reviews 382 College & Research Libraries presented at a convocation and includes distinguished contributors such as William G. Bowen and Ernest L. Boyer. Part 3 of Challenges Facing Higher Edu- cation at the Millennium is the largest sec­ tion of the book and includes chapters such as “Financing Universities through Nontraditional Revenue Sources,” “Net­ works and Strategic Alliances within and between Universities and with the Private Sector,” “Governance,” and “The Re­ search University Potential as an Area’s Growth and Prosperity Stimulant.” “Higher Learning as a Joint Venture be­ tween State and Industry: The Example of the International University in Ger­ many” is by the book’s only female con­ tributor, Heide Ziegler, president of the private International University in Bruchsal, Germany. All of these and the other discussions in this book are articu­ late and well informed, if not particularly earth-shaking. I must say, though, that I was not sure what to make of the anti- Spock (Benjamin) contributor who sug­ gested that “The recent dramatic success of the film Titanic, particularly with the young generation, is, in my opinion, due to the authentic values that it represents.” The three chapters comprising Part 4, “The University of the Future,” include discussions of higher education in the twenty-first century from a European point of view, a brief discussion of “fu­ ture challenges” facing American univer­ sities (really a reiteration of earlier com­ ments), and a similarly reiterative de­ scription of the characteristics of “the new university” by former Cornell University president Frank H. Rhodes. “The Glion Declaration,” a statement summarizing the collective views of colloquium mem­ bers appears as an appendix. Includes an index.—Ellen D. Gilbert, Rutgers Univer- sity. Collins, Boyd, et al. Building a Scholarly Communications Center: Modeling the Rutgers Experience. Chicago: ALA (Frontiers of Access to Library Mate­ rials, no. 5), 1999. 161p. $48, alk. paper (ISBN 0-8389-0765-2). LC 99-29859. July 2000 Building a Scholarly Communications Cen- ter is a timely example of how academic libraries are reinventing themselves in the context of the rapidly changing academic world. The volume’s authors, librarians at Rutgers University, set out to share their experiences in planning and devel­ oping Rutgers’s Scholarly Communica­ tions Center (SCC) as a “gateway to new models of scholarly communication and the new roles of libraries.” The book’s primary goal is to explain how academic libraries can “reinvent themselves to meet the demands of an increasingly information-based—and in­ formation-hungry—society”; it achieves this goal. It is clearly written, even the detailed information on the implementa­ tion of the various stages of this ambitious project. The authors are frank in their dis­ cussions about the challenges and diffi­ culties they faced, especially concerning staffing and construction issues. As many other academic librarians have likewise experienced, funds were available for building walls and purchasing comput­ ers, but none was allocated for the staff­ ing changes that resulted from the estab­ lishment of the SCC; the SCC Manage­ ment Team squeezed the necessary per­ sonnel from existing library staff and fac­ ulty. Other pertinent discussions include how to deal with the challenges of teach­ ing in an electronic environment and with the management of staff training con­ cerns. The SCC, completed in December 1996, is an addition to the Alexander Li­ brary at Rutgers University and in­ cludes three distinct parts—Teleconfer­ ence Lecture Hall, Information Han­ dling Laboratory, and Humanities and Social Sciences Data Center. Each of these units is discussed in detail in sepa­ rate chapters, including the rationale, planning, staffing, and special needs of each unit. The Teleconference Lecture Hall, the “cornerstone” of the SCC, is a large lecture theater with satellite and ISDN videoconferencing capabilities. The Information Handling Laboratory is a series of small classrooms designed Book Reviews 383 for seminars and hands-on instruction. The Humanities and Social Sciences Data Center contains two small units that were designed to support specific research ef­ forts at Rutgers. Building a Scholarly Communications Center is geared toward library managers who may face the same practical concerns as the librarians at Rutgers. The authors spend little time on reviewing the relevant literature but, rather, concentrate on the nitty-gritty of how the SCC was created. Floor plans, diagrams, and tables are in­ cluded, as well as other useful informa­ tion such as a list of questions asked of each architectural firm and fee schedules for use of the SCC. The book also Includes infor­ mation about the contributors and an in­ dex. A complete bibliography would have been useful, although each chapter in­ cludes a list of references. Also, no URLs are listed for the SCC, Rutgers, or any of the institutions that were visited as part of the planning process. This book will be of most interest to a small group of academic librarians, namely those who hope to embark on a similar project. The practical approach will make this book a valuable acquisi­ tion for them because it illustrates “the typical procedures that any academic li­ brary might expect to undergo in devel­ oping a technology-oriented facility.”— Emma Duncan, University of Toronto at Scarborough. The Evolving Virtual Library II: Practical and Philosophical Perspectives. Ed. Laverna M. Saunders. Medford, N.J.: Informa­ tion Today, 1999. 198p. $39.50 (ISBN 1­ 57387-070-6). LC 95-39544. In this sequel to her 1996 book, The Evolv- ing Virtual Library (reviewed in College & Research Libraries 58 [May 1997]:287–89), editor Laverna Saunders presents up­ dated scholarship on the virtual library, a term that encompasses the digital or elec­ tronic segment of a traditional library’s information resources. Using the same format as the earlier volume, this book begins with Saunders’s essay on the ef­ fects of burgeoning electronic information on library staff. Nine essays by different library experts follow. These are mostly case histories of working library projects or theoretical articles that address signifi­ cant issues involved in the constant digi­ tization of information. For the academic audience, all but two of the essays (which concern public and school libraries) are pertinent. One standout is Gail McMillan’s chapter on the Scholarly Communications Project (SCP), a library department she directs at Virginia Tech. Now ten years old, the SCP is an excellent example of how academic libraries can facilitate the creation of digi­ tal resources on campus as well as pro­ vide users with uncomplicated access to them. The resources offered by the SCP include locally originating e-journals, electronic theses and dissertations, elec­ tronic reserves, online news resources, and digitized images. Amazingly, SCP survives on 1.5 FTE and less than $100,000 in operating expenses—an exceptional value in a 24,000-student university. Another first-rate descriptive essay concerns the Making of America Web site, which is hosted by the University of Michigan and currently contains a collec­ tion of digitized primary-source Civil War documents. This project is a commend­ able mix of quality content, functional conversion technology, and user-friendly accessibility, all of which are clearly docu­ mented by Maria Bonn. Materials that once sat unused in a special collections department now are viewed thousands of times monthly on the Internet. Given the abundance of such one-of-a-kind re­ sources in academic libraries, there is great potential for more projects like this one. The George Machovec essay is an im­ pressive technological primer on networks and telecommunications. Topics covered include LANs and WANs, operating sys­ tems, bandwidth and high-speed lines, Internet protocols, thin clients, and vari­ ous methods of electronic authentication. Although written at a comprehensive level, less-sophisticated computer users can comfortably understand the material.