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Criteria for cancelling individual subscriptions Kate Hood 09 Feb 2007 14:21 UTC

Hello, Sue, Jennifer and others -

Just wanted to say that Jennifer's answers to Sue's queries below are
identical to what I would have said, and we are a very similar size.  Hope
that is helpful.

Thanks,

Kate Hood
Library Associate for Serials and Binding
Guilford College, Serials Library
5800 W. Friendly Ave.
Greensboro, NC  27410
khood@guilford.edu
336-316-2362; 336-316-2449 fax

Date:    Thu, 8 Feb 2007 11:59:35 -0500
From:    "van Sickle, Jennifer" <Jennifer.vanSickle@TRINCOLL.EDU>
Subject: Re: Criteria for cancelling individual subscriptions

Hello Sue and other list members,

My replies follow below.  We are a small liberal arts college with about
2100 FTE.  Hope this helps.

Jennifer van Sickle
Trinity College
Hartford, CT

-----Original Message-----
From: SERIALST: Serials in Libraries Discussion Forum
[mailto:SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU] On Behalf Of SUSAN BEIDLER
Sent: Tuesday, February 06, 2007 2:39 PM
To: SERIALST@LIST.UVM.EDU
Subject: [SERIALST] Criteria for cancelling individual subscriptions

I work at a small 4-year college (1500 FTE students) with no graduate
programs.  We are JSTOR subscribers. Partly because of space limitations
and partly for budget reasons, we have been actively eliminating
duplication in our journal collection and have already withdrawn the
print volumes we had that were duplicated by JSTOR.  We also cancelled
all of the microform subscriptions that we had for JSTOR titles.  We are
looking at other steps we may want to take in the future to control the
rate of rise in our serials budget.

I would welcome hearing from similar types of institutions on the
following questions:

1.  Have you cancelled individual current subscriptions (print, e-only,
or combined), relying on their inclusion in aggregator packages for
access to the content?

Generally not, unless it is a title that is of limited use or value to
the collection.

2.  If so, what criteria did you use to make your decision?

We try to keep titles that are interdisciplinary and support student
research/assignments.  Expensive titles that are only used by faculty
are more likely to be cancelled.  We always consult with the academic
departments on cancellation projects.

3.  Have you re-evaluated your microform subscriptions in light of the
title's availability in an aggregator package?

We have pared down MF due to cost and low usage.  We keep MF for core
titles/newspapers.

4.  How important is archival access to online content when you evaluate
subscription options? Essential!

Thanks for sharing your experiences.
Sue

Sue Beidler
Snowden Library
Lycoming College
700 College Place
Williamsport PA 17701

phone: 570-321-4084
fax:      570 321-4090
email: beidler@lycoming.edu

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