Topic: Libraries
Research Report
April 12, 2019
Ithaka S+R US Faculty Survey 2018
The Ithaka S+R US Faculty Survey has tracked the changing research, teaching, and publishing practices of higher education faculty members on a triennial basis since 2000. Our aim in this project is to provide actionable findings and analysis to help colleges and universities as well as relevant support services, such as academic libraries, learned societies, and scholarly publishers, plan for the future.
Research Report
April 11, 2019
When Research is Relational
Supporting the Research Practices of Indigenous Studies Scholars
In 2017 Ithaka S+R launched a project to explore the changing research methods and practices of Indigenous Studies scholars across Canada and the US with the goal of identifying services to better support them in ways that are also beneficial to Indigenous communities more broadly. The project was undertaken by a cohort of research teams at 11 academic libraries with guidance from a group of advisors comprised of Indigenous scholars and librarians. Each research team in the cohort developed findings…
Blog Post
April 9, 2019
What to Watch for at ACRL 2019: Research Data Edition
With the ACRL (Association of College and Research Libraries) 2019 conference less than a week away, there has been some discussion about research data receiving limited attention in this year’s program. Academic libraries are at the forefront of key issues in data management, sharing, and use, so we wanted to make sure to highlight this important topic. Here’s a preview of some of the data-related sessions, lightning talks,…
Blog Post
April 8, 2019
Learning from the Locals
How Local Survey Partnerships Have Enriched the Ithaka S+R US Faculty Survey 2018
In 2012, Ithaka S+R began offering colleges and universities the opportunity to field a customized instance of the US Faculty Survey, which tracks the research and teaching practices, perceptions, and needs of faculty members at four-year colleges and universities on a triennial basis. In more recent years, we began fielding our parallel surveys of undergraduate and graduate students as a means to gain better insight into the needs of these important stakeholders. To…
Blog Post
April 4, 2019
Hot Topics in FAIR Data: An Orientation for the Uninitiated
“Data” has become a watchword in academic circles – not to mention in society writ large. But it can be difficult to stay abreast of data-related developments as a plethora of organizations, initiatives, and technologies emerge. I recently had the privilege of attending and speaking at a CODATA workshop on FAIR data (which I’ll explain momentarily) and responsible research data management. Hosted at Drexel University, the two-day workshop brought together…
Blog Post
March 15, 2019
Two New Ithaka S+R Analyst Job Openings
Are you passionate about evidence-based approaches to improving higher education and the arts? Ithaka S+R has two new positions to support our dynamic research on libraries, scholarly communication, and museums. Our work helps these organizations better support scholarship, instruction, community engagement, and student success by empowering them to gather and effectively utilize evidence that supports strong decision-making about strategic direction and service offerings. Our new analyst positions provide unique opportunities to conduct and publish major research…
Blog Post
March 6, 2019
Scale Is Existential
New Issue Brief on Library Collaborations
For more than a hundred years, academic libraries in North America have understood that they must seek scale greater than that of their own institution in order to provide the collections and services that their communities need. In search of cross institutional scale, libraries have developed an array of consortia and other collaborative vehicles. But as the nature of the collections libraries seek to provide, and the services that their user communities require, has evolved, so must their…
Issue Brief
March 6, 2019
Restructuring Library Collaboration
Strategy, Membership, Governance
Academic libraries typically serve individual higher education institutions, yet their objectives require that they achieve greater negotiating power, more efficient distribution of collections, and stronger systems and services than even the largest academic library can provide itself. As a result, academic libraries have sought for more than a century to generate cross-institutional scale. In this paper, I examine efforts to generate that scale, including consortia and other membership organizations, which collectively I term “collaborative vehicles.” Yet collaboration is not good…
Blog Post
March 1, 2019
What is Content Syndication?
Over the past year, there have been some important developments among the major publishers as they move towards a new model for distributing their content. The principal driver has been the fear of “leakage,” which is to say usage for which publishers cannot provide COUNTER statistics and therefore are unable to monetize. There is real fear of losing library sales altogether due to leakage to SciHub, ResearchGate, and similar sites, which in one view is what has happened,…
Blog Post
February 28, 2019
Landscape of Library Service Quality Tools
During the course of the past year, I have had a chance to speak with many assessment librarians, library deans, and others in academic libraries about the types of tools they are using, or considering, for their planning and assessment projects. We typically connect because they have fielded, or are thinking about fielding, one or more of the Ithaka S+R Local Surveys, which primarily focus on the ways in which students and faculty members…
Blog Post
February 25, 2019
On Being Student-Centered
Reflections on the CCLASSS Project and DREAM 2019
What does it mean for us to be student-centered in our work at Ithaka S+R? In our collaborative research initiative on student success and community college libraries, the Community College Libraries & Academic Support for Student Success (CCLASSS) project, being student-centered means that we have positioned student voices as not only valuable but essential to our work. While our ultimate aim for the CCLASSS project is to design new library…
Past Event
June 11, 2019
Library Acquisition Patterns: How Do Libraries Buy from University Presses?
