course education program in digital curation and data management including a course called 'Tools, Applications, and Infrastructure for Digital Curation' that employs a virtual lab component. This poster discusses the first offering of the course; several challenges that the authors faced; and the new strategies developed to address these issues and improve the course and virtual lab for the next offering.

Description: This article discusses technology in secondary career and technical education. Today, school districts continually struggle with the following questions pertaining to career and technical education programs: How does career and technical education fit the secondary curriculum? What is the magic mixture of knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to ensure that American students have the competitive edge in the workplace? How should school districts train teachers of career and technical education to teach in the information age? How will the efficacy of technology implementation in career and technical education be measured? What trends should drive changes in career and technical education? The authors state that as we move deeper into the information age, we must seek to resolve these issues. This article addresses each of these concerns by exploring the use of technology in the secondary career and technical education classroom.

Description: This paper proposes a Retrieval Outcome Analysis Framework, or ROA Framework, to systematically evaluate retrieval performance of Cross-Language Information Retrieval systems. The ROA framework goes beyond TREC-type retrieval evaluation methodology by including procedures focusing on individual queries, especially difficult queries. The framework is comprised of four interrelated components: (1) Overall System Performance Evaluation, (2) Query Categorization, (3) Translation Analysis, and (4) Individual Query Analysis. An example of applying the framework is discussed in detail. The author believes the proposed framework would be especially useful for the development of real world Cross-Language Information Retrieval systems because the evaluation guided by the framework has the potential to discover causes behind poor retrieval performance.