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A shrinking commitment has eroded the quality of the University of Rhode Island's libraries. Most students may not notice, but the slide is taking a toll

by Kathleen Hughes

The rare book stacks at the new British Library in London, rise up like the Columbia on the Cape Canaveral launch pad -- huge and glorious, a massive column of smoky, thick glass, behind which gold embossed, brown leather folios reign supreme. Closer to home, the Beinecke rare book and manuscript library at Yale University is made of translucent marble. Standing inside on a sunny day, you can approximate a pleasant version of the inside of a New Orleans family mausoleum. In the event of a nuclear disaster, it is said, the multiple-story stacks will retreat underground.

There are no such rare book capsules or fantastical housing at the University of Rhode Island's main library in Kingston, but there is that same low, serious, intoxicating hum when one enters the 250,000-square-foot modern building. It's boxy, glassy, and similar to some concert halls, except with reading rooms and study lounges scattered about, and glass display cases holding old photographs -- like one of the original College Hall library burning in 1895, when students saved all 400 books by dragging them out on rugs.

Some URI faculty and staff might appreciate having such a neat way to avert a current threat. Instead, the URI libraries, which are the cornerstone of the state's public library system, and open to any Rhode Island resident over 18, are faced with a tortuous loss of resources and collections, due to inadequate state funding and the low priority placed on money for the library. This loss is jeopardizing not only faculty, graduate student, and advanced undergraduate work, but also undergraduate teaching and URI's reputation as a research university, the only public one in the state.

Although undergraduates doing basic research are more apt to notice a slow Internet connection or shoddy dorm rooms, underfunding the library system -- which includes the Pell Library/Bay Campus and the College of Continuing Education library/Providence -- is already exacting a toll.

Stephanie Pavone, an 18-year-old sophomore from Cranston, sometimes can't find journals she needs at URI, and instead relies on HELIN (Higher Education Library Information Network), a consortium of Rhode Island college and university libraries, to help her get them. Nick McGrane, a 22-year-old senior from Denver, Colorado, found nothing written more recently than 1956 when he looked for books on ancient Egypt. Another consequence of the library crisis that students might notice: the use of textbooks, rather than original texts. "I've given up assigning things that require the use of the library," says Violet Daniels, who teaches history at URI's Providence Campus. "I use textbooks."

These stories aren