ILS Migration email archive 

Welcome to Phase Three of the ILS Migration Process! We are on the move with the decision to contract with Equinox and migrate to their Evergreen ILS.  A reminder that you can find previous ILS Update Emails on the Info Portal. 

Equinox/Evergreen ILS Contracting Update:

1. The contract between Equinox and SELCO has been reviewed and approved by the board, signed by and sent to Equinox. We have paid the initial invoice, which is 90% of the implementation and first year ILS fees.

2. Equinox has assigned us a project manager (Rogan Hamby).

3. We are setting up the first meeting between Rogan and some SELCO staff to begin establishing project plans, timelines, and data evaluation. We hope to have more information with some dates by the end of November. 

 Phase Three will include the following stages:

1. Migration begins with the setup stage, where the formal go live date is determined and schedule with training dates is determined. 

2. Next is data configuration with a data grab, analysis and configuration. 

3. The testing phase begins with testing and training happening over a long period of time on our data. The end of this phase will see a freeze in the ILS as data is migrated over and ends with the go live. 

We are aiming for a go live date in early May. This means at the end of April, each library will be without an ILS system for a week, so please plan accordingly. We will have an offline circ module available during that time, but offline circ is limited in functionality. If you have building projects that require you to close your building, the end of April might be a good time to schedule those. 

Setting Up the ILS User Group

1. Now that we have the ILS chosen, we are creating a new ILS user group in conjunction with the migration. 

2. The ILS User Group will have its first virtual meeting on Thursday, November 14 from 1:00 to 2:00 pm. At this meeting:

   1. We will create an ILS Structure Task Force 

   2. We will have more migration updates and hopefully more details about the various migration task forces we are creating:

      1. Discovery Task Force (led by Ranelle Irwin)

      2. Cataloging Task Force (led by Becky Lashinski)

      3. School Task Force (led by Ashley Dress and Cheryl Hill)

      4. Circulation/Interlibrary Loan Task Force (led by Sarah Jackson and Cheryl Hill)

      5. Training Task Force (led by Carol Jackson and Terry Glidden)

How You Can Help Prepare Your Library for the ILS Migration:

• Check out the Preparing for ILS MIgration page on the Info Portal

• Document your workflows

• Weeding your collection is a great thing to work on now until the final freeze (likely April 2025) 

• Clean up borrowers. 

• Optional: Inventory your collection. Keep in mind that inventory is much easier to do in Evergreen. 

• Training will be an ongoing process in the spring, so you may wish to consider the effects on budgeting and schedulIng. 

SELCO staff is working on cleaning up bibs/authorities/items that meet certain criteria. We will do our best to reach out to the owning library and notify you of relevant changes/deletes/etc. 

Got questions? Need more information? Please reach out to us via the Help Desk so we can get you info and answers in a timely fashion. Thank you!

Good afternoon, 

I am very pleased to announce that based on the recommendation from the ILS Task Force, the SELCO/SELS Board approved contract negotiations to begin with Equinox for the Evergreen ILS. The Board also approved the  Transition of ILS Service to SELS Members. 

These topics will be discussed at the SELCO Advisory meeting on August 6th. If you would like to discuss them before that please reach out to Krista or Cheryl to schedule a time to discuss. 

At this time all the vendors have been notified of the selection. Many of the schools are not available for notification during summer, but once the school year begins SELCO staff will visit each one to notify and help facilitate a smooth transition and partnership moving forward. 

Once contract negotiations and timelines are worked out with Equinox we will have much more information to share. But in the meantime you are welcome to look at  TDS & Lake Agassiz regions that use the Aspen Discovery layer for patron access and any one of the many demo options available for the Evergreen ILS.

Lastly, I want to say a big thank you to the 10 Library staff members that gave up their time during the summer to be active and engaged in the ILS Selection Task Force.

Please take a moment to say thank you to :

Annice Sevett (AL)

Gina Herman (HOK)

Laurie Kodet (NOR)

Christina Ingvaldson (OWAT) 

Samantha Buley (PRE)

Beth Nelson (RUSH)

Dan Brower (RW)

Nate Deprey (STEW)

Samantha Berhow (WIN)

James Hill (ZUM)

Link to attachment - Transition of ILS Service to SELS Member Libraries 

Two quick updates regarding the vendor demos. 

I have finalized the details of the last vendor demo : Sirsidynix will demo their Symphony ILS on June 18th 9-12, virtual and recorded.  

III has offered lunch to those attending in person. Please fill out this survey  (by June 17th) to help us gather lunch numbers for June 20th. 

As a reminder all ILS migration information is posted on the SELCO info portal ILS migration page. 

