- Email: [email protected]
Building by benchmarking: A method of creating and evaluating an Asian American Studies collection
Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/lcats
Building by benchmarking: A method of creating and evaluating an Asian American Studies collection Glenn Masuchika The Pennsylvania State University Libraries at University Park, W304 Pattee Library, University Park, PA, USA
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Available online 30 March 2012 Keywords: Benchmarking Collection development Assessment Asian American Studies
a b s t r a c t This article examines the methodology undertaken while investigating whether existing materials pertaining to Asian American Studies at The Pennsylvania State University Libraries could support a new academic program. Presently active academic subareas in the field of Asian American Studies were determined. Then existing collections of thirteen “benchmark” universities were examined according to these subareas and compared to the holdings of Pennsylvania State University Libraries. This method can evaluate the fitness of existing collections to new academic demands and serve as a tool for collection development by identifying present and future areas of academic study. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction In 2009, The Pennsylvania State University formed an investigative committee and charged the committee members to explore the establishment of an academic minor in Asian American Studies. The committee was comprised of professors, administrators, and librarians, and each brought their insights to the discussion. For the professors, their areas of interest concerned the organization of the new program, its funding, its home location on the campus, the curriculum of the program, and the assigned faculty. For the librarians, their main area of interest was the support of a new academic program with the existing materials in the library, despite the facts that the program did not exist and its eventual needs were not yet known. A methodology was needed to preliminarily evaluate the present library collection based on the assumption that the needs of a proposed Asian American Studies program are similar to the needs of established Asian American Studies programs. The conclusions of the study would be included in the investigation committee's discussions and influence its decision-making process. The methodology of benchmarking was chosen.
2. Asian American Studies in the academic world One response to the civil rights movement that swept through the United States in the 1960s was the establishment of many new fields of academic research that focused on topics such as race and ethnicity, class, sex, and body issues. Colleges and universities began new disciples such as Asian American Studies, African and African American Studies, Hispanic/Chicano and Latino/Latina Studies, and other ethnic-directed academic programs, Women's Studies, Disability Studies, and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered Studies. During this period, the field of Asian American Studies expanded as a legitimate academic area. The Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS, 2007) lists over sixty universities in North America offering research in Asian American Studies, ranging from programs that award doctoral, master and bachelor degrees, as well as undergraduate minor and certificates. The Pennsylvania State University has established academic programs leading to both the bachelor of arts and bachelor of sciences in African and African American Studies and Women's Studies, and dual-titled master's and doctorate in Women's Studies. This inquiry into the establishment
E-mail address: [email protected]. 1464-9055/$ – see front matter © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.lcats.2012.03.001
2
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
of an academic minor in Asian American Studies would be the first step in adding this area of ethnic studies to the curriculum of the Pennsylvania State University. 3. Library concerns and study limitations The primary question is whether the library's collection, as it existed, can adequately and efficiently support both the faculty and the students with informational sources in Asian American Studies. If the Faculty Senate and the University Administration agree to establish a minor in Asian American Studies, can the library immediately support this newly-created academic field of Asian American Studies with existing resources program minor? The answer to this question is based on either of two assumptions. The first assumption is that the architecture and composition of similar programs are alike. Two similar programs develop, growing independently, will be similar, and the research interests of professors in different Asian American Studies programs will converge. Thus if their research interests are similar, the library resources they require would be similar. The second assumption is more troubling, and it is based on the belief that the librarians cannot know the future informational needs of a program not yet established, its directions of research, and the interests of its not-yet-hired professors. The library is attempting to find evidence that its collections could support something that did not exist. Of these two assumptions, only the first, through a discovery process, can produce an answer. The second assumption precludes the use of any discovery process and no answer can be derived. The investigation continued on the assumption that “like-programs” grow “alike.” Investigating the adequacy of the materials in a collection requires evaluation criteria. A method frequently used by librarians involves comparing the existing collect to the various “recommended materials lists” found in the library literature. Books on collection development often include sections listing bibliographic sources useful in finding valued books and materials (Alabaster, 2002; Hoffman & Wood, 2005; Johnson, 2004). These lists are also found in periodical articles and library websites on collection development, and they authoritatively suggest sources to get the “best of…” for a collection. Many recommend a list of materials necessary for a core collection in a specific field. These sources recommend the use of book reviews, listing of awards, indexes, approval lists contracted with professional book vendors and publishers, and selection recommendations specially constructed for librarians by subject area specialists. Despite the ease and convenience of simply comparing the various recommend materials lists to the holdings of a library's collection to determine its fitness, this task presents an opportunity to better understand which subareas of this discipline are interesting to an Asian American Studies faculty and are experiencing growth in the academic world. This study can also tell which subareas in the discipline are garnering little interest and are in decline. This knowledge will impact collection development in two ways. First, it will allow the library to better appraise the materials presently in its collection for its usefulness and relevancy for research and help determine if the Pennsylvania State University Libraries can immediately support a new program. Second, it will allow the library to both maintain and grow a collection in tandem and in tune with the directions and expansions of the field of Asian American Studies. 