OpenAthens Update (August 2019)
Thank you for all your hard work, great questions, and patience as we work with OpenAthens and EBSCO to tackle one of our most challenging goals: Make authentication as easy as possible.
Our goal to complete as many higher education institutions as possible before the fall semester was ambitious. We recently completed implementation for six USG institutions over a two-week period, and we continue to gain momentum.
What is taking so long?
There are many moving parts and partnerships in any large-scale systems implementation. With this project, delays generally fall into three categories:
- Gaining third party vendor cooperation in the resource activation process
- Getting essential information (collections, connections)
- Technology troubleshooting
Where are we now?
Implementations are complete for our pilot institutions, and work is underway with the University System of Georgia institutions.
Live with OpenAthens (or very near):
- 12 University System of Georgia institutions
- 4 private colleges or universities
- 3 technical colleges
- 1 public library
Brief update per library type:
For USG: Remaining implementations will be complete in the early fall. We will be reaching out to you soon to schedule training for Alma/Primo and linking changes.
For technical colleges: We will be reaching out to you to verify that your OpenAthens IP is on file with vendors.
For private colleges and universities: Implementation set up basics are complete for most of our private academic institutions. We will be working with you to go live in early to mid-fall.
For public libraries: Atlanta Fulton Public Library is essentially ready to go live. For other library systems, GALILEO will meet with you in the fall to discuss implementations.
For school libraries: With more than 180 school districts and 2,000-plus public and private K-12 schools in Georgia, this will be our most challenging task. We will begin working with the Georgia Department of Education this summer to plan implementation for school libraries and identity test sites.
More Need-to-Know Info
Our team is working with EBSCO and OpenAthens soon to set tentative go live dates for the remaining academic institutions. As soon as those dates are set, each institution will be updated. Once we begin public and school library implementations, we will have a much better idea of timelines. For more information, please review the information on the GALILEO OpenAthens Implementation Guide or contact us.