Libraries are the vital center of university life. Thomas Carlyle once said that the true university is a collection of books. While the increasing complexity of worklife in the twentieth century has made it impossible to think of simply reading one's way through a series of books as adequate preparation for most professions, libraries continue to perform their traditional function. Universities provide the environment for scholars to create knowledge and teach new generations of students. Basic to this purpose is a record of what has been learned to serve as a resource for both learning and teaching. The SUS libraries represent content--observations, facts, surmises, opinions, ideas--all contained in documents, organized so that learners can retrieve what they need to support their academic work. To Florida's universities come students, scholars, administrators, and all inevitably go; but the libraries remain, a record of the past, of people's work, thoughts, ideas, hopes and aspirations, available to all who have need of the learning that libraries protect.

Together, the SUS Libraries form the largest information resource system in the state of Florida and they serve as backup to the state by providing access to their unique holdings to all citizens. Each of the SUS libraries is different. Their particular circumstances have been determined to no small extent by the history and tradition of each university--degrees offered, courses taught, research funded. Within this context, each library supports the educational efforts of its university. The libraries are defined by four characteristics: they collect documents (books, journals, electronic files, films, maps, recordings, etc.) that serve the academic needs of their users, organize the documents through indexing and cataloging systems so that they can be retrieved, provide space, equipment and knowledgeable assistance to make their various documents accessible, and archive them so that they can be found in the future. These four activities support and are basic to the function of the universities. The libraries provide SUS students and scholars the resources for discovery and the raw material for learning. Few organizations are more central to the purposes of universities and nothing could be more essential to supporting their drive to improve educational quality.

The SUS Library Program is comprised of the individual library of each institution combined with the Florida Center for Library Automation (FCLA) and the joint service programs developed by the libraries. The Center was established in 1985 to support the SUS university libraries in meeting their obligations to students and faculty for both teaching and research by providing automated library services. In the early years, the Center provided automated cataloging, acquisitions, and circulation support to the libraries and on-line catalogs for the use of students and faculty. In recent years, the SUS Library Directors Group has broadened that purpose to encompass a significant role in providing access to electronic resources. Together, the libraries and the Center provide an integrated program of service to all SUS students.

The SUS Library Directors Council is composed of the ten directors of the SUS Libraries and the Director of the Florida Center for Library Automation. It meets on a quarterly basis to deal with issues relating to interaction between the ten libraries such as student use of other SUS libraries, distance education, funding for library collections and services, common management issues, joint programs management (e.g., SUS electronic collection), oversight of FCLA services, and sharing of expertise (collection digitization, outsourcing, contract development, etc.). In fulfilling the above, the group develops library user programs and policies, budgetary strategies, distribution formulae, and other administrative documents. It provides advice on library issues, when asked, to BOR staff, to the SUS Council of Academic Vice Presidents or the Council of Presidents, and to various state agencies that need information on SUS university library services (e.g., PEPC, FIRN, Florida State Library, etc.). Over the past five years, the Libraries have made significant progress in using technology much more broadly than for automating existing internal library functions.

As new electronic technologies allow revolutionary possibilities for uncoupling user location from access to a document, the SUS libraries are actively collaborating in purchasing and sharing resources. They are developing extensive programs to meet the library needs of distance education students. To do this, the libraries are rapidly exploiting the extraordinary information revolution initiated by the emergence of the Internet. Increasingly, they are choosing to subscribe to full text/image journals and other resources by accessing publishers servers directly through the Internet. The libraries are also forming local and regional consortia, such as the SUS Electronics Group, to improve their bargaining power and work on ensuring ownership of content and maintenance of an archive for future generations of students and scholars. The resulting subscriptions to electronic files are now included in the LUIS (Library User Information System) catalogs and "hot linked" to the full text/image Internet resource.

The LUIS system, the basic information system for the SUS, has been greatly expanded in recent years. No longer simply an online catalog of SUS holdings, it now offers a diverse information menu.

1. The OPAC (on-line public access catalog) contains all of the books, journals and other materials held by the SUS Libraries. These catalogs are accessible from university offices, laboratories, and dormitories or off-campus residential locations. They are also accessible through the FIRN network which makes them available to K-12 and community college students, and to public library users. In 1996, FCLA developed an Internet version of the SUS catalogs called WebLUIS. This represents an evolutionary step toward providing web access not only to the library catalogs and citation databases but also to full image and text articles linked to the libraries' resources.
2. Electronic Indexes. In 1992, LUIS had expanded to include indexes to articles and reports in journals. By mid-1997, there are 27 indexes covering diverse topics in the humanities, arts, social sciences and sciences. The two most popular indexes, the General Academic Index and the Business Periodicals Index, contain links to available full text articles. The qualified WebLUIS user, therefore, can locate articles in these indexes and click on the link to access the article directly.
3. Gateways and the Internet By 1995, LUIS was expanded to provide "gateways" by which users can gain access to catalogs of other national and international libraries. Through sharing agreements, many of these holdings are quickly available to SUS faculty and students. While the "gateways" in LUIS function as a vast bibliographic universe for SUS users, they also provide linkages to remote information systems which deliver local services, such as CARL Uncover, the Research Libraries Group's CitaDel databases, and the resources available through the Internet.
4. Off Campus Data Access. In 1997, the FCLA developed the essential validation technology to ensure the libraries meet publishers' licensing restrictions. This step forward means that qualified distance learners can have access to electronic resources from off-campus locations. As a result of the "Distance Learning Initiative" the Florida population now has access to the 58 (and rapidly expanding) files provided through OCLC's First Search Service and to the electronic version of the Encyclopedia Britannica.. Individual libraries are now able to subscribe to electronic files that meet specific local academic program needs and make the files accessible through the Internet to local constituencies by using the FCLA's validation service. A cursory examination of any SUS Library or the FCLA Internet homepage reveals the rapid integration of electronic information services throughout the system.

The SUS Libraries are committed to providing the information, in all forms, required by the SUS faculties and students. As Internet information resources proliferate and grow more essential to the universities instruction and research programs, the libraries will develop new systems and adapt older systems for selecting, organizing, accessing, and archiving the resources that record and form the foundation for Florida's universities to advance.