CEP Study Finds
Western Book Donation Programs
Effective, but Needing Improvement
Using its extensive networks of contacts in East European and NIS universities and libraries, the Civic Education Project recently completed a study of the effectiveness of U.S. book and journal donations to that region. Based on 700 detailed surveys of librarians, faculty members and university officials, plus a large number of interviews with donor organizations, the study is a first in its field. It is available from CEP, either by mail or eletronically. Following are some of the key points from the Executive Summary.
- In general the need for such donations is great throughout the region. The most acute need is for current journals in the natural and technical sciences. Over 70% of faculty members surveyed claimed they did not have "reasonable" access to "essential" foreign journals.
- Book and journal donations are reaching readers in Eastern Europe. Over 90% of surveyed faculty members have read a donated book or journal. 1/3 of the librarians surveyed stated that over 75% of the Western books acquired in the past 2 years were donations.
- Despite the efforts of donor organizations, broad access to donated books remains a widespread problem. "Searches conducted by CEP for donated books and journals [found] . . . in the majority of cases, less than 30% of the donated books are broadly accessible to the reading public. Diversion, poor cataloguing, 'warehousing' of donations by libraries and severely restrictive conditions for access to donated materials are disturbingly widespread."
- Quantity of books donated too often outstrips quality. E.g., "Donor organizations often provide too many subscriptions to 'second-tier' journals and not enough to core journals."
The recommendations of the CEP study, which was directed by Jonathan A. Becker, were essentially three:
- Recipient libraries should be monitored regularly and required to account for donations, publicize them broadly, and demonstrate access. Those which fail to comply should be cut off from further donations.
- Donor organizations should make greater efforts to integrate book donations into academic courses being taught in the language of the donated materials. Faculty members should be consulted, particularly about textbooks which could be incorporated into their courses.
- Donations of certain literature through alternative technologies, e.g. CD-ROM, should be considered, especially for scientific and technical journals.
Copies of the Executive Summary of the report and the entire report itself exist online.
The URL for the Executive Summary (9Kb) is:
ftp://capstan.cis.yale.edu/pub/civic-education/book-donations-report/00_Summary.txt
The URL for the full text of the report (108Kb) is:
ftp://capstan.cis.yale.edu/pub/civic-education/book-donations-report/Book_Donations.txt
Copies of the report which can be printed in Macintosh or Windows format also exist in the Civic Education FTP Directory.
For more information contact:
- Civic Education Project
P. O. Box 205445 Yale Station
New Haven, CT 06520-5445
Tel: (203) 781-0263
Fax: (203) 781-0265
E-mail: [email protected]
This article is from the November 1994 issue of
Civil Society ... East and West
For more information or to order a
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The URL for this document is: http://solar.rtd.utk.edu/~ccsi/csew/94-11/cep-book.html
Last updated: December 1995
