17 Future of Academic Libraries Challenges and opportunities

K. P. Vijayakumar

Objectives

The main objectives of this module are to:

1. Inquire the reasons for the decline of academic libraries in the digital environment

2. Examine why libraries are still considered to be vital in the information environment

3. Survey the ways and means adopted by the present academic libraries to overcome the threat, and

4. Explore the strategies open for the libraries to regain the preeminent position.

Abstract

The library and its role in academic research is no doubt going through a clear transformation in the 21st Internet access is becoming more of a human necessity than a privilege. A number of reasons have been put forward for the decline in the importance of libraries. But there are a number of studies carried out in different parts of the world which have underlined the importance and relevance o f libraries in the modern world. The study carried out by Steelcase carried out by Roger Winter, Workplace Consultant of the company, serves as a typical example. Some of the ways and means adopted by present day academic libraries include shift in focus, exploration of the possibilities of social media, solving the problems of the users related to information in the information mess and value addition in the new information environment. The libraries of University of Guelph (Canada), Wilfrid Laurier University (Canada) and Manchester University UK), among many others, serve as typical examples.

The strategies open to the academic libraries to occupy a preeminent position in the academic environment include academic skills training for the professionals, re-skilling of the staff, student involvement in the redesign process, change in the mindset, change in the hierarchical structure, thrust on information literacy, right approach to changes, increasing the accessibility of research content, and rethinking library spaces to foster more hands-on activities like development of makerspaces. In short, libraries have to offer opportunities for the three C’s i.e. collaboration, creation and contemplation for all categories of users.

Introduction

It is clear that the library has been a valuable institution for academic purposes as long as pen has been put to paper. However, the library and its role in academic research is no doubt going through a clear transformation in the 21st century. Libraries have long been endless sources of information for students. But, the face of libraries is changing as content is moving toward a digital platform and Internet access is becoming more of a human necessity than a privilege.

The academic library’s value is derived from the requirement that teachers, research scholars, and students have easy, rapid, reliable, and documented access to the rich set of materials that constitute the scholarly and cultural record. If some other institution were to provide the same or essentially similar access to those materials, then the academic library would have no clear mission. The fact remains that there are a range of facilities that are available to carry out the same mission, there is no other single entity that is capable of delivering the same services than the libraries. Therefore, the future of academic library or for that matter any type of library depends on its effectiveness in providing materials and expertise requisite for excellent academic work.

The scale and pervasiveness of the disruption that sectors like libraries face is amazing. In fact, libraries are not alone in facing the onslaught of changes taking place in the social, economic, cultural and technological fronts. The Smartphone is resulting in a huge array of products becoming obsolete. Address books, video cameras, pagers, wristwatches, maps, books, travel games, flashlights, home telephones, dictation recorders, cash registers, walkmen, day-timers, alarm clocks, answering machines, yellow pages, wallets, keys, phrase books, transistor radios, personal digital assistants, dashboard navigation systems, remote controls, airline ticket counters, newspapers and magazines, directory assistance, travel and insurance agents, restaurant guides and pocket calculators are a few among them.

Other replacements taking place in the society are:

1. Physical banks with branches, tellers and checks are being replaced by online banking with mobile payments and digital wallets.

2. Taxis are being replaced by services of Uber and Lyft .

3. Video rental stores like Blockbuster have given way to online streaming by Netflix and Amazon.

4. Most physical book stores like Borders have already succumbed to Amazon, and paper books are being replaced by the Kindle and other devices.

5. The last Encyclopedia Britannica in 2010, with 40,000 articles and 100 editors in one language, is no match for Wikipedia, with 35 million articles that are constantly updated by 69,000 editors in 291 languages.

Reasons put forward for the decline of academic libraries

Libraries are under attack from different corners on the argument that the book is dead, and that they are like dinosaurs doomed to extinction. The main arguments put forward by the critics of libraries are given below:

1. In the past, the main role of academic libraries was to provide access to content. Now, however, users are able to access quality content from a variety of other sources.

