New paper measures return on investment in libraries
Academic libraries are under growing pressure to demonstrate their value to their institutions. The question increasingly being asked is: for every dollar invested in the library, how many dollars does the university receive in return?
A case study conducted in 2007 at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) by Judy Luther, President of Information Strategies at UIUC, set out to answer this question. The results were published in a Library Connect white paper in 2008. Rather than measuring time or resources saved, the approach taken by most cost/benefit studies, this study focused on grant income generated by faculty using library resources.
While significant work is being done in research evaluation, no existing models for calculating a return on investment in academic libraries were found. A model for the university environment was thus developed, inspired by an article by Roger Strouse of Outsell, Inc. (1). The results, which are very much a first step, showed that for every dollar invested in the UIUC library in 2006, $4.38 was generated in grant income for the university in return. The full paper can be found here.
(1) Strouse, R. (2003) “Demonstrating value and return on investment: the ongoing imperative,” Information Outlook, Issue 3, pp. 14-19. |
