FoKAL Summit 2009 Notes
Cumberland Falls State Resort Park
June 9-10, 2009
Mission Statement—Warren Grey 
Mission Statement (Handout)
Motion made by Thomas Scott, Seconded by Stan Campbell, Mission Statement Approved Unanimously
Logo Opportunity—Ilona Burdette
Consortia Logos (Handout)
Speaker: Kathy Perry 
You have to do advocacy before you can see results—it won’t happen on its own (Handout)
VIVA (Virtual Libraries of Virginia)
History
 A proposal was written in early 90’s and now the budget is just over $20M. 25% of budget comes from public colleges and the rest is from private colleges, there is a NEH grant and over 50% is from the General Assembly
Consortial Administrivia
3 FT Staff
James Madison University (JMU)—procurement office
VATech-Blacksburg—VIVA listserv
VCU-Richamond—VIVA webmaster
UVA-Charlottesville—Locally Loaded Databases
Sweet Briar College (SBC)—Coordination of Private Nonprofits
73 Members (39 publics, 33 non-profits, and library of Virginia),  90 Libraries, 800 Contacts
Mission Statement
VIVA’s mission is to provide in an equitable, cooperative and cost-effective manner, enhanced access to library and information resources for the Commonwealth of Virginia’s nonprofit academic libraries serving the higher education community.
Viva Fundamentals
VIVA levels the playing field…Provides access to outstanding library collections for every student and faculty member in the Commonwealth.
VIVA is a sharing consortium…Member schools share collections, expertise and labor to achieve common goals.
VIVA creates extraordinary value from the Commonwealth’s financial investment…Leverages purchasing power, increases efficiency and produces economies of scale.
Advocacy (examples from VIVA)
Goals and Objectives
•	Realistic, Do-able, Positive
•	Funding
o	Immediate and long-term
o	Increasing or just staying even (“flat is the new up”)
•	Support of key groups and players–can’t have enemies or negative reputation
•	Overall, seek to remaining cooperative and collegial
Positioning Statement
•	Rely on our mission statement
•	Balance needs of all our members
o	Undergraduate and research
o	Public and private
o	Big and little
•	Reflect and support State Council’s priorities
•	Reflect and support Governor’s priorities
Audiences—External
•	External Media
o	Prepare Press Releases
o	National Press? No
o	Regional Press and
o	Campus Press
•	General Public - No
•	State legislators
o	Develop a team—willing to try to communicate with legislators; some legislators may not have even gone to college or care about higher education; most may not have used computers
o	Poetry or Poultry? Find out what is important to the needs of legislators
o	When?
•	During Legislative Session—Free Access; really busy during this time and trying to read legislation (may only get a staff member instead of the legislator)
•	Demo Week or Demo Day or just a letter—a lot of time and stress with little payoff
•	Brochures and letters in the hands of legislators or their staffs was worth it, free access that is password protected to some our databases
•	Rest of the Year—Visit in home districts
•	Letters signed by 3 librarians
o	All or some?
o	Money Committees—most important
•	Don’t forget the staff! They can help things get through or not get through
•	Visit in the off-season, they have free time in August when they are out of session
o	Lobbyists—don’t want to be enemies with these people, the lobbyists for private non-profits was the most effective and gave free advice
•	Executive Branch—constantly debriefing these people
o	Governor
o	Secretary of Education
o	Secretary of Finance
o	Secretary of Information Technology
o	Department of Planning and Budget—best contact because it is in charge of all of higher ed., prisons, etc.
•	State Council of Higher Education—do not ignore this group
o	Staff—meet these people, re-introduce yourself
o	Council Members
•	Virginia Business Higher Education Council—wise counsel, be ready for the good times
Audiences—Internal—you can’t take your own members for granted
•	Campus decision-makers—don’t be seen as in competition to them
o	Presidents
o	Provosts
o	Campus lobbyists
•	Librarians
o	Users Groups Meeting at VLA
o	PR for campus newspapers
•	Students and faculty
•	Branding
o	Put logo for VIVA on the VIVA acquired resources—this is a great idea for FoKAL logo
Key Messages
VIVA fundamentals in our mission statement—
We are:
1.	Equitable—see statewide map
2.	Cooperative—decentralized
3.	Cost Effective—96% of total budget goes to direct services for the members; individual institutions pay procurement fees; for every $1 in electronic resources there is $5 of value for the state; cost avoidance for group purchases from 94-09 is $275,000,000; 08-09 Expenditures:
a.	92% Electronic Collections
b.	4% Interlibrary Loan
c.	3% Centralized Administration
d.	<1% Travel & Training
Early days: Cost Savings & Value Added Survey
Now: simple Excel Chart
During Economic Crisis: “Double Whammy” effect—if VIVA is cut, then libraries will have to cut other things too to get resources
Strategies
•	Build on Success
o	You have to start somewhere
o	Cooperation in Higher Ed is unusual
•	Meetings
•	Annual Schedule
o	Legislative Session
o	Off-season
•	Prepare materials
o	Statistics
o	Handouts (Handouts)
Discussion Topics
•	Goals
o	What are key issues?