2. The very fact that there is considerable drop in the number of persons visiting the library for loan of documents or for reference, as evidenced by library statistics, is an indication of the redundancy of libraries. Who needs a librarian to use search engines that can traverse billions of pages in milliseconds when the user can now do it all alone?

3. With the universal availability of scholarly content in the open access platform, anybody with internet connectivity can access them.

4. Outside traditional publishing, there is increased use of social media to create useful scholarly content and discourse. Academics who are impatient with the slow peer review process to share and get acknowledgement of their work can take to academic blogging to increase their reach and build their reputations as they wait for citations to their published work to accumulate and their h-indexes to rise. Social media content and the rising interest in altmetrics for measuring impact of scholarship in new media is an area we need to keep close watch on.

5. Many public and university libraries were created to pool and share information resources of a community (in the form of manuscripts, books, letters and so on). These libraries filled a need in the community to increase access to a commodity that was rare and expensive. Today this function is obsolete because of the ubiquitous reach of the Web. There are plenty of sites that let people share resources. From sites like LibraryThing and Goodreads for books; to Flickr (and Instagram, and Facebook) for photos; to YouTube for video there are ample alternative, and arguably better ways to share ideas and resources.

6. When Carnegie wrote that “there is not such a cradle of democracy upon the earth as the Free Public Library” he was right. Public and academic libraries had minimal fiction collections, and were one of the few places one could track the workings of government. However, today with the advent of the web, the government is often by- passing the depository program and publishing this material directly to the public.

7. A strong argument in favour of libraries is that they provide free Internet access to the disadvantaged and disconnected. The counter argument is that it is better to divert funding to libraries to provide Internet access to follow the model of rural electrification by providing direct Internet access to homes. In other words, the money spent on libraries would be better spent by buying the underprivileged a tablet and expanding and provide monthly allowances to buy quality information.

8. There is a strong argument that public and school libraries are necessary to promote reading. This argument made sense when universal public education was not so universal. Today, when there is no more discrimination on the basis of caste, creed, gender, income etc. Therefore, the need of the hour is to improve the performance, and lower the barriers of access to education. Instead of believing that librarians who have little formal training in reading instruction (math instruction and science instruction etc.) can solve the education gap through a ‘do-it-yourself-here-are-the-books’ model, it is better to focus on enabling teachers to teach.

Why libraries are still important?

There are a number of studies carried out in different parts of the world which have underlined the importance and relevance o f libraries in the modern world. Two of them are given below:

Bond Architects, a firm that provides architecture, interior design and planning solutions to a wide range of clients with special interest in libraries, explored whether with the increase in the number of students with laptops, wi-fi everywhere on campus, digital textbooks, and online course assignments and resources, is the collegiate library even still relevant to today’s college students. They presented the results of a study carried out by Steelcase provided by Roger Winter, Workplace Consultant of the company. Steelcase asked students why the library was important to them. The following are the reasons that students gave to show that the library was still relevant, in the order of importance:

1. Convenient hub

2. Socialization

3. Motivation

4. Collaboration

5. Resource rich

6. Safe

7. Relevant collections

8. Distraction free

9. Service

10. Ambiance

CollegeOnline, which serves as an online roadmap to higher education provides 16 reasons why libraries and librarians are still extremely important. They are:

1. Not everything is available on the Internet.

2. Digital libraries are not the Internet.

3. The Internet isn’t free.

4. The Internet compliments libraries, but doesn’t replace them .

5. School libraries and librarians improve student test scores.

6. Libraries aren’t just books.

7. Mobile devices are not the end of books or libraries.

8. Library attendance isn’t falling.

9. Physical libraries are adapting to cultural change.

10. Eliminating libraries would cut short an important process of cultural evolution.

11. Wisdom of crowds is untrustworthy.

12. Librarians are the irreplaceable counterparts to web moderators.

13. Unlike moderators, librarians must straddle the line between libraries and the Internet.

14. Library collections employ a well-formulated citation system.

15. Libraries can preserve the book experience.

16. Libraries are helpful for news archives.

The justifications presented by different authorities for the continued existence of libraries are summarized below:

