College & Research Libraries news

Five years ago . . .

Comparison charts as a public relations tool

by Janet R. Cottrell and Frank M. Wojcik

he escalating pace of change occurring method is outcome assessment, in which the in most academic libraries can make it impact on student and faculty is measured in Tdifficult to determine the actual effects of our terms of effectiveness, quality, and so on. efforts. Preparing a summary chart compar­ These measures can be difficult to develop, ing current information resources and services implement, and interpret, and frequently re­ with those offered five years ago is an easy quire hard-to-gather longitudinal data. Atti- way to help patrons, administrators, and staff tudinal assessments, such as focus groups or see the overall effects over time. satisfaction surveys, are another useful mea­ Whether the issue is reelecting someone sure. They can be relatively inexpensive to for public office or assessing library and in­ develop and deploy, and their interpretation formation services, the question people re­ can be fairly straightforward, but they are, in ally want answered is “Are we better off now the end, measures of opinion, not fact. than we were five years ago?” In the fast­ Another tool to assess the value of pro­ changing world of academic librarianship, it grammatic or resource changes—a very is easy to lose sight of such a basic question. simple and inexpensive one—is a well-for­ Our accelerated rate of change, our continual matted comparison chart highlighting factual evolution, and our preoccupation with the differences in services, collections, access, here and now sometimes make it difficult to or other measures between two points in step back and determine the actual effects of time. our initiatives—to see the big picture. The topics that any given library chooses However, such assessment is crucial. Few to highlight will depend on the kinds of libraries can afford to implement new initia­ changes made in recent years, but in general tives indefinitely without some indication of the chart should reflect areas of dramatic their worth. Librarians who make no effort to change, features whose introduction may have assess the value of changes they have imple­ been controversial, topics that are particularly mented risk having their patrons and funders important to the library’s mission, and so on. form their own opinions in the absence of Typical topics that might be highlighted in­ accurate information. clude changes in the physical collection (types, amounts, usage); changes in the online Assessment methods collection; changes of physical size or lay­ Assessment methods vary in terms of scope, out; changes in staffing, hours, or services difficulty, expense, and usefulness. Perhaps provided; and changes in consortial arrange­ the most ambitious and comprehensive ments or management structure. About the authors

Janet R. Cottrell is director of information access, Library and Information Services, and Frank M. Wojcik is director o f information resources. Library and Information Services, at , e-mail: [email protected] and [email protected]

C&RL News ■ July/August 2002 / 495 The "Five Years Ago" chart statistic reflecting the decrease in materials When Frank Wojcik, one of the directors of checked out of the library; this entry never fails Kenyon College’s merged library and comput­ to start an interesting discussion. ing services organization, known as Library and First prepared for a board of trustees sub­ Information Services, created a comparison committee meeting, Kenyon’s “Five Years chart in 2000, he highlighted the tremendous Ago” chart has served in many settings. The expansion in print and online materials now chart, or information from it, has been used accessible through the college’s consortial in faculty advisory committee meetings, a di­ agreements1 (see Table 1). The differences over vision-wide staff meeting, and an interview time in the scope of print monograph titles, in a campus publication. It is posted on the journal titles, and databases speak for them­ division’s Web site and has come up in dis­ selves.2 The chart includes other striking dif­ cussion with prospective employees. Facts ferences, such as an increase in the number of from the chart have been pulled out for use degreed librarians on the staff. Finally, as a in “Did you know . . . ” signs posted near the sort of teaser, he included without comment a reference and current periodicals areas.

Table 1: Changes in information resources at Kenyon College in the last five years (May 2000)

Five years ago, the library had a computerized card Today, the library has a new Web-based catalog, catalog, providing access to Kenyon’s book collec­ which includes local Kenyon holdings, plus access tion of 300,000 titles. to the CONSORT and OhioLink collections: a total of 7 million titles. Besides using the catalog as a finding aid for these collections, the Kenyon com­ munity is able to link directly to thousands of full- text electronic journals and books from the cata­ log.

