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Technical services functions in academic libraries have evolved in response to fiscal pressures and advances in technology. In this study the author investigates how technical services in large research university libraries are adapting to support the changing roles of academic libraries. The author conducted hour-long phone interviews in early 2014 with the representatives from nineteen out of the twenty-five university libraries in the Technical Services Directors Large Research Libraries Interest Group. This paper presents the results and discussion based on the interview data: use of the name, Technical Services; new and emerging functions of technical services; organizational structure of technical services units; change drivers that are affecting technical services now, and those that will soon; and challenges in managing technical services. Five models of a technical services organizational structure were developed from participants' organizational charts and interview data. This research also highlights the skills needed among technical services personnel., Academic libraries continually confront challenges that are primarily driven by technological innovation and budget constraints. Library administrators try to find ways to meet these challenges by transforming and streamlining workflows [...]

The American Library Association (ALA) Preservation Statistics Survey, a national survey on the preservation activities of cultural heritage institutions, was introduced in 2012 in response to the decision of the Association of Research Libraries' (ARL) decision to discontinue its long-running preservation statistics program. This paper presents the history of both surveys, discusses the rationale for collecting national data on these activities, and how the data has been used. The paper also includes key results, derived from analysis of both surveys. The surveys suggest that institutional support for preservation activities has declined significantly since its peak in the early 1990s. Preservation programs continue to focus on text-based materials and seem to employ fewer nonprofessional staff than they did five years earlier. The benefits and challenges of conducting a voluntary national survey are also discussed., The systematic collection of data that documents and describes preservation activities locally and nationally facilitated the emergence of library preservation as a professional field of practice and supports preservation programs [...]

This preliminary study assesses university students' ability to identify document types or information containers (journal, article, book, etc.) and different types of search tools (database, search engine) in the online environment. It is imperative to understand -students' behaviors due to the pervasiveness of online resources and their impact on information literacy. A survey administered at the University of Florida sought to investigate this phenomenon and queried respondents about their age, higher education level, exposure to bibliographic instruction, and time devoted to school-related online searching. Analyses of 765 responses show that many students cannot consistently correctly identify these containers and behavioral characteristics have no influence on this process. This has implications for the online information seeking process and judging credibility and is of importance to the library, education, and publishing communities. Recommendations for these various communities are discussed., In 2010, The Economist noted that digital information is increasing tenfold every five years. (1) Navigating this vast amount of information to find what a seeker needs to answer a [...]

The serials literature for 2012-13 reflects the ongoing challenges faced by members of the serials information chain. Problems with workflow, systems, electronic exchange of information, and control of proprietary information still occur and can be seen documented in the literature. However, the literature also reflects growing determination that this state of affairs can and should change. Serialists are experimenting with new models of pricing and delivery of content. They are developing standards and protocols to facilitate more seamless communication of accurate information. The changes that need to occur and the difficult decisions that need to be made to create this new, well-functioning system can clearly be seen in the literature under review., The serials literature for 2012-13 continues the tradition of being a literature of practice and purpose. Libraries exist in a world of increased user expectations and decreased user tolerance of [...]

While demand-driven acquisition (DDA) or patron-driven acquisition (PDA) focuses on providing library materials at a user's point of need, approval plans attempt to help the library collect everything that might be desired in the future. DDA is the standard method of just-in-time library collecting, while approval plans are a prime example of just-in-case collecting. Therefore, these two methods are often perceived as oppositional library acquisitions practices. Yet, for the start of the 2013-14 fiscal year, California State University, Fullerton's Pollak Library implemented a hybrid approach of DDA and the approval plan, which came to be known as the DDA-preferred approval plan. This study analyzes the cost and number of books acquired before and after the implementation. Findings demonstrate that the library was able to provide access to a significantly higher number of books in the 2013-14 academic year than in the prior year, and spent much less, suggesting that DDA and the approval plan can work together harmoniously for cost-effective collection building., Approval plans and demand-driven-acquisition (DDA), also known as patron-driven acquisition (PDA), have come to be known as opposing methods of library collection building. With a focus on setting parameters so [...]

This paper presents the results of a research study, a survey of library and information science master's degree holders who have taken a beginning cataloging course, to identify the elements of a beginning cataloging course that help students to learn cataloging concepts and skills. The results suggest that cataloging practice (the hands-on creation of bibliographic records or catalog cards), the effectiveness of the instructor, a balance of theory and practice, and placing cataloging in a real-world context contribute to effective learning. However, more research is needed to determine how, and to what the extent, each element should be incorporated into beginning cataloging courses., Cataloging is integral to the work of libraries. Its purpose is to provide and maintain content for the library catalog using content standards, encoding schemes, and controlled vocabularies, which facilitate [...]