1. It is a fact that not all information would be available digitally. Though Google started scanning millions of books, very few of them are available free of cost. Still libraries serve as access points for the materials that are not available in the Net. The decision as to which form to use — what is available digitally or in physical form – is totally dependent on the user.

2. There is a line of argument that in the context of availability of a lot of scholarly materials online free of cost, the libraries are redundant. But the fact is that not all content can be open access. Open access materials will most likely increase in quantity and play an important role in making publicly-funded research freely available to all. However, it would be a very long time before they can completely satisfy the needs of all disciplines due to incompleteness and cost problems inherent in the both the ‘green’ and ‘gold’ open access routes.

Academic libraries are likely to continue with costly subscriptions to e-journals and databases to enable their customers to do their academic and research work successfully. The current journal subscription model is too entrenched in the scholarly communication process to disappear overnight, even with the rapid growth of open access. Digital media such as e-books have price tags. Libraries continue to play an important role in pooling together a common fund to enable users to access a wide and deep range of publications that no single individual can afford on their own. Libraries are still essential for the availability of most open access materials. Green open access depends on libraries continuing their subscriptions so that self-archived publications can be deposited in institutional repositories and made open access.

3. Being informed in a democracy is more than simply keeping up with the information and documents that government produce. It involves reading newspapers, treatises, even keeping up with pop culture. Where once libraries filled the gap of providing a rich and diverse corpus to enrich our communities’ thinking, deliberate proliferation of biased, unauthenticated, unfiltered information is possible in the Internet. There is every possibility that users who are not critical get carried away by the information.

4. Libraries foster a habit of reading and a love of reading. It can be argued that with digital documents people are better able to follow their passion with instant delivery. But the four walls of the library and stack rooms provide a better ambience than a living room. Moreover, libraries make available the e-resources free of cost thereby saving the expenditure on the part of the users.

5. The number of visitors to the library for loaning out documents and for reference services might have declined, but the use of the services through the website/portal of libraries has registered an upward trend because of the increased subscription of e- resources in libraries. So also the visit to the open spaces provided by the libraries has tremendously increased.

6. The line of argument to belittle the IT services provided by libraries also do not hold good. The library provides the Internet access not only to access information but also to push the passions and possibilities of the communities to the whole world. Members can use the Internet connection to check mail and apply for jobs, but they can also use it to create businesses, and start global conversations. Very often, the library staff members impart necessary skills for the purpose.

7. Libraries very often serve as true platforms of the community. They very often include information about community organizations (locations, services, events) etc. directly to their information retrieval system. This is more so in the case of public libraries. Organizations with their own web sites already can embed library and community information in their own websites easily. For example, the Red Cross can embed books about first aid on their web site drawn from the library catalogue.

8. The mission that has driven libraries for the past 3,000 years in service of playing a pivotal role in shaping a better tomorrow is still in vogue. That mission is hope through knowledge and the empowerment of the individual.

9. In the changed environment, we need libraries:

to discover new knowledge not found in any textbook,
to create whole new opportunities for innovation, and
to give our communities a voice and power in the working of government.

Libraries will never be obsolete so long as our communities dream, strive, and work to ensure a world of insurmountable opportunities.

Ways and means of overcoming the threat

A number of suggestions and opinions have been put forward to salvage the libraries against all odds. They are outlined here.

1. Shift in focus

While continuing their role as provider of scholarly content, libraries need to shift their focus to developing services that incorporate this broader information universe.

