ERIC Number: ED317219
Record Type: Non-Journal
Publication Date: 1990-Jan
Pages: 27
Abstractor: N/A
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: N/A
EISSN: N/A
Available Date: N/A
A Preliminary Look at How Non-Academic, Off-Campus Patrons Use College and University Library Engineering Materials and Services.
Franklin, Hugh
Libraries at 52 U.S. colleges and universities offering engineering programs were surveyed by mail to determine how they handled the engineering information needs of off-campus, nonacademic users. Twenty-five provided usable responses. For this sample, 60.4% of the estimated service is to companies, 18.8% to consultants/entrepreneurs/inventors, 13.2% to government agencies, and 7.6% to "others." Service to technical companies exceeds that to legal companies by a ratio of 13.5 to 1. State government agencies receive more service than federal government agencies by a ratio of 1.4 to 1. Most service is provided within the urban area of the particular library. Reference accounts for 33% of services; circulation for 27.4%; interlibrary loan for 19.8%; online searching for 16.4%; document delivery for 2.2%; and "other" for 1.2%. Fees charged vary widely among libraries. Circulation fees are charged by 54.4% of the responding libraries, with no allowance for level of use. Five libraries (22% of the respondents) charge for any type of reference service. Nine appended "figures" include the survey instrument and tables and graphs displaying the survey results. (Contains 15 references.) (Author/SD)
Publication Type: Reports - Research; Tests/Questionnaires
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A
Author Affiliations: N/A