Academic libraries continue to face funding pressures compounded by the need to provide students with access to electronic resources, both in journal and book formats. With space constraints and the need to repurpose library space to other uses, libraries must carefully examine the move to e-only formats for books to determine if the format makes…

District costs for teachers' health insurance are, on average, higher then employer costs for private-sector professionals. How much of this is attributable to collective bargaining? This article examines the question using data from the National Compensation Survey (NCS) of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and the state of Wisconsin. In…

Charters represent an expansion of public school choice, offering free, publicly funded educational alternatives to traditional public schools. One relatively unexplored research question concerning charter schools asks whether charter schools are more efficient suppliers of educational services than are traditional public schools. The potential…

Compares OCLC, WLN, and RLIN in terms of the composition of the databases, indexes and searching, special uses for public services, costs, and documentation. Selected bibliographies of general public service uses and interlibrary loan applications are provided. (CLB)

As more colleges and universities coordinate institutional research as a support system for long-range planning, new analytical tools are necessary. A system developed to project the effects of statewide policy alternatives may have wide applicability to other institutions and multi-institutional planning groups. The Instructional Cost Index…

The purpose of this paper is: (1) to propose models to be used in evaluating relative time and cost factors involved in monograph cataloging within a hospital library, and (2) to test the models by performing a cost and time analysis of each cataloging method studied. To establish as complete a list of cataloging work units as possible, several…

The purpose of this study was to improve upon previous research investigations by analyzing the elements of cost effectiveness, precision, recall, citation overlap, and hours searching in a comparison between computerized database searching and manual searching, using the setting of an academic library environment with a diverse group of students…

In academic year 2003-2004, students and their families spent over $6 billion on new and used textbooks. Given that nearly half of undergraduates receive federal financial aid and that the cost of textbooks is one component considered in making these awards, escalating textbook prices can impact federal spending. Because of the impact on access,…

Describes a model enumerating cost factors for comparing costs for paper, online, and CD-ROM indexes and abstracts. The model is applied to start-up and annual costs, and to the cost of storing and providing access to ERIC, Applied Science and Fisheries Abstracts, and Excerpta Medica, based on anticipated academic library usage. (MBR)

Examines the cost structure and future system costs of Venezuela's Universidad Nacional Abierta, compares them with the costs of other distance universities, and discusses the cost implications of media choice, size of program, and number of students. The usefulness of cost analysis and projection for decision making is also discussed. (EAO)

The applicability and validity of NCHEMS' Information Exchange Procedures (IEP) to major research universities are examined. IEP enables peer institutions to compare information about their resources. Evaluation of the IEP costing methods are examined in this document, which is intended as an appendix to "Evaluation of the IEP Costing…

To determine the cost/benefit relationship between education, incarceration, and welfare, a comparison was undertaken of the actual institutional costs required to produce an associate degree graduate at Miami-Dade Community College (M-DCC), in Florida, and the institutional costs of incarceration and welfare in the state. Costs analyses were…

Describes databases available on optical disks, compares the databases with their print and online analogs, and suggests that the librarian should call such products to the attention of users needing information available in CD-ROM format. Five features desirable to most libraries are listed. (Author/CLB)

Specific cost areas are examined for 100 private, four-year colleges having a full-time equivalent (FTE) enrollment of fewer than 3,000 students. A questionnaire was distributed to each of the institutions to gather the data presented here. The purpose of the study was to compare costs and cost factors of small colleges. Five categories of expense…

A new statistical measure termed the Composite Indicator of Changes (CIC) reflects overall changes in average salaries and wages paid by public school systems in much the same way that the Dow-Jones averages reflect price changes in the stock market. The CIC is useful for comparing salary trends among various categories of personnel, among…