"Research Library Issues" ("RLI") is a bimonthly report from ARL (Association of Research Libraries), CNI (Coalition of Networked Information), and SPARC (Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition). This issue includes the following articles: (1) Removing All Restrictions: Cornell's New Policy on Use of Public…

Putting data-driven decision making into practice requires the use of consistent and reliable data that are easily accessible. The systematic collection and maintenance of accurate information is an important component in developing policy and evaluating outcomes. Since 1982, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) has been collecting…

The Kothmale Community Radio and Interorg project in Sri Lanka has been hailed as an example of how a community radio initiative should function in a developing nation. However, there is some question about whether the Kothmale Community Interorg Project is a true community radio initiative that empowers local communities to access ICT services…

Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) provide the information and tools needed to inform policies, practices and decisions at every level to improve student achievement and system performance. It is equally important that there are policies and practices to protect personally identifiable information and to ensure the confidentiality and…

The literature on sociology in this country in the past few years has featured vigorous discussion of matters relating to the modernization of education in Russia. It is the authors opinion, that the examination of this set of problems has been limited primarily to the present day, and not enough attention is being given to the emergence of the…

A little over a year ago, press releases from the Association of American Publishers (AAP) and Cornell University touted the release of new "jointly drafted" copyright guidelines to govern what has become a tense subject: the use of electronic course reserves, or e-reserves. Since the mid-1990s, e-reserves have offered libraries and academic…

Legislation introduced in Congress last month (the "Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act") would take an aggressive and needed stand against online piracy, a growing problem that hurts American consumers and costs Americans jobs. Critics of the legislation argue that this bill would hurt free speech, encourage censorship in foreign…

How do European universities organise the knowledge transfer (KT) task? We consider the institutional organisation of knowledge transfer as encompassing 1) the knowledge transfer office structure, i.e. the way universities have embedded and organise their KT activities, 2) the focus towards the KT task, linked to the KT strategy, and 3) the KT…

Digital resources play an increasingly important role in academic libraries, which must demonstrate their value to the institution and their impact on student learning outcomes in new and more compelling ways. This study examines 5 years of vendor-supplied e-resource usage data in conjunction with other library and institution measures. Results…

This study was designed to explore the phenomenon of college students who illegally file-share. The main research question was, "What are the experiences of college students who file-share and what are their perspectives on the moral and legal implications for doing so?" Data were collected from six students using interviews, focus…

This research was conducted to investigate the relationships between conceptions and practice of information literacy in academic libraries. To create a structure for the investigation, the research adopted the framework of Argyris and Schon (1974) in which professional practice is examined via theories of action, namely espoused theories and…

In response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the USA PATRIOT Act greatly expanded the ability of the Federal Bureau of Investigation to use National Security Letters (NSLs) in investigations and the contexts in which they could be used by relaxing the standards under which NSLs could be employed. NSLs allow investigators to acquire a significant…

Mark Brazaitis worries that his university may sabotage the literary careers of his students. As director of the creative-writing program at West Virginia University, Mr. Brazaitis oversees the training of about 30 graduate students, who hope to become published authors. At the end of their three years in the program, they hand in their magnum…

ReLeah Cossett Lent provides practical advice for ensuring that books are kept on shelves and in classrooms for students to read. She outlines steps for creating professional learning communities that engage with censorship issues and prepare schools to deal with book challenges in thoughtful, supportive ways. (Contains 4 figures.)

This Digital Literacies column describes the dilemma many new teachers feel as their uses of social networking sites pose conflicts with institutional cautions regarding educators' participation in these kinds of online activities. Pre-service teachers discuss the challenges of marrying their own out-of-school literacies to mandated professional…