Steering Committee

What is the Steering Committee?

The steering committee consists of the individuals and libraries that have decided to contribute their time to developing CORAL and with assisting others by answering questions on this list. There is a level of commitment made for this work which in turn gives the group members the chance to help plan and manage CORAL's future development. It is our attempt at sharing ownership among interested and motivated parties without having to rely on just one institution to manage the product.

Who is on the committee?

Current members: [as of 4/22/2024]

• Rebecca Tatterson, Chair of Steering Committee, East Carolina University (Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Tim Streasick, Vice-Chair of Steering Committee, University of Michigan - Dearborn (Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Michael Reese, East Carolina University (Lead Developer)
• Beth Ashmore, North Carolina State University, (Associate Head, Acquisitions and Discovery)
• Michael Kares, Jessup University, (Electronic Resources Librarian)

Affiliate Members:

• Andy Panayiotou, SirsiDynix (Product Manager)
• Lisa Carlucci, Equinox Open Library Initiative (Executive Director)
• Mike Rylander, Equinox Open Library Initiative
• Jennifer Weston, Equinox Open Library Initiative

Past members:

• Xiaoyan Song, (Past Chair of Steering Committee, North Carolina State University (Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Doug Hahn, Texas A&M (Developer)
• Ben Heet, University of Note Dame (Original CORAL Project Manager, Founder of Steering Committee, Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Robin Schaaf, University of Notre Dame (Original CORAL Developer, Sr. User Experience Analyst)
• Scott Vieira, Rice University (Past Chair of Web Committee, Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Remington Steed, Calvin College (Developer)
• Mang Sun, Rice University (Systems Librarian)
• Katherine Swart, Calvin College (Collection Development Librarian)
• Emma Cryer, Duke Medical Center Library (Associate Director)
• Steve Oberg, Wheaton College (Past Chair of Steering Committee, Assistant Professor of Library Science)
• Jeffrey Mudge, Wheaton College (Developer)
• Eric Hartnett Texas A&M (Electronic Resources Librarian)
• Tommy Keswick, CalTech (Digital Technologies Development Librarian)
• Paul Poulain, BibLibre
• Matthias Meusburger, BibLibre (Developer)

Anyone with a desire to contribute, and the time to do so, is welcome to join. Please email Rebecca Tatterson, Chair of the Steering Committee and express your interest!

What does the committee do?

1. CORAL development
   • submit any planned development to the Community Discussion in Slack
   • share finished development publicly for comment
   • commit accepted features to CORAL module repositories on GitHub
2. Community Tech Support
   • respond to technical emails so asker knows they are heard
   • answer the question, or begin discussion on Admin list
   • help answer questions posted on the forums

Project Governance

CORAL Governance

There are currently two groups that oversee the CORAL project; the Steering Committee and Affiliates. The Steering Committee is comprised of the tech services and IT representatives from member libraries. It makes recommendations for the project's public web presence including documentation, wiki space, and outreach. The Affiliates group is the for-profit vendors or software development/hosting companies that participate in the CORAL project.

Here is the proposed path for decision making authority.

1. The Steering Committee and Affiliates group work toward consensus on decisions that are agreeable to all via the coral-admin listserv and the monthly conference calls.

2. If there is no consensus between SC and Affiliates then the Steering Committee attempts to reach consensus.

3. If there is no consensus within the SC then the majority opinion of SC members wins approval. If the majority opinion is not obvious then SC members will cast votes. Each steering committee member receives one vote. In the case of an even split the Chair casts the tie-breaking vote.

The Steering Committee will maintain a Chair position. The Chair position is restricted to the SC members with e-resources management experience. This restriction is not meant to belittle the contributions of developers but to make sure that the strongest voice in determining CORAL's future is someone who has expertise in e-resources management. In the absence of the Chair, other members of the Steering Committee with e-resources management experience will fill in as needed.

The Steering Committee will seek volunteers from its members for the role of Chair to serve a two year term. If there is no volunteer for the role of Chair one will be appointed by a majority vote of SC members. If there are multiple volunteers one will be selected by a majority vote of SC members. If there is only one volunteer that person will be appointed as Chair.

The Steering Committee will attempt to maintain a minimum of eight members representing four separate institutions. There is no maximum number of members but the Steering Committee will consider the appropriate functional size of the committee when considering new members.

Libraries may volunteer to join the Steering Committee or may be invited by the Steering Committee. Steering Committee members must have a local production installation of CORAL and will be asked to contribute one or two individuals; a technical services librarian/staff member with e-resources management expertise and an information technology professional/developer. New members are approved by a two-thirds majority vote of SC members.

Affiliates may volunteer or be invited by the Steering Committee. New affiliates are approved by a two-thirds majority vote of the SC members. Affiliate members are allowed two participants on the coral-admin list and may have two participants join the monthly conference calls. The number of affiliate members participating on the coral-admin listserv and the monthly SC conference calls will not exceed the number of steering committee members.

The Steering Committee is the final authority for the CORAL project but will make every effort to encourage and include contributions from any party invested in CORAL as trusted partners.

The following Steering Committee members joined the Committee prior to these rules and are granted ex officio status. Emma Cryer, Doug Hahn, Eric Hartnett, Ben Heet (resigned from Committee as of February 2017), Jeffrey Mudge, Steve Oberg, Remington Steed, Katherine Swart, Scott Vieira.

Each SC member will be granted admin and ownership rights to the GitHub repositories. Each Affiliate will be granted two accounts with admin rights to the GitHub repositories that will supply merge rights for code contributions (if they want them). Steering Committee members are responsible for policing GitHub and making sure that all members follow agreed upon procedures (which we still need to hammer out and make clear first, this will be extremely important). IT reps on the Steering Committee have primary responsibility for policing GitHub activity and may remove admin rights from accounts as necessary.