4. Methodology As stated previously, this study would not be focused on the existing core collection in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries measured against recommended lists of Asian American Studies material. Instead the study began with an investigation of the general area and subareas of academic research of Asian American Studies in North American universities. Its purpose was to reveal two sets of indicators that would give a clear impression as to what were the most relevant, important, and active subareas of Asian American Studies presently under investigation. Two were chosen to examine: first, the subareas presently being pursued by faculty of established Asian American Studies in comparably-sized programs, and second, the subject areas of the Asian American Studies courses presently taught by those faculty members. Once the subareas were identified, they would be used in the “benchmarking process” to measure how the materials in the Asian American Studies collection at the Pennsylvania State University Libraries compared in number to Asian American Studies collections in other university libraries. Simply stated, “benchmarking” as a process used to compare how well a business or organization is performing their tasks to other businesses of equal size or to the “best” of the industry (Spendolini, 1992; Stapenhurst, 2009). When benchmarking one's business or organization to others, it is important to decide which indicators to choose. Benchmarking sometimes requires direct comparisons, usually quantitative measurements, such as cost per item, time of delivery per item, time of completion of a specific time per item, etc. When these indicators are measured and compared to other businesses, managers can see how well their units are performing, which units are underperforming, and what needs to be fixed or adjusted for the business organization to run more efficiency, maximizing profit and minimizing cost. Benchmarking is not unusual in library evaluation research. One could argue that whenever one compares a particular function of a library, whether it is the number of books circulated or the successful completion rate of interlibrary loan requests, with similar functions in other libraries, a rudimentary and informal type of benchmarking is occurring. Wilson and Strouse (2005) stated that there are two types of benchmarking: informal and formal. Informal benchmarking is performed by the manager on a daily basis by comparing tasks, processes, and goals as they come up. Formal benchmarking involves a direct and concerted effort to “improve the value of an offering, operate more efficiently, and compare resources required with those of peer organizations” (p.26), and they concluded that the library community are best be served with formal benchmarking. The formal benchmarking process has been used to evaluate special libraries in the Caribbean (Nicholas, 2010), small academic libraries in the United Kingdom (Brooks & Manoli, 2009), a university library in Hong Kong (Chim, 2007), Canadian hospital libraries (Logan, 2009), United States government special libraries (Deutsch & Silcox, 2003), and public and private universities in Spain and
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
3
Finland (Balague & Saarti, 2009). There are also studies that discuss various statistical benchmarking processes for libraries (Creaser, 2000), financial benchmarking processes in libraries (Jones, 2007), and general concerns for those who plan benchmarking in special libraries (Henczel, 2002). Howard D. White (1995) created a benchmarking methodology of using “brief tests” which counted the total amount of a particular book found in numerous libraries. The books held in the most libraries had a higher ranking than books found in only a few libraries. This is not to say one book is of more value than another; it is meant to say that certain books belong in certain libraries depending upon the clientele of that library, whether they served the general public or a specialized, academic group of scholars. This ranking gave librarians a method of comparing their collections with the collections of similar libraries. The benchmarking process was carried out during the months of May and June 2010 and began with the identification of comparable universities to the Pennsylvania State University in North America that had established minors in Asian American Studies. The Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS, 2007) lists thirty-two college and university programs that offer doctorates, masters, bachelors, minors and certificates in Asian American Studies; twenty college and university programs within other academic programs that offer Asian American or affiliated (i.e. ethnic studies or American Studies degrees with an Asian American emphasis) academic degrees and minors; and eighteen programs that offer courses but no academic degrees and minors. From the list, thirteen universities were chosen that offered only pre-bachelor degree minors or certificates in Asian Studies and no higher degrees in the field. The universities chosen for this study were Arizona State University, California State University at Fresno, Hunter College of the City University of New York, New York University, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, Truman State University, University of Illinois, University of Maryland, University of Minnesota, University of Pennsylvania, University of Utah, and the University of Wisconsin. For multi-campus universities, all the individual libraries physically separated by location were considered one collection and the collection-as-a-whole was searched via their online catalog. The purpose of choosing only universities offering minors and certificates and no upper degrees was to limit the informational need of the materials to the pre-bachelors level; that no materials were required to complete degree programs. These thirteen university libraries were designated the “benchmark” libraries. They were chosen because of their comparable student and faculty population to the Pennsylvania State University, the size of their facilities, and offering of courses. Eleven are public universities and two are private. All of them have established academic programs Asian American Studies and offer an undergraduate minor or certificate in Asian American Studies.
5. Examination of the types of courses in Asian American Studies programs In order to understand the areas of study in which Asian American courses are offered, the online course listings of all thirteen universities were examined, and the courses offerings in Asian American Studies were evaluated. The study showed that there are five identifiable areas: general courses, literature, art, history and social studies. General courses were introductory or survey courses that covered a wide range of studies across ethnic groupings. The splitting of the humanities courses into separate “literature, art, and history” categories was primarily due to the preponderance of their listing as either “literature,” “art,” or “history” courses. Literature courses included literature, creative writing, and literary criticism. Art courses fell under the subcategories of various kinds of art-making practices, theater, cinema, music, and dance. The category of “social science” (i.e. sociology, anthropology, economics, political science and government, business, communications, immigration studies, etc.) was chosen to aggregate all the individual courses in the subareas of the social sciences because the diversity and number of courses meant that there would be very few representative courses each individual category. Courses titled “Special Topics” or “Seminars” were not counted due to the changing subject matter whenever the courses were offered. Not surprisingly, there were no natural science courses (i.e. mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, etc.). The results are in Table 1. The results of Table 1 are as follows: one hundred eighty-eight courses listed. 39(20.7%) were general courses; 32(17%) were literature courses; 20(10.6%) were art courses; 38(20.2%) were history courses; and 59(31.3%) were social science courses.
