How does a smaller, fully online academic library offer a wide and deep collection of academic level e-books to its distance learners in a sustainable and affordable way? The State University of New York (SUNY) Empire State College Online Library, with a staff of four, has used demand-driven e-book acquisitions since September 2013. Despite…

In her biography about her horticulturalist father, Jonathan Baldwin Turner, Mary Turner Carriel wrote the following of Turner's quest to fence prairies; words that may also serve as an allegory for present-day libraries: What he could have done to tempt the pioneer from his home in the East to settle upon the fertile lands in the West. The first…

Wise and careful selection of materials remains among the most important and enduring duties of the librarian--and also among the most difficult. The author has found this to be especially true in a specialized-subject library, where traditional collection development methods do not always yield good results. While collection development practices…

Fewer employees, shorter hours, diminished collection budgets, reduced programs and services--all at a time of record library usage. In this book, library expert Carol Smallwood demonstrates that despite the obvious downsides, the necessity of doing business differently can be positive, leading to partnering, sharing, and innovating. This…

Memoirs and autobiographies have been a wildly popular nonfiction genre for the past 20 years, ever since Frank McCourt and Mary Karr set the craze in motion with "Angela's Ashes" and "The Liar's Club", respectively. Memoirs have drawn fiction readers to the nonfiction shelves and elbowed their way into book discussion groups. In this confessional…

The silo is a well-worn metaphor in information systems used to illustrate separateness, isolation, and lack of connectivity. Through the many iterations of system development, libraries, archives, and museums (LAMs) have sought to avoid silos and find the sweet spot between interface design and metadata interoperability. This effort is being…

The core mission of libraries has always centered on making content and related services available to patrons. The form in which that content is delivered has changed continually. The most ancient libraries or archives organized clay tablets or cylinders written in cuneiform. Centuries ago, the transition from scrolls to codices must have been…

What do a pink door, reading glasses, a website, and a Beetle Kill Pine ceiling have in common? Yes, readers will find them all in this collection of great design in libraries. But the reason they're featured is their important commonality: they were intentionally and thoughtfully placed in a library to meet people's needs or otherwise engage…

The relatively high use rates and program attendance highlight the public value provided by local libraries at a time of dramatic economic, technology, and demographic change. The Public Libraries in the United States Survey is one important way of examining when, where and how library services are changing to meet those needs. The data, supplied…

Baking can be intimidating. Just ask all those contestants on "Top Chef" who would rather prepare Beef Wellington than bake a cake. But libraries can take the fear factor out of baking by putting together a solid collection of cookbooks that can help anyone master the sweeter side of the culinary arts or even serve as delicious armchair reading…

Since SC LENDS started operating in June 2009, more public libraries have come on board. All of this on the back end connects to a Mozilla-based staff client that has distributions for Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows, using SSL encryption to keep communications secure and private between remote libraries and the servers hosted at a high-end…

Traditional libraries are being redefined. They are not only places to access books in print, but are also rich resources for digital assets. As a result, technology training programs need to progress beyond basic "mouse and keyboard" in order to meet the ever-changing needs and demands of the public. As library collections transition to…

The lyrics from the Ervin Drake song made famous by Frank Sinatra, "It Was a Very Good Year," kept coming to mind in 2010, despite the economy. While the quantity of works produced declined, and publishers suffered along with everyone else, there was no diminution in quality. With reduced budgets for collections, librarians were forced to make…

As I approach my thoughts on faith and the adult learning I will concentrate my deliberations on faith, spirituality and dissonance, and the adult learner as reported in in-person dialogs selected from four studies (Shirk, 1990, 1998, 2005). Consideration will be given to the sociopsychological aspects of and the costs and benefits related to…

Library staff members should ultimately base their purchasing choices on the mission statements of their employing institutions. Fortunately, library mission statements have much in common. Undoubtedly, for example, all libraries have a goal that includes "serve the information needs of the community," because on some level, all libraries are…