ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 162 P re sid e n t’s R eport, 1 9 6 6 / 6 7 The ssociation of ollege and esearch Libraries, through the work of its sections and committees, has carried out a variety of pro­ grams and projects dur­ ing the course of the past year. With more than twelve thousand mem­ bers, ACRL is now the largest division in the American Library Assoc­ iation. Perhaps the most ac­ tive of all ACRL units Dr. McCoy has been the Junior Col­ lege Libraries Section, re­ flecting the urgent need for library support of the rapidly expanding junior college move­ ment. Guided by the ten-point national pro­ gram outlined at the junior college conference at Pomona, California, held in 1965, and under the chairmanship of Harriett Genung, the Sec­ tion has initiated a series of projects: With a $5,000 grant from the ACRL Grants Committee the Section is drafting proposals for establish­ ing demonstration junior college libraries sim­ ilar to the Knapp project for elementary and secondary school libraries; the Section has sub­ mitted a proposal to the J. Morris Jones—World Book Encyclopedia—ALA Goals Award to es­ tablish at ALA Headquarters on a one-year basis a clearinghouse of information relating to junior college libraries; a third proposal, still in the planning stages, is for a nationwide sur­ vey of junior college libraries, with the object of establishing criteria for library support that would be acceptable both to the American Li­ brary Association and the American Association of Junior Colleges. The ALA and the AAJC have continued to work together through the close association of the two executive officers— William G. Shannon, executive director of AAJC and George M. Bailey, executive secre­ tary of ACRL. A conference on Junior College Libraries, sponsored by the two associations and the University of California at Los Angeles, will be held at UCLA on June 21-24. The conference is intended for junior college ad­ ministrators and instructional staff, as well as for librarians. The Junior College Booklist, un­ der the editorship of James Pirie, is expected to be completed in 1968. A preconference institute has also been planned by the Rare Books Section, to be held at Stanford University on June 22-24. The theme is “Techniques of Special Collec­ tions” embracing such topics as disposing of duplicates, exhibition techniques, and valua­ tions and appraisals. Some questions have been raised as to the scope of the Section—whether or not it can be expanded to encompass the in­ A C R terest of manuscript librarians or whether they should be accommodated elsewhere in the As­ sociation. A meeting of those concerned will be held during the San Francisco conference. Consideration continued to be given both at Midwinter and by correspondence to the peti­ tion of the Subject Specialists Section for di­ visional status in the ALA. An alternate pro­ posal made by the chairman of the ALA Com­ mittee on Organization, was that the Section become a roundtable. This was unacceptable to the Section. Subsequently, the Reference Services Division proposed that the various special subject groups be given section status in their division. A conference on this proposal will be held in San Francisco with representa­ tives from ACRL, RSD, and the ALA Com­ mittee on Organization. The Agriculture and Biological Sciences Subsection has arranged the San Francisco Conference program on “Es­ tablishment of a National Medical Information Network,” the speaker being Dr. Martin M. Cummings, director, National Library of Med­ icine. The ad hoc Committee on Community Use of Academic Libraries, created by the College Libraries Section in 1964, completed its na­ tionwide survey of library practices which was published in the May 1967 issue of College and Research Libraries. The questionnaire study, directed by E. J. Josey, reflected on the whole, a rather liberal attitude, on the part of a large majority of the 783 college and universities responding, toward permitting use of their li­ braries by persons not formally associated with their institutions. At the recommendation of the Planning and Action Committee the ACRL Board of Directors approved the continuation of the Committee as an ACRL Committee since it concerned matters not limited to colleges but shared by all sections of the Association. “Trends in Academic Library Budgeting” is the topic of the San Francisco program of the University Libraries Section. The Section’s Urban Universities Library Committee plans a session on means of access to material relating to urban studies. The Committee on Academic Status is preparing a number of papers for publication as an ACRL monograph. On com­ pletion of this task, the Committee asked to be discharged and a new standing ACRL Committee on Academic Status be appointed. Section II–A of the Higher Education Act of 1965 was funded for the 1967 fiscal year to the amount of $24.5 million, as opposed to $8 mil­ lion for the previous year. This will permit com­ plete funding of basic ($5,000) matching grants and partial funding of supplemental and special purpose grants. Guidelines and application forms were distributed by the U.S. Office of 163 Education on February 24, with April 10 as the deadline for receipt of applications. The formulae for making grants were based on recommendations of the Advisory Council on College Library Resources, appointed by Presi­ dent Johnson. Title II–B of the Act continued fellowships for library education; Title II–C provided $3 million to the Library of Congress for the Shared Cataloging program; Title VI provided $17 million for audio-visual equip­ ment. Because of the large number of appli­ cants for grants under Title II–A and the short­ age of