Table 1 Asian American courses by university and category.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinos UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin TOTALS
General
Literature
Art
History
Social sciences
4 5 8 7 4 1 1 3 2 0 2 1 1 39
2 1 8 2 1 3 0 3 0 1 8 1 2 32
2 0 1 4 4 0 0 3 2 2 1 0 1 20
0 0 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 5 8 2 1 38
4 1 5 4 7 3 2 9 4 7 6 5 3 59
4
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
If the general courses were removed due to their lack of area specificity, the statistics change to one hundred forty-nine courses in total. 32(21.4%) were literature courses; 20(13.4%) were art courses; 38(25.5%) were history courses; and 59(40%) were social science courses. If the literature, art and history courses were combines as humanities, the statistics further change to 90(60%) were humanities and 59(40%) were social sciences. 6. Evaluation of the subject areas of the faculty of Asian American Studies The online catalogs of the thirteen universities were examined for the faculty of the Asian American Studies programs. When possible, only the core faculty and the affiliated faculty were included in this study, and other adjunct or part-time faculty were not included. Whenever it was not possible to fully distinguish the status of a faculty member due to ambiguous descriptions or labeling, the person was not included in the evaluation. The purpose of this exclusion was to concentrate only on the areas of interest determined by the core or affiliated faculty who actively sought library resources to support their academic work and could influence the collection development of the library. Adjunct and part-time faculty often do not have this level of influence. The gross categorizations used to label the courses were adopted for the faculty: literature, arts, history, and social sciences. The category “general” found in the course listings was eliminated. Categorizing the faculty was determined several ways. Many faculty profiles included descriptions of their academic work, biographies, curriculum vitae, titles of publications, and areas of interest. Based on these indicators, the faculty members were placed in one of the four previously mentioned categories that best fit their descriptions. There were faculty members who held dual-titled professorships in Asian American studies and other subject areas such as English, comparative literature, theater, media studies, political sciences, anthropology, etc., and these faculty members were categorized accordingly. In those instances where a faculty member crossed categories, a subjective decision was made based on the emphasis of interest found in the faculty member's biographical statement, curriculum vitae, majority of courses taught, and other descriptions. The results are in Table 2. The results of Table 2 are as follows: ninety-eight core or affiliated faculty listed. 31(31.6%) were literature faculty; 5(5%) were art faculty; 13(13.3%) were history faculty; and 49(50%) were social science faculty. If the literature, art and history faculties were combined together as the humanities faculty, the statistics further change to 49(50%) in the humanities and 49(50%) in the social sciences. 7. Conclusions of both studies The use of statistics derived from investigations of Asian American Studies courses by subject and Asian American Studies faculty by specialties revealed several helpful facts for evaluating and considering future development of an Asian American Studies collection. The above statistics showed that there were two major areas of study: humanities and social sciences, and that the humanities were generally split into subareas of literature, arts, and history. The subareas of social sciences included course descriptions and faculty interests that spanned sociology, anthropology, economics, political science and government, business, communication, immigration studies, and other social science subareas, with none significantly mentioned or emphasized over the others. The percentage of humanities courses taught were 60% and the percentage of social science courses taught were 40%. The percentage of humanities faculty to social science faculty was evenly split 50% each. There were no natural science courses taught or natural science faculty members. This statistical information gave a broad overview of the areas presently under study at comparable Asian American Studies programs at North American universities. This information could act as a guide to the collection development librarian responsible for not only maintaining a collection relevant to the work of faculty members and students, but also could show a direction toward building a collection if such a collection as yet did not exist. The statistics showed that attention must be paid equally in acquiring materials in the humanities and the social sciences, one not significantly emphasized over the other. There were Table 2 Asian American faculty by university and category.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinois UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin TOTALS
Literature
Art
0 No data found 8 2 1 7 4 3 0 2 2 No data found 2 31
0
History 2
Social sciences 5
1 1 1 0 2 0 0 0 0
0 0 2 2 1 3 0 1 1
4 4 4 2 1 11 3 10 1
0 5
1 13
4 49
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
5
discrepancies in the statistics in the humanities that suggest further study needed to be done. There were fewer courses taught in literature (32 total) than history (38 total) and there were more literature faculty (31 total) than history (13 total), however this did not significantly change the proportion of humanities to social sciences. 8. A comparison of the collections in Asian American Studies between the Pennsylvania State University Libraries and the thirteen “benchmark” university libraries “Book” counting is a controversial method of collection assessment, because while it shows the quantity of materials, it tells little about the quality of the totality. Nevertheless, if the volume count in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries matched the volume count in the “benchmark” university libraries, this was one important preliminary indication that the libraries at the Pennsylvania State University could immediately support a newly established minor. If the volume count was below the mean of the “benchmark” university libraries, this then would be an indication that improvements must be made. For this part of the study, the Asian American Studies collections in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries were compared with the Asian American Studies collections in the other thirteen libraries. There was no discrimination of the type of materials retrieved or the age of the materials. The purpose was to do the largest search for each search term. Searches were performed in Pennsylvania State University Libraries and each of the thirteen university libraries for seven Library of Congress subject headings. They were as follows: American literature — Asian American authors Asian Americans — history Asian Americans — fiction Asian Diaspora Asian Americans — politics and government Asian Americans — ethnic identity Asian Americans — psychology. The choice to limit the number of Library of Congress subject headings to only seven was determined by the limited purpose of this study. This purpose was to derive a preliminary answer whether the materials in the library could support a new program and for that answer to enter into the committee's discussions. For a more comprehensive study among existing programs and library collections, more than seven Library of Congress subject headings certainly would be required to acquire significant results. These seven Library of Congress subject headings were chosen due to the frequency of their appearance in MARC records on books about Asian Americans. Using these seven would retrieve numbers usable in comparisons. Based on the discovery that the Asian American Studies subareas were nearly evenly split between the humanities and the social sciences, these seven subject headings were chosen to represent that even split. The first three were primary humanities-related (“American literature — Asian American authors,” “Asian Americans — history,” and “Asian Americans — fiction”), the last three were primary social science-related (“Asian Americans — politics and government,” “Asian Americans — ethnic identity,” and “Asian Americans — psychology”). The term “Asian Diaspora” appeared on MARC records of books in both categories. These seven terms certainly do not encompass the entire spectrum of topics found in Asian American Studies, however they worked to give an idea of the number count of materials in university libraries cataloged with these terms. It also must be noted that all attempts to perform identical searches in all the fourteen online catalogs were taken, however due to differences in the search options of search boxes at various universities, there could be errors in the numbers received. If the catalog allowed searching an “L.C. subject,” that was the preferred search. If not, a search as a “subject” was performed. If there was no option to search either as a “L.C. subject” or “subject,” the seven terms above were searched as a “keyword.” The results are in Table 3.