Equinox - Evergreen ILS

Wed, June 12  |  9am - 1pm  |  Virtual

Microsoft Teams 

Join the meeting now

Meeting ID: 238 028 524 780

Passcode: DhAhvS

Bywater - Koha ILS

Thu, June 13  |  12pm - 4pm  |  Virtual

Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84096161557?pwd=a7rhGqaoHSLHQvULM75D5aZ8abDPBB.1

 Meeting ID: 840 9616 1557 Passcode: 300625

SirsiDynix - Symphony ILS

Tue, June 18  |  9am - 12pm  |  Virtual

Join Zoom Meeting

https://sirsidynix.zoom.us/j/93389205323

Meeting ID: 933 8920 5323

III - Polaris ILS - Lunch Survey

Thu, June 20  |  9am - 4pm  |  In person at SELCO & Virtual

Link to Online meeting TBD

We'll be providing an agenda so people can pick and choose what to attend.

ILS Vendor Demos

The ILS Selection Task Force has decided to invite four vendors to demonstrate their software. The four vendor demonstrations are listed below.

Equinox - Evergreen ILS

Wed, June 12  |  9am - 1pm  |  Virtual

Bywater - Koha ILS

Thu, June 13  |  12pm - 4pm  |  Virtual

SirsiDynix - Symphony ILS

Tue, June 18  |  TBD  |  Virtual

III - Polaris ILS

Thu, June 20  |  9am - 4pm  |  In person at SELCO & Virtual

We'll be providing an agenda so people can pick and choose what to attend.

These demos will be recorded for those who cannot attend live. We will send out the virtual meeting links once we get closer to the demos.

SELCO ILS Migration News - 5/2/24

We’re excited to announce that we’ve moved to Phase 2: The Selection Process! Here are a few updates:

Public Libraries Task Force:

The Public Libraries Task Force members have been selected. Our thanks to everyone who offered to serve on this committee!  This task force was put together with the intention of representing a range of libraries while keeping the focus on what will benefit all SELCO area libraries. 

Public Libraries Task Force consists of :

Annice Sevett  - Albert Lea

Gina Herman - Hokah

Laurie Kodet - Northfield

Christina Ingvaldson - Owatonna

Samantha Buley - Preston

Dan Brower  - Red Wing

Beth Nelson - Rushford

Nate Deprey  - Stewartville

Samantha Berhow - Winona

James Hill - Zumbrota

Request for Proposals (RFP) for a New ILS Are In!

The RFP for a new ILS closed April 30 and SELCO received five responses from vendors. SELCO staff are reviewing the RFPs this week as we need to ensure that all submissions have the necessary technical requirements.

The Public Libraries Task Force (PLTF) has their first meeting on Monday, May 13 and will begin reviewing the vendor responses as well as notes by SELCO staff. 

At their second meeting at the end of May, the Public Libraries Task Force will utilize structured questions to help guide the conversation. At that meeting, the PLTF will make their selection of which vendors they want to explore further via vendor demonstrations. As soon as we have the demo information, we will pass it along to you. 

Public Libraries Task Force members and SELCO staff will begin creating questions for vendors and areas they would like the vendors to highlight in their demonstrations. We will share the notes from the PLTF meetings after each meeting. 

What Else Is Up?

Remember to have your staff keep updating and documenting your current ILS procedures (or workflows) at your library including checkout, checkin procedures, interlibrary loans, and selection and adding of books. Every procedure that is clear and well documented will help the migration process go more smoothly.

If you have any questions at all about this process and/or the migration, please reach out to the SELCO Help Desk https://infoportal.selco.info/help-desk.

Thank you!

Pam O'Hara and Carol Jackson

Hello!

I plan on sending out a weekly update to SELCO staff on how things are going/what's coming up. I'll send an update at least once a month to members, more often if there is news.

Cheryl just put out a call for volunteers for the task force for selecting the next ILS System. There will be 3-5 volunteers from member libraries as well as 6-ish SELCO staff - my role is note taker and communicator.

The window for submitting RFPs is April 30.

Vendor demos will be from May through June - everyone is invited to attend.

More info here:

Staff Roles

Project Plan

Rough Timeline There are many unknowns yet, so they are not listed on the timeline. We will update as we go.

Info Portal page

Thanks!

Pam

Good Morning, 

I know many of you have been patiently waiting for news about the ILS Migration, and so I wanted to quickly get some information out to you all. 

The Request for a Proposal (RFP) was completed and sent directly to several vendors, as well as posted here for others to view.

The RFP was written to identify those vendors who can meet our high level requirements, things that are mandatory (i.e. a hosted solution).  Additionally the RFP was informed by Marshall Breeding's 2023 article, which discusses the advancement of open source software and the ability of the ILS to deliver services directly to patrons. 

The next step will be a taskforce of a few library staff and SELCO staff. This taskforce will review the submitted RFPs, choose which vendors to demo and develop a script of specific questions to ask at the demos.  

Cheryl is currently working on a charge for the taskforce and the ILS Migration - Selection Scope and Charter with timeline and milestones. Cheryl hopes to have those both out to everyone in the next few days.

Thank you again for your patience.