o	What is the consensus on 1 goal?
•	Objectives
•	Positioning Statement
•	Audiences
•	Key Messages
•	Strategies
•	Evaluation
•	Questions:
o	How do you bill the schools?
•	For Private Schools--Administrative fees only at first from JMU, then there was a matching program to figure out what products to purchase ($250,000) other things were paid for on their own under the VIVA contract SBC, in 2000 JMU billed the private schools
•	Publics got everything at first and then they did ‘pay to play’, some consortia have formulas based upon FTE or types of schools but VIVA had to reduce costs to show value to current buyers and then add other schools through ‘fundraising’ (asking other schools to join and pay)
o	Do legislators have qualms with supporting privates?
•	There is a grant that supports private colleges (scholarships for students)
•	The privates lobbyist makes sure this money stays and many legislators went to private colleges
o	How did you manage to save so much money?
•	When negotiating deals, we said to the vendors that you could probably sell to 6 institutions, but now you could get more than that…
•	VIVA does not acquire any product if there is not a discount.
o	Can you say more about the VIVA icon by the databases?
•	VIVA asked the schools to put the icon by the databases in whatever lists they create so that it will be immediately seen—students may not care, but librarians can find out what is funded through VIVA.
o	Can you review the total revenue of VIVA?
•	It is not a line item, but only shows up if there is an increases, it won’t be in the budget materials
•	Any troubles with the Council of Secondary Education allotting the money to VIVA? Yes, but advocacy to the Budget Planning Committee saved VIVA’s money.
o	Find-It Virginia supports public libraries and K-12 libraries
o	Do you find that stories/testimonies/analogies are helpful in advocacy?
•	The Advocacy Team will come in and then a local library director or other person to provide a story/anecdote and it really works. Be really clear on what is being presented, don’t disagree with anyone that talks (one-voice), and don’t give too much information.
o	Can you give examples of tie-ins to the governor’s strategies?
•	Almost cancelled a database that was of interest to the governor, instead of cancelling it VIVA asked some of the subscribers to pay a percentage to help. Then emphasize that when talking to the executive branch.
o	Are there dues for VIVA or are the privates and public monies for databases?
•	There are no dues, but the publics are charged for procurement services and the lump of community colleges are charged too (this is about $35,000), the private colleges are charged 1.8% of invoices for procurement. Privates are also charged matching funds. Central administration and travel fees come from General Assembly monies? Yes, mostly.
o	How does VIVA address acute or immediate issues or provide unified statements to current events, etc.? What is the infrastructure of the membership?
•	Work with the outreach committee or an ad hoc task force for certain issues.
o	Do you have the same committees that you had when you started?
•	Now there are fewer committees. Started with about 4-5 committees and then reduced the committees in ’99 to Steering Committee, Resources for Users (Collections & Training), Outreach Committee, ILL/Resource Sharing Committee (Distance Education, etc.); VIVA’s organization does not necessarily reflect every library’s organization
First-Timer’s Experience at Legislative Day—Carrie Cooper
15 librarians from KY went to Washington D.C. and went to the offices of the state representatives and senators. There was a sense of camaraderie when the librarians were on their visits.
Ben Chandler visit to EKU, create a READ Poster—staff was excited and there was a lot of positive energy for the visit in D.C. Make the most of every moment when you get in front of the legislators.