Table 3 Seven term searches by university library.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinois UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin
AL-AAA
AA-H
AA-F
AD
AA-PG
AA-EI
AA-P
90 154 61 81 97 74 27 138 82 82 79 76 142
37 69 38 30 47 27 21 217 33 42 35 28 178
4 45 30 17 11 13 5 78 11 18 11 17 45
10 23 2 22 14 7 1 28 14 19 9 33 21
35 0 31 29 37 25 8 37 27 36 32 32 45
65 133 40 56 53 50 11 103 56 63 56 59 66
15 23 11 17 16 13 2 67 15 18 21 15 34
6
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
Legend: AL-AAA AA-H AA-F AD AA-PG AA-EI AA-P
American literature — Asian American authors Asian Americans — history Asian Americans — fiction Asian Diaspora Asian Americans — politics and government Asian Americans — ethnic identity Asian Americans — psychology
The means values (rounded up to the nearest ones place) of each of the seven Library of Congress subject headings from the thirteen libraries searches were then compared to the number of holdings retrieved from a search of those subject headings in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries. The results are in Table 4. In all seven subject headings, the results of searching the Pennsylvania State University Libraries catalog showed that the number of materials retrieved were higher than the mean of the number of materials retrieved from the thirteen “benchmark” university libraries. This benchmarking exercise produced an inferential statistic, and the strength of this statistic was based on the assumption that the number of volumes in a collection was a meaningful method of measuring the strength of a collection, especially, in this case, when it was measured against the number of volumes in the collections of universities that had established minors in Asian American Studies. People may object to the crudeness of this method, yet this statistic, like circumstantial evidence in a criminal case, can be joined with others to present an arguable case. If one wanted to continue, the next step would be to inventory the collections for materials known for their high quality in Asian American Studies and then value the collections' worth by the presence or absence of these works. However, this method would be skewed if one subarea of Asian American Studies was designated as a prime area of study at one university resulting in materials of that subarea collected heavily while another university ignored that subarea resulting in a very paltry subarea collection.
9. Summary of the benchmarking process The process of benchmarking can be a useful tool for collection development librarians in gaining useable information for decision making. An acknowledged problem for collection development librarians is to create a collection development statement which becomes the library's official guiding principle or justification for building and maintaining a collection in specific ways. A benchmarking study can give the librarian not only the knowledge and direction of the growth of an academic field, but also the statistical evidence to justify purchases responding to that growth to the Library Administration. It will show the administrators what is needed for the library to be “the best” in the field or if that is not possible, at least what is needed to be in competition with other equal institutions. There are numerous caveats with the benchmarking process. Choosing the “best” companies or organization to use as benchmarks is a very subjective matter and often, even seemingly, comparable enterprises are so different in their internal processes that little can be gained from benchmarking. Other major problems include deciding on the wrong indicators for measurement or making false assumptions as to what the chosen indicators are actually measuring or what they can measure accurately. Yet benchmarking is one of the many tools in the toolkit for decision makers. When used properly, benchmarking is a very intuitive, immediately understandable, method of investigation, and false assumptions, poor indicators, and lapses of logic are readily discovered. When adopted by librarians, it can add greatly to the investigative, evaluative, and decision making processes.
10. Conclusion The purpose of this study was not to prove the accurate predictability of the benchmarking process. That judgment can only be made once a minor-granting program in Asian American Studies is established and members of the Pennsylvania State University community have tested the ability of the library's resources in meeting their academic wants and needs. This study, based on the assumption that “like-programs” grow “alike,” can derive an answer to a committee's question. Yet it is wise to remember that there are dangers in basing outcomes on assumptions. There is always the assumption that predicting the informational wants and needs of a nonexistent program with no teaching and researching faculty is next to impossible. New programs can often seek new territories and their informational needs could be different from the ones of the past. The weakest part of this endeavor is not the process of benchmarking, but its inability to predict the future. Table 4 Number of holdings of PSU and the mean of thirteen “benchmark” universities.
PSU Mean holdings, benchmark universities
AL-AAA
AA-H
AA-F
AD
AA-PG
AA-EI
AA-P
143 91
157 62
47 22
22 16
40 29
80 62
35 21
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
7
Yet librarians will be asked to sit on committees that determine the beginnings of new programs and their voices concerning resource support will have weight. For a preliminary judgment, the process of benchmarking will produce a result that can add to the discussion. References AAAS (2007). Association for Asian American Studies. Directory of Asian American Studies Program. Minneapolis, MN. Retrieved from. http://aaastudies.org/list/ index.html. Alabaster, C. (2002). Developing an outstanding core collection: A guide for libraries. Chicago and London: American Library Association. Balague, N., & Saarti, J. (2009). Benchmarking quality systems in two European academic libraries. Library Management, 30 (4/5), 227–239. Brooks, P., & Manoli, T. (2009). How do we compare? The experience of benchmarking a smaller university college library in the UK higher education sector. SCONUL Focus, 40, 51–57. Chim, W. (2007). The quest for excellence: One library's experience. Library Management, 28 (6/7), 323–336. Creaser, C. (2000). Benchmarking in academic libraries. Performance Measurement in Further Education Libraries. Proceedings of a Seminar Held at Loughborough University 9–10, March 1999, 41. (pp. 30–39). Deutsch, P., & Silcox, B. P. (1993, July). Learning from other libraries: Benchmarking to assess library performance. Outlook Information, 7 (7), 18–20 22–25. Henczel, S. (2002, July). Benchmarking — Measuring and comparing for continuous improvement. Outlook Information, 6 (7), 12–14 17–18, 20. Hoffman, F. W., & Wood, R. J. (2005). Library collection development policies: Academic, public, and special libraries. Lanham, Maryland: The Scarecrow Press. Johnson, P. (2004). Fundamentals of collection development & management. Chicago: American Library Association. Jones, D. Y. (2007, July). How much do the “best” colleges spend on libraries? Using college ranking to provide library financial benchmarks. College & Research Libraries, 68 (4), 343–351. Logan, P. (2009). Benchmarking: How do Canadian hospital libraries compare? Journal of the Canadian Health Libraries Association, 30 (4), 131–132. Nicholas, P. (2010). Benchmarking, an imperative for special libraries in the Caribbean: The Jamaican case. Library Management, 31 (3), 186–197. Spendolini, M. J. (1992). The benchmarking book. New York: American Management Association. Stapenhurst, T. (2009). The benchmarking book: A how-to-guide to best practice for managers and practitioners. Oxford, UK: Elsevier. White, H. D. (1995). Brief tests of collection strength: A methodology for all types of libraries. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Wilson, K., & Strouse, R. (2005, September). Learning from peers: Benchmarking your information management activities. Information Outlook, 9 (9), 25–26 29–31.
