1. A Survey of Digitisation of Core
Readings in Higher Education:
preliminary results
Jane Secker, June Hedges & Ned Potter
Heron User Group Meeting
2nd July 2009

2. Context
 Survey builds on those carried out
by Liz Hart and Jenny Delasalle
 New Comprehensive Licence
 Timing: March - April 2009
 Audience: Heron User Group
members, but also LIS-Copyseek
 Web-based survey

3. Survey topics
1. Background
 Your institution
 Digital readings at your institution
 Copyright Licensing & compliance, incl. the new CLA
Licence
2. Procedural Issues
• Scanning
• Delivery of readings
• Management of readings
3. Wider Issues
• Collection management
• E-Learning

4. Respondents
 44 institutions responded to the
survey although some gaps
 24 Full Heron members (3
Packtracker only)

5. Volume of digitisation
 11 non-Heron members
 Vast range in amount of digitisation
from 20 - 2844 readings
 563 average (mean)
 Most anticipating a growth in
numbers next year to an average of
866

6. Staffing levels
 Variation from no staff to 5 or 6 in a
team
 18 had a dedicated team
 19 did not have a dedicated team
 A third had seen an increase in
staffing to cope with demand but
the majority (25 respondents) had
not
 Most promote their services (81%)

7. Motivations for scanning
 Improve access to course readings: 37 (highest)
 Support for e-learning: 31 (second highest)
 Meeting student expectations: 22 (third highest)
 Reduce need for multiple copies (save space): 13
(fourth highest)
 Reduce need for multiple copies (save money): 8
(second lowest priority)
 Raising the profile of your library: 6 (lowest
priority)

8. CLA Licence
 All apart from one respondent had signed the new
CLA Licence
 Only two had signed the comprehensive licence
 Most regularly consult the CLA website (76% said
they did)
 65% (20 institutions) of all respondents saying it
was ‘quite useful’ (only 3 people said they found it
very useful and the remainder were indifferent)
 15 institutions were using Packtracker for data
reporting, 20 were using a central record sheet, 1
gets departs to complete, 2 using another method

9. Impact of the New Licence
 Common themes include increase in
workload as a greater amount of material
is being scanned
 Number of customers using HEI’s various
digitisation services has widely increased
 Almost everyone mentioned the addition
of the US publishers as having a major
impact
 A few noted savings made due to no
longer having to copyright-clear items

10. Impact on Paper Services
 Harder to quantify; often the library isn’t
the keeper of relevant photocopying
statistics
 General feeling is that paper copies may
be reducing, but in line with general
University policy rather than as a direct
result of the Licence
 A few libraries are trying to digitise their
short-loan collections, but this is proving
harder than anticpated

11. Licence Repertoire
 Of 34 respondents, 31 said they’d
like to see the repertoire increased,
2 said they saw no need for that,
and 1 didn’t know
 However, HEIs had extremely
varied suggestions as to which
countries should be included

12. Licence Repertoire (2)
Regions HEIs would like to
see included in the Licence
Also mentioned
7 once each:
6 • Far East
5 • Japan
4 • France
3 • Spain
2 • South Africa
1 • “All English
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13. Copyright issues
 Do you get copyright permissions outside
the licence - 11 / 38 responses did not
(20%)
 The rest did, using: Heron (16),
publishers (16) and the CCC (10) in the
US
 24 institutions have a copyright officer, 13
do not and one respondent wasn’t sure
 LIS-Copyseek used by 35/38 respondents
for queries, CLA consulted (29) colleagues
(26), Copyright Officer (12)

14. Scanning
 Who does your scanning?
 In-house - 17
 Outsource - 6
 Both - 15
 Other – 1
 29 respondents said they outsourced to:
 British Library (14)
 Heron (11)
 Other
 13 respondents create text files, 23 do
not and 3 didn’t know if they did!

15. Scanning (2)
 Do you provide text for visually impaired
students?
 Yes 21
 No 10
 Don’t know 7
 Source of scan
 Original source 30 / 38
 Photocopy 20 / 38
 Copyright fee paid copies 34 / 38
 Other 1
 84% do NOT have a limit on the number
of requests a lecturer can place for scans

16. Rejecting requests
 The question “Do you digitise all readings you are
asked to?” got the biggest response of all the
‘free text’ questions – key issue
 Very few digitise all items requested to the extent
of always obtaining clearance where necessary
 Large proportion only scan what is eligible under
the Licence; they do not typically copyright clear
 Many take a mixed approach: “If the request falls
outside the CLA Licence then a discussion is held
with the academics as to whether we progress
their request to the HERON service (at a cost)”
 Some have an annual limit, either overall or per
department / module

17. Delivery of readings
 Via catalogue 1
 Via reading list 11
 Via VLE 36 / 39
 Other 4
 Readings tend to be stored on
library server or in VLE although
some institutions store in more than
one place

18. Management and feedback
 Reading lists generally updated by library staff,
less frequently by academic and admin staff
 15 of our respondents used Packtracker to
manage the process, more had no system,
although 6 had an in-house system
 Requests for digitisation almost always came from
academic staff, although subject librarians were
sometimes involved
 Only 14 respondents collected usage stats of
readings (21 did not)
 Only 5 respondents collect feedback on the
service in their library survey

19. Responding to Usage Stats
 Of those who did collect usage
statistics, only 3 currently act upon
them
 Several say ‘not yet’ or ‘we intend
to’, but it seems a tricky area –
“We would [take action based on
usage stats] if we could get the
stats from Blackboard (sore topic!)”

20. Collection management and e-
resources
 74% said their collection management
policy took into account e-books
 Similar numbers check e-book availability
before scanning
 23 respondents would scan an e-book if
they received a request but only 3 would
scan a journal
 27 respondents said e-availability
impacted on paper collections

21. E-learning / VLEs
 All institution had a VLE
 30/39 library staff had access to it
 In only 4 cases were other
permissions for other (e.g. AV
materials) managed by the library

22. Further Issues
Issues raised in free text question at
the end include:
 “Number of scans created is beginning to get
unmanageable in terms of renewals”
 “Some staff would like to incorporate materials
into complex learning objects…”
 Many practitioners are finding work-load a
problem, due to taking it on in addition to current
roles rather than as a dedicated team
 “Managing digital readings is demanding, and
requires extra staffing to do it properly”

23. Further Issues (2)
 The issues of time, ongoing funding,
difficulty of CLA reporting and problems of
copyright compliance come up time and
again
 All these problems are exacerbated by
up-scaling of each library’s digitisation
service – even if there not a concerted
effort to increase through-put, just
reusing items year on year means the
time / reporting / staffing burdens are
always increasing

24. Any questions?
 Jane j.secker@lse.ac.uk
 June j.hedges@ucl.ac.uk
 Ned E.Potter@leeds.ac.uk