William Joseph Thomas

eBooks and Efficiencies in Acquisitions Expenditures and Workflows

East Carolina University’s Joyner Library acquires ebooks through several different methods including packages firm orders and most recently a Demand-Driven Acquisition (DDA) program. Because we expect our volume of ebook business to increase substantially in the next few years we are interested in evaluating efficiencies in our acquisitions expenditures on ebooks and the workflows each purchase type requires. Currently each acquisition method requires a different workflow raising the question of whether any transformation in workflows might further streamline operations. In order to assess the efficiencies of acquisitions dollars expended we compare use of our ebooks by acquisition method and set those briefly against the use of firm order print titles. The big picture rendered by these comparisons will influence how we focus our purchasing in the future and any changes will directly impact workflows to support these changes. To make comparisons of ebook use we examine the percent of titles used and the intensity of use measured as the total number of uses of the books divided by the total number of books in the group studied. Future directions for purchasing and potential impacts on staffing and workflows are briefly explored.

ORCID Identifiers: Planned and Potential Uses by Associations, Publishers, and Librarians

The presenters gave an overview of ORCID and examples of how organizations are integrating ORCID identifiers (iDs) into their systems. In its twin roles as a scholarly association and a publisher, the Modern Language Association is exploring how best to integrate ORCID iDs into the publication process and into its member services. Librarians are well-positioned to partner with new and established scholars in accurately capturing their record of scholarship, and to work with internal partners such as research offices and graduate schools. As a member of the University of North Carolina system, East Carolina University researchers are interested in the potential for ORCID profiles to supplement information in the statewide profile system REACH NC. Texas A&M University is one of nine institutions recently selected to participate in an ORCID Adoption and Integration Program (funded by the Sloan Foundation) for their proposal to integrate ORCID iDs into their open-source Vireo Electronic Thesis and Dissertation management system, the university’s institutional repository, and their VIVO profile system.

Rules of thumb for deselecting, relocating, and retaining bound journals

Purpose – Like many other academic libraries, Joyner Library at East Carolina University has experienced pressure in recent years to convert stacks space to other uses. The rise of electronic collections coupled with the changing perception of libraries from book warehouses to service points forces librarians to rethink their collection management strategies, concomitantly reducing print collections. The purpose of this article is to recommend specific strategies that will assist librarians engaged in a large‐scale deselection project.Design/methodology/approach – First, librarians, staff, and graduate assistants developed a workflow to examine print journals for which the library has online archival holdings in order to de‐duplicate the collection. Librarians also determined which titles might be stored based on some online availability and length of print run. Third, librarians led a subject‐based review to determine which titles should be retained in the general circulating collections.Findings – Exami...

Author Impact Metrics in Communication Sciences and Disorder Research

PurposenThe purpose was to examine author-level impact metrics for faculty in the communication sciences and disorder research field across a variety of databases.nnnMethodnAuthor-level impact metrics were collected for faculty from 257 accredited universities in the United States and Canada. Three databases (i.e., Google Scholar, ResearchGate, and Scopus) were utilized.nnnResultsnFaculty expertise was in audiology (24.4%; n = 490) and speech-language pathology (75.6%; n = 1,520). Women comprised 68.1% of faculty, and men comprised 31.9% of faculty. The percentage of faculty in the field of communication sciences and disorders identified in each database was 10.5% (n = 212), 44.0% (n = 885), and 84.4% (n = 1,696) for Google Scholar, ResearchGate, and Scopus, respectively. In general, author-level impact metrics were positively skewed. Metric values increased significantly with increasing academic rank (p < .05), were greater for men versus women (p < .05), and were greater for those in audiology versus speech-language pathology (p < .05). There were statistically significant positive correlations between all author-level metrics (p < .01).nnnConclusionsnThese author-level metrics may serve as a benchmark for scholarly production of those in the field of communication sciences and disorders and may assist with professional identity management, tenure and promotion review, grant applications, and employment.

Weeding One STEPP at a Time

Joyner Library recently had to make space for a new campus partner. To do so we focused our activity on print journals. We created a set of rules guiding our deselection storage and retention decisions.

The NIH Mandate One Year On: How Are Libraries Responding?

Signed into law in January 2008, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Public Access Policy went into effect March 19, 2009. This law has the potential to affect significantly the activities of librarians, researchers, and publishers. In an effort to assess the impact, Joseph Thomas of East Carolina University studied how academic libraries are responding to the new mandate and whether the librarians perceived a correlation between their activities in response to the mandate and the growth of institutional repositories.

Helping Keep the Costs of Textbooks for Students Down: Two Approaches

ABSTRACT Librarians at East Carolina University and the University of North Carolina at Greensboro received a 2-year grant to support a combined alternative textbook project. This project engages in a two-pronged approach to reduce students’ textbook costs and increase their academic engagement. One strategy is to award departmental faculty mini-grants to use materials that would have no cost to their students, including OER or library resources. The second strategy is to identify required texts that the library already owns or can purchase as unlimited-user e-books. Benefits to students include reduced costs and an increased opportunity for engagement and academic success.

Trusting Digital Preservation for Print Collection Management, Or How Librarians Should Learn to Stop Worrying and Love the "E"

This article advocates planning for the management of print collections in light of digital preservation activities. Three activities include deduplicating print holdings from archival online journal packages participating in shared journal retention agreements and participating in at least one digital preservation initiative.

This Is Not a Dumpsite: The Problem of Evaluating Gift Books

After repeated efforts to streamline their gifts-in-kind selection and processing, librarians still face concerns over the small percent of books added and the amount of staff time required. The primary problem is that the purpose of the gifts program is to add reasonable and relevant materials to the collection, and too little of what is received fits that description. Resulting questions include whether the library needs to continue to receive gifts, and if so, whether there are ways to identify which books might be worth adding to the collection. To answer these questions, the authors reviewed circulation records of gift books acquired over a seven-year period and compared those lists with required reading lists for classes, interlibrary loan reports, and lists of financial donors. Results indicate that gift books do circulate, and that required readings lists can be helpful in gift book selection. Librarians are also encouraged to analyze circulation rates by subject on a periodic basis to hone their selection of gifts.

Open Access for Online Scholarship: The Beginnings of Institutional Repositories in North Carolina

North Carolina Libraries Recent articles in this column have focused on unique print collections, including the Friends Historical Collection, the Moravian Archives, and the Schlobin Collection of Literature of the Fantastic. Changing direction somewhat, this article will focus instead on a type of collection that is online only—an institutional repository—and will feature some of the pioneer work done in the state of North Carolina.