The Task Group began its work by reviewing the background to the charge and the charge itself. Some of us met informally at the ALA Conference in Chicago, but our discussions have been conducted almost exclusively via e-mail. One TG member set up a Web summary of our progress at http://www.lib.cwu.edu/~dcc/naco-continue-ed-summary.html. We shared our own NACO training and contributing experiences in an attempt to define our intended audience and to understand what kind of "refresher courses" or "continuing education" might be needed. Two different needs emerged: One is the problem of keeping up with changes to the rules and the authorities format; the other concerns maintaining contributors' proficiency. As one TG member put it, "I would hazard the following as a fairly typical scenario: trainer goes in and gives whatever the basic training is. Institution gets enthusiastic about contributing, but either deliberately sticks to the fairly straightforward headings or simply doesn't have a sufficiently broad range of material in hand to encounter the more awkward situations more than very occasionally. So some of what they were taught is either not put into practice or drops out in the face of too many tricky problems. Two years later they've forgotten how to deal with some of this stuff entirely, and need help."

Because of staff turnover at NACO institutions, it cannot be assumed that all NACO contributors received, at one time, the "standard" training, either from LC or from a regional trainer. Furthermore, different NACO contributors have concentrated their efforts on different kinds of headings. Monographic catalogers, for example, might be comfortable creating personal name records but have difficulty with conference headings, while serials catalogers may routinely establish corporate bodies, but need a review of the rules for establishing personal names and series.

We agreed that our primary audience consists of NACO contributors at participating NACO institutions that need or want ongoing training in any or all areas of name and series authority work. This group includes NACO contributors who have never received direct training from a NACO trainer (either regionally or at LC). The TG identified as secondary audiences, former NACO contributors now working at non-NACO libraries and the cataloging community in general with an interest in name authority work. Although catering to those audiences may be beyond the scope of this group's mandate, some of the training materials created for NACO participants could be used to promote PCC membership.

Our aim is to keep costs to the program to a minimum. Potential cost areas include rental of a room and audio-visual equipment for training sessions, Web development and maintenance, and printing and distribution of training materials. We have not yet investigated actual costs, except for meeting space at ALA conferences; we plan to confer with the Task Group on PCC Participant and Training Documentation, which is examining various models of document delivery. ALA charges $50 a room for a 2-hour session (or any portion thereof) plus the cost of audio/visual equipment (which tends to run up the price). Most workshops and meetings wind up costing about $250 a session.

Benefits to current NACO contributors include continued awareness of the full range of authorities-related rules and rule interpretations, and NACO policies, procedures, and documentation, as well as greater consistency in their application. Additionally we hope to facilitate the expansion of the range of contribution for a NACO agency, keep current NACO agencies active, and encourage libraries to join the NACO program, particularly when members of their staffs have previously been NACO contributors in previous positions.

Recognizing the diversity of needs among the thousands of NACO contributors, we decided that any curriculum we devised would have to cover the entire range of NACO work; it would be impossible to focus on a few discrete topics. The more we discussed the idea of developing a curriculum, the more convinced we became that ideally, this activity will entail creating and maintaining a new NACO manual using the CONSER Cataloging Manual (CCM) as a model. Much of the information to be included in such a manual already exists, scattered in current NACO documentation and announcements in various online and printed sources. The NACO trainer's manual, for example, includes excellent instructions on how and where to search before formulating a heading and a quite thorough treatment of "general" uniform titles. (It does not cover uniform titles for music, religious documents other than the Bible, legal documents other than laws, or series/serial headings.) What's needed is an all-in-one guide to NACO, organized by type of heading, so that NACO contributors can locate the information they need as they work. The responsibility for creating and updating the various "modules" of the manual can be widely distributed among name authorities experts at the Library of Congress and various NACO participating institutions.

Having decided on using the CCM as a model, we have been struggling with defining the content of a NACO continuing education manual. One problem is that we don't see a clear dividing line between initial training and "continuing" education. We've asked ourselves what we want to cover in a new manual that isn't covered in the trainer's manual. Do we have new information to present or will we offer much the same information in a different way? Will the curriculum we're talking about end up being suitable for both initial and ongoing training?

ome members of the TG are concerned that we may not have sufficient time and all the necessary expertise to complete a NACO manual the size and scope of the CCM. We plan to gather information from other sources that can be used as the basis for some of the modules, draft modules for the most common kinds of headings, and suggest ways of delegating the creation of other modules to NACO experts around the world.

Workshops can be scheduled in coordination with ALA conferences (annual and mid-winter), other national library conferences such as NASIG, MLA, and ARLIS, and regional conferences in the US and abroad. Suggestions for topics to be covered as well as presenters for these workshops should come from the PCC membership. Materials needed for the sessions can be distributed via the Web.

Recognizing that many NACO contributors will be place-bound, especially as the NACO program expands into Africa, South America, and Oceania, we think it is important to provide for virtual ongoing training sessions. Self-paced Web-based refreshers on various topics (questions, exercises, and answers) might also be offered. We assume that the Task Group on Web-Based Training and Distance Education will have ideas for how this virtual training can be accomplished.

Most TG members cited the need to provide many more examples of authorities records, especially records relying on some of the more rarely-encountered rules. Examples can be gleaned from newly-contributed records and updated on a regular basis. Examples of common mistakes might also prove useful.

In addition to more formal sessions, there is a need for a forum for questions and answers concerning the application of the rules to specific headings as well as an ongoing discussion of the policies and procedures of the PCC. We will recommend that all NACO contributors subscribe to PCCLIST and we will encourage the use of the list as a forum for discussion as well as for the distribution of news or policies. The vast majority of postings to PCCLIST are from Library of Congress staff, announcing policies or projects underway at LC. Yet, according to a message from Ann Della Porta, the list was also created to "serve as a forum where catalogers from PCC participating institutions may post questions and potential solutions encountered in the course of cataloging; share cataloging tips; and freely discuss difficulties and methods used to resolve problems. . PCCLIST was created with the expectation that the collective knowledge of the PCC participants could be shared among members."

There was a consensus in the group that session leaders should come from the PCC general membership. Sessions held in conjunction with other conferences and meetings can be held as frequently as expected attendance warrants. Exercises could perhaps be delivered in advance, to allow more time for discussion during the training sessions. Web-based (or other Internet-based) sessions as well as participation in an ongoing discussion list would be at the contributor's or agency's discretion.

Distribute the work as widely as possible along the lines of the CCM. Establish a review board of some kind (or identify an existing one) that will oversee and monitor the review and updating of material.

Request feedback from trainers and trainees after each session of initial or refresher training.

Coordinate with Task Group on PCC Participant and Training Documentation and LC's Cataloging Policy and Support Office.

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