The Changing Academic Library

"The Changing Academic Library is a revision of Budd's The Academic Library: Its Context, Its Purpose, and Its Operation. This book has been completely updated and revised to reflect the dynamic states of higher education and academic libraries. It presents a critical examination of major issues facing colleges and universities and the unique challenges that their libraries must come to grips with. Current practice is reviewed, but it is examined in the broader context of educational needs, scholarly communication, politics and economics, technology, and the nature of complex organizations."--Publisher's description.

"In this newly revised and expanded third edition, The Changing Academic Library: Operations, Culture, Environments, number 74 in ACRL's Publications in Librarianship series, presents a critical examination of major issues facing colleges and universities and the unique challenges their libraries face. In twelve chapters--including a completely new second chapter on the state of higher education--the book presents an overview of higher education and the role of libraries within the institution, covering academic models from private colleges to public universities; discusses governance models, financing, and organizational culture, and the library's place within them; examines changes in scholarly communication; looks at the impact of the library on its community; and explores issues affecting library collections, access, services, and staffing"--

Academic libraries are in the midst of significant disruption. Academic librarians and university administrators know they need to change, but are not sure how. Bits and pieces of what needs to happen are clear, but the whole picture is hard to grasp. Reimagining the Academic Library paints a simple straightforward picture of the changes affecting academic libraries and what academic librarians need to do to respond to the changes would help to guide future library practice. The aim is to explain where academic libraries need to go and how to get there in a book that can be read in a weekend. David Lewis provides a readable survey of the current state of academic library practice and proposes where academic libraries need to go in the future to provide value to their campuses. His primary focus is on collections as this is the area with the greatest opportunity for change and is the driver of most library cost. Lewis provides an accessible framework for thinking about how library practice needs to adjust in the digital environment. The book will be useful not only to academic librarians, but also for librarians to share with presidents and provosts who a concise source for understanding where and how to focus their expenditures on libraries.

Massive technological change has been impacting universities and university libraries in recent years. Such change has manifested in technological developments impacting all areas of academic library activity, including systems, services, collections, the physical library environment, marketing, and support for university teaching, learning, research, and administration. Many books and papers have examined these changes from a technical perspective. However, there is little substantive reflection on what technological change means, and how best to get out in front of it, for the academic library. Technology, Change and the Academic Library systematically reflects on technological innovation, the successes, failures and lessons learned, the nature, process and culture of change, and key aspects including impacts on library staff and users, roles and responsibilities, and skills and capabilities. The book takes an international perspective on the massive change currently affecting academic libraries. The title gives an overview and literature review, considers technological innovation and change management, future technologies and future change, and provides information on further reading. Case studies describe the rationale, aims, and objectives for particular technological innovations, and consider methods, outcomes, and recommendations for the future. Finally, the book reflects back on how technological change can best be wrought in academic libraries. Gives library managers and librarians insight into how best to identify, plan, and implement technological innovation Provides a wide-ranging overview, literature review, and a series of reflective case studies on technological innovation in libraries Emphasises current trends, lessons, and critical issues for putting technological innovation into place Offers an international perspective on technological innovation in the academic library Uses a critical methodology to reflect on what works, what does not, and how managers can apply lessons from real cases worldwide

"Institutions of higher education and academic libraries are not the traditional organizations they once were. They are subject to a variety of forces, including shifting and changing populations, technological changes, public demands for affordability and accountability, and changing approaches to research and learning. Academic libraries can no longer establish their excellence and ground their missions, visions, and strategic directions using the old means and methods. Leading Change in Academic Libraries is a collection of 20 change stories authored by academic librarians from different types of four-year institutions. Librarians tell the story firsthand of how they managed major change in processes, functions, services, programs, or overall organizations using John Kotter's Eight-Stage Process of Creating Major Change as a framework for examining change at their institutions, measuring their successes and areas for improvement, and determining progress. In five sections--strategic planning, reorganization, culture change, new roles, and technological change--chapters discuss tackling common challenges such as fear, anxiety, change fatigue, complacency, unexpected changes of leadership, vacancies, and resistance; look at the results of their tactics; and provide effective practices they found. Each section ends with a thorough analysis of the stories within and the most effective tips for leading that kind of change. Leading Change in Academic Libraries can help you establish flexible, nimble, and collaborative decision-making processes, and facilitate the transition from legacy collections-based libraries to forward-looking service-based libraries"--from the ALA website.

Examining the academic library within a contextual framework (of colleges, universities, and American society), this work provides analysis of the institution's content and function. Rather than concentrating on management issues, this book emphasizes the structure, organization, decision making and operations of academic libraries.

This book advances the belief that the library--more than any other cultural institution--collects, curates and distributes the results of human thought. Essays broaden the debate about academic libraries beyond only professional circles, promoting the library as a vital resource for the whole of higher education. Topics range from library histories to explorations of changing media. Essayists connect modern libraries to the remarkable dream of Alexandria's ancient library--facilitating groundbreaking research in every imaginable field of human interest, past, present and future. Academic librarians who are most familiar with historical traditions are best qualified to promote the library as an important aspect of teaching and learning, as well as to develop resources that will enlighten future generations of readers. The intellectual tools for compelling, constructive conversation come from the narrative of the library in its many iterations, from the largest research university to the smallest liberal arts or community college.

Libraries of all types have undergone significant developments in the last few decades. The rate of change in the academic library, a presence for decades now, has been increasing in the first decade of this century. It is no exaggeration to claim that it is undergoing a top to bottom redefinition. Cataloging and reference remain central to its new role, and the circulation of books is still high though declining. Among the changes is the architecture of the library: when new libraries replace old or where renovation is occurring; the role of technology at every stage and in every library application; the management of serials – selection, shelving and budgeting; and in a gradual but irrevocable move to digital forms, altered allocation of resources including larger portions of the budget diverted to preservation, not only of aging books, a theme in the latter part of the last century, but of digital files – cultural, historical, personal. In brief, the academic library is dramatically different today than it was only ten years ago. And with it, the profession of the academic librarian is also undergoing significant changes. Managing digital resources in all its forms, from telecommunications to storage and access devices, is central to its new roles. Creating, curating and preserving digital information is also key to the new librarianship. And what about services to its clients? Here also we see dramatic change, particularly but not exclusively with guiding library users in the effective use of networked knowledge. Information literacy is a key term and skill in using the new tools of digital literacy: reading and writing, searching and extracting; and the new technologies that drive social networking – the Iphone, Ipad, and Ipod and its many imitators. We can’t expect the redefined academic library to assume its final shape any time soon, if ever, but the transformation is well underway. This series: Creating the 21st-Century Academic Library, will explore this topic from a number of different perspectives. Volume 1, Visionary Leadership and Futures, will begin the discussion by examining some of the new roles and directions academic libraries are taking.