Editorial

Citation

Ashcroft, L. (2009), "Editorial", New Library World, Vol. 110 No. 7/8. https://doi.org/10.1108/nlw.2009.072110gaa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: New Library World, Volume 110, Issue 7/8

The economic downturn has had influence on both libraries and library associations. The American Library Association has cut staff and taken other measures to cover a projected shortfall in its budget. In the UK, Wirral Council decided to close 11 public libraries, which has resulted in a barrage of protests from angry crowds. A campaign to reverse this controversial move is being mounted. Thus the article from Aabo regarding libraries and return on investment (ROI) is particularly pertinent. Aabo points out that the need to communicate the value of libraries is growing – particularly now during a global financial crisis. Her study provides a meta-analytical review of library studies reporting a return on investment figure and makes the tentative conclusion that “for each dollar invested in public libraries they return, on average, approximately four times more”.

The Commission for Employment and Skills (UK) has recently commented that cutting training in an economic downturn is a false economy. This was reinforced by the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals (CILIP) who say that investment is continuing to be made in developing the skills and expertise of staff and that this is even more important now when there could be fewer staff delivering a service. TFPL commented that their clients have presented a strong demand for more onsite, bespoke training targeted specifically at addressing the organisation’s needs. (Owen, 2009) Attebury and Finnell present the case in their article for the need for specific training regarding liaison duties. Their research involving analysing academic library job advertisements and surveying library school students found that few respondents were exposed to a discussion of liaison work in the classroom, yet liaison activities were included in job advertisements. This has implication for library education and for professional training.

A new report from JISC, Economic Implications of Alternate Publishing Models, for academic journal articles is the result of a year long research project to evaluate the cost effectiveness of three different models. The timing of the report is sensitive given the drop in the value of sterling and UK purchasing power. The report concludes that for unhindered dissemination of results some form of open access publishing is desirable. Juznic’s article focuses on the uses of electronic resources and selection policies in research libraries. He presents the quantitative decision grid evaluation process used by the Slovenian Research Agency, the national funding body.

High profile UK LIS leaders recently attended a seminar following a year long consultation on the “Libraries of the future”. Everyone was worried about commercialisation of information and knowledge and Google’s “monopoly” since Microsoft abandoned its rival digitisation programme. However, Ballard demonstrates in his paper how placemarks on Google Earth and Google Maps can be linked back to a university library’s original content, such as special collections. He describes the process and concludes that “Google has provided libraries with free tools to enhance the discovery and access to their collections”.

Described as “cool, funky and academic”, the new tic@bedford is a social learning space in the Bedford Library at Royal Holloway, University of London. It has been designed to encourage collaborative and group learning, where students can relax and study at the same time. The zone has a new and modern look, providing books, digital resources, IT facilities and group study areas. In their article, Epperson and Leffler move beyond social surroundings to present the results of their study designed to discover the extent to which students use social software programs and to determine their level of desire for having a library or librarian presence within those settings. They conclude that library involvement in social software programs should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis, as the majority of their respondents use these programs but are apathetic about using them for library questions or research.

Guidance on the management of controversial material in public libraries has been published by the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA), who consulted with CILIP. Both bodies worked together to ensure that the guidance upholds the profession’s equal access to and communication of information and knowledge. Perhaps controversial material could result in some “patron aggression”, which is the topic of the article from Kean and McKoy-Johnson. However, while much previous research into aggressive behaviour has focused on public libraries, they focus on this situation in an academic library, presenting research findings from the Main Library at the University of the West Indies. The majority of their respondents had not received any training for these situations and indicated a need. They conclude on how important it is for libraries to have clear policies regarding patron aggression.

Linda Ashcroft