Serials Reviews in Uncertain Times: Two Approaches and Advice for Avoiding Fiscal Nightmares

10/21/2002
NELA Annual Conference
Sturbridge, MA

Albert Joy (University of Vermont)
Jay Schafer (University of Massachusetts at Amherst)
Leslie C. Knapp, EBSCO Subscription Services

Presented by the New England Technical Services Librarians (NETSL) at the New England Library Association's Annual Conference, Sturbridge, Mass.

Co-sponsored by the North American Serials Interest Group (NASIG).

Presented October 21, 2002, by the New England Technical Services Librarians at the New England Library Association's Annual Conference in Sturbridge, Mass. Co-sponsored by the North American Serials Interest Group (NASIG).

This panel discussion featured librarians from two state universities in New England and a representative from one of the major serials vendors, speaking on the all-too-perennial issue of reviewing serials subscriptions. Despite the broad generic similarity between the academic institutions represented, their serial review (or cancellation) projects were conducted under dramatically contrasting circumstances. In one situation, a review project was undertaken proactively, allowing an opportunity to creatively rethink the composition of the locally-held serials collection. In the other, a series of disastrous budget cuts forced not only a set of cancellations which cut down into the muscle and bone of the collection, but also a radical rethinking of information provision in general.

Albert Joy, Acquisitions and Collection Development Librarian at the University of Vermont's Bailey-Howe Library, discussed a one-year project undertaken in 2001 to review the periodicals collection and reduce expenditures, with an initial goal of saving 15%. As well as describing the project itself, he emphasized the process involved. Although the project was difficult, it was made somewhat more palatable by the fact that the library staff was able to undertake it thoughtfully, using a timetable of its own choosing rather than being forced to react under pressure.

The first aspect of any serials or cancellation project to consider is the motivation for undertaking it. The aims and goals must be as clear as possible. In this case, an analysis of expenditures and trends at Bailey-Howe showed that 72% of acquisitions expenditures were for serials, and that this percentage was likely to increase. Mr. Joy thus originated the process of imposing the cuts, as a way to anticipate and limit future budget problems.

As mentioned, the overall goal in this instance was to cut 15% of current serials expenditures. But how to allocate the cuts is a separate question from an overall goal, and leads to the question of what exactly is being cut. Are cuts being thought of in terms of number of titles or dollar amounts? Will the cuts be made equally across academic departments, and if not, what other approach will be used? In 1992, the library went through a similar process, with the intent to cut an equal percentage of expenditures across departments. However, this resulted in (for example) more history titles being cut than chemistry titles, as the latter are much more expensive. This type of outcome was not necessarily desired as part of the 2001 project.

A most essential question in terms of the politics of budget cutting is, who is making the decisions? To address all aspects of the project, a committee was formed, both to ensure stakeholder review and to allow for political considerations to be appropriately addressed. Part-time faculty were included in the committee, as they were among the most knowledgeable stakeholders.

Mr. Joy emphasized the importance of the review instrument used to the success of a serials review project. Every aspect of such an instrument can make a difference to the process and the outcome, from format (spreadsheet vs. text file, paper vs. online), to the elements included (such as historical price information, or information about inclusion in aggregations), and particularly the distribution of the titles among academic disciplines. The 1992 project involved a spreadsheet sorted by Library of Congress Classification numbers. There was some provision for interdisciplinary sharing of data: for example, the Psychology and Sociology departments worked with the same classified lists. By contrast, in 2001 lists were generated by department, which gave rise in many cases to the question of determining which department a given title would be assigned to.

Despite the assignment of titles to departments, however, individual faculty members from any discipline were able to review titles on any departmental list. This addressed interdisciplinary questions at a low level of granularity, that of the individual teacher and researcher. The periodicals lists were available for review on the campus network. Faculty logged on using their library usernames and barcodes, which allowed project managers to view participation by department. Information about individual titles included their current prices and average yearly price increases. Each person was able to rank individual titles as "no longer needed," "less important," "more important," or "essential." It as emphasized throughout that the emphasis of the project was on which titles were to be saved, rather than cut.

