---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 5 Jul 1996 11:48:11 -0600
From: Dan Lester <DLESTER@BSU.IDBSU.EDU>
Subject: Guidelines for Journal Usage (Albert Henderson) -Reply

Date: Tue, 2 Jul 1996 18:38:19 EDT
From: Albert Henderson
<70244.1532@COMPUSERVE.COM>

You say don't trust your faculty to provide accurate information about
what they use and its importance to library patrons. If I recall
correctly, your study reported that every serial in your library had been
identified by at least one faculty member as important for a teaching or
research program. Nonetheless you canceled over 20 percent of the
-----------------------

First, faculty do what many people do, including most of us. We tell what
we WANT, or what we THINK WE NEED, not what we truly need.  I'd bet that
the vast majority of readers of this list have books that they bought
because "they needed them" or they "just had to read them" but are still
sitting unread and unopened on a shelf, by the bed, etc.  I'll not lie and
say that I don't have some of those myself.

I can give you an example regarding research scientists, guys who have
received hundreds of thousands in grants for research in their fields.
They said that we just HAD TO HAVE a particular journal in their field
that cost $6500 per year.  We said that we didn't have the money,
especially since NO ONE else in their large department besides these two
cared about it, but had dozens of other requests for less expensive
journals in the queue.  We came to an agreement that we'd put money in a
special account with CARL Uncover so that they could order any articles
they wanted from the journal.  We trained them on Uncover (which is VERY
simple in case you've never tried it).  We trained their GAs on Uncover.
They have internet connected PCs on their desks and fax machines in their
offices, so they have the ultimate in convenience and the perfect price:
free to them.  In over two years they've ordered less than 500 dollars
worth of articles, but they still complain that Uncover "is hard to use",
despite that we train freshmen successfully to use it every day. What I'm
sure they mean is "I don't wanna change, dammit, and the library has to do
it my way or else."  Well, times change, like it or not, and they'll have
to adapt.  I do NOT feel sorry for them.
===================

You mean that this is an arithmetical exercise in 'survival of the
fittest' journals that has nothing to do with the qualitative view of your
patrons .... the use by a research department is no more valued than the
use by an undergraduate, or a visitor.
-----------------

That's right.  If I can satisfy hundreds of undergraduates for 6500 worth
of journals they need to complete assigned lessons, I'll do that before I
satisfy one PhD researcher who balks at trying something newer and better
and faster, who won't contribute any research overhead funds, and is a
consistent _prima dona_ and world class whiner.
=====================

and in the unashamed intent of the study to justify the cancelation of
subscriptions and the highhandedness of the administrators who simply hand
you marching orders.
----------------------

Well, if your boss told you to cut $200,000 in journals, what would you
do?  Try to put the orders through anyway?  Tell him or her to go to hell?
Refuse to do it?  Quit in protest? Somehow I doubt it.  And the boss is in
the same situation. And, for that matter, so is the VP and the President
if the Board or the Legislature has ordered the cuts.  Sometimes there IS
no choice.  You may not realize that the only free money in university
budgets is for "capital expenditures" and "supplies" and "temporary help".
There is usually little in supplies or temporary help, so the big chunks
are "capital expenditures", which in most states includes books.  Non temp
staff can NOT be cut quickly, as they have legally enforcable contracts or
have protection under Civil Service or other laws.  Therefore, the
researchers who want equipment and the library materials budget are what
take the biggest hit.
 And, until there are major legal changes, which seems unlikely, it will
continue the same way.
=================

Tony Stankus has recommended talking, personally, to each faculty member
and negotiating each journal of interest that might be canceled.
-----------------------

Well, when you figure out how to do that, and figure out how to get the
differing opinions (as indicated above) even within a discipline
reconciled, and multiply that by 50 or more departments, write us an
article on your secret and become loved by librarians.  Over the years
I've had more than one resolution by the department sent to the library,
saying "we can't decide what to cut, you decide it".  So we did.  And of
course they still bitched while conveniently forgetting that they'd been
asked and had decided not to decide.
====================

Never mind publishers. My question is do you sympathize with researchers,
students and faculty? Does your library collection enable or limit their
opportunities? Do the members of your university have a say in how the
budget is drawn?
-----------------------------

Yes, I sympathize with some researchers, with many faculty, and with most
students.  Your second question is unanswerable as it is stated.  We do
everything possible within limits of budget and staff to get people what
they need, AND what they want.  Of course we don't facilitate them as well
when their needs are urgent due to their own procrastination or
incompetence, simply because those needs are often impossible to fill.
(In case you aren't aware of it, the people with last minute needs,
writing the term paper the night before it is due, are NOT figments of
librarians' imaginations.
=======================

Increases in the volume of publications are generated by increased
research expenditures, not by publishers. Why haven't library expenditures
kept pace with research spending??
---------------------------------

I give up, why?  Again, if you have the magic answer to that problem, let
us know.  As soon as we know it we'll order more journals from you.  AND,
you'll be famous and revered in the library world.

cheers

cyclops

Dan Lester, Network Information Coordinator
Boise State University Library, Boise, Idaho, 83725 USA
voice: 208-385-1235   fax:  208-385-1394
dlester@bsu.idbsu.edu     OR    alileste@idbsu.idbsu.edu
Cyclops' Internet Toolbox:    http://cyclops.idbsu.edu
"How can one fool make another wise?"   Kansas, 1979.