Contents lists available at SciVerse ScienceDirect
Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/lcats
Building by benchmarking: A method of creating and evaluating an Asian American Studies collection Glenn Masuchika The Pennsylvania State University Libraries at University Park, W304 Pattee Library, University Park, PA, USA
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Available online 30 March 2012 Keywords: Benchmarking Collection development Assessment Asian American Studies
a b s t r a c t This article examines the methodology undertaken while investigating whether existing materials pertaining to Asian American Studies at The Pennsylvania State University Libraries could support a new academic program. Presently active academic subareas in the field of Asian American Studies were determined. Then existing collections of thirteen “benchmark” universities were examined according to these subareas and compared to the holdings of Pennsylvania State University Libraries. This method can evaluate the fitness of existing collections to new academic demands and serve as a tool for collection development by identifying present and future areas of academic study. © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction In 2009, The Pennsylvania State University formed an investigative committee and charged the committee members to explore the establishment of an academic minor in Asian American Studies. The committee was comprised of professors, administrators, and librarians, and each brought their insights to the discussion. For the professors, their areas of interest concerned the organization of the new program, its funding, its home location on the campus, the curriculum of the program, and the assigned faculty. For the librarians, their main area of interest was the support of a new academic program with the existing materials in the library, despite the facts that the program did not exist and its eventual needs were not yet known. A methodology was needed to preliminarily evaluate the present library collection based on the assumption that the needs of a proposed Asian American Studies program are similar to the needs of established Asian American Studies programs. The conclusions of the study would be included in the investigation committee's discussions and influence its decision-making process. The methodology of benchmarking was chosen.
2. Asian American Studies in the academic world One response to the civil rights movement that swept through the United States in the 1960s was the establishment of many new fields of academic research that focused on topics such as race and ethnicity, class, sex, and body issues. Colleges and universities began new disciples such as Asian American Studies, African and African American Studies, Hispanic/Chicano and Latino/Latina Studies, and other ethnic-directed academic programs, Women's Studies, Disability Studies, and Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgendered Studies. During this period, the field of Asian American Studies expanded as a legitimate academic area. The Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS, 2007) lists over sixty universities in North America offering research in Asian American Studies, ranging from programs that award doctoral, master and bachelor degrees, as well as undergraduate minor and certificates. The Pennsylvania State University has established academic programs leading to both the bachelor of arts and bachelor of sciences in African and African American Studies and Women's Studies, and dual-titled master's and doctorate in Women's Studies. This inquiry into the establishment
E-mail address: [email protected]. 1464-9055/$ – see front matter © 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.lcats.2012.03.001
2
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
of an academic minor in Asian American Studies would be the first step in adding this area of ethnic studies to the curriculum of the Pennsylvania State University. 3. Library concerns and study limitations The primary question is whether the library's collection, as it existed, can adequately and efficiently support both the faculty and the students with informational sources in Asian American Studies. If the Faculty Senate and the University Administration agree to establish a minor in Asian American Studies, can the library immediately support this newly-created academic field of Asian American Studies with existing resources program minor? The answer to this question is based on either of two assumptions. The first assumption is that the architecture and composition of similar programs are alike. Two similar programs develop, growing independently, will be similar, and the research interests of professors in different Asian American Studies programs will converge. Thus if their research interests are similar, the library resources they require would be similar. The second assumption is more troubling, and it is based on the belief that the librarians cannot know the future informational needs of a program not yet established, its directions of research, and the interests of its not-yet-hired professors. The library is attempting to find evidence that its collections could support something that did not exist. Of these two assumptions, only the first, through a discovery process, can produce an answer. The second assumption precludes the use of any discovery process and no answer can be derived. The investigation continued on the assumption that “like-programs” grow “alike.” Investigating the adequacy of the materials in a collection requires evaluation criteria. A method frequently used by librarians involves comparing the existing collect to the various “recommended materials lists” found in the library literature. Books on collection development often include sections listing bibliographic sources useful in finding valued books and materials (Alabaster, 2002; Hoffman & Wood, 2005; Johnson, 2004). These lists are also found in periodical articles and library websites on collection development, and they authoritatively suggest sources to get the “best of…” for a collection. Many recommend a list of materials necessary for a core collection in a specific field. These sources recommend the use of book reviews, listing of awards, indexes, approval lists contracted with professional book vendors and publishers, and selection recommendations specially constructed for librarians by subject area specialists. Despite the ease and convenience of simply comparing the various recommend materials lists to the holdings of a library's collection to determine its fitness, this task presents an opportunity to better understand which subareas of this discipline are interesting to an Asian American Studies faculty and are experiencing growth in the academic world. This study can also tell which subareas in the discipline are garnering little interest and are in decline. This knowledge will impact collection development in two ways. First, it will allow the library to better appraise the materials presently in its collection for its usefulness and relevancy for research and help determine if the Pennsylvania State University Libraries can immediately support a new program. Second, it will allow the library to both maintain and grow a collection in tandem and in tune with the directions and expansions of the field of Asian American Studies. 