2. Exploring the possibilities of social media

In order to make the libraries more relevant in the context of increased use of social media, academic libraries, especially university libraries, have started setting up groups to explore trends in social media and to develop new services. For example, as a start, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, initiated the campus-wide blogs@ntu service which helps staff in creating course blogs, research blogs, and marketing blogs. This would equip the library staff to be competent in the use of social media to assist the users in this popular information space.

3. Solving the problems in information the information deluge

There are many new types of scholarly content accumulating in the common digital space including data-sets, videos, audio, maps, and text embedded in tools and applications. Finding information is less of a problem today than selecting appropriate information to use. More choice means that the burden is now on users to be able to discern and select useful information.

4. Value addition in the new information environment

Librarians guide and teach students in making sense of the complex information environment. They are agents that act on behalf of, and in collaboration with, their users in getting optimal value from the information world, both within and beyond the library.

The role of university libraries is not just about providing access to content, but enabling users to learn, make discoveries and develop insights of their own. Because of this the concern of the library professionals is with the entire information universe, not just library managed and subscribed content. In the future, this broad approach by libraries would provide more value to the users.

Lukanic has put forward a four point formula for invigorating academic libraries. According to him, for academic institutions seeking to thrive amidst the constantly shifting world of higher education, libraries have become the heart of the spirit of collaboration and innovation—going beyond being places to merely access knowledge to become hubs to truly explore and create.

1. Libraries must respond to strategic campus and business needs

2. Libraries need to have technology infused in every aspect of service

3. Libraries must embrace flexibility

4. Libraries must have places to engage

Examples

In spite of the doom and gloom predicted for the future of libraries, there are a wide band of libraries serving as beacons or role models manifesting the roles academic libraries can play even in the context of widespread adversities. They can be considered as vibrant academic libraries. A careful survey of literature in the field shows that Academic leaders are immersed in ongoing discussions about strategic investments and outcomes that impact institutional priorities, use of resources and the modeling of spaces on campus. This critical, evidence-based decision-making must be aligned with library planning efforts.

1. The University of Guelph, a public research university in Ontario, Canada, has committed to such rigorous analysis with the revitalization of its McLaughlin Library. Originally designed to support a 300,000 volume collection and 15,000 students, McLaughlin Library needed a plan to accommodate the university’s evolution into a comprehensive research university with a 1.2 million volume collection serving over 21,000 students.

University leaders conducted online staff surveys, open town-hall sessions, focus group discussion, student intercept polling and interactive staff planning workshops to develop a plan to renovate the existing facility. The plan created 40% more study space, including flexible active learning instruction areas, a range of collaborative group-study rooms and a new “Research Collaboratory,” co-located with reading and exhibit rooms. By reorganizing for efficiencies in staff workspaces and moving non-technical operations off the main floor, the university also created a vibrant new main entrance that invites students into the learning commons and offers a 24-hour zone, café, and computer lab.

2. Wilfrid Laurier University, a Canadian Public Research University, made technology a central focus for the planning of its new library which is fully equipped to support the multimedia, study and instructional needs for its 16,000 students. The library offers robust access to technology and digital content along with an IT infrastructure capable of supporting 24/7 fast-paced learning and connectivity. The University of Guelph made similar adaptations for McLaughlin Library by introducing compact shelving for a consolidated collection and spaces and tools reflective of the rise of digital resources.

3. The University of Manchester library is one of the largest research libraries in the UK, and the largest academic library after Oxford and Cambridge. It serves the biggest campus- based university in the UK, with nearly 40,000 students and 4,000 academic staff. It also includes the John Rylands library in central Manchester, which houses important collections spanning 5,000 years. Now the library spends 85 percent of the budget on digital content. For many of the users the service provided by the library is entirely virtual. This transformation has ensured that the visit to library sites has increased manifold.