Mr. Joy described the communication plan that was put in place for this project. It is highly desirable, if not essential, that faculty feel a sense of ownership when a major serials review project is underway, but given constant demands on their time and attention, they must receive multiple communications about the importance of participating. In this case, letters were sent by email to the faculty network, emphasizing the major points of determining what is to be kept and the project's interdisciplinary focus. The final level of participation was considered low, with about 20% of faculty responding. Mr. Joy visited forty-three department chairs with analyzed project data, which showed the results for individual titles sorted by the highest rank given, rather than the mean rank. Consistent with the project's emphasis on what to keep, this meant that if one person said a given title was "essential," then it would be ranked as such. This means of ranking, combined with the data about relative levels of participation by department, provided the basis for negotiation by showing which titles were desired by faculty in each department, regardless of their initial disciplinary assignments.

In the end, the project resulted in a cut of about 12.5% of serials expenditures. Since the Bailey-Howe Library was not under external pressure to reduce the serials budget, this was an acceptable outcome. Departments that were able to achieve greater than the target of 15% were rewarded with credits for new titles in their disciplines, which in turn created opportunities for department chairs to focus discussion with faculty colleagues on the topic of library serials in their disciplines. Given sufficient time, Mr. Joy concluded, librarians can work in a positive manner with faculty on the often-threatening topic of serials reviews, giving those who participate a sense of ownership in the process, and even allowing for creative thinking about the composition of the collection.

The situation for the library at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst could hardly have presented a sharper contrast. Jay Schafer, Associate Director for Content Acquisition and Access, gave a talk titled "From Collection Development to Content Acquisition and Access." Mr. Schafer's previous title was Coordinator for Collection Development; the change in title was far from cosmetic, as will be seen.

During fiscal year 2002, the University Library was forced to confront successive waves of unanticipated reductions in its collection development budget, totaling approximately $2.5 million. Mr. Schafer began by describing an aspect of the Massachusetts state budget which could well be considered anomalous. The budget includes a line item for Educational Reference Materials (ERM). The ERM is part of the state Board of Higher Education budget, not that of the University system. Nevertheless, it is only used to fund the acquisitions budgets of the state's twenty-nine institutions of higher education. The ERM line is politically vulnerable, and acquisitions funding patterns have proved to be very unstable over time. The Amherst campus receives 30% of the increases or decreases in the ERM line, which, for a major university library, is excessively erratic, and unsustainable over the long view which collection development requires.

At the start of the fiscal year, the library administration had anticipated a budget shortfall of about $200 thousand, and intended to meet this gap without doing a serials cancellation project. On Sept. 26, 2001, the administration received word that the shortfall would instead be $1.2 million, a million dollars greater than expected. By October 2, a plan was put in place to cut journal expenditures by $1 million, and books by $200 thousand. As Mr. Schafer noted, they believed at that point that the budget was balanced for the year.

The $1 million journal cancellation project focused on three categories of materials. The first group was a list of potential cancellations developed in 1999 with faculty input, and approved by faculty. Next, "duplicate" subscriptions for titles received in more than one format, such as paper with online or with microfilm, were cut. This affected 245 titles, but saved only $46,452. The third category of titles examined was those with subscription costs over $2,000. Not all such titles were cut: criteria for examination included subscriptions duplicated the medical school at Worcester, and a calculation of perceived use relative to subscription cost and vs. the cost of document delivery. Not surprisingly, this part of the process hit STM (science, technology, and medicine) titles the hardest. 212 titles were cut in this category: the average subscription cost was $3100 (Mr. Schafer noted that the average Elsevier title cost just over $3000). This third phrase was carried out with minimal faculty input; some advice was sought but there was no opportunity for faculty to veto cancellation decisions. Instead, the library emphasized delivery of content instead of subscriptions (also known as access vs. ownership).

On November 21, the ERM line was cut by 64%, resulting in a loss of another million dollars. On December 3, the library stopped all payments and all new purchasing. Boxes remained unopened, and vendors were told to stop sending new materials.