4. Methodology As stated previously, this study would not be focused on the existing core collection in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries measured against recommended lists of Asian American Studies material. Instead the study began with an investigation of the general area and subareas of academic research of Asian American Studies in North American universities. Its purpose was to reveal two sets of indicators that would give a clear impression as to what were the most relevant, important, and active subareas of Asian American Studies presently under investigation. Two were chosen to examine: first, the subareas presently being pursued by faculty of established Asian American Studies in comparably-sized programs, and second, the subject areas of the Asian American Studies courses presently taught by those faculty members. Once the subareas were identified, they would be used in the “benchmarking process” to measure how the materials in the Asian American Studies collection at the Pennsylvania State University Libraries compared in number to Asian American Studies collections in other university libraries. Simply stated, “benchmarking” as a process used to compare how well a business or organization is performing their tasks to other businesses of equal size or to the “best” of the industry (Spendolini, 1992; Stapenhurst, 2009). When benchmarking one's business or organization to others, it is important to decide which indicators to choose. Benchmarking sometimes requires direct comparisons, usually quantitative measurements, such as cost per item, time of delivery per item, time of completion of a specific time per item, etc. When these indicators are measured and compared to other businesses, managers can see how well their units are performing, which units are underperforming, and what needs to be fixed or adjusted for the business organization to run more efficiency, maximizing profit and minimizing cost. Benchmarking is not unusual in library evaluation research. One could argue that whenever one compares a particular function of a library, whether it is the number of books circulated or the successful completion rate of interlibrary loan requests, with similar functions in other libraries, a rudimentary and informal type of benchmarking is occurring. Wilson and Strouse (2005) stated that there are two types of benchmarking: informal and formal. Informal benchmarking is performed by the manager on a daily basis by comparing tasks, processes, and goals as they come up. Formal benchmarking involves a direct and concerted effort to “improve the value of an offering, operate more efficiently, and compare resources required with those of peer organizations” (p.26), and they concluded that the library community are best be served with formal benchmarking. The formal benchmarking process has been used to evaluate special libraries in the Caribbean (Nicholas, 2010), small academic libraries in the United Kingdom (Brooks & Manoli, 2009), a university library in Hong Kong (Chim, 2007), Canadian hospital libraries (Logan, 2009), United States government special libraries (Deutsch & Silcox, 2003), and public and private universities in Spain and
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
3
Finland (Balague & Saarti, 2009). There are also studies that discuss various statistical benchmarking processes for libraries (Creaser, 2000), financial benchmarking processes in libraries (Jones, 2007), and general concerns for those who plan benchmarking in special libraries (Henczel, 2002). Howard D. White (1995) created a benchmarking methodology of using “brief tests” which counted the total amount of a particular book found in numerous libraries. The books held in the most libraries had a higher ranking than books found in only a few libraries. This is not to say one book is of more value than another; it is meant to say that certain books belong in certain libraries depending upon the clientele of that library, whether they served the general public or a specialized, academic group of scholars. This ranking gave librarians a method of comparing their collections with the collections of similar libraries. The benchmarking process was carried out during the months of May and June 2010 and began with the identification of comparable universities to the Pennsylvania State University in North America that had established minors in Asian American Studies. The Association of Asian American Studies (AAAS, 2007) lists thirty-two college and university programs that offer doctorates, masters, bachelors, minors and certificates in Asian American Studies; twenty college and university programs within other academic programs that offer Asian American or affiliated (i.e. ethnic studies or American Studies degrees with an Asian American emphasis) academic degrees and minors; and eighteen programs that offer courses but no academic degrees and minors. From the list, thirteen universities were chosen that offered only pre-bachelor degree minors or certificates in Asian Studies and no higher degrees in the field. The universities chosen for this study were Arizona State University, California State University at Fresno, Hunter College of the City University of New York, New York University, Northwestern University, Ohio State University, Truman State University, University of Illinois, University of Maryland, University of Minnesota, University of Pennsylvania, University of Utah, and the University of Wisconsin. For multi-campus universities, all the individual libraries physically separated by location were considered one collection and the collection-as-a-whole was searched via their online catalog. The purpose of choosing only universities offering minors and certificates and no upper degrees was to limit the informational need of the materials to the pre-bachelors level; that no materials were required to complete degree programs. These thirteen university libraries were designated the “benchmark” libraries. They were chosen because of their comparable student and faculty population to the Pennsylvania State University, the size of their facilities, and offering of courses. Eleven are public universities and two are private. All of them have established academic programs Asian American Studies and offer an undergraduate minor or certificate in Asian American Studies.
5. Examination of the types of courses in Asian American Studies programs In order to understand the areas of study in which Asian American courses are offered, the online course listings of all thirteen universities were examined, and the courses offerings in Asian American Studies were evaluated. The study showed that there are five identifiable areas: general courses, literature, art, history and social studies. General courses were introductory or survey courses that covered a wide range of studies across ethnic groupings. The splitting of the humanities courses into separate “literature, art, and history” categories was primarily due to the preponderance of their listing as either “literature,” “art,” or “history” courses. Literature courses included literature, creative writing, and literary criticism. Art courses fell under the subcategories of various kinds of art-making practices, theater, cinema, music, and dance. The category of “social science” (i.e. sociology, anthropology, economics, political science and government, business, communications, immigration studies, etc.) was chosen to aggregate all the individual courses in the subareas of the social sciences because the diversity and number of courses meant that there would be very few representative courses each individual category. Courses titled “Special Topics” or “Seminars” were not counted due to the changing subject matter whenever the courses were offered. Not surprisingly, there were no natural science courses (i.e. mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, etc.). The results are in Table 1. The results of Table 1 are as follows: one hundred eighty-eight courses listed. 39(20.7%) were general courses; 32(17%) were literature courses; 20(10.6%) were art courses; 38(20.2%) were history courses; and 59(31.3%) were social science courses.
