A LIBRARY PLANNING AND ACTION INITIATIVE

BACKGROUND

University of California’s library system is at a critical juncture. The combined effect of budget constraints and spiraling prices – coupled with the growth in demand for digital documents but with minimal relief in the demand for print and other formats – has resulted in a nonsustainable “business model” for campus libraries individually and for the University as a whole. Old formulae developed for State funding of libraries are no longer relevant to new situations. There is no library plan on the table that accommodates the changing realities. UC’s librarians are in an increasingly untenable position in trying to mediate between and among faculty/student needs and budgetary constraints.

There is an urgent need to develop a sustainable business model to accommodate the evolution of our libraries and to implement actions that fit with that model. This model must have the support of campus leadership and of the faculty, and integrate with overall academic planning. In the context of budgetary decentralization, this model must also address how to budget our libraries so that they function as an overall unified system.

The unique nature of the UC System – with nine first-class research campuses – compels us to take leadership in establishing “the UC Library of Tomorrow” that can both support traditional modes of scholarship and take advantage of emerging technologies to establish new modalities.

The University Librarians have been struggling with how to pursue the vision of a single library system and yet be responsive to their campus needs. Although the University already benefits from many cooperative activities, there is no overarching framework that governs a unified model, other than a 15-year old plan that does not address today’s issues. A fresh approach is needed with new incentives to stimulate strategic change.

INITIATIVE

At the May '96 retreat of the Chancellors and Academic Vice Chancellors, there was agreement that a university-wide approach to library planning is essential in order to maximize the information resources available through the libraries and take best advantage of emerging technologies. The University Librarians have been considering how to address these issues, as have the Executive Budget Committee, the Academic Planning Council, and the Academic Senate.

In light of this broad interest in enhancing the UC library system in both substantive and cost effective ways, an 18 month planning and action initiative will be undertaken to begin on September 1, 1996. The initiative will identify organizational, budgetary, and functional changes required to ensure the continued scholarly and economic vitality of UC's libraries; guide library evolution over the next decade; and ensure that immediate actions are taken in support of such changes and evolution.

GOALS

The overall goals of the planning and action initiative shall be to:

• Propose specific recommendations for improving the organizational, functional and budgetary context within which the UC libraries operate, as a framework for library evolution over the next five to ten years. In particular:
• recommend a sustainable business model or models for the University library system to accommodate the changing funding, intellectual, service, collection development and technology environment;
• develop viable options for collaborating with other segments of the State's educational system, with industry, and with other educational and research institutions to improve access to information resources and the effectiveness of library services across the State;
• determine the most effective ways to exploit digital technologies to provide new opportunities and to mediate changing demands, exponential growth, and rising costs; and assess how the presence of these technologies may shift the role and scope of libraries, librarians and library services.
• initiate actions and strategic projects that can both provide information critical to planning and address immediate issues faced by the University’s libraries.
• Strengthen on-going efforts to:
• assess the effects of recent campus library acquisitions decisions on current demands of scholarship and teaching, and project future adequacy in the light of trends, academic programming, and changing faculty interests; and
• enhance sharing of information resources and services among UC’s libraries, including: greater coordination of collection development; increased non-bibliographic resource sharing; greater leveraging of the University’s purchasing power; and more effective inter-library loan processes.

PLANNING TEAM AND ADVISORY PLANNING TASK FORCE

The goals will be accomplished by the work of a designated Planning Team in the Office of the President and an advisory Library Planning Task Force, chartered by the Provost, who will work closely with the team. To assure the breadth of input necessary, this Task Force will be composed of Chancellors, Vice Chancellors, other Academic Administrators, University Librarians, LAUC representatives, Information Technologists, Faculty, including relevant Senate committee representation, and Students. The Task Force will be chaired by an Academic Vice Chancellor and charged with advising the Provost and the Planning Team on achievement of the initiative's goals.

Responsibility for coordinating the overall initiative will be jointly shared by The Associate Vice President for Information Resources and Communications and the Vice Provost responsible for library planning in the Division of Academic Affairs.

The Planning Team will be headed by a University Librarian, who will take a leave of absence to come to OP for this purpose. The UL would be given the title of Special Assistant for Library Planning, and will be a member of the Library Planning Task Force. The Planning Team will include one full-time staff member. The Special Assistant for Library Planning would also work closely with Gary Lawrence, (Coordinator of Libraries and Academic Computing) and Clifford Lynch, (Director of the Division of Library Automation), and other appropriate staff at UCOP and at the campuses.

ASSUMPTIONS

The efforts of the task force and the working team will be guided by the following assumptions:

1. The UC Library System constitutes a shared Universitywide resource, and in the upcoming decentralized fund allocation environment, new organizational and budgetary means may be necessary to sustain and enrich the concept of "one University, one library."
2. A process is needed to develop new business models that integrate library planning and actions with Universitywide and campus academic programs, as well as information technology plans, and that is not wedded to existing approaches to library planning and budgeting.
3. The UC library can play a critical role as providers of information services to other California higher education segments and to the state as a whole.
4. The planning process must reach out beyond the Task Force and the Planning Team to the full range of "stakeholders", including COC, COVC, APC, the Academic Senate, University Librarians, LAUC, the Library Council, Information Technologists, and others.
5. The planning process should comprehend the full range of academic and library issues, including digital and non-digital.
6. Initiatives must be launched in the immediate future. The University must act as well as plan.

DIGITAL LIBRARY WORKING GROUP AND OTHER INITIATIVES

With regard to this last assumption, the planning and action initiative must nurture activities underway and build upon prototype efforts and projects.

The work of the Task Force and the Planning Team should build on the report of the Digital Library Working Group, an effort initiated by the University Librarians and the Library Council. Indeed, the planning initiative should not delay the momentum generated by this undertaking, but should extend its efforts to initiate the “Library of Tomorrow”. Projects should be launched right away in “technology-ready” disciplines, such as science and engineering where there are also heavy expenditures on journals, but planning consideration will need to be given to how to broaden such projects to apply to other disciplines, and reach out beyond the boundaries of UC.

The Task Force and Planning Team should also focus on the changing role of libraries in the chain of scholarly communication, in particular the role of the library in electronic publishing. UC, for example, is in a strong position to help resolve the crisis in scholarly monographs, whose continuing publication is threatened by the twin pressures of rising costs and diminishing circulation. The Planning Team should encourage new synergies to evolve among libraries, the UC Press, and information technology providers leading to different, more cost effective, means of production and distribution.

Other initiatives should be undertaken to strengthen on-going efforts to:

• assess the effects of recent campus library acquisitions decisions on current demands of scholarship and teaching, and project future adequacy in the light of trends, academic programming, and changing faculty interests; and
• enhance sharing of information resources and services among UC’s libraries, including: greater coordination of collection development; increased non-bibliographic resource sharing; greater leveraging of the University’s purchasing power; and more effective inter-library loan processes.