This is the second article in a two-part SWOT analysis of academic libraries. The purpose of this research is to guide strategy development, decision making and advancement of positioning by identifying and analyzing the key strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats impacting academic libraries. Its premise is that an understanding of these…

This study sought to (1) Determine how international students conduct research. (2) Determine whether international students conduct research in the way they perceive that they do. (3) Determine whether international students are efficient in conducting research. This study collected data from 67 international students who attend the University of…

This issue of "Research Library Issues" ("RLI") highlights the value of professional failure. The idea to explore this theme emerged from conversations with the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) Innovation Lab Advisory Group earlier this year. It is the hope this issue highlights the value of failure--both its necessary…

The trajectory of U.S. higher education in the next 20 years is portrayed by some as an arc of potential disaster and by others as a slightly upwardly inclined plane that may have some dips along the way. Generally these scenarios focus on the teaching and learning program of higher education institutions and give very little attention to the…

While there is a considerable body of literature that presents the results of citation analysis studies, most researchers do not provide enough detail in their methodology to reproduce the study, nor do they provide rationale for methodological decisions. In this paper, we review the methodologies used in 34 recent articles that present a…

Big data sets and powerful computing capacity have transformed scholarly inquiry across many disciplines. While the impact of data-intensive research methodologies is perhaps most distinct in the natural and social sciences, the humanities have also benefited from these new analytical tools. While full-text data is necessary to study topics such…

This article takes a broad view of the evolution of collecting behaviors in a network environment and suggests some future directions based on various simple models. The authors look at the changing dynamics of print collections, at the greater engagement with research and learning behaviors, and at trends in scholarly communication. The goal is…

This article takes a broad view of the evolution of collecting behaviors in a network environment and suggests some future directions based on various simple models. The authors look at the changing dynamics of print collections, at the greater engagement with research and learning behaviors, and at trends in scholarly communication. The goal is…

How can libraries best assess and improve user space, even if they are not in a position to undertake new construction or a major renovation? Staff at New Mexico State University used a variety of ethnographic methods to learn how our spaces were being used as well as what our users considered to be ideal library space. Our findings helped us make…

Eighteen scholarly papers and twelve abstracts comprise the content of the fourteenth annual Brick and Click Libraries Symposium, held annually at Northwest Missouri State University in Maryville, Missouri. The proceedings, authored by academic librarians and presented at the symposium, portray the contemporary and future face of librarianship.…

Modern composition instructors often use and teach research methods for Internet search engines and electronic databases. It is not their intent to turn back the clock. However, if they can help students connect the world of Internet searches and the university library, they can promote information literacy in its broadest sense by developing…

The study describes the methodology of a comparative citation analysis, discusses the results of its application to the analysis of published works and student theses at a single research university and evaluates the findings as a background for the management of a university library collection.

This manual describes the methods, procedures, techniques, and activities that were used to produce the Academic Library Survey of 2004 (ALS:2004). This manual is designed to provide guidance and documentation for users of the ALS data. Included in the manual are the following: (1) an overview of the study and its predecessor studies; (2) an…

A theoretical model proposed by Paul Kantor for determining shelf availability for library materials by checking a small sample of items drawn from the checklist against the stacks and circulation records is applied to a working environment, and the following considerations are examined: (1) time required to apply the model to a working library…

Book condition surveys have been conducted in several large research libraries in the United States to determine the extent of book deterioration in those libraries. This paper outlines the steps for conducting a brittle book survey adapted from more comprehensive surveys to assess the extent of paper brittleness of the book collections in a small…