Your Comment: I wish the library provided access to more online and print journals in my area of research.
Our Response: The library recognizes the increasing demand by faculty and students for print and electronic resources necessary for their learning, teaching and research. Unfortunately, even before the recent budget cutbacks, funding for library collections failed to keep pace with enrollment growth, new programs and degrees, and the escalating costs (well above general inflation rates) of scholarly journal and database subscriptions.
In some cases, the library's declining budget for journals has forced us to choose between print and online subscriptions for journals. Since many more people can simultaneously use an online journal from outside the physical library, we have and will continue to move as much content as possible from print to online journal access.
Because the library has been unable to subscribe to many new journals for the past few years (and will be reviewing serials again this year for additional cancellations), we are providing very fast turnaround time (24 hours) for the majority of articles requested via Interlibrary Loan.
If you know of resources that would be beneficial to study in your discipline, please suggest them to your subject librarian. The library is happy to consider all requests, and though funding to obtain the resources may not be immediately available we are always striving to provide a collection that best meets the needs of our users and will consider requests as funding becomes available.
Your Comment: The library needs more healthcare field journals online.
Our Response: By 2011, the library's print journals in the health related disciplines will be available online for those journals that offer electronic access. This appears to be a growth area for the university and we are looking for alternate funding sources in order to add to the collection.
Your Comment: I mostly use electronic journals. For many of the journals I need, the content is available electronically back to the start of the journal, but in most cases GSU Library does not provide access to these back issues. It would be really helpful if such access could be provided.
Our Response: The library has purchased several backfile collections of journals. We continue to do so when funds are available for these purchases.
Your Comment: You should consider adding more books on CD or tape for commuting students, especially textbooks, novels for literature classes, and history books, so we can prepare for class while driving.
Our Response: If you have specific suggestions for class-related novels to add to the collection, please let us know. Unfortunately, our decreasing materials budget does not allow us to purchase textbooks or audiobooks that are not related to the curriculum. (You may also have noticed that we have had to eliminate our casual reading collection due to budget cuts, but we are facilitating a book exchange program. We will include audiobooks in the exchange program, if people want to donate them.)
Your Comment: Other libraries, such as the Emory University Library, often have what I need.
Our Response: The University Library maintains cooperative agreements with other academic libraries in the Atlanta area, so that GSU faculty and students can take advantage of the collections of nearby schools such as Emory and Georgia Tech. We also participate in the GIL Express delivery service – you can request a book from another library and pick it up at the GSU Library.
Your Comment: It would be nice if more legal resources were available online from the GSU Law Library for non-law students. Non-law students need access to legal resources.
Our Response: The University Library and the Law library share as many electronic collections as our license agreements allow; examples include HeinOnline and Making of Modern Law. LexisNexis Academic also includes significant legal resources. Unfortunately, resources such as WestLaw will only allow online access for law school students and faculty.
Your Comment: It would be nice if the full-text PDF were available for all articles.
Our Response: We have no control over format; the decision to offer journal articles in PDF or HTML is up to the publishers and the database providers. While the library prefers to subscribe to journals that offer PDF articles, they are not always available in that format.
Your Comment: It’s very inconvenient that some online journals aren’t available for a year or more after publication.
Our Response: Publishers make the decision whether or not to "embargo" or deny online access to the most recent journal issues for a period of time, usually one year. If you need a current article from a journal that is embargoed, put in an ILL request. We can usually deliver the article to your desktop within 24 hours of your request.
Your Comment: If I am willing to donate money to pay for a journal, why will the library not buy that journal for me?
Our Response: Subscriptions to journals are ongoing costs, which increase each year. It has been the library's experience in the past that donors are not able to continue funding subscriptions as prices increase each year. It is not feasible for the library to initiate subscriptions for only a year or two and then cancel access to the title when the donor funds are no longer available. If a journal title fits within our collecting profile we will seriously consider any donation for journal title support that is for a period of five or more years.
Your Comment: It would be convenient if the library provided electronic books that can be retrieved online immediately, like other university libraries do.
Our Response: The library provides access to a number of electronic book collections, for example, ebrary, Books 24x7, NetLibrary, and Gale Virtual Reference Library. You can find these collections through the library’s Article Databases. Records for electronic books are also in GIL, the library catalog, so if you search for a title or subject in the catalog, electronic books are included.
Your Comment: Please don’t replace all of the library’s print books with ebooks! Electronic journals, however, are fantastic.
Our Response: The library does not plan to replace print books with e-books! However, we recognize that e-books have merit: they are convenient for accessing off-campus, allow for multiple people to use the same book at the same time, and fill a need for patrons who cannot come into the library to retrieve a book.
Your Comment: Books that are lost should be replaced automatically. It’s maddening to find out a book is missing, and then learn that the library might not even bother to purchase a replacement copy.
Our Response: The library does selectively replace books that are declared lost, if the book is available and not out of print. The library’s declining materials budget does not allow us to replace every book that is lost from the collection.
Your Comment: I would like to see the acquisition of print books continue to grow. The downside to electronic access is that students don’t physically go to the library. I worry that we lose an awareness of the development of research across time that is only understandable by physically removing items from shelves and replacing them according to year and/or discipline.
Our Response: The library recognizes that not all disciplines use research materials in the same way, and that humanities and fine arts scholars need access to printed books. Budget permitting, the library will continue to acquire print books in the disciplines that require them.