Speaker: Wayne Onkst
Excited to talk to Academic Library Directors because typical audience is Public Libraries. Advocacy is part of your job. Resources are being divided and in order to get a share, you must be represented
Kentucky Politics 101
“In Kentucky” Poem by James Hillary Milligan (1902)
3 Branches of Government:
Executive
•	Headed by Governor
•	Executes the laws and administers services of government
•	Governor (Steve Beshear—good library user) and Lt. Governor (Dan Mongiardo) elected for 4 year terms
•	Can succeed themselves for one additional term
•	12 agencies:
o	Agriculture
o	Economic Development
o	Education—includes libraries, though State Librarian reports to the Governor
o	Energy & Environment
o	Finance & Administration
o	Health & Family Services…
•	Other state elected officials
o	Secretary of State
o	Attorney General
o	Treasurer
o	Auditor
o	Commissioner of Agriculture
o	All elected for 4-year terms, we need to advocate with all of these persons
Legislative
House of Representatives
•	100 Representatives
•	Districts based on population (43,000 per district)
•	Elected for 2 year terms
•	Speaker presides (Greg Stumbo—good library user, his community has done a good job of advocacy)
•	The library director should know their representative by name and vice versa
Senate
•	38 Senators
•	Districts are based on population (112,000 per district)
•	Elected for 4-year terms
•	President of Senate presides (David Williams—not as good of a library supporter)
•	The library director should know their senator by name and vice versa
Legislature
•	Meets every year
•	Even year session determines budget for next biennium and lasts for 60 days (next is 2010)
•	Odd year session lasts 30 days
•	Special sessions may be called by Governor at any time but Governor must be specific on issues to be covered. Only those can be discussed.
•	In the 2009 session, more than 1,200 bills and resolutions proposed, 108 became law. A very limited amount of legislation actually gets through.
•	Dominated by rural areas (legislative leaders are from rural areas).
Organization
•	Both houses organized by Committees
•	Committee chairs control issues that go before the committee. These are the most powerful people because they determine what bills get considered by their committees.
•	Determination of which committee receives a bill is very critical.
Champions
•	All are champions for their local area. How is this going to help my district (and get more votes)?
•	Need champions for libraries. Make the statement that ‘strong libraries are good for Kentucky.’
•	Many possibilities—need to identify and cultivate.
Budget
•	Governor proposes budget. Historically (prior to 1980), the Governor was able to dominate the legislature. John Y. Brown changed things to give the Legislative Branch more control. In 1999, there was more Legislative control and in 2000 the Legislative Branch was dominated by Republicans.
•	House and Senate have Appropriations & Revenue Committees that review the Governor’s proposal.
•	House acts first as required by Constitution
•	Conference Committee irons out differences between House and Senate versions of budget
•	Budget discussions dominate legislative business.
Political situation
•	Legislature has become more powerful in recent years
•	Republican control of Senate has changed the way Frankfort works
•	House of Representatives…
•	Revenue is bleak
Federal Government
•	Legislative Day in D.C. has shown that there is interest in libraries by Federal legislators
•	Work is mainly through legislative staff
•	Get contact names and stay in touch
•	Success Story: Get senators to sign a letter to House Appropriations & Revenue Committees (Chair: Rick Rand—big library supporter; Charlie Border is in the Senate) for funding for two initiatives. It is always worth asking.
•	There is only so much that D.C. senators can do, much is handled on the state level.
•	Get to know the staff members because they take calls and do respond—they also do a lot of the work.
•	Laws about non-library issues can have implications. Example of lead-based products and books for children.
Observations
•	Librarians normally have not become involved in political process
•	Many not oriented in “political” direction
•	Often trained to avoid political involvement
•	…
Lobbying
•	First step is to know your local legislators
o	Secretary of State’s website
o	ALA advocacy website
•	Meet legislators in district
•	Invite them to your library
•	Your administration must be aware of what you are doing
•	Legislators like getting their picture taken with people
•	Legislators must know the benefits to their constituents
•	Follow up visits, calls or emails in Capitol
•	Legislators keep office hours in mornings during the session to meet with lobbyists and constituents
•	Message line for legislators is available: 1-800-372-7181
•	Have an established relationship before meeting with them in Frankfort—meet them at home first.