The difficulty for a library to spend their collections budget efficiently is a timeless problem. The diversity of a typical budget, with its mix of one-time and continuing funds, for an array of resources that have both regular and sometimes irregular frequencies, provides great challenges. Approval plans, usually expending onetime funds, generate expenditures that contain high variability on a weekly basis. Standing orders for serials fall into the same category. With some effort, it is possible to expend all continuing funds. But it is the commitments that do not result in expenditures, with funds remaining in cash balances that can determine what university administrators call 'efficient results.' Acquisitions personnel must take an aggressive approach to commitments with the goal of turning as many possible into expenditures. New expenditures will compensate for the orders that remain committed. Based on the assumption that efficient spending focuses on a library budget's final cash balance, this article presents a method to consistently achieve a zero or negative cash balance., Most historically underfunded libraries pursue additional funding for their collection development budgets. During this process, university administrators may question why collection funds are not spent by a seemingly high percentage. [...]

To better determine how e-book acquisitions might affect future collection development decisions, a team of librarians from the University of Florida (UF) launched a project to assess cost and usage of e-books purchased using three different acquisitions methods: e-books acquired in large publisher packages; single-title e-books selected through firm orders; and e-books purchased through two patron-driven acquisitions (PDA) plans. The cost-usage data were then sorted into three broad areas of subject disciplines--humanities and social sciences (HSS); science-technology-engineering-mathematics (STEM); and medicine (MED)--and the results were reviewed and summarized. The authors compared the cost-usage data of e-books acquired by the acquisitions methods across the three subject areas and describe how the findings are affecting current and future acquisitions, traditional collection management, and budgeting at UF., The Smathers Libraries has a primary mission to support the wide-ranging research and instructional activities at the University of Florida (UF), a large land-grant university with an annual enrollment of [...]

Publishers attract readers to books and inform them about the books' contents by adding information to the books' covers. In many academic libraries, the dust jackets of cloth-bound books are discarded. This study was a physical inventory of 1,319 recently published books in an academic library, and comparison of circulation statistics between different cover types. By every measure, books with publisher-supplied information on the cover circulated at a higher rate than books with plain covers. The implications of our findings for collection management are discussed., Sages ranging from George Eliot to Bo Diddley have advised against judging books by their covers. (1) Although the proverb is indubitably correct as prescriptive advice, the question remains whether [...]

Aggregates have been a frequent topic of discussion between library science researchers. This study seeks to better understand aggregates through the analysis of a sample of bibliographic records and review of the cataloging treatment of aggregates. The study focuses on determining how common aggregates are in library collections, what types of aggregates exist, how aggregates are described in bibliographic records, and the criteria for identifying aggregates from the information in bibliographic records. A sample of bibliographic records representing textual resources was taken from OCLC's WorldCat database. More than 20 percent of the sampled records represented aggregates and more works were embodied in aggregates than were embodied in single work manifestations. A variety of issues, including cataloging practices and the varying definitions of aggregates, made it difficult to accurately identify and quantify the presence of aggregates using only the information from bibliographic records., Seventeen years after the publication of the Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records: Final Report (FRBR Report), discussions about the FRBR model have not ceased. (1) Aggregates, which are relatively common, [...]

Within the research projects of doctoral students in library and information science lie ways to mitigate the challenges of an inequitable world. Too often, these valuable findings go underused. That's [...]

Marketing students evaluated reference services at Central Missouri State University's library. The staff were unaware that they were being evaluated. Results of the study indicate that marketing students conduct subjective surveys well because they understand the methodology and its problems., This article describes an unobtrusive survey of reference services conducted at Central Missouri State University's library. The survey was part of a larger assessment of reference services. A senior-level marketing [...]

More than a year ago I issued a call for more research in the broad area of readers' advisory. This column presents preliminary findings of research that was even then [...]

The accuracy of citations in medical fields has been studied. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the accuracy of one hundred citations in library science journals. Ten references [...]

When Beals wrote that the literature of librarianship was made of 'glad tidings, testimony, and research,' with the last category woefully underrepresented, he seems to have missed some of the [...]

A whirlwind of reports, product announcements, and spirited discussions swept over the library landscape in 2006. Lorcan Dempsey's blog announced the posting of the University of California Bibliographic Services Task [...]

Ralph A. Beals, in his much quoted, misquoted, and abused discussion of the contribution of library science literature to an understanding of the social value of libraries, suggested that the [...]

A FULL-TIME RESEARCHER HELPS THE RENOWNED MYSTERY WRITER KEEP IT REAL What kind of beer do Rwandans drink? How does a person disappear and create a new identity? Do Chicago [...]

What would it take for us to create the perfect library and the perfect librarian? We see our nation's libraries redefined by technology and reinvented by ourselves as new services [...]

Today's increasing on-the-job demands are eroding the profession's foundation. The maturity of librarianship depends largely on the research conducted by its practicing librarians. This maturity has been slowed in recent [...]

Two decades ago, in May 1967, the editors of Wilson Library Bulletin devoted an entire issue of their journal to the most important problem then facing the American library profession. [...]

BECAUSE HE WAS AN ACTIVE SCHOLAR AND A great organizer of science, Lenin mastered the basic methods of scientific information work. He highly valued works of different types--indexes, catalogs, abstract [...]