The request was for an article from the periodical Molecular and Cellular Biology . Greta Hiebert, interlibrary loan assistant, Bethel College Library, entered the request using the OCLC FirstSearch service link to the OCLC Interlibrary Loan service. She did not realize that the 88 millionth request was imminent. January is usually a slow time.
Many students are off campus for interterm trips.
Ms. Hiebert explained that she handles virtually all of the ILL traffic at Bethel College Library. Last year we made 2,276 borrowing requests and received 2,218 requests to lend. I enjoy being able to personally attend to every step of the process, both borrowing and lending. I retrieve the books from the stacks and do my own photocopying and packaging for the mail, as well as data entry and the inevitable sleuth-work of verifying citations and weeding out duplicate requests. Ms. Hiebert said that OCLC ILL Custom Holdings has improved her daily workflow.