Table 1 Asian American courses by university and category.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinos UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin TOTALS
General
Literature
Art
History
Social sciences
4 5 8 7 4 1 1 3 2 0 2 1 1 39
2 1 8 2 1 3 0 3 0 1 8 1 2 32
2 0 1 4 4 0 0 3 2 2 1 0 1 20
0 0 2 4 4 2 2 4 4 5 8 2 1 38
4 1 5 4 7 3 2 9 4 7 6 5 3 59
4
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
If the general courses were removed due to their lack of area specificity, the statistics change to one hundred forty-nine courses in total. 32(21.4%) were literature courses; 20(13.4%) were art courses; 38(25.5%) were history courses; and 59(40%) were social science courses. If the literature, art and history courses were combines as humanities, the statistics further change to 90(60%) were humanities and 59(40%) were social sciences. 6. Evaluation of the subject areas of the faculty of Asian American Studies The online catalogs of the thirteen universities were examined for the faculty of the Asian American Studies programs. When possible, only the core faculty and the affiliated faculty were included in this study, and other adjunct or part-time faculty were not included. Whenever it was not possible to fully distinguish the status of a faculty member due to ambiguous descriptions or labeling, the person was not included in the evaluation. The purpose of this exclusion was to concentrate only on the areas of interest determined by the core or affiliated faculty who actively sought library resources to support their academic work and could influence the collection development of the library. Adjunct and part-time faculty often do not have this level of influence. The gross categorizations used to label the courses were adopted for the faculty: literature, arts, history, and social sciences. The category “general” found in the course listings was eliminated. Categorizing the faculty was determined several ways. Many faculty profiles included descriptions of their academic work, biographies, curriculum vitae, titles of publications, and areas of interest. Based on these indicators, the faculty members were placed in one of the four previously mentioned categories that best fit their descriptions. There were faculty members who held dual-titled professorships in Asian American studies and other subject areas such as English, comparative literature, theater, media studies, political sciences, anthropology, etc., and these faculty members were categorized accordingly. In those instances where a faculty member crossed categories, a subjective decision was made based on the emphasis of interest found in the faculty member's biographical statement, curriculum vitae, majority of courses taught, and other descriptions. The results are in Table 2. The results of Table 2 are as follows: ninety-eight core or affiliated faculty listed. 31(31.6%) were literature faculty; 5(5%) were art faculty; 13(13.3%) were history faculty; and 49(50%) were social science faculty. If the literature, art and history faculties were combined together as the humanities faculty, the statistics further change to 49(50%) in the humanities and 49(50%) in the social sciences. 7. Conclusions of both studies The use of statistics derived from investigations of Asian American Studies courses by subject and Asian American Studies faculty by specialties revealed several helpful facts for evaluating and considering future development of an Asian American Studies collection. The above statistics showed that there were two major areas of study: humanities and social sciences, and that the humanities were generally split into subareas of literature, arts, and history. The subareas of social sciences included course descriptions and faculty interests that spanned sociology, anthropology, economics, political science and government, business, communication, immigration studies, and other social science subareas, with none significantly mentioned or emphasized over the others. The percentage of humanities courses taught were 60% and the percentage of social science courses taught were 40%. The percentage of humanities faculty to social science faculty was evenly split 50% each. There were no natural science courses taught or natural science faculty members. This statistical information gave a broad overview of the areas presently under study at comparable Asian American Studies programs at North American universities. This information could act as a guide to the collection development librarian responsible for not only maintaining a collection relevant to the work of faculty members and students, but also could show a direction toward building a collection if such a collection as yet did not exist. The statistics showed that attention must be paid equally in acquiring materials in the humanities and the social sciences, one not significantly emphasized over the other. There were Table 2 Asian American faculty by university and category.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinois UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin TOTALS
Literature
Art
0 No data found 8 2 1 7 4 3 0 2 2 No data found 2 31
0
History 2
Social sciences 5
1 1 1 0 2 0 0 0 0
0 0 2 2 1 3 0 1 1
4 4 4 2 1 11 3 10 1
0 5
1 13
4 49
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
5
discrepancies in the statistics in the humanities that suggest further study needed to be done. There were fewer courses taught in literature (32 total) than history (38 total) and there were more literature faculty (31 total) than history (13 total), however this did not significantly change the proportion of humanities to social sciences. 8. A comparison of the collections in Asian American Studies between the Pennsylvania State University Libraries and the thirteen “benchmark” university libraries “Book” counting is a controversial method of collection assessment, because while it shows the quantity of materials, it tells little about the quality of the totality. Nevertheless, if the volume count in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries matched the volume count in the “benchmark” university libraries, this was one important preliminary indication that the libraries at the Pennsylvania State University could immediately support a newly established minor. If the volume count was below the mean of the “benchmark” university libraries, this then would be an indication that improvements must be made. For this part of the study, the Asian American Studies collections in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries were compared with the Asian American Studies collections in the other thirteen libraries. There was no discrimination of the type of materials retrieved or the age of the materials. The purpose was to do the largest search for each search term. Searches were performed in Pennsylvania State University Libraries and each of the thirteen university libraries for seven Library of Congress subject headings. They were as follows: American literature — Asian American authors Asian Americans — history Asian Americans — fiction Asian Diaspora Asian Americans — politics and government Asian Americans — ethnic identity Asian Americans — psychology. The choice to limit the number of Library of Congress subject headings to only seven was determined by the limited purpose of this study. This purpose was to derive a preliminary answer whether the materials in the library could support a new program and for that answer to enter into the committee's discussions. For a more comprehensive study among existing programs and library collections, more than seven Library of Congress subject headings certainly would be required to acquire significant results. These seven Library of Congress subject headings were chosen due to the frequency of their appearance in MARC records on books about Asian Americans. Using these seven would retrieve numbers usable in comparisons. Based on the discovery that the Asian American Studies subareas were nearly evenly split between the humanities and the social sciences, these seven subject headings were chosen to represent that even split. The first three were primary humanities-related (“American literature — Asian American authors,” “Asian Americans — history,” and “Asian Americans — fiction”), the last three were primary social science-related (“Asian Americans — politics and government,” “Asian Americans — ethnic identity,” and “Asian Americans — psychology”). The term “Asian Diaspora” appeared on MARC records of books in both categories. These seven terms certainly do not encompass the entire spectrum of topics found in Asian American Studies, however they worked to give an idea of the number count of materials in university libraries cataloged with these terms. It also must be noted that all attempts to perform identical searches in all the fourteen online catalogs were taken, however due to differences in the search options of search boxes at various universities, there could be errors in the numbers received. If the catalog allowed searching an “L.C. subject,” that was the preferred search. If not, a search as a “subject” was performed. If there was no option to search either as a “L.C. subject” or “subject,” the seven terms above were searched as a “keyword.” The results are in Table 3.
Table 3 Seven term searches by university library.
