The investment environment of the past 15 years has challenged endowed nonprofit institutions, which have struggled to balance the claims of current constituencies with the need to preserve their endowments' future purchasing power. In the fall of 2011, I undertook a survey of chief financial officers at about two dozen liberal arts colleges to…

Budgeting and accounting control of serials are examined based on a survey of 100 academic and public libraries. The questionnaire used in the survey stressed classification and encumbering of serials but was open-ended to encourage commentary. The lack of consensus among respondents regarding the budgetary control of serials precluded the…