Fuelling Our Momentum: BC ELN Sees Increased Funding 

We're excited to share that BC ELN has received confirmation of core funding from the Ministry of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills for the 2025/26 fiscal year — including a $114,500 increase to our base funding, bringing it to $600,000. This boost reflects confidence in BC ELN’s ongoing success in leveraging funding to deliver strong, system-wide benefits to libraries and learners across the province. The additional support will strengthen BC ELN’s operations and propel progress on key collaborative initiatives in the years ahead. 

Monitoring U.S. Developments

Recent political developments in the United States—including new tariffs and federal funding cuts to departments that support library initiatives—have raised questions about potential impacts on consortially-licensed electronic resources. While the situation continues to evolve, BC ELN is actively monitoring developments and taking steps to protect our partner libraries’ interests.

Read more about BC ELN's activities in light of a rapidly changing U.S. political landscape.

Saying Goodbye to the BC ELN 2024-2025 Student Librarians

The time has come for BC ELN to say goodbye to the 2024-2025 Student Librarians Sameena Sheriff and Casey Wagner. We asked these talented UBC iSchool students to reflect on their time at BC ELN. Read on to learn about the projects they tackled, the skills they gained, and the moments that made their experience memorable.

Arca Digital Repository

Islandora Migration: Arca’s migration to Islandora 2.0 is nearing its end! There have been 30 member sites built; of those, all but two have completed the data migration, and six sites have formally launched on the new platform. We are expecting the full migration of Arca sites to be complete in May. Can't wait until then? Check out an example of the newly launched Capilano University Institutional Repository! 

Arca Supports New Curriculum Sharing Pilot: Arca has joined a pilot partnership with the Collaborative Framework initiative, led by Vancouver Community College with pilot funding from the Ministry of Post-Secondary Education and Future Skills. 

The initiative aims to streamline the sharing of curriculum materials across BC’s post-secondary sector to better meet industry training needs. BC ELN is supporting the pilot on a cost-recovery basis by building and hosting the initiative’s curriculum repository in Arca, and by providing consultation on development of the shared service. 

Arca Partnerships with the BC History Digitization Program (BCHDP)

Upcoming Site Launch: The launch of the newly migrated BCHDP Arca site is imminent! Alongside the new site there will be walkthroughs available to help visitors from cultural heritage organizations navigate the site and make full use of its features. 

New BCHDP Collections Coming Soon: We welcomed four new collections into the new BCHDP Arca site (using the new Islandora Workbench tool developed by Mark Jordan). All four collections were digitized with funding from the 2024/25 cycle of the BCHDP. Stay tuned for the launch of these collections:

• BC Labour Heritage Centre: The BC Workers’ News (and subsequent papers) 
• Kaatza Station Museum and Archives: The BC Lumber Worker/The Lumber Worker/The Allied Worker newspapers (round 2) 
• Museum of the Cariboo-Chilcotin: Williams Lake Tribune newspaper 
• Swedish Heritage in British Columbia: Swedish Press (Svenska Pressen) newspaper collection (round 1) 

BCHDP Support Service: Of the seven applicants to the 2025-26 BCHDP cycle that were supported by the BC ELN-BCHDP Support Service six were successful in achieving funding! Five of those applicants plan to host their digitized materials in Arca.

AskAway Chat Research Help

Commitment Models Review Working Group: The working group has concluded their work and delivered recommendations to the AskAway Advisory Committee. The outcomes of this work will be shared with the broader AskAway community in the early summer. 

Emerging Technologies Working Group: A working group was formed to meet AskAway’s priority to “leverage technology to enhance the service.” The group includes representation from diverse institution types and roles. They started meeting in January 2025 and they meet monthly.  



Emergency and Crisis Response Procedures Update: The Admin Centre has updated service provider procedures to provide guidance on referring patrons to emergency and crisis response services. Although AskAway interactions are rarely emergencies, there is the possibility that a user could need urgent help. The new medical emergency procedures for AskAway align with PSFS recommendations on overdose prevention and emergency response. The Patrons in Crisis guidelines were updated to refer patrons to the national 988 Suicide Crisis Helpline, in addition to the BC Crisis Centre. 

Illume Resource Sharing

SHAREit Patron Authentication: Prince George Public Library has successfully launched the new NCIP feature with automatic ILS patron authentication! Starting this summer, the Illume Support Centre will offer NCIP integration, along with other options like SIP2, LDAP, and SSO, to more libraries. Stay tuned for more details, including an upcoming group demo and training session. If your library is interested in testing or setting up automated patron authentication through SHAREit, please get in touch! 

Canadian Server Migration: BC ELN, Auto-Graphics, and SFU IT have spent the past year upgrading Illume’s infrastructure to improve security, stability, and long-term sustainability. The Canadian SHAREit server, hosted at SFU, will be migrated on May 12, with about 5 hours of downtime expected expected. 

BC ELN has also commissioned a second SHAREit server to locally test future software updates for critical bugs/issues before they are applied to our live server. This test server will also provide a handy environment for libraries interested in testing advanced features such as automated patron authentication before they go live for their site. 

Auto-Graphics and Soutron Global: Soutron Global has acquired the SHAREit vendor Auto-Graphics as of March 31st, 2025. Soutron Global has expressed its commitment to build on the strong foundations of each company and are fully committed to supporting, enhancing and improving the Auto-Graphics software. BC ELN does not currently expect this acquisition to have any negative impact on Illume libraries or SHAREit, but will be monitoring the situation closely. 

Licensing

New Periodical on Offer: Overdrive Magazines, an exciting new periodical resource, is now available to BC ELN members in collaboration with Consortia Canada. Learn more and subscribe on Consortia Manager! 

Improving the Resource Selection Process: BC ELN has been revising its New Product Selection process to better support member needs. This work began with an environmental scan of national and international best practices, followed by a membership survey to gather feedback. Further updates and refinements are planned for the coming year. 

Spotlighting Consortia Licensing at UBC iSchool:

In March, BC ELN’s Licensing Manager joined UBC’s LIBR 580 Collection Management class to introduce future librarians to the vital role of consortial licensing. The session highlighted how collaborative subscriptions help libraries stretch budgets and expand access through collective power. 

WriteAway Online Writing Support

New WriteAway Institution: Nicola Valley Institute of Technology (NVIT) has joined WriteAway!  

New Training Tutorial: The WriteAway Administrative Centre has implemented a new tutor training course with easy-to-follow modules to increase tutor understanding of the WriteAway tutoring approach.  

Sustainability Planning: The WriteAway Advisory Committee has been engaging in conversations regarding long term sustainability planning. These conversations are supported by data gathered from surveying participating members and non-members on interest in potential changes and barriers to joining or continuing participation.