Access Lab 2020: Switching from EzProxy to OpenAthens: how and why one small urban university’s library elected to make the change and what it learnt Joanna Kolendo, e-resources & reference librarian, Chicago State University, US

1. Library case study:
Switching from EzProxy to OpenAthens:
How and why one small urban university’s
library elected to make the change
and what it learned
Prof. Joanna Kolendo, e-resources & reference librarian
Presented: Access Lab 2020 ‘Simplifying the future together’
Thursday 19 March 2020
at 14:00

2. Chicago State University
Chicago State University is a public, urban institution of higher learning located
on the south side of Chicago.
• Governed by a Board of Trustees appointed by the Governor of Illinois.
• Consists of five colleges—Health Sciences, Arts and Sciences, Business,
Education, and Pharmacy.
• Serves minority, nontraditional, and first generation students; in 2018, 68%
of students were African-American.
• Offers 36 undergraduate and 25 graduate and professional degree-granting
programs.
• Has a Division of Continuing Education and Nontraditional Degree Programs.
• Declared financial exigency & experienced financial issues, as has the state.
• Currently is heavily investing in online programs.
Estimated CSU population:
Students 3,000
Faculty and Staff 300

3. Chicago State University: Gwendolyn Brooks Library
In October 2015, the webmaster, who was responsible for the Ezproxy
server, left the University.
• No one new would be hired for the position, as the position was
eliminated.
• The e-resources librarian and systems librarian are now responsible
for the system.
• With the loss of the webmaster, there was a loss of
expertise, and this lack of expertise causes issues with
quick fixes and updates.
Money from the webmaster position made it possible for a new system to
be investigated.

4. OpenAthens EZproxy
Having specific accounts allows library to set
permissions, run stats
Proxy IP can’t identify users – can’t set
permissions or run user statistics
Cloud hosted, with easy library
setup/maintenance
Requires maintaining an intricate server –
hard to do
Unique identifiers integrate into local SSO
systems
SSO systems are personal – IP addresses
Ongoing subscription ensures updates Consider the human cost of using EZproxy
Rick Rybak, EBSCO, 12/12/2016
OpenAthens: Selling Points: the WHY

5. Questions before be opted in?
• New resources (Kanopy)
• Old resources (use the system)
• March 2018, connecting OpenAthens to our campus’ authentication
system, Shibboleth version 2.5.2, which was in production at the time
• Pricing

6. How & specific CSU issues/problems
• CSU Team:
• Joanna Kolendo, (e-resources librarian; will be responsible for
OpenAthens in the future)
• Martin Kong, (system librarian, responsible for Ezproxy and
Voyager and Alma/Primo implementation)
• Reginald Granjean, (ITD Infrastructure Network
Engineer)(connector support; the only Shibboleth engineer)
• EBSCO Implementation Project Manager, Chris Shatswell (10/2019)

7. How & specific CSU issues/problems
• Form
• Connector
• & Test Accounts
• Resource Template (11/9/18)
• 120 databases; 304 individual e-journals

8. • Attributes
• What attributes are available?
• Where do they come from?
How & specific CSU issues/problems:
Things Learned
Banner Shibboleth OpenAthens
Reports
• CSU does not transfer much information to Shibboleth.
• Thus, attributes sent to OpenAthens are minimal.

9. Attributes
Values
How & specific CSU issues/problems:
Things Learned

10. • IT assistance with setup & changes to server
How & specific CSU issues/problems:
Major changes cause interruption

11. • Alma/Primo (change over)
• Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois (CARLI)
decision to subsidize governing libraries subscription to OpenAthens.
How & specific CSU issues/problems:
Major changes cause interruption

12. What GB Library learned: The Future
• Set up all resources to work with OpenAthens (a few individual e-
journals left)
• Set up an implementation Taskforce for OpenAthens along with
Primo/Alma (June 2020)
• The system librarian will work with the Banner engineer to obtain
more attributes to feed to OpenAthens
• Deal with privacy issues with data collection
• Hope to correlate library utilization through the following attributes:
• Total # of credits
• Status: Grad/undergrad/professional programs
• Grade range/GPA range
• Major/minor
• International
• Online
• Age range
• Gender