At this point, the situation was so drastic that a change in tactics was required. On the political level, the library administration sent a message to the campus at large: this is no longer simply the library's problem, but is a problem for the entire campus. The Research Library Council, a Faculty Senate advisory group, put together a white paper on the crisis. The paper emphasized that the threat to the library's vitality is a threat to the institution at large, and that sustainable sources of funding are required. Regarding the latter, the paper suggested solutions such as greater direct funding from the campus's general operating fund, a student fee for library acquisitions, and a Research Trust Funds drawn in part from grants received by faculty. The paper also looked at the Library's projected drop in Association of Research Libraries rankings.

On December 17, the Provost granted $600 thousand, to pay a single outstanding invoice. In February 2002, the Chancellor granted a one-time payment of $2 million, with the caveat that the funds should be spread out over a couple of years. With these funds, the library paid existing invoices and restarted standing orders (but not approval plans).

The first phase of the crisis, the need to fund existing obligations, was therefore addressed, although ongoing collection development efforts were still devastated. The second phase, now in progress, addresses the changing nature of library collections at the University. The emphasis at this point, in discussions with the faculty, is on "content review" rather than cancellations per se. There will be a significant shift to providing members of the community with the content they require, beyond the collection development paradigm. This, then, is the significance of Mr. Schafer's change in title, to Associate Director for Content Acquisition and Access.

The Massachusetts state budget crisis, still unresolved as of this writing, has had a number of other outcomes. There is a proposal in the state legislature to eliminate the ERM as a politically vulnerable line item, with library acquisitions funds folded into campus budgets instead. The FY2003 budget for the University at Amherst includes a significant increase in library funding as part of the campus's own budget, although the still-existing ERM has been further cut. The Library has been hit with multiple staff reductions, many resulting from early retirement. There is a new and real awareness of the significance of the Library's acquisitions budget among administration, faculty, and students, and a growing acceptance of the concept of a mix of acquisition and access to information resources required by campus constituencies. There is an increasing commitment to campus-based funding of acquisitions. In all, the disaster of FY2002 has made it clear to members of all stakeholder groups that "budget politics as usual" is a process that must be must be radically transformed.

Leslie C. Knapp, EBSCO Subscription Services, concluded the program with "An Agent's Perspective on Serials Reviews," with an emphasis on how best to work with agents during a review process. Close communication is essential. It is particularly important for libraries to advise their agents about the potential scope of cuts before the final decisions are made. Agents and libraries are partners in this, and both parties will benefit by the provision of timely information. Ms. Knapp described the timing of the renewal process, in terms of the agent's relationships with both libraries and publishers. Again, the better the understanding by library staff, of how agents must work with publishers to ensure subscription continuity and efficiently process order changes, the more smoothly a serials review process will be accomplished.

Serials agents are working in the same economic environment as libraries and publishers. Agents also lose money when serials subscriptions are cut. Fewer customers are prepaying annual invoices, as more institutions experience uncertainty about the upcoming year's budgets. Prompt payment of invoices is still essential, however: agents generally borrow money to pay publishers, and must be able to repay the interest. For this reason, agents may assess carrying charges for late payments. In addition, the basic negotiated service charge is based on the expectation of a certain level of business. If that level drops beyond a certain point, the service charge may have to be reviewed.

There are many resources available to help manage a serials review process. Agents will publish their own periodical price indexes, and may also contribute pricing information to articles in professional journals. They can provide special reports to individual libraries in multiple formats, to help assess collection strength, show historical price information for individual titles and groups of titles in different disciplines, help anticipate price increases for domestic and non-domestic titles, and provide detailed information by publisher, periodicals index, and so on.

Ms. Knapp emphasized some key points to remember when undertaking a serials review process. "Noncancellable" titles are those for which no refund is available after the invoice has been paid; this is determined by the publisher, not the agent. For other titles, if customers must make budget cuts after the publishers have been paid, the process for securing refunds is very labor-intensive and time-consuming. (In a paraphrase of Charles Dickens, she told the audience that "It is a far, far better thing not to renew than it is to cancel after being invoiced.") In general, she encouraged the outlook that, while everything about a serials review is a challenge, the process is also an opportunity. Although the experiences of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and the University of Vermont differed in many respects, they both demonstrated the truth of this perspective.

Reported by David Miller (NETSL Writer/Editor)