The library authorities have observed that the needs of the students have drastically changed. Students continue to need study space, but their expectations are different. They want the library to provide roomy group space to support new ways of learning, silent areas for when they are revising, relaxation areas and cafes to allow them to spend long hours in the building. It was found that more than anything else, users, especially students want easy access to power to recharge their growing numbers of mobile devices, and very good wifi.

Strategies for academic libraries to cope with the future

Despite all the predictions of doom for the future of academic libraries in the digital age that the digitalization of print and other emerging technologies would make them irrelevant, universities, colleges and schools around the world are evolving their libraries and intellectual centers into catalysts for discovery, learning, collaboration, and scholarly breakthroughs. Those who predicted the demise of libraries in the face of emerging technology failed to understand how libraries could transform to become beacons for both interactive learning and knowledge creation across both the physical and digital realms.

With the majority of college students using smart phones in addition to laptops and tablets, libraries need to offer learning opportunities across multiple media that allow students to access local and global networks of information. That access allows not only access to knowledge but also the ability to easily create and share knowledge. Libraries must now foster a positive ecology of relationships, connectivity settings, and tools layered together to foster discovery and learning within the context of a dynamic academic framework. The major strategies mooted are listed below:

1. Growing need for academic skills training

The experience in developed countries has shown that students still needed to borrow books, but there are marked differences in demand across disciplines, and e-books are increasingly used instead of print. They also increasingly seek the help of the library staff as they try to navigate the complex world of information. They also consult the staff to make judgements about relevance and quality of information accessed, and correctly reference their sources in their work. This is largely because academic libraries offer training by conducting information literacy programmes to address their needs. Such programmes are regularly oversubscribed. This highlights the need for courses on digital literacy.

2. Student involvement in the redesign process

Many libraries make use of the student feedback for developing the learning commons – from use of space and selection of furniture right down to selected student artwork being used as part of the internal design.

3. Re-skilling of the staff

Libraries have to make a critical look about the structure and roles of the staff and make some major changes to ensure that they are focused on the right priorities, and are developed with the right skills. With this end in view, many libraries are preparing to reskill the existing staff and recruit new ones in order to boost research performance and to provide excellent student support.

4. Change in the mindset

For several decades, libraries have made significant efforts to make themselves relevant to the computer age with elaborate efforts to computerize services and develop new technology. Naturally, the question arises as to whether those efforts have paid off? In order to answer this question, it has to be accepted that the computer age is not fundamentally about computerization. But it is about the change in management mindset enabled by computerization. That’s because the most important thing that computers and the internet have done is not just to make things faster and easier for organizations. Even more importantly, they have shifted the balance of power in the marketplace from the seller to the buyer. The customer is now in charge. The customer has choices and good information about those choices. Unless customers and users are delighted, they can and will take their business elsewhere.

As a result, the slow moving hierarchical bureaucracies of the 20th century can no longer cope with the speed and complexity of a marketplace. This is because in such an environment, success depends on understanding the wants and needs of fickle customers and finding ways to delight them.

5. Change in the hierarchical structure

In a bureaucratic set up, the management is characterized by vertical hierarchy. But in the Creative Economy, it’s the opposite. The management ideology is horizontal. The central goal of the organization is to delight the user or customer. The values are enablement, self-organization and continuous improvement to add value to the user or customer. Forward-looking firms like Apple, Amazon, Zappos and Zara have embraced this different management ideology.

6. Thrust on information literacy

Libraries have to increasingly offer information literacy programmes. For this purpose, they have to assume the role of teachers in the use of information resources. Success here will require two things:

1. coordinated curricula in which librarians and faculty demand the engaged use of library materials and library expertise; and

2. the ability to search library collections with something like the same ease and efficacy with which one can search the open Web. For this purpose, library professionals have to spend significant resources in making the resources and methods easily available to the world.

7. The right approach to changes

In order to identify the right approach, the question as to how the library can the library be managed to enable continuous innovation? This will involve a shift to the management practices of the Creative Economy, including:

the shift in the role of managers from controllers to enablers,
the shift in coordinating work from bureaucracy and counting outputs to Agile approaches to coordination and assessing outcomes,
the shift in values from efficiency to continuous improvement, and
the shift in communications from top-down command-and-control to horizontal conversations.