time for wise spending of funds granted, the U.S. Office of Education has announced “forward financing” of the title, which will permit libraries to expend their grants during the following fiscal year. Much of the credit for the passage of the library section of the Higher Education Act of 1965 should go to Edmon Low, chairman of ACRL’s Legislative Committee, who worked closely with Germaine Krettek, able head of ALA’s Washington office. At the New York meeting of the Board of Directors of ACRL, appreciation was expressed to Edmon Low “for his many years of distinguished service to the Association and for his significant contribu­ tions in promoting library development through his work on federal legislation.” The ACRL Committee on Legislation has been asked by the Board of Directors to “take a direct and active role in formulating objectives and in planning legislative action at the national level.” It is the intention of the Board that the Committee on Legislation initiate legislative proposals as well as promote them and that it assume the additional role of communicating to the membership about funds available. The distribution in March of this year of Library Statistics of College and Universities, 1965–66, published by the Library Administra­ tion Division of ALA was welcomed by aca­ demic libraries across the nation, who were still relying on figures for 1963-64, the last year for which U.S. Office of Education figures were available. The project was partially financed through a $9,600 grant from the ÚSOE and was under the direction of the LAD Statistics Committee for College and University Librar­ ies, headed by Robert L. Talmadge. Special appreciation goes to Alphonse F. Trezza, ex­ ecutive secretary of LAD, and to Frank L. Schick and Theodore Samore of the school of library and information science, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, which was under con­ tract to perform the editorial and statistical work and the machine tabulations. Eighty- three per cent of the colleges and university libraries responded. A comparison of statistical information col­ lected during the last seven years (1959/60- 1965/66), prepared by Schick and Samore, shows a tremendous growth of college and uni­ versity libraries, both in terms of number of volumes and total budgets. Volumes increased from 176.7 millions to 265 millions. However, due to increased student enrollment, the num­ ber of volumes per student decreased from 52 to 46. While expenditures for library materials increased from 40.7 million to $111 million during the seven years, price increases in books and subscriptions (estimated at 150 per cent) and a near doubling of United States book titles, means that libraries are probably no better off in covering published output than they were seven years ago. Dr. Schick also points out that increased expenditures for li­ brary materials is made up by a limitation of funds for salaries and wages, the ratio for salaries and wages having dropped in the seven years from 61.3 to 56.3. He suggests a re- evaluation of federal support funds to take into consideration library manpower requirements. A significant organizational change took place during the year in a redefining of the role of the Planning and Action Committee. Concern was expressed by members that the Committee in recent years was devoting most of its time at Midwinter and annual conferences to its role as an executive or agenda committee at the expense of long-range planning and review. A special two-day session of the Committee was held on March 14-15 in the pleasant surround­ ings of Neal R. Harlow’s home in New Bruns­ wick, New Jersey, at which time members scrutinized the objectives of the Association and statements of purpose of all ACRL units as supplied by the chairmen. Recommended changes will be discussed with chairmen and, where appropriate, the Board of Directors; Mr. Bailey and Dean Harlow were commissioned to revise the ACRL organizational manual to reflect changes. It was decided that the Plan­ ning and Action Committee would, henceforth, meet in mid-May to examine the reports of ACRL units in terms of total goals and pro­ grams of the Association and that an Executive Committee, consisting of the three ACRL of­ ficers, meeting shortly thereafter, would develop the agenda for the meetings of the Board of Directors. Removing the planning activities from the pressures of the Midwinter and an­ nual conferences should enable the Planning and Action Committee to fulfill the function for which it was created. The Audio-Visual Committee [is developing] a draft statement of audio-visual guidelines for academic libraries, for consideration at the San Francisco Conference. The Committee on Grants, headed by Helen M. Brown, awarded a total of $62,500 in aid to eighty-one colleges and a special grant to the Junior College Libraries Section. The U.S. Steel Foundation continued to supply the ma­ jor financial support. Others contributing to the fund were: Library Bureau, McGraw-Hill, 164 Olin Mathieson Charitable Trust, Pitney- Bowes, Time, and The H. W. Wilson Founda­ tion. In awarding grants special consideration was given to emerging colleges in the South and to approval of the employment of consul­ tants to advise on the building of book collec­ tions and the over-all development of library services. A check for $50,000 received from the U.S. Steel Foundation on May 22 ensures continuation of the program for 1967-68. The Standards Committee, under the chair­ manship of Norman Tanis, has continued work during the year on the revision of the ALA Standards for Junior College Libraries. The Committee met with representatives of the As­ sociation of Research Libraries during the New Orleans