Prevailing And Best Practices In Electronic Print Serials Management

"This report looks closely at the electronic and print serials procurement and management practices of eleven libraries including: The University of Ohio, Villanova University, the Colorado School of Mines, Carleton College, Northwestern University, Baylor University, Princeton University, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of San Francisco, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and the University of Nebraska Medical Center"--P. 6.

The study profiles the interlibrary loan efforts of nine leading American colleges: the University of Texas at Arlington, Tulane University, the University of Minnesota, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis, Brigham Young University, the University of Tennessee, Colorado State University, Oberlin College and Stony Brook University. The libraries interviewed shared their thoughts on a broad range of topics including but not restricted to: workflow management, productivity measures, departmental organization, budgets and spending trends, service to distance learning students, copyright and licensing issues, measures for special collections, automation and software use, use of institutional repositories and open access publications, shipping costs and procedures, and many other facets of academic interlibrary loan management. The purpose of the report is to define and diffuse best practices by profiling measures taken by nine leading institutions of higher education. Although the report contains much useful quantitative information, especially relating to budgets and employment, the focus in this report is on a journalistic narrative explaining departmental goals, procedures and practices and evaluating results.

Corporate Library Benchmarks, 2009 Edition presents extensive data from 52 corporate and other business-oriented libraries; data is broken out by company size, type of industry and other criteria. The mean number of employees for the organizations in the sample is 16,000; the median, 1700. Some of the many issues covered in the report are: spending on electronic and print forms of books, directories, journals and other information resources; library staffing trends, number of library locations maintained and the allocation of office space to the library, disputes with publishers, allocation of library staff time, level of awareness of database contract terms of peer institutions, reference workload, and the overall level of influence of the library in corporate decision making.

The Survey of Academic & Research Library Journal Purchasing Practices presents data about the journals acquisitions and management practices of an international sample of academic and research libraries. The study reports on a broad range of issues, including: spending trends, use of print vs. electronic access, purchases in ¿bundles¿, purchases through consortia, the role of subscription agents, use and plans for use of open access, attitudes towards the pricing practices of a range of major journal publishers, sources of funding for journal purchases and relations with academic and administrative departments of library parent organizations, and the practical management of the journal acquisition process, among other issues.

Of main findings -- Departmental assessment -- Standardized testing -- Assessment office -- Student assessment of instuctors -- Evaluation of adjunct faculty -- Faculty involvement in assessment -- Tutoring -- Assessing student services -- Assessment environment -- Curriculum changes -- Use of benchmarking data -- Use of consultants and services -- Post graduation assessment -- Assessing assessment.

This special report examines the management practices and business decisions of special collections libraries with a focus on rare books, manuscripts, maps, and other historical documents. The report profiles the John J. Burns Library of Rare Books and Special Collections at Boston College, the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library, the L. Tom Perry Special Collections at Brigham Young University-Provo, the Huntington Library, the Newberry Library, the San Antonio Public Library, the Watkinson Library at Trinity College, the Special Collections Research Center at the University of Southern Illinois-Carbondale, and the Bancroft Library at the University of California-Berkeley. Interviews were conducted in November and December of 2007. Additional information through an online form was provided by San Jose State University Kent State University Map Library AGS Libraries, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and California State University-Chico.

The report presents detailed data from 65 academic libraries about their completed, current, or planned library renovation projects. The study includes detailed data on capital spending, library redesign budgets, and spending on computer labs & infocommons, in-library classrooms, artwork, library furniture, carpeting and other flooring, and other elements of academic library renovations or new construction. Details construction preferences for architectural features such as atriums, landscaping, better access to restrooms and building entrances/exits, installation or expansion of library cafes, development of group work areas, better use of natural light, better soundproofing and other design features often sought in new academic library construction or renovation. Also explores the use of various renovation and building features designed to save energy. Other areas covered include student satisfaction with the library redesign, its impact on the use of library services, and governance issues over what campus groups guide and control the redesign. Data is broken out by size and type of library, and by libraries that have experienced recent renovation projects vs those that have not.

The International Survey of Library & Museum Digitization Projects presents detailed data about the management and development of a broad range of library special collection and museum digitization projects. Data is broken out by type of digitization project (ie text, photograph, film, audio, etc) size and type of institution, annual spending on digitization and other variables. The report presents data and narrative on staffing, training, funding, technology selection, outsourcing, permissions and copyright clearance, cataloging, digital asset management, software and applications selection, marketing and many other issues of interest to libraries and museums that are digitizing aspects of their collections.