8 Increasing the accessibility of research content

This trend has been growing gradually largely due to open content movement as more libraries facilitate open access models for research output. Academic and research libraries are adapting to this trend by developing new resources and funding opportunities. DART Europe is a partnership of research libraries and library consortia throughout European Union that provides researchers with a single portal for the discovery of theses and dissertations. Cornell University Library emphasizes open access scholarly publishing through their website. The Colorado State University Libraries has allocated considerable amount to support the Open Access Scholarship and Research Fund. Examples abound in this area.

9 Rethinking Library spaces to foster more hands-on activities

This is as a result of the ways in which the move away from print materials are freeing up physical areas of libraries that can be used for facilitating workshops, media production and training. A marked movement in this direction is the development of makerspaces. Many academic and research libraries have renovated or repurposed space to accommodate makerspaces (also referred to as hackerspaces, hack labs or fabrication labs) areas where students and faculty can access tools, materials, and the expertise to make things outside of their curricular objectives. It is believed that makerspaces and making activities effectively engage learners in creative, problem-solving through self-directed design, construction and iteration.

Conclusion

The academic library’s shift from a repository of collections to a catalyst for discovery and creation is now happening across the globe. More than ever, libraries are essential as the place where people, knowledge, and research intersect to tackle our world’s greatest challenges. Data tells us that the circulation of print collections in academic libraries is decreasing. With increased focus on sharing of collections, consortial delivery programs, and collaboration amongst libraries in identifying and preserving print runs and last copies, the academic library is changing dramatically. Books will still be very much a part of the library of the future- but increasingly, libraries are taking a central role on campuses as cultural and creative centers. Libraries are spaces for everyone. Still one can see a large number of students and researchers visiting the libraries. Students want spaces that inspire learning and offer opportunities for the three C’s: collaboration, creation and contemplation.

Collaboration: Group learning, problem-based learning and experiential learning are the current buzzwords on college campuses. These pedagogies require the right kinds of spaces to bring students together to discuss, solve problems and learn.

Creation: Libraries can, and should be centers for knowledge creation. Students are creating digital objects, publishing online journals, using media to tell their stories and share their research. Often this means delving into primary source materials in archives and special collections, curating content and creating online digital archives. The Academic Commons facility offered by many university and college libraries provides a golden opportunity for the researchers and students.

Contemplation: Anyone who has had the opportunity to study in any of the great libraries knows the feeling of awe when sitting in the reading room. Spaces do inspire and inspiration leads to enhanced understanding and creativity.

From the discussion, a vivid picture of the academic library of the future can be painted. There still will be books, but maybe not so many and perhaps not all on site. The library will be the central destination on campus attracting all students — a vibrant, active space where knowledge creation and research go hand in hand. Library spaces will be collaborative with active learning classrooms associated with research seminars, filled with unique resources and artifacts to support student learning. The library will offer one stop “shopping” for students and faculty with the establishment of faculty development centers, as well as student writing and media creation centers. Furniture will be mobile and flexible to allow students to form study spaces at will. Electronic publishing and scholarly communication centers will assist students and faculty with publications. Markerspaces would invoke the creative talents in the users.

References

College Online. Are librarians totally obsolete? Retrieved from http://www.collegeonline.org/ library/adult-continued-education/librarians-needed.html
https://bondarchitectsinc.wordpress.com/2011/08/08/the-importance-of-the-college-library/ Lukanic, Brad. 4 Ways academic libraries are adapting for the future. Retrieved from http://www.fastcoexist.com/3036939/4-ways-academic-libraries-are-adapting-for-the-future
Snavely, Loanne. Student engagement and the academic library. California: Libraries Unlimited, 2012.