This reply is not being sent because Joe and I happen to work for the same library. Its impetus is my hope to throw in a bit of patron-side POV.
If the ABA criteria are meant to measure whether member institutions meet minimal standards for works locally available to their faculty and student patrons, counting every individually cataloged title makes sense to me (whether hard-copy, microform, or electronic).
What should be important to ABA, imho, is ensuring that some minimum mass of critical works is locally available.
Why count any works that can't be located via the institution's OPAC? Why not count all works that can be located via the institution's OPAC?
Enquiring minds want to know ...
Stanley
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Stanley R. Conrad, JD/MLS
Reference / Special Collections Librarian [on leave]
Rittenberg Law Library
St. John's University School of Law
8000 Utopia Parkway
Jamaica, NY 11439
conrads@stjohns.edu
718-990-2012 (voice)
718-990-6649 (fax)
-----Original Message-----
From: owner-law-lib@ucdavis.edu on behalf of Joseph Hinger
Sent: Tue 10/4/2005 1:26 PM
To: law-lib@ucdavis.edu
Cc: Linda Ryan; ptejeda@charlestonlaw.org; feld@ymail.yu.edu; james.mumm@marquette.edu
Subject: ABA questionnaire
In filling out the recent 2004/2005 ABA Annual Questionnaire, I was quite surprised at some of the changes in this year’s questions, specifically relating to electronic and web-based titles. It appears as if electronic and/or web-based titles or products are NOT counted anywhere in the title count, however, we ARE permitted to count them as a serial subscription (if they are serials) if they are cataloged separately in the library’s catalog.
These questions and definitions seem a bit illogical to me. Historically, at least in my 15 years of working Law Library Technical Services, emphasis has been put more and more each year on the phrase “if you have it cataloged in your system on a record, then it can be counted.” In many libraries, micro titles are NOT cataloged to title level contained within the package, therefore, no counting should take place. If libraries do have the financial resources and manpower to catalog such packages at the title level, and you have records in your system for these titles, then by all means they can be counted. Over the past 10 to 15 years, libraries have spent great financial resources in cataloging such packages, as well as purchasing cataloging for these packages from outside vendors; thus, allowing us to count such titles.
What makes the online world so different? If I catalog something online, whether it is a serial subscription, or a monograph, or a map, etc., I should be permitted to count it, as I have a record in my catalog.
The way I see the questionnaire this year, NOT being able to count electronic and/or web-based titles or products, whether I have a bibliographic/cataloging record for it or not, leads me to believe that the overall direction of the questionnaire could change from year to year. I personally believe, that in alignment with the past questionnaires, that libraries should be able to count whatever they want, as long as there is a bibliographic/cataloging record for it in your library system. In my library, we have spent great amounts of financial resources, time, manpower, etc., to catalog our retrospective microform titles AND our online resources, as we tended to believe that “if we cataloged it, we could count it.” Now we are being told differently, regarding web-based/electronic titles. I hope to see this disparity corrected in future ABA Questionnaires.
A recommendation that I have is for us to be alerted at least a year in advance what the questions will be in the coming year. Receiving the questionnaire after the timeframe for which the statistics are requested has caused me major manipulation of the information in my online system. Had I known what they would be asking a year ago, I could have “recoded” my system to recount these statistics well in advance of receiving the questionnaire.
This past year at the AALL meeting, there were several sessions on statistics and counting, that were very interesting and thought provoking. I’m sure any discussion about this topic would be appreciated by the Statistics Committee of AALL, as well as the Subcommittee on Serials Statistics, which is a subcommittee of the the Serials Committee of the Technical Services SIS.
I would love to hear others feelings about this ABA Questionnaire situation, and how others are approaching these changed questions.
Joseph Hinger
Associate Librarian for Technical Services
St. John’s University
Rittenberg Law Library
8000 Utopia Parkway
Jamaica, NY 11439
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