This article describes how to use state-level open records laws as a research tool. Similar to the federal-level Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), state open records laws allow individuals to access records and information held by state agencies. This has the potential to be a potent research tool, though it has been rarely used in library and information science to date. This article provides an overview of the federal and state laws pertaining to accessing government information, and then describes an ongoing research project that used these laws to collect data. Two pilot studies were conducted (one in Massachusetts and one in Alabama) to evaluate the potential of using of state open records laws for research purposes. The article concludes with several suggestions for other researchers who wish to use open records laws to obtain government information for research purposes.
This research project used Freedom of Information requests to obtain public records from Alabama institutions about challenges to materials in public schools and public libraries. Challenges occur when a patron objects to certain content. In this analysis, we examine the records of challenges. The research questions were as follows: How many challenges occur in public schools and libraries? What is the nature of these challenges? Are there institutional or demographic factors that are correlated to the occurrence of challenges? In this exploratory study, the number of reported challenges was surprisingly low. We investigated whether reported challenges were related to certain institutional or demographic factors, but did not find any discernible relationships. The data suggest that most challenged material is retained, but that librarians may be self-censoring to reduce controversy in their collections.
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