Publications
Case Study
January 23, 2018
Pipelines and Inroads
The Andy Warhol Museum
Front façade of The Andy Warhol Museum. Photo by Abby Warhola. The Andy Warhol Museum fits within a simple narrative at first glance—the largest single-artist museum in North America devoted to presenting and circulating globally the most complete collection of Warhol’s work. In fact, Andy Warhol’s legacy lends itself to the plurality of narratives and identities embodied in the museum. For many of the museum’s visitors, the seven-story prewar industrial building has become a place of pilgrimage, a destination…
Issue Brief
January 4, 2018
Big Deal: Should Universities Outsource More Core Research Infrastructure?
Research universities have developed in symbiosis with a robust set of commercial providers that serve their needs. From food service providers to run dining halls to private equity firms to manage parts of the endowment, outsourcing has allowed universities to remain more focused on their core educational and research functions. But universities have also at times elected to outsource academic infrastructure. Commercial firms have developed a major role in several significant university functions, including scientific publishing, library management systems, and…
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Research Report
December 14, 2017
Supporting the Changing Research Practices of Public Health Scholars
Danielle Miriam Cooper, Katherine Daniel, Caitlin Bakker, Jaime Blanck, Chris Childs, Ann Gleason, Rosie Hanneke, Shanda Hunt, Janna Lawrence, Jeanne Link, Annabelle Nuñez, Sarah Safranek, Kay Hogan Smith, Claire Twose, Sue Woodson
Ithaka S+R’s Research Support Services Program investigates how the research support needs of scholars vary by discipline. In 2016-2017 Ithaka S+R examined the changing research methods and practices of public health scholars conducting research through U.S. institutions. This project was undertaken collaboratively with research teams at seven academic libraries with the goal of identifying services to better support public health scholars. This report aims to provide actionable findings for the organizations, institutions, and professionals who support the research process of…
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Research Report
October 31, 2017
Higher Ed Insights: Results of the Spring 2017 Survey
In May and June of 2017, we surveyed the Ithaka S+R Higher Ed Insights panel—164 senior leaders and experts at colleges and universities, associations, research groups, and philanthropies—about the state of higher education and the likely impact of recent events and trends. While respondents were generally positive about the state of undergraduate education in the United States, they expressed urgency about the need to improve degree completion rates, the quality of student learning, and affordability for students. Respondents’ reactions to…
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Research Report
October 5, 2017
Save America’s Treasures: Impact and Lessons
As part of the National Historic Preservation Fund, Save America’s Treasures awarded nearly 500 grants between 1999 and 2010 through the National Park Service, National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Institute of Museum and Library Services to preserve collections that embody the American story. The collections contain major parts of the nation’s artistic, social, and intellectual history. The impact of these grants has not been assessed in any comprehensive way, and one of the…
Research Report
September 19, 2017
CIC Consortium for Online Humanities Instruction II
Evaluation Report for First Course Iteration
The CIC Consortium for Online Humanities Instruction began in 2014 with the support of The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The success of the first Consortium motivated the Mellon Foundation to support a second Consortium that was formed in the summer of 2016 with teams of faculty members and administrators from 21 institutions that were selected through a competitive process.[1] Each institution is represented by a four-member team including a senior academic administrator, two full-time faculty members in the…
Research Report
August 30, 2017
Inclusion, Diversity, and Equity: Members of the Association of Research Libraries
Employee Demographics and Director Perspectives
The library community considers diversity to be a core value.[1] But, the academic library sector has struggled with addressing equity, diversity, and inclusion. One key shortcoming has been in its efforts to ensure representative numbers of library employees of color.[2] In recent years, many academic librarians and observers of academic libraries have worked toward understanding this issue and the shortcomings of efforts to diversify, focusing on staffing, library education, and advocacy for diversity and social justice…
Issue Brief
August 16, 2017
Red Light, Green Light: Aligning the Library to Support Licensing
