This document discusses several studies on the roles and perceptions of academic libraries. Some key findings from the studies include: - Academics value libraries' role in purchasing resources and see this as very important, especially for humanists. - Few academics think students have strong research skills, but there is little agreement on whose role it is to develop these skills. - Academics prefer using their library's website, databases, or public search engines over visiting the physical library building. - Academics select journals to publish in based on characteristics like coverage, readership, and impact factor. Disciplines vary in embracing digital research methods.

1. Collections and budgets: libraries and
publishers and collaboration
Roxanne Missingham, University Librarian

2. Genesis
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"Universities are here to make the world a
better place: as their direct purpose, not a by
product” Prof Stephen Parker
Vital role of collections

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Kautto-Koivula and Huhtaniemi

4. Perceptions of the roles of the
academic library
• Ithaka S+R
• Tenopir
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5. Ithaka study. Key findings (1)
• The largest shares of respondents cite the library’s role as a purchaser of
resources as very important. Larger shares of humanists than academics
from other disciplines identify each of the library’s functions as very
important, especially it’s service-oriented roles.
• Though less than one-fifth of academics surveyed indicate that they think
that their students have strong research skills, there exists little consensus
regarding whose primary responsibility it should be to develop these skills.
• When searching for academic literature, academics favour their library’s
website, scholarly databases or publicly available search engines over the
library building.
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6. Key findings (2)
• Respondents report that they value established scholarly dissemination
methods, prioritize publishing for audiences in their sub-discipline and
discipline, and select journals in which to publish based on characteristics
such as topical coverage, readership, and impact factor.
• Academics from the social sciences, medical sciences and natural and
physical sciences have begun to embrace digital research methods while
humanists feel that new practices might not be relevant or valuable to the
types of research that they conduct.
• Regarding data curation, academics tend to work with research datasets or
collections of media on their own computers, and think they could best be
supported through access to commercial software or institutional
repositories.
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7. Research practices
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11. Tenopir studies (ANU)
• Increasingly library focused –
– One third of respondents (32.7%, 18 of 55) do not
have a personal subscription
– Average number of personal subscriptions is 2
(M=2.45, SD=2.91)
– Print is the predominant form for personal
subscriptions.
• Academic staff who published 5-10 items
in the last two years read the most books
and other publications
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12. Libraries – roles within the academy
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16. • Most article and book readings are for
research and writing; other publications
are read more for current awareness and
research.
• ANU academic staff members on average
spend 133 hours per year with library-
provided material, equivalent to 16.6 eight-
hour days annually
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17. • Australian National University
postgraduate students, on average, spend
254 hours per year of their work time with
library-provided material, or the equivalent
of 31.75 eight-hour days annually
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18. Ithaka studies of Group of 8 libraries
• Survey in 2014/5
• Go8
– Melbourne
– New South Wales
– Queensland
– Sydney
– Western Australia
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http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/3478739

20. Digital natives
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http://larrycuban.wordpress.com/2014/05/24/cartoons-on-digital-natives-and-immigrants/

21. Reviewing collections
• Review value
• Factors include:
– Relevance to research and teaching
– Cost and use
– Cost per use
– Competitor products
– Degree of uniqueness
– Workflow costs – cataloguing, processing
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23. • Text books vs scholarly monographs
• Open access
– Knowledge unlatched and the demand for
new models
– Open access text books have been found to
produce better student retention, higher
marks and greater literacy
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http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1108

25. • Comments/questions
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