Five years ago, the library offered OCLC’s Today, we offer more than 125 major databases. FirstSearch, Lexis/Nexis, and 14 CD-ROM-based da­ Within the past year we have added such titles as tabases. Generally, searching these databases had the ATLA Religion Index, ABC Political Science, to be performed in the library, and often the search CIS History Universe, IT Knowledge, Humanities had to be conducted by a librarian. Abstracts, INSPEC, and m any others. These cita­ tion databases link to the electronic full-text of ar­ ticles, wherever possible. Through our patron au­ thentication software, members of the Kenyon community can search most of these databases from anywhere in the world.

Five years ago, the library subscribed to approxi­ Today, the library subscribes to more than 4,500 mately 1,250 periodicals and had begun canceling periodicals, including more than 3,200 journals in many titles because of budgetary constraints. electronic format. Some of our electronic subscrip­ tions have reinstated the paper subscriptions we canceled in the 1990s.

Five years ago, Kenyon’s library made heavy use Today, Kenyon continues to use mediated interli­ of staff-mediated interlibrary loan services to pro­ brary loan, but to a much smaller extent than be­ vide access to materials not locally available. This fore. Library users are able to borrow books di­ process was slow and labor intensive. rectly from CONSORT, OhioLink, and the Center for Research Libraries without the assistance of li­ brary staff. Delivery of these items takes only a few days. In addition, our expanded journal hold­ ings make us less dependent on other institutions for access to periodical literature. (continued on next base)

496 / C&RL News ■ July/August 2002 Prepared fairly easily using data collected statewide, and many of Kenyon’s digital infor­ for routine annual surveys, the chart has long mation resources, electronic journals, electronic repaid the effort invested in its preparation. As books, digital images, and research databases a concise information piece, a quick reference are acquired through OhioLINK’s cooperative chart, and a prompt for substantive discussion, acquisitions programs. the “Five Years Ago” chart has served us well. 2. Obviously the numbers on the chart pre­ sented here represent a moment in time in 2000, Notes and many statistics have changed dramatically 1. Kenyon College is a member of the Five since then. For example, we now have access Colleges of consortium, which also in­ to more than 5,700 journals and 24,000 elec­ cludes the , Denison Uni­ tronic books, and we employ 14 librarians. versity, , and Ohio Wesleyan Digital images, which were not mentioned in University. The Five Colleges collaborate on the chart, have become an important part of an information literacy project, a foreign lan­ our collection. We are in the process of updat­ guage technology project, a remote library stor­ ing the chart to reflect these new trends. It is age facility, a cooperative collection develop­ always possible, given current economic con­ ment project, and CONSORT—a shared inte­ ditions, that we will see a contraction of li­ grated library system. Kenyon also belongs to brary budgets and that consortial purchasing OhioLINK, a statewide consortium including power, in particular, may be adversely affected. the libraries of 80 colleges and universities. Also, due to marketplace variables, some ven­ OhioLINK’s direct borrowing program provides dors mentioned in the chart, e.g., IT Knowl­ access to more than 31 million library items edge, have not remained viable. ■ Table 1 (continued)

Five years ago, Kenyon had developed an exten­ Today, the slide library is even larger and our slide sive slide library in support of the college curricu­ collection is supplemented with more than 50,000 lum. digital images from the OhioLink Digital Media Cen­ ter. Locally, we are planning image digitization projects and improved access to our entire image collection.

Five years ago, Kenyon’s Government Documents Today, every' newly arrived Government Document collection was cataloged selectively; much of it was is cataloged. In addition, Kenyon is participating not cataloged at all. This made the collection diffi­ in an award-winning historical documents catalog­ cult to access by our users. ing project with the other Five Colleges of Ohio libraries. Access to documents is easier and more efficient than ever before.

Five years ago, library users always had to visit the Today, Kenyon has established an electronic re­ library in order to use course reserve materials. serves system, which the community can access from anywhere, at any time.

Five years ago, Kenyon employed eight librarians. Today, Kenyon employs 13 librarians. This num­ ber is up from five librarians two years ago.

Five years ago, all of our library cataloging was Today, much of our cataloging is done locally, but done locally, using OCLC as a cataloging resource. some is outsourced and some is done in coopera­ tion with OhioLink and the Five Colleges of Ohio consortia.

Five years ago, the library circulated more than Today, total circulation for the year, including items 77,000 items to the Kenyon community. borrowed from OhioLink and CONSORT, will to­ tal approximately 68,000 items. This year Kenyon borrowers will borrow more than 25 percent of their books from CONSORT and OhioLink.

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