•	Frankfort Library Day
•	Get to know Committee chairs
•	Members of leadership are very important
•	Tips:
o	Legislators are generally supportive of libraries
o	They want to talk to their constituents to learn what they are thinking
o	They enjoy visiting their district
o	Cooperation between your colleagues is important
o	Coordinate message
o	Strength in numbers
o	Cooperation with other library groups would add considerably to our success—our similarities are much greater than our differences
o	Public librarians have strong lobbying effort
o	KSMA is planning to reactivate its legislative committee in the coming year
o	Legislative Day in Washington has been successful with a delegation representing all types of libraries
What can you do individually?
1.	Develop vision for your library
2.	Determine what your college/university administration, local government, state government and federal government do to help
3.	Inform the leadership of your vision and needs
4.	Stay informed of issues that impact your service
5.	Make your officials aware of these issues
6.	Look for ways to advocate on behalf of your library
7.	Stay connected with your colleagues on common issues and concerns.
What can we do collectively?
•	Provide method of sharing information on issues and activities
•	Learn together
•	Act in concert to maximize voice
Next Step
•	Create a plan of action
•	Empower Stacey Nickell to establish a legislative network and information exchange for FoKAL
•	KDLA is interested in helping coordinate efforts between different library groups
Questions
•	Was there a Library Legislative Committee?
o	The Public Libraries setup a library caucus. They got legislators to sign on, but there was no specific/concrete commitment.
•	Is there another lobbyist out there?
o	Wayne is pretty much it. The public libraries contribute $200/year for a lobbyist ($10,000-$12,000/year). Is it effective?
•	VIVA has had a good response by working with the lobbyist for the independent institutions. AIKCU has an organization that does lobby Frankfort—have you worked with them?
o	No contact at all.
•	Many institutions have government relations officers that are responsible for communication with legislators in the state and D.C. Do you have any suggestions for working with them?
o	Meet them first. Make them aware of your needs. They should be a really good resource.
o	Enid is now able to solicit letters from consortial groups on behalf of library funding. KDLA lost $200,000. From the CPE side, Enid is not allowed to contact legislators. Wayne can contact legislators as long as he does not conflict with what the Governor wants or what his Secretary wants.
•	What is the current budget situation?
o	KDLA has lost 20% of their budget. Every single grant program has been cut or reduced. 30 positions have been lost or are not able to be filled.
o	$200,000 to Library Services and Technical Act will continue to go to KYVL.
•	Are there specific individuals to target with the message of virtual library?
o	In the blue book—look at Appropriations & Revenues Legislative Committees
o	Speaker of House
o	President of the Senate
o	KYVL provides a perfect example of how we can all work together for maintaining and increasing funding.
Advocacy Committee—Stacey Nickell
Introduction of Committee Members
FoKAL Advocacy Committee (Handout)
1.	What do you think should be included in our advocacy plan? Consider personal narrative (qualitative) for effective component; is there any quantitative data that would help?
2.	What are the common elements we all share as academic libraries? Add community members, alumni to constituencies; supporting local curriculum, supporting Higher Ed. goals
3.	What are the top three issues that FoKAL should advocate for?
How do we gain influence in our state and with CPE?
On Campus
•	Plan a retreat with Academic Dean/Provost/President
•	Regional Stewardships—have some kind of meeting with people from institutions that go to that and let them know about FoKAL
•	Work with the ADD (Area Development Districts)—business leaders and government
•	Write articles/letters to the Editor for the regional newspapers about FoKAL to see if they will write a feature article
•	Develop a logo and other promotional materials
•	Put a bookmark in ILL or develop something about KYVL (Courier) and about FoKAL
•	Go Dark Day
•	Faculty Presentations in the library
•	Reports to Faculty Senate/Plenary Faculty including FoKAL
•	Celebrate Faculty Promotions
•	To be in Frankfort, make sure our Presidents/Provosts know and make sure our campus advocates have us on their radar
State
•	Develop strong talking points that we can all agree upon and put it on a Fact Card or Brochure
o	Cost-avoidance
o	Supporting CPE goals for higher ed.,
o	Support the inclusion of private institutions
o	How much we need electronic resources
o	More fair to spread these resources across the state instead of large institutions or just cities
•	Work on adding library representatives to key groups on the state level
•	Think about developing a legislative day for academics in Frankfort
•	Cast a wide net—approach a lot of different people and their staff members
•	Try to get articles written about libraries (KDLA got an article written up in a governmental office newsletter)
•	Identify who are the library champions
•	Celebrate the library champions
•	Alumni connections to legislators (could be senators/representatives)
•	Faculty relationships to legislators
•	KYVL and FoKAL cannot be at odds—tell people how important KYVL is to FoKAL
•	Offer library space for legislative leaders
•	Engage our staff to be outreach on behalf of KYVL
•	Federal Depository libraries
•	Priorities & Talking Points
CPE
•	Letter from FoKAL to the CPE was a good thing, keep it up
•	Develop an awareness of who is on CPE, who is on the staff, who is new and who is a friend of libraries
•	Send a representative to CPE to get on the agenda
Making Advocacy Easier
•	Demonstrate how lives are impacted by libraries and customize the message
•	Step out of our roles, comfort zones
•	Advocate for KYVL with one voice
•	Grass roots efforts of individual letter writing, phone calling campaign, sending the same bullet points or messages (including other types libraries)
•	Know who the power-brokers are
•	Get some links on the FoKAL Wiki for Advocacy
•	Testimonials
•	Letters from organized groups (KCTCS Directors, etc.)
