Budget Reduction Process

Budget Reduction Process & Journal Cancellation Project

The University Library must reduce spending on library resources by approximately $1.0M, in order to address the effect of the significant, permanent cut to the Library's budget, in combination with rising materials costs due to inflation and escalating prices. This amount is based on the ~$800,000 cut to the collections budget, an average inflation rate of 7%, and gradual journal prices increases not addressed in previous years' allocations from campus.  The Library budget cuts will include all resource types (databases, journals, books, etc.).

How the Proposed Cuts Were Identified

The lists of proposed cuts include journals, databases, newspapers and other serials to which UCSC has local subscriptions. At this time, we are unable to include titles from packages licensed with our UC peers through the California Digital Library (CDL).  To obtain the best possible pricing, these packages are multi-year commitments and it is very difficult to extract ourselves from them out of cycle. In Phase 2 of this project (identified here in the Timeline), we will be analyzing the CDL packages for budget savings opportunities as the contracts come up for renewal.  In these cases, it is likely that entire packages will be cut because in general, these packages cannot be "unbundled" to allow for specific title cancellations within the bundle.
 
The proposed title cuts have been identified through extensive analysis performed by librarian subject specialists.  Data and information gathered during this process included:

  • Contact with faculty members
  • Usage statistics
  • Overlap with other resources
  • Cost per use
  • Value Metrics (Impact Factors, Eigen Factors, etc.)

In a final step to ensure some appropriate balance into the process, several budget cut strategies are being employed to allow the Library to account for format and publishing patterns of the different disciplines. We shall also factor in the profound pricing differences of resources across the disciplines into our decision making process. A guiding principle is that the cuts will be made proportionally to collection expenditures made by division.
 
We will make every effort to honor University priorities and minimize impacts. However, this reduction is so large that the Library will not be able to meet everyone's needs or requests.  All instructional and research programs will be impacted.

How Faculty Can Help Us Make Difficult Decisions:

Timeline:  Faculty input sought through December, 2009

We encourage you to review the list(s) below and provide feedback on specific titles. Your feedback is important and instructive as we make difficult decisions.  Comments describing how loss of a specific resource will impact student and research success at the programmatic level will be most useful.
 
Lists have been prepared to make this review as manageable as possible.  These lists represent the proposed local title cuts from Phase One of this project. Five separate lists have been prepared, grouping titles by division.  Below you will find lists for (1) Arts; (2) Engineering; (3) Humanities; (4) Physical & Biological Sciences; and (5) Social Sciences.  To browse a list of all online journal titles to which UCSC subscribes, please see our A-Z title list or browse by subject.
 
Because of the interdisciplinarity on campus, faculty members and researchers may access and provide comments on any of the titles on the lists.  To provide feedback to the Library, please use the Comment Form.

Lists of Proposed Title Cancellations

Arts titles
Engineering titles
Humanities titles
Physical & Biological Sciences
Social Sciences titles

Comments

Please submit any comments on the titles via this web form.

 Questions?

For questions about titles on the lists or the Library Collections budget reduction process, please contact your librarian subject specialist.