Considering the Value of Usage Data for Better Collection Strategies

1. Considering the Value of Usage Data for Better Collection Strategies • Forrest Link • Yuji Tosaka • Cathy Weng VALE Annual Users’ Conference January 4, 2013 Rutgers University

2. Presenters Forrest Link Acquisitions Librarian The College of New Jersey Yuji Tosaka Cataloging/Metadata Librarian The College of New Jersey Cathy Weng Head of Cataloging The College of New Jersey

3. Presentation Summary • Report of a library usage study • Examined recent library purchases and circulated and ILL titles • To find out if and how library purchases met user needs • A look at the kinds of data that can be generated and some ways of interpreting that data. • Study findings may help reshape local practice of collection development

4. How the Story Begins • Charleston Conference 2011 • RichardEntlich of Cornell presents on the capture and use of ILS data • June 2012 • TCNJ Library forms new committee to develop and implement collection development policy • July 2012 • TCNJ Library hires a new librarian for Access Services and ILL

5. The College of New Jersey • The College • Public, primarily undergraduate with graduate programs in nursing and education • Approximately 6,100 undergraduates, 650 graduate students, 350 full time faculty • The Library • Holds over 600,000 volumes • Acquires approximately 4,100 books annually • Borrows approximately 1,400 unique books annually through ILL • Circulates approximately 15,000 unique titles annually *Images taken from TCNJ website, May 3, 2011.

6. Notes on Collection Development

7. Library Collection Development • To develop a quality collection in support of community’s academic needs • Budgeting • Selection (including withdrawal) • Collection evaluation • Policy formation (*) * About Collection Development at Cornell University (http://www.library.cornell.edu/colldev/cddescript1.html) accessed Dec. 26, 2012.

8. Rethinking Collection Development • Long-standing “just in case” approach • “80/20 statistics” • “Overselection” vs. “Underselection” • Emphasis shifted to demand-based funding and selection • Towards effective collection development

9. Effective Collection Development • To ensure a “return on investment” • Measured by collection use • Aim to avoid Type I and II errors • Type II errors: titles acquired but not used • Type I errors: titles used but not acquired • Can be measured using circulation data and interlibrary loan data (ILL)

10. Measuring Collection Use • Circulation statistics • Titles that library acquired and used • Can identify needs in various subject areas • Can identify user groups (student or faculty) • ILL titles • Reflect user needs that the library doesn’t own • Can identify user groups

11. Study Questions • What do ILL book requests and circulation data tell us about our collection use and patron needs? • How can data analysis inform our collection development practices to better serve our patrons?

12. Beginning Assumptions • Effective collection development can be measured by collection use • Collection use = meeting user needs • User needs represented by titles • owned and circulated • not owned but borrowed via ILL

13. Data and Methods

14. Data Collection • Data extracted for the study period (July 2008-June 2012) • List of books purchased during the study period • Circulation data for titles purchased for the General Collection • ILL data for books borrowed

15. Data Sources • Acquisitions data • Voyager data for the past four FY periods (July 2008 — June 2012) • Recent publications with 2007 imprints or later used to analyze circulation and ILL data

16. Imprint Dates for New AcquisitionsFY 2008—2011 Cut-off date Note: Percents do not add up to 100% due to the exclusion of titles published outside the imprint dates above.

17. Data Sources • Circulation data • Voyager data for the past four FY periods (July 2008 — December 2012) • General Collections (circulating)

18. Data Sources • ILL data • OCLC User Statistics for the past four FY periods (July 2008 – June 2012)

19. Data Scope • Included all faculty, graduate student and undergraduate transactions for books circulated and borrowed via ILL having imprint dates of 2007 onward • Eliminated LC classes A, C, S, U, V because of very low acquisition rate • End result represented 82% of purchased books and 30% of books borrowed on ILL

20. Measures • Total user needs in a library • Circulation of local library materials • ILL requests for library materials that are not locally available • Focus on recent acquisitions

21. Testing the Assumptions • What are we buying? • What are we circulating? • What are we borrowing on ILL? • How well have we done in collection building to meet user needs?

22. Initial Findings

23. Data Set

29. Another Way of Looking at the Data • If Lending = User needs met and • Lending = Circulation + ILL • Then (ILL / (Circulation + ILL)) = the part of lending that is ILL or the portion of user needs not met by our collection

36. Some Rethinking • Maybe we’re looking at this incorrectly • Maybe all borrowing (via ILL or our acquired collection) is not equal, not all “need” • Maybe we’re looking at “The Long Tail”

37. A Brief Digression • The Long Tail

38. The Light Bulb

43. Caution in using ILL Data • Purpose of ILL service • To meet academic needs (e.g., multidisciplinary titles) • To meet user needs of general interest outside curriculum scope • For recreational purposes • Take above factors into consideration when considering user-initiated acquisitions

44. Early Conclusions • We have made some inaccurate assumptions • all need is not equal • The question is not “What should we buy?” but “Should we buy?” • We cannot judge the usefulness of a book without expert mediation • Findings can shed light on effectiveness of collection development practices

45. Post Study Questions • What constitutes a good academic collection? • Should ILL requests continue be seen as needs in the long tail or are we looking at the cutting edge? • If ILL needs represent more than just long tail, should the library re-examine our collection development policy?

46. Thank You! Questions? • Forrest Link, linkf@tcnj.edu • Yuji Tosaka, tosaka@tcnj.edu • Cathy Weng, weng@tcnj.edu