There is widespread frustration within the academic library community with the seemingly uncontrollable price increases of e-resources, especially of licensed bundles of scholarly journals. The scholarly communications movement has vastly expanded academic and indeed public access to scholarly content. Yet prices for certain scholarly resources continue to outpace budget increases, and librarians do not feel in control of budgets and pricing. What if libraries found ways to bring together the whole library behind the objective of stabilizing or reducing what…
Issue Brief
July 26, 2017
Rethinking Liaison Programs for the Humanities
For generations, most research libraries have had employees with deep subject expertise. Once known as bibliographers, these scholars and librarians originally focused their efforts on selection for collection building. Today, there is real anxiety about the role of subject expertise and academic liaisons in research libraries. We argue that evidence about scholars’ practices and needs should be a key input into reorganizing library subject expertise.[1] Librarian subject expertise and liaison roles At many research libraries, the role of…
Research Report
June 8, 2017
Quality Assurance in U.S. Higher Education
The Current Landscape and Principles for Reform
The American higher education sector is diverse and creative. In 2014-15, the sector produced over 1 million associate’s degrees, nearly 1.9 million bachelor’s degrees, over 758,000 master’s degrees, and over 178,000 doctoral degrees.[1] The world leader in innovation for decades, the sector continues to produce cutting edge research and contributes mightily to the American economy. Recent estimates concluded that the United States spends a larger percentage of GDP on higher education than any other country.[2] But…
Research Report
June 7, 2017
Supporting the Changing Research Practices of Agriculture Scholars
Danielle Miriam Cooper, Sarah Bankston, Marianne Stowell Bracke, Beth Callahan, Hui-Fen Chang, Leslie M. Delserone, Florian Diekmann, Andrea L. Dinkelman, Diana Farmer, Shannon L. Farrell, Sharon Giovenale, Charlotte Glennie, Scott Hanscom, Inga Haugen, Liz Holdsworth, Marei Houpert, Claudine Arnold Jenda, Erin Kerby, Megan Kocher, Adam Kriesberg, Emily Marsh, Alesia McManus, Nan McMurry, Sarah Milligan, Carolyn Mills, Valrie Davis Minson, Jim Morris-Knower, Mary Ochs, Livia Olsen, Necia Parker-Gibson, Cynthia Parr, Hannah Gascho Rempel, M. Brooke Robertshaw, Ashley Shea, Megan Sheffield, Laura I. Spears, Suzanne Cady Stapleton, Sarah C. Williams, Jane Yatcilla, Sarah Young
For America’s land-grant universities, agriculture is a field of bedrock historical importance and vital current relevance. While it is sometimes perceived by the general public as a field to help small farmers modernize, today it also includes advanced genetic research, economic and policy issues around food security, and deep engagement with climate change. As a rich interdisciplinary field at the heart of so many research universities, the practices and needs of agriculture are of interest to many. For that reason,…
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Issue Brief
May 18, 2017
Finding a Way from the Margins to the Middle
Library Information Technology, Leadership, and Culture
Given the number and variety of significant information technology projects led or supported by research libraries, one could incorrectly assume that information technology has been successfully integrated into our organizations. Unlike other recent library service program developments—namely, information literacy and scholarly communication, which also started on the margins—information technology has not found its way to the “middle” in most of our organizations. Information technology workers, not solely but in particular, experience a lingering divide between the culture of the information…
Research Report
April 3, 2017
US Library Survey 2016
The Ithaka S+R Library Survey 2016 examines strategy and leadership issues from the perspective of academic library deans and directors. This project aims to provide academic librarians and higher education leaders with information about chief librarians’ visions and the opportunities and challenges they face in leading their organizations. In fall 2016, we invited library deans and directors at not-for-profit four-year academic institutions across the United States to complete the survey, and we received 722 responses for a response rate of…
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Research Report
February 15, 2017
Funding Socioeconomic Diversity at High Performing Colleges and Universities
This report is published on behalf of the American Talent Initiative (ATI). ATI is a partnership between Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Aspen College Excellence Program, Ithaka S+R, and a growing alliance of top colleges and universities collaborating on a national goal: educating an additional 50,000 low-to-moderate income students by 2025. ATI members are working together to identify the best ways to attract the talent pool that is now missing from top colleges and to share the best practices for providing those…