•	Possibility of internal space for Advocacy (Secure part of a website for sample letters)
•	Speakers in our towns and communities to talk to groups, with testimonials and college/public librarians show up
•	First thing to advocate for is KYVL
Executive Committee Report—John Stemmer
All members of the committees have participated and there have been a variety and number of good ideas. Acknowledgements: Carrie Cooper and Jared Porter for organizing the Summit
Accomplishments Since Last Year
•	Out of 50 potential members for FoKAL, all 50 signed the MOA.
•	26 members signed a database deal last year through SOLINET (now Lyrasis) to address last year’s KYVL budget cuts
•	Review the MOA/By-laws and formation of three committees:
o	Advocacy Committee
o	Information Literacy Committee
o	Committee on ILL and Reciprocal Borrowing
•	Signed a Lyrasis agreement for negotiating database renewals with vendors—maintain a database of our resources. All 50 members participated in this renewal inventory.
•	Join ICOLC—International Congress of Library Consortiums and supported the letter on the global economic crisis for dealing with publishers and databases and resources
•	Wrote a letter to CPE President King to fully fund KYVL
•	By unanimous consent we all agreed to our FoKAL Mission Statement
•	Upcoming: Approve two policies for reciprocal borrowing and ILL policy and hopefully disband the Committee on ILL/Reciprocal Borrowing
Questions/Comments
•	How are we paying Lyrasis for database renewals?
o	Vendors are requested to cover the Lyrasis fees. If the vendor does not pay the 2-3% then Lyrasis must build that into the cost-savings.
•	Need a small group for collections committee to work with Lyrasis? There are frustrations with the communication with Lyrasis.
o	The notion of a collections group has been discussed in the Executive Committee. The Executive Committee conference called with Lyrasis last week and would like to setup a monthly conference call to address the issues.
•	Impressed with the Executive Committee and work that has been done.
•	John Stemmer has been a terrific leader.
FoKAL Logo—Ilona Burdette
A few ideas so far, there will be some submissions coming through today and the rest will be later on posted on the listserv
Tag Line Suggestions
•	Focusing the efforts of KY Academic Libraries
•	Unbridled Libraries
•	Working Together to Enrich Higher Education
•	Enriching Higher Education
•	Focusing on KY Academic Libraries
FoKAL Websites
www.fokal.pbworks.com
www.fokalwiki.pbworks.com
Committee on Interlibrary Loan and Reciprocal Borrowing—Pat Wilson
Acknowledgements of Committee Members
Met in March and reviewed policies and then used ACRL template to develop policies.
Interlibrary Loan Policy
•	Lending #3—two business days is difficult for libraries that have smaller staff; the language is ‘should’ not ‘must’
•	How would this make things different for the staff?
o	There is not a lot of difference, we are just solidifying it and agreeing upon it as a group
•	Borrowing #2—should it be the Affiliation field instead of the Borrowing Notes field?
o	Suggestion to strike specific field as long as it is included
o	Just include “FoKAL” in the field
•	Can we all use Odyssey as our first choice?
o	The group did not address technologies. Could this be another sub-committee?
o	Odyssey is free through OCLC
o	How many are discontinuing Ariel? about 10
o	How many are using Illiad? About 8
•	Borrowing #1—Non-Affiliated should be added to go first to their group members
•	Why use the word ‘affiliate’?
o	There are other borrowers at our institutions that are not under the umbrella
o	Strike affiliates from the ILL Policy
o	Eliminate Definitions #2
o	Basically the local institutions will have their own policies (some do allow community borrowers)
•	Borrowing #5—visit the idea of ending this with us not charging one another for lost or damaged items if the patron has been approached
o	How much is actually lost, can we quantify this?