meeting to explore the feasibility of de­ veloping standards for university libraries. Further consideration will be given to the matter at the San Francisco Conference. “Guidelines for Library Service to Extension Students,” published in the January 1967 ALA Bulletin, were subsequently ( April 25) en­ dorsed by the National University Extension Association. CHOICE continues to fulfill its stated func­ tion: “to provide a reference and advisory guide to inform librarians, faculty, students, scholars, and the general public of the more important current publications on any subject and to assist in achieving balance in building library collections.” CHOICE completed its third year ( the first with new editor, Peter Doiron) with circulation of approximately four thousand three hundred reviews of 5,461 titles during 1966-67, and with some two thou­ sand one hundred subject specialists on the re­ viewing list. A continued subsidy of $108,855 was granted by the Council on Library Re­ sources with the understanding that by the end of the next three years CHOICE’S budget would, through increased subscriptions and ad­ vertising, enable it to be self-supporting. CHOICE plans two- or three-year compila­ tions to supplement the new ALA publication, Books for College Libraries, edited by Melvin J. Voigt and J. H. Treyz and issued during the year. Heavy demand for copies of CHOICE’S “Opening Day Collection” led to the reprint­ ing of the list as a separate publication. College and Research Libraries, under the editorship of David Kaser, continues to provide a high-quality publication of scholarly articles of interest to the academic library community, while at the same time an expanded coverage of news and official material appears in CRL News supplements. A volume on library surveys, prepared by Maurice Tauber and the Committee on Library Surveys, is now at Columbia University Press. It consists of papers of the 1965 conference held at Columbia, together with questionnaires used in a number of library surveys. The Com­ mittee is also preparing a bibliography of col­ lege and university surveys, to be ready for publication soon. The Committee on Liaison with Accrediting Agencies, headed by James Jones, continues to serve as an important channel of communica­ tions with officials of regional accrediting agencies. Meetings with regional accrediting officials are held during Midwinter and annual conferences. In San Francisco, invitations have been extended to representatives from the Western Association and the Northwest Association. Continued liaison of ACRL with the Asso­ ciation of American Colleges has brought forth a proposal from the college association repre­ sentatives that ACRL provide their association with a newsletter (possibly two or three times a year) covering important items of library development, that would be of interest to col­ lege presidents. The proposal will be dis­ cussed further at the San Francisco conference. One of the fruitful contacts made by the Advisory Committee on Cooperation with Edu­ cational and Professional Organizations was with the National Association of Student Per­ sonnel Administrators who sought advice from ACRL on library service to students. Mr. Bai­ ley attended their Cincinnati convention and discussed problems of mutual interest. Recognizing the increased involvement of college and university librarians in interna­ tional library affairs, the ACRL Board of Direc­ tors at the New Orleans meeting established an International Relations Committee. The Com­ mittee will be advisory to ACRL in ways in which the Association may be usefully involved in international library affairs and will serve as a subcommittee of the ALA International Re­ lations Committee. A program of Intern Committee Membership was created by the ACRL Board of Directors in December on an experimental basis by au­ thorizing the president-elect to appoint one junior member of the ACRL to standing com­ mittees for a one-year term. The candidates are to be chosen, if desired, from a panel of nominees supplied by the president of the Junior Members Round Table. The experiment is intended to draw promising young persons into the affairs of the Association. Your President is grateful for the opportu­ nity of serving the Association during the year and expresses sincere appreciation to the offi­ cers of the Association and to the chairmen and members of committees who are largely responsible for the progress indicated in this report. Special appreciation is given to George M. Bailey, ACRL executive secretary, who provides the continuity from one administra­ tion to the next and who performs the many organizational tasks with both skill and grace.— Ralph E. McCoy, May 28, 1967. ■■ 165 Now you can get almost any out of print book ever published, anywhere. For 4¢ a page. We can supply you with a full–size xerographic copy of just about any book ever published anywhere in the world. The cost is 4 cents a page for books in English, 6 cents for those in other languages. This includes perfect binding in a soft and durable paper cover. If you prefer your book on 35mm positive microfilm, the cost is only a fraction over a penny a page. It doesn’t matter if the original is worth $10 or $10,000. The price is still the same. We already have over 25,000 titles in our vaults, and are adding hundreds more every month. If you want a book that’s not yet in our file, University Microfilms will find it, film it, clear copyright and royalties, all for the same few cents a page. This service is often cheaper than the cost of an interlibrary loan. And you don’t even have to give back the book. Do you have University Microfilms’ O.P. book catalogs? 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