College and university students across the United States are concerned about the cost of textbooks. This study examines the student patterns of coping with textbook inflation and the role that course reserve collections play in ameliorating costs. In the winter of 2007, an online survey was distributed to 1,500 Oregon State University students to explore their textbook purchasing habits and use of course reserves. Students reported that textbook costs come directly from their personal funds. They see course reserves as one mechanism to help them deal with textbook costs. Libraries could focus efforts to assist students by purchasing recommended and optional textbooks.
In 1998, tenure track librarians at Oregon State University
(OSU) Libraries were required to participate in peer evaluation of
instruction. This paper discusses the benefits of peer evaluation as
applied to library instruction and outlines the planning, implementation,
and outcomes of a formal process for peer evaluation of instruction at
OSU Libraries.
Students at U.S. colleges and universities are concerned about the high cost of textbooks. Expansion of library course reserves has been suggested as one solution to this problem. The authors surveyed libraries at public universities to explore the status and management of physical course reserves and the role they play vis-à-vis textbookclass materials, which may take the form of books, photocopied articles, textbooks, class notes, old tests, and video or sound recordings.The authors would not have thought about investigating the status of physical course reserve services had it not been for a wakeup call we received from an article published in the campus student newspaper. The Daily Barometer (Heartman, 2005) reported on a proposal that had been presented to the faculty senate by the Associated Students of Oregon State University (ASOSU). The students were very concerned about the rising cost of textbooks and looked to the library as a source of relief. Their proposal called for two copies of every assigned textbook to be put on reserve in the library as one solution for coping with highly inflated textbook costs.According to a 2005 report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), students spend on average $900 a year on textbooks. System, 2007; NYPIRG, 2008). These recommendations do not acknowledge the costs for libraries of providing expanded reserve services in terms of budget, space, and staffing. Only the report from the Minnesota Office of Higher Education (2007) addressed these issues in any fashion by stating that "faculty can be encouraged to support library expenses for the placement of textbooks on library reserve" (p. 11). Costs are an enormous issue. A recent textbook reserve project at the University of Illinois had to be abandoned because of high costs (Laskowski, 2007).The ASOSU proposal inspired the authors to ask questions about the library's physical course reserves service (Pollitz & Christie, 2006). What were the implications in terms of budget and staffing if the OSU Libraries adopted the students' recommendation for alleviating textbook costs? Are course reserves sustainable and still relevant in today's academic climate? What does it cost to run a course reserve service? Is providing a reserve service the most effective use of these funds? Questions about our own course reserves service prompted us to wonder how other libraries were managing their services and how librarians viewed the interplay between course reserve services and the high cost of textbooks.There is little current literature on how physical course reserve services are being used. In the past 10 years, with the development and adoption of electronic reserve services (e-reserves), library literature has focused on that topic with very little attention paid to traditional paper-based reserve services.
Management of Library Course Reserves
461There is also little current information on the cost of providing the physical course reserve service, including the purchase of books and other items to go on reserve and libr...
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