Hi everyone,
Thanks to all who responded. Here is my original message. Responses
follow.
My district is considering changing catalog systems, and I wanted to ask
your advice. We would like a system that would integrate our elementary,
middle, and high school libraries (we are small - 1 high school and middle
school, 4 elementaries) and also possibly our village schools. We also
want a web-based system that students and teachers can access from home.
One system that we are interested in is Follett's Destiny. Does anyone
out there have experience with this system? What are it's pluses and
minuses? Or do you have a different system that you are really happy with?
We just converted to Follett and are pleased with it. Get the package
that
has Alliance Plus. With Alliance it is easy to add books by just scanning
their ISBN#s. There is a module that will allow you to search the school
library from home. We boutght this module, but have not activated it.
The
only problem we had was with the conversion from a useless program called
Eloquent. If I could do it again I would have started from scratch and
entered all the books with Alliance Plus. The recon feature of Alliance
did
not work as well as I had Hoped.
-----
I don't have experience with Destiny, but I think that Booksystems, Inc.
of Huntsville, AL also has a web-based system that you might want to
investigate. You can check out their website:
[ http://www.booksys.com ]www.booksys.com or contact [
mailto:sales@booksys.com ]sales@booksys.com for current technical
requirements and pricing.
--------
I am a Destiny user. In a nutshell? I LOVE it! It is Web-based so ther
are no issues with cross-platform accessability. It is user friendly; it
is thorough; the reports are precise, detailed, and almost no-brain easy
to use and generate; patron data is updated automatically every week (in
my NYC school, this is a BIG plus); tech support is immediate adn on the
money. You will have to download a utility to circulate when your
Internet connection is down, but otherwise? It is a dream come true. It
creates a union catalog by virtue of the fact that all libraries on your
Destiny server will be part on one online database. Cataloging is a snap
and again, almost no-brain easy. I don't know how I lived without it.
--------------
We are only two schools and we love it. (Destiny)
-------
We've just changed to Sagebrush's Accent system. It's a direct competitor
to Follett. We've been very pleased so far.
This is just the public catalog component. There is also the
administrative
client - that's where you do _everything_ else, from circulation to
cataloging to reports - that is not available via that address.
A plus for you guys might be the administrator training can be done at
Edmonton, Alberta, CA.
--------
My library is using Athena, but in January we are switching to Destiny. I
am from a 13 school district - 2 high schools, 2 middle schools, and 9
elementary schools 5 of which are already automated. Those that are
automated are switching to Destiny as well as the remaining schools
becoming automated for the first time.
The decision to go with Destiny was encouraged by the tech dept. rather
than using Sagebrush Accent which is also a web based system, due to the
technological infrastructure supported by Follett's Destiny. The tech
director thought that the back end was supported by the latest technology
not found on Accent. We have already been trained by Follett - 3 days in
fact to learn about all the features of Destiny. The interface is fairly
simple and easy to use. The main server will be housed in our Board office
so if there are any problems with an individual school, the tech dept. can
service and correct the problem immediately. All that I have read about
Destiny from the listserv has been very positive and the only drawback is
that be sure you have enough bandwidth to support the system. It is
important for the technology department to explain the type of system that
they have and speak directly to Follett to be sure you have all the
servers and necessary extra equipment needed to properly run Destiny. We
have bee
n told that we will love the system as it will eventually be accessible by
our students from home, too.
---------
We just got Surpass a couple years ago and although there were a few
problems the first year, this year has been pretty smooth sailing.
There is even an updated version that came out in September with better
features requested by librarians using the originial software. They are
inexpensive compared to other systems and have an additional program to
download MARC records into the system, like MARC Magician does. There
are two versions of the card catalog, Safari and WebSafari. We use
WebSafari because it is web-based and can be accessed from home, if you
choose to. Also, all 12 of our elementary schools share the catalog and
each school has a separate location code, making interlibrary loans
easier. I would look into Surpass, especially if you're on a budget.
-----------
We use Follett's Destiny in Noblesville, Indiana, and I think it's a great
system.
I know Follett has been very responsive as far as tailoring the system to
meet our needs. This year we added pictures of book covers, WebPath
Express
(for websites about specific topics), and correlation of the collection to
academic standards.
One drawback I thought of since I sent the previous e-mail is that the
system is very unforgiving if you don't spell your search term correctly.
You can use an asterisk if you aren't exactly sure (e.g. gira* for
giraffes), but not all of the kids can apply this concept. Also -- for a
subject search, the term has to be plural, rather than singular. When
it's
something like fly vs. flies, it makes a big difference.
------------
(Destiny) My district of 300 schools is 2/3 done with implementing it!!
We've
learned alot in the process. Our district had to buy a new server
just to handle all of us (you wouldn't have this problem). The
biggest problem was handling all the various individuals who had
cataloged "their way" for years and who were reluctant to compromise
as we standardized our holdings, records, etc.
>> What are it's pluses and >minuses?
For the students, it is visually attractive!! We purchased several
add on features, such as Title Peek, and having the state standards
available for the teachers is great! We have been having a good time
coming up with very creative ways to draw teachers into the catalog.
Students and teachers can be empowered to view their own accounts,
and place books on hold on line.
One big minus is hardware related--when the server goes down, you are
up a creek. It is imperative that each school have a Dolphin to do
remotes circulations (and other things) when this happens. If you
aren't on Follett Circ/Cat+ right now, you wouldn't notice some of the
missing features that we were used to, but those will be back when the
next upgrade arrives in Jan.
Our district also purchased the Textbook Manager component and we are
just beginning to explore it. Because we have no textbook clerks in
our buildings, and since our libraries are very understaffed, the
librarians will NOT take on this task, but the district will probably
all schools to begin using it next year. My school is a few steps
ahead and will be converting our old Textlink data to Destiny in two
weeks.
Our district has also chosen at this time to keep it as and intranet
program--it is not available outside of school district computers. We
hope to convince them to change next year. But, yes, it can be
accessed if that is the way the district goes.
-----------
We have Sirsi Unicorn. (They have other smaller Sirsi products available
but they weren't available when we bought almost 10 years ago.) This
product does all you mention and is very robust. You can see our online
catalog at mais.sirsi.net . We have our database along with three other
area schools.
-------
Thanks Again!
Kaia Henrickson, Librarian
Kodiak High School Library
722 Mill Bay Road
Kodiak, AK 99615
khenrickson@kodiak.k12.ak.us
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