Budget Constraints on Stanford Libraries Eased

From The Stanford Daily:

Following sharp budget cuts during the global economic recession, Stanford’s libraries will experience their first significant funding increase this academic year. The University allocated an additional $1 million to the $19.5 million library materials budget, the fund that supports the libraries’ collection of academic resources.
Although the increase in funds has different implications for different collections, the addition will enable the library system to recover some of its lost purchasing power.
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Stanford’s libraries rely on 45 subject specialists, each of whom cooperates closely with their corresponding departments to determine which materials need to be purchased. Routine meetings with faculty and surveys of student demand are both part of this process. Specialists also keep track of the current topics being researched or taught by faculty members.
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“We [also] buy a lot of small-press American avant-garde poetry that might not get the kind of readership that, say, a popular novel would,” [Annette] Keogh, [curator for British and American literature] said. “But, we think … [somebody might be] interested 50 to 100 years down the line.”

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Filed under: Funding, Libraries, News