ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries 630 / C&RL News Making the most of your serials budget Libraries a n d lib ra ria n s n e e d e d fo r in te rn a tio n a l e x c h a n g e s ALA's Joint Committee on International Ex changes is building a database of U.S. and in ternational libraries and librarians interested in international study visits or exchanges. Requests for information and inclusion on the database for and from all countries of the world are w el comed, although in 1992-1994 special atten tion will be given to visits and exchanges with East/Central Europe and the countries of the former Soviet Union. Librarians considering a study visit abroad are invited to request an in put form to be included in the database. Al ready the Moscow Library Association, the Na tional Library of Romania, the Library and Technical University o f Budapest, the Univer sity Library at the Lajos Kosuth University in Debrecen (Hungary), the National Library of Prague, and the National University Library of Macedonia have offered to host American li brarians. Committee members are prepared to act as go-betweens and to assist those inter ested in finding sources of financial support. The committee has received letters from Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Romania, and the Commonwealth of Independent States such as this from Lyubov, a reference librarian in a science library, “Neither w e nor our chil dren will live to see the society w e are trying to built today. So I dream to see America—coun try of the future, as I imagine it.” For more information contact Opritsa Popa, chair, ALA IRC/IRRT Joint Committee on Inter national Exchanges, University of California, Davis, Shields Library, Davis, CA 95616. Reference help a v a ila b le on the Internet Need help answering a difficult reference ques tion? “Stumper L” may be able to help. Stu dents at Rosary College’s Graduate School of Library and Information Science are operating a listserv on the Internet. Librarians can send in questions they n eed help finding answers to and the graduate students send the q u es tions on to the over 500 librarians in 5 coun tries that subscribe. The subscribers then re spo n d directly to the questioners using the Internet. Questions sent to “Stumper L” have included “What state driver educational manuals allow advertising?” “How can one make a native Ameri can dream catcher?” and “What is the origin of the phrase ‘run-of-the-mill’?” To subscribe to the service send the message "Sub Stumper L (your nam e)” to Mail-serv@crf.cuis.edu. ■ During the past four years of increased se rials prices coupled with decreased institutional budgets and statewide funding, the University o f M assachusetts M edical C enter Library (UMMCL) has been able to increase subscrip tions from about 2,100 to 2,500 titles. Two approaches made this 20% increase possible. First, the policy of using only one sub scription agent was evaluated and abandoned. Surveys show ed that: 1) some publishers gave 10-55% discounts w ith no a d d ed service charges; 2) some domestic subscription agents added 3.5-4.9% service charges for all titles; 3) some domestic book dealers supplied do mestic continuations at 12-15% discounts; and 4) som e foreign subscription agents dis counted foreign titles 3.5-5.0%. Because of these findings, subscriptions were redirected as follows: foreign serials to a foreign agent; discounted domestic titles to the publishers; non-discounted domestic titles to publishers w hose total annual subscription costs ex ceeded $10,000; domestic continuations to a book dealer; and remaining titles to a do mestic agent. Second, the n eed for subscriptions by som e of the Medical Center’s revenue-gener ating components w as brought to the atten tion of administrative units. Potential cuts in subscriptions were equated with potential cuts in abilities to provide quality patient care and perform important basic research. As a result, supplemental funds w ere appropriated in or der to maintain and add titles. Thus, during a period w hen many aca demic libraries had to reduce subscription levels, the UMMCL was able to keep pace with the ever-increasing volume of scientific peri odical literature. Testifying to the value of this information, the library now supplies over 2,000 interlibrary loan articles per m onth to its region o f the country.—D onald Morton, University o f Massachusetts Medical Center Li brary ■ mailto:Mail-serv@crf.cuis.edu