•	Ilona Burdette motion for modifications to ILL Policy
•	Second by Tara Cooper
•	Unanimous acceptance
Reciprocal Borrowing and Use Policy
•	There are no end dates on student ID cards—how do we know that a person is a current student? If you really want a follow-up you call circulation of the host library.
o	People don’t come to some libraries for no reason at all. More books are actually lost by current students.
o	Second photo ID (like Driver’s License) is sometime used by certain institutions
•	The Policy Paragraph 4: What is reported back to the home library?
o	This could be done by the libraries’ policies
•	Introduction Paragraph 1: strike “not available at the affiliate’s home library...”
•	Are we going to keep the term affiliate?
o	Yes it would make sense here to recognize that relationship.
•	Tara Cooper motion for acceptance with minor edits
•	Susan Brown seconded
•	Unanimous acceptance
Information Literacy Report—Marcia Freyman
17 members on the committee
11 met May 20th in person at UK to discuss the charge from the Executive Committee
Focus on bullet point #3: Facilitating the implementation of shared information literacy competencies for higher education in Kentucky
Formation of sub-committees:
•	K-16 Connections (also connections with KDE and CPE)
o	Members of this sub-committee will present on a panel at the KSME on July 21st
•	Promotion and Sharing of Information Literacy
o	Probably the most work
o	Proposal accepted for the KLA fall conference to discuss this sub-committee and what this will mean for librarians across the state
o	EKU had an information literacy day last year that was wonderful. Look for a sponsored day each year where ideas about this could be discussed or presented.
•	Library Science Program Collaboration
o	Make connections to offer our services, some of us are geographically closer to these institutions—internship/credit opportunities.
o	Some high school programs across the state. Governor Scholars, etc. where high school students will live on campus and take classes.
Timeline is Fall 2009
Proposal to FoKAL Directors
Consortial purchase of LibGuides – teachers and subject disciplines can use this as well (besides librarians)
Questions/Comments
•	There is a state-wide P-16 council that has local P-16 councils that has nothing about Information Literacy or Computer Literacy
o	K-12 calls it inquiry
o	As far as making a statewide impact that may be good to find out who is in charge
Next Steps—Jared Porter
The FoKAL Non-Affiliated group has decided to be recognized as FIG (FoKAL Independents Group).
Introduce New Executive Committee
John Stemmer, chair (AIKCU - 2010)
Jared Porter, secretary (FIG - 2010)
Elsie Pritchard (SAALCK - 2010)
Sheree Williams (KCTCS - 2010)
Billie Anne Gebb (FIG - 2011)
Sheila Stuckey (SAALCK - 2011)
Ilona Burdette (AIKCU - 2011)
Cynthia Atkins (KCTCS - 2011)
Major issues/initiatives for 2009-2010
•	Lyrasis Collections Committee
o	Inventory
o	Now what?
o	Renew last year’s KYVL databases
o	Selection
o	Communication with KYVL
o	Broader focus (suggestions)
o	Ad Hoc Collections Task Force
•	Composition of the task force: “Type” of institution represented
•	Communicate internally
•	Work with Lyrasis (or will this be the Executive Committee?)
•	Research  Communication  then to Directors
•	KYVL database recovery
•	Priority list
•	ILL Technologies
o	Odyssey
o	Hosting Illiad—will this allow consortial deals?
•	FoKAL Logo
•	Other purchases: LibGuides, Filmstore, Humanties & Sciences
•	Communication and collaboration with KYVL
o	Mechanism for “KYVL Fallout”—the expectation this year is about 2.6% cut
•	Vendors that won’t deal with Lyrasis
Summit Reflections (Pros/Cons)
Cookout!
Cumberland Falls is a good location
June is a good month (the earlier the better)
Improvements:
•	Earlier Moonbow 
•	Microphones for speakers
•	KYVL presentation?
•	More group business discussion time
•	Breakout sessions?
•	Possible topics: Collections, Budget