ASU CSU-Fresno Hunter CUNY NYU Northwestern OSU TSU UIllinois UMaryland UMinnesota UPennsylvania UUtah UWisconsin
AL-AAA
AA-H
AA-F
AD
AA-PG
AA-EI
AA-P
90 154 61 81 97 74 27 138 82 82 79 76 142
37 69 38 30 47 27 21 217 33 42 35 28 178
4 45 30 17 11 13 5 78 11 18 11 17 45
10 23 2 22 14 7 1 28 14 19 9 33 21
35 0 31 29 37 25 8 37 27 36 32 32 45
65 133 40 56 53 50 11 103 56 63 56 59 66
15 23 11 17 16 13 2 67 15 18 21 15 34
6
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
Legend: AL-AAA AA-H AA-F AD AA-PG AA-EI AA-P
American literature — Asian American authors Asian Americans — history Asian Americans — fiction Asian Diaspora Asian Americans — politics and government Asian Americans — ethnic identity Asian Americans — psychology
The means values (rounded up to the nearest ones place) of each of the seven Library of Congress subject headings from the thirteen libraries searches were then compared to the number of holdings retrieved from a search of those subject headings in the Pennsylvania State University Libraries. The results are in Table 4. In all seven subject headings, the results of searching the Pennsylvania State University Libraries catalog showed that the number of materials retrieved were higher than the mean of the number of materials retrieved from the thirteen “benchmark” university libraries. This benchmarking exercise produced an inferential statistic, and the strength of this statistic was based on the assumption that the number of volumes in a collection was a meaningful method of measuring the strength of a collection, especially, in this case, when it was measured against the number of volumes in the collections of universities that had established minors in Asian American Studies. People may object to the crudeness of this method, yet this statistic, like circumstantial evidence in a criminal case, can be joined with others to present an arguable case. If one wanted to continue, the next step would be to inventory the collections for materials known for their high quality in Asian American Studies and then value the collections' worth by the presence or absence of these works. However, this method would be skewed if one subarea of Asian American Studies was designated as a prime area of study at one university resulting in materials of that subarea collected heavily while another university ignored that subarea resulting in a very paltry subarea collection.
9. Summary of the benchmarking process The process of benchmarking can be a useful tool for collection development librarians in gaining useable information for decision making. An acknowledged problem for collection development librarians is to create a collection development statement which becomes the library's official guiding principle or justification for building and maintaining a collection in specific ways. A benchmarking study can give the librarian not only the knowledge and direction of the growth of an academic field, but also the statistical evidence to justify purchases responding to that growth to the Library Administration. It will show the administrators what is needed for the library to be “the best” in the field or if that is not possible, at least what is needed to be in competition with other equal institutions. There are numerous caveats with the benchmarking process. Choosing the “best” companies or organization to use as benchmarks is a very subjective matter and often, even seemingly, comparable enterprises are so different in their internal processes that little can be gained from benchmarking. Other major problems include deciding on the wrong indicators for measurement or making false assumptions as to what the chosen indicators are actually measuring or what they can measure accurately. Yet benchmarking is one of the many tools in the toolkit for decision makers. When used properly, benchmarking is a very intuitive, immediately understandable, method of investigation, and false assumptions, poor indicators, and lapses of logic are readily discovered. When adopted by librarians, it can add greatly to the investigative, evaluative, and decision making processes.
10. Conclusion The purpose of this study was not to prove the accurate predictability of the benchmarking process. That judgment can only be made once a minor-granting program in Asian American Studies is established and members of the Pennsylvania State University community have tested the ability of the library's resources in meeting their academic wants and needs. This study, based on the assumption that “like-programs” grow “alike,” can derive an answer to a committee's question. Yet it is wise to remember that there are dangers in basing outcomes on assumptions. There is always the assumption that predicting the informational wants and needs of a nonexistent program with no teaching and researching faculty is next to impossible. New programs can often seek new territories and their informational needs could be different from the ones of the past. The weakest part of this endeavor is not the process of benchmarking, but its inability to predict the future. Table 4 Number of holdings of PSU and the mean of thirteen “benchmark” universities.
PSU Mean holdings, benchmark universities
AL-AAA
AA-H
AA-F
AD
AA-PG
AA-EI
AA-P
143 91
157 62
47 22
22 16
40 29
80 62
35 21
G. Masuchika / Library Collections, Acquisitions, & Technical Services 36 (2012) 1–7
7
Yet librarians will be asked to sit on committees that determine the beginnings of new programs and their voices concerning resource support will have weight. For a preliminary judgment, the process of benchmarking will produce a result that can add to the discussion. References AAAS (2007). Association for Asian American Studies. Directory of Asian American Studies Program. Minneapolis, MN. Retrieved from. http://aaastudies.org/list/ index.html. Alabaster, C. (2002). Developing an outstanding core collection: A guide for libraries. Chicago and London: American Library Association. Balague, N., & Saarti, J. (2009). Benchmarking quality systems in two European academic libraries. Library Management, 30 (4/5), 227–239. Brooks, P., & Manoli, T. (2009). How do we compare? The experience of benchmarking a smaller university college library in the UK higher education sector. SCONUL Focus, 40, 51–57. Chim, W. (2007). The quest for excellence: One library's experience. Library Management, 28 (6/7), 323–336. Creaser, C. (2000). Benchmarking in academic libraries. Performance Measurement in Further Education Libraries. Proceedings of a Seminar Held at Loughborough University 9–10, March 1999, 41. (pp. 30–39). Deutsch, P., & Silcox, B. P. (1993, July). Learning from other libraries: Benchmarking to assess library performance. Outlook Information, 7 (7), 18–20 22–25. Henczel, S. (2002, July). Benchmarking — Measuring and comparing for continuous improvement. Outlook Information, 6 (7), 12–14 17–18, 20. Hoffman, F. W., & Wood, R. J. (2005). Library collection development policies: Academic, public, and special libraries. Lanham, Maryland: The Scarecrow Press. Johnson, P. (2004). Fundamentals of collection development & management. Chicago: American Library Association. Jones, D. Y. (2007, July). How much do the “best” colleges spend on libraries? Using college ranking to provide library financial benchmarks. College & Research Libraries, 68 (4), 343–351. Logan, P. (2009). Benchmarking: How do Canadian hospital libraries compare? Journal of the Canadian Health Libraries Association, 30 (4), 131–132. Nicholas, P. (2010). Benchmarking, an imperative for special libraries in the Caribbean: The Jamaican case. Library Management, 31 (3), 186–197. Spendolini, M. J. (1992). The benchmarking book. New York: American Management Association. Stapenhurst, T. (2009). The benchmarking book: A how-to-guide to best practice for managers and practitioners. Oxford, UK: Elsevier. White, H. D. (1995). Brief tests of collection strength: A methodology for all types of libraries. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Wilson, K., & Strouse, R. (2005, September). Learning from peers: Benchmarking your information management activities. Information Outlook, 9 (9), 25–26 29–31.