Journal Review Project 2007

Why are we doing a journal/database review now?

Our last review was done over 10 years ago, though it seems like just yesterday to many of us. During those years, journal costs rose at rates approaching those of health care. For example, in 2007, journal prices for academic libraries increased at an estimated 7.99%¹ and European titles increased 12-14 percent.² What effect has this had? Looking back just 8 years, in 1999/00, the Library spent 40.5% of its budget on one-time purchases (books, videos, microfilm sets, databases we could purchase, etc.) and 59.5% on subscriptions. By 2006/07, those percentages had shifted to 25% and 75%. Comparing 1999/00 to 2006/07, we actually spent $5000 LESS on books and videos compared to our spending in 1999/00; during the same time, our spending for subscriptions increased by 94%. Vassar’s expenditures reflect broad trends noted in a recent study done by the Association of Research Libraries.³ These trends do not, we believe, serve the library’s goal of maintaining a balanced and rich collection.

Because so much of our budget is committed to subscriptions, we are struggling to support new curricular areas, purchase some of the amazing resources that have appeared in the past several years and serve the research needs of the academic program. During the past ten years, we have added new departments and programs and these require sufficient resources. As we consider all our needs and the way we build the collection in general, it is time that we review journal and database subscriptions to see if these are the titles that are the most important for our current work.

What is the goal for the review?

Our goals are twofold: pedagogical and financial. Pedagogically, we want to insure that our substantial journal expenditures are used to purchase the titles that best support our current academic mission and that we have increased flexibility to consider new journals. Financially, we want to restore a proper balance between one-time purchases and subscriptions. Most of our peers aspire toward at least a 30%/70% ratio and we feel this is an appropriate balance for Vassar as well. To do this, we need to reduce subscriptions by $250,000.

The good news here is that the Library staff have spent the last year in a “quiet phase,” to borrow terminology from development. At this point, we’ve reduced expenditures by approximately $160,000. These savings result from a thorough review of our reference subscriptions done by the reference librarians, discounts offered for pre-paying our large serials vendors, negotiating better deals, moving selected titles to “e-only” in consultation with faculty, and purchasing selected journal “bundles” that resulted in significant savings AND greater access. Even while reducing expenditures, we’ve actually added access to over 1000 peer-reviewed journals.

Last year, the Library also approached senior administration regarding the Library budget and the impact of rapidly escalating journal costs. The senior officers have been extremely supportive and provided sufficient funding this year to keep our subscriptions at the current level while we do a thorough, deliberate review of our subscriptions. Longer term discussions about the library acquisitions budget can only take place after the conclusion of this review.

At this time, we are ready for the departments and programs to begin their review of all journal and database subscriptions (except for journals that are bundled in a package that we know we cannot cancel). The subscriptions we are able to review total approximately $850,000 and we hope to reduce this by $85,000, or 10 %. The process we follow will be sensitive to special circumstances that affect the needs of individual faculty and departments and programs.

What is the process for the review?

The faculty review will consist of three parts:

1. Faculty members will be asked to take a survey indicating how important individual journals and databases are for their own research and for their students’ work. This survey allows us to consider the academic merits of each title without imposing any disciplinary assumptions on the choices faculty make. Faculty will also be able to indicate if a specific title could go e-only or whether it should be retained as a print subscription.
2. Each department and program will then receive a report of how the titles that “belong” to their discipline were rated in the initial survey, along with more details on subscription costs and usage data (if available). Departments and programs as a whole will be asked to rank every title on their list as 1 (essential), 2 (very desirable), 3 (desirable) or 4 (candidate for cancellation) and whether a journal subscription should be retained in print format or could move to “e-only.” We hope that departments and programs will use as their guideline the goal of a 10% reduction and will take the expressed interest of other faculty into account in their deliberations.
3. The Library will compile all the titles that have been selected for possible cancellation and distribute this full list to each faculty member for a second review. At this point, students will also be invited to comment on these potential cancellations. Because our research and curriculum are so interdisciplinary, important titles for your work may have appeared on the lists reviewed by other departments. This second review will be an opportunity to “reclaim” a title that had been tagged for cancellation.

The Library will review the titles in light of the information that has come from the faculty and make final cancellation decisions. The library will consider issues such as equity, usage, cost, alternative means of accessing titles and new options for archiving and delivering content in addition to feedback from the faculty. At the conclusion of its review, the Library will distribute the list of cancellations and format changes to the faculty. As is always the case, if there are any questions about the decisions the Library has taken, they can be discussed with the Library Committee or the DOPAA.

Timetable

We would like to ask the faculty to begin the first step described above, the individual surveys, immediately. At the beginning of the survey, you’ll login, then be taken to some brief instructions. Please complete the survey portion of this review by Oct. 12. The complete steps of the review are outlined below:

We very much appreciate your contributions to this review.

Will there be an opportunity to suggest new journal subscriptions?

Questions?

Questions about the process or the reasons for this project may be directed to Mark Christel, Assoc. Director for Reader Services and Collections, by phone 845-437-5763 or by email at christel@vassar.edu.

¹See the 5-year cost estimate (http://www.ebsco.com/home/printsubs/overview-07.xls) that appears in Ebsco’s 2007 summary of journal price increases: (http://www.ebsco.com/home/printsubs/priceproj.asp). Ebsco is a leading serials vendor.
²ibid: Ebsco’s article on 2007 journal prices (http://www.ebsco.com/home/printsubs/priceproj.asp).
³ARL Statistics, 2004-05, available at http://www.arl.org/bm~doc/arlstat05.pdf; note Graph 2 on page 11.