Issue 29

Cherryl Schauder has recently joined the SCIS team as National Cataloguing and Metadata Coordinator. Her main role involves the application and development of standards for enhancing the quality of the SCIS database. One of Cherryl's first tasks is to coordinate the revision work for the fourth edition of SCIS Subject Headings, which was begun in late 1998. Regular liaison with SCIS cataloguers at the different State agencies is a vital part of her role.

Cherryl says it is very exciting to be part of a cataloguing service which is unique in its customisation for the needs of Australian schools and yet which draws on international best practice and standards.

Cherryl has worked as a cataloguer in school, public, university and special libraries. She has had extensive experience in cataloguing education and consulting, having been a lecturer and senior lecturer at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University for seventeen years. Cherryl recounts with humour the challenges of teaching the various cataloguing tools in ever-decreasing time periods, as the library and information studies syllabus expanded to me the demands of the Information Age. Cherry regularly taught a unit on Thesaurus Construction, and introduced a one-semester Records Management subject, which was included in several courses. Last year the second edition of a records management textbook she co-authored was published (Records Management -a Guide to Corporate Record Keeping by Jay Kennedy and Cherryl Schauder, 2nd edn, Addison Wesley Longman, 1998). Cherryl's Master's thesis examined the different indexing approaches applied by sixty online databases in Australia and overseas. Her research interests have focused on indexing theory, and particularly the role of the human indexer in relation to full text databases.

Cherryl's wide experience has given her an insight into the importance for students of consistent cataloguing, and also into the time-consuming nature of this work. She says that she is pleased to be working for a service that supports teacher librarians with their multiple tasks.

When Cherryl is away from cataloguing and metadata issues she is a secret 'Star Trek' d Pratchett fan. She is also known for her tendency to become enslaved by stray elderly cats. In recent ears, to the great amazement of her family, Cherryl has taken up aerobics.

Cherryl is interested in receiving input from schools on any aspect of SCIS catalogue records, and particularly SCIS subject headings.