Research Report
February 8, 2017
Supporting the Changing Research Practices of Religious Studies Scholars
Danielle Miriam Cooper, Roger C. Schonfeld, Richard Adams, Matthew Baker, Nisa Bakkalbasi, John G. Bales, Rebekah Bedard, Chris Benda, Beth Bidlack, Sarah Bogue, Trisha Burr, Gillian Harrison Cain, Ina Cohen, Wesley Custer, Virginia Dearborn, Gerrit van Dyk, Suzanne Estelle-Holmer, Kathryn Flynn, Jenifer Gundry, Trevan Hatch, Justin Hill, Bill Hook, Thad Horner, Hye-jin Juhn, Andrew Keck, Michael Kohut, Gloria Korsman, Graziano Krätli, Ryan Lee, Rebecca Lloyd, Reed Lowrie, Margot Lyon, Jean McManus, John Meeks, Christine Pesch Richardson, John Robinson, Kay Roethemeyer, Robert Roethemeyer, Ramona Romero, Fred Rowland, Veronica Simms, Kate Skrebutenas, Jacqueline Solis, Steven Squires, Maria Stanton, Naomi Steinberger, Chris Strauber, Elka Tenner, Amanda Thomas, Paul Allen Tippey, Nancy Turner, Nicholas Weiss
Ithaka S+R’s Research Support Services Program is a series of projects that investigate the research support needs of scholars by their discipline. In 2016 Ithaka S+R examined the changing research methods and practices of academic religious studies scholars in the United States, with the goal of identifying services to better support them. The project was undertaken collaboratively with research teams at 18 academic libraries and the American Theological Library Association with guidance from an advisory committee. The goal of this…
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Research Report
November 15, 2016
An Academic Policy Framework for Technology-Mediated Content
I. Introduction In this report, we recommend a set of policies regarding governance, conflicts of interest, conflicts of commitment, and intellectual property to guide academic institutions in developing ways to create and promote technologically-mediated content. These policies are intended to encourage innovation in the development of new educational technologies by creating incentives for both institutions and their faculty to produce new scholarly materials in support of teaching and learning. We address these policies in the context of three…
Issue Brief
October 26, 2016
Finding the Public Domain: The Copyright Review Management System
The public domain is the ultimate open access. It is key to the bargain of copyright. Rather simplistically, in order to incentivize authors to produce works, the public, through Congress, grants authors copyrights in those works. While there is a range of opinion about the purpose and nature of copyright, they all have one common idea: copyright is limited by time. A copyright is a monopoly that lasts for a limited time and is limited by certain conditions. Those limitations…
Case Study
October 20, 2016
Institutional Transformation for Student Success
Lessons Learned from Ithaka S+R’s Case Studies
Over the past decade, U.S. colleges and universities have faced increasing pressure from funders, policymakers, and advocates to improve degree completion rates and demonstrate their value to students.[1] At the same time, researchers have produced substantial evidence about the efficacy of a number of structural and pedagogical changes institutions can make to help students succeed. These changes include remedial course redesign, proactive advising and coaching, active learning pedagogies incorporating technology, and streamlined pathways through institutions.[2] Yet…
Case Study
October 6, 2016
Engineering Learning at Kaplan University
Facilitated by growth in the availability of data about learners, scholars in cognitive science, psychology, computer science, and other disciplines have developed sophisticated insights about how people learn and succeed in academic contexts.[1] Yet, growth in the field of “learning science” has far outpaced higher education institutions’ efforts to apply its insights to their students’ experience. Leaders at Kaplan, Inc.,[2] a company serving over a million learners in various programs, believe that a practical corollary to…
Research Report
October 4, 2016
Canadian Association of Research Libraries Faculty Survey
Executive Summary of Findings
Since 2014, eleven member institutions from the Canadian Association of Research Libraries (CARL) have administered the Ithaka S+R Local Faculty Survey on their campuses.[1] The survey instrument covers many scholarly research and teaching-related topics, in part overlapping with the 2015 Ithaka S+R U.S. Faculty Survey and other previous iterations of the Ithaka S+R U.S. Faculty Survey.[2] Each of these Local Faculty Surveys included a core set of questions on preferences and practices related to discovery, digital…
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