New: Academic Library Statistics: 2010 Released by National Center for Education Statistics (NCES)

The “First Look” report was released this morning.
Highlights From the Report

• Academic Libraries: 2010 summarizes services, staff, collections, and expenditures of academic libraries in 2- and 4-year, degree-granting postsecondary institutions in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. Findings include:

• Academic libraries held approximately 158.7 million e-books and about 1.8 million electronic reference sources and aggregation services at the end of FY 2010.

• Academic libraries spent approximately $152.4 million for electronic books, serial backfiles, and other materials in FY 2010. Expenditures for electronic current serial subscriptions totaled about $1.2 billion.

• During FY 2010, some 72 percent of academic libraries reported that they supported virtual reference services.

• Academic libraries reported 88,943 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff working in academic libraries during the fall of 2010.

Download the Complete Report (56 pages; PDF)
Download Data Tables (40 pages; PDF)

Selected Findings

Services

• Academic libraries loaned some 11.2 million documents to other libraries in fiscal year 2010 (table 1). Academic libraries also borrowed approximately 10.2 million documents from other libraries and commercial services. Documents from commercial services accounted for about 176,000 of those documents borrowed.

• The majority of academic libraries, 2,362, were open between 60-99 hours during a typical week in fall of 2010 (derived from table 2). Another 564 academic libraries were open 100 or more hours per typical week.

• In fiscal year 2010, academic libraries conducted approximately 34.6 million information services to individuals,1 including computer searches (table 3).

Collections

• At the end of fiscal year 2010, there were 227 academic libraries that held at least 1 million or more books, serial backfiles, and other paper materials including government documents (table 4).

• Academic libraries held approximately 158.7 million e-books and about 1.8 million electronic reference sources and aggregation services1 at the end of fiscal year 2010 (table 5).

• In fiscal year 2010, academic libraries added about 12.9 million audiovisual material units, making their total audiovisual material holdings over 1.12 billion units (tables 5 and 6).

Staff

• Academic libraries reported 88,943 full-time equivalent (FTE) staff working in academic libraries during the fall of 2010 (table 7).

• Academic libraries reported 26,706 FTE librarians working during the fall of 2010 (table 7). Librarians accounted for about 30 percent of the total number of FTE staff in academic libraries during the fall of 2010.

Expenditures

• Just under half of academic libraries, 1,739, had total expenditures of $500,000 or more in fiscal year 2010 (derived from table 8). Another 581 academic libraries had total expenditures under $100,000 (derived from table 8).

• During fiscal year 2010, academic libraries spent about $3.4 billion on salaries and wages, representing approximately 50 percent of total library expenditures (table 9).

• Academic libraries spent approximately $152.4 million for electronic books, serial backfiles, and other materials in fiscal year 2010 (table 10). Expenditures for electronic current serial subscriptions totaled about $1.2 billion.

• During fiscal year 2010, academic libraries spent approximately $142.7 million for computer hardware and software (table 11).

Electronic Services

• In fall of 2010, about 41 percent of academic libraries reported providing documents digitized by staff (table 12).

• Over half (54 percent) reported providing technology to assist patrons with disabilities in fall of 2010 (table 12).

Virtual Reference

• During fiscal year 2010, some 72 percent of academic libraries reported that they supported virtual reference services (table 13).

• During fiscal year 2010, about 32 percent of academic libraries reported that they utilized instant messaging applications (table 13).

Download the Complete Report (56 pages; PDF)
Download Data Tables (40 pages; PDF)

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