Roger Schonfeld at the AUP Meeting
In June, Roger Schonfeld will present on “Library Acquisition Patterns: How Do Libraries Buy from University Presses?” at the Association of University Publishing Meeting in Detroit, Michigan. He will be joined on the panel by Jon T. Elwell (EBSCO) and Terry Ehling (MIT Press). The conference will run from June 11-13, 2019, and more information will be forthcoming on the AUP website. About the panel Ithaka S+R’s Library Acquisition Patterns (LAP) project is a national study that examines…
Blog Post
February 21, 2019
Reflections on PASIG
Advancing Digital Preservation Through Community Cultivation
From February 12-14, I attended the PASIG Conference where 150 individuals from 12 countries gathered to share experiences and insights on organizational, technical, social, business, and political aspects of digital preservation and archiving. Digital preservation involves the management and endurance of digital objects to ensure the authenticity, accessibility, and usability of content over time in the face of technological and organizational changes. Since 2007, the Preservation and Archiving Special Interest Group (…
Past Event
May 31, 2019
Danielle Cooper and Rebecca Springer at SSP
The Great Divide: Communicating Scholarly Research to Practitioners
On Friday, May 31, Danielle Cooper and Rebecca Springer will speak on “The Great Divide: Communicating Scholarly Research to Practitioners” at the Society for Scholarly Publishing Annual Conference in San Diego, California. Danielle and Rebecca will be joined on the panel by Angela Cochran (American Society of Civil Engineers), Amy Rechenmacher (University of Southern California), and Ingrid Tomac (University of California San Diego). The panel will run from 11:15 am to 12:15 pm. For more information and to register, please see the…
Past Event
April 13, 2019
When Enough Isn’t Enough: Rethinking Research Support in the Sciences
Danielle Cooper and Rebecca Springer at ACRL
On Saturday, April 13, Danielle Cooper and Rebecca Springer will present “When Enough Isn’t Enough: Rethinking Research Support in the Sciences” at the ACRL Conference in Cleveland, Ohio. Their talk is scheduled for 8:30 am. For more information and to register, please see the conference website. About the presentation What would it take for university libraries to develop the same kind of buy-in with scientists as they often have with humanists? A major challenge is that how libraries offer…
Past Event
April 8, 2019
Holistic Approaches to Research Data Management: Scholars as Collectors
Danielle Cooper and Oya Y. Rieger at the CNI Spring Meeting
In April, Danielle Cooper and Oya Y. Rieger will present on “Holistic Approaches to Research Data Management: Scholars as Collectors” at the CNI Spring Meeting in St. Louis, Missouri. The conference runs from April 8-9. For more information and to register, please visit the CNI website. Presentation abstract In conjunction with their research and teaching activities, scholars create and assemble complex personal collections of information. These collections vary widely depending on the…
Past Event
March 22, 2019
Roger Schonfeld Leads Workshop at RLUK
Beyond Open: Transformations in Scholarly Publishing
On Friday, March 22, from 11:30 am -1:00 pm, Roger Schonfeld is facilitating a workshop on “Beyond Open: Transformations in Scholarly Publishing.” Roger will be joined by Toby Greene (OECD) and Daniel Hook (Digital Science). The workshop is part of the RLUK19 Conference in London, England. For more information and to register, please see the conference website. About the workshop Open access is transforming the scholarly publishing landscape. In just the past year, the academic sector has asserted itself through…
Blog Post
February 13, 2019
The Right Tool for the Job
Fostering Strategic Approaches to User Research
In October 2018 we had the opportunity to engage with attendees to at the Digital Library Federation (DLF) conference about fostering strategic approaches to digital library assessment. During the session we briefly presented a framework for thinking through various user research avenues and related methodologies (suggesting that the user survey isn’t the only useful tool libraries could employ even if we use them a lot!) and then invited participants to consider what they…
Past Event
February 13, 2019
Oya Rieger at PASIG 2019 in Mexico City
On February 13, Oya Rigier is giving a lightning round talk at the PASIG conference at El Colegio de México in Mexico City. Her talk will begin at 3:50 pm. For more information, please see the conference website. About PASIG The Preservation and Archiving Special Interest Group (PASIG) is dedicated to advancing the practice of digital preservation and archiving. It brings together practitioners, industry experts and researchers to share experience in a vendor-neutral forum on how to put preservation and…
Blog Post
January 29, 2019
Do Physical Books Still Spark Joy?
On the Material Reality of Today’s Academic Libraries
Marie Kondo of Tidying Up, the decluttering-as-self help phenomenon, recently met controversy for declaring that she strictly limits the number of books in her home to thirty. She has since clarified that the optimal physical book collection size is a personal metric, however, the underlying controversy echoes an issue that many academic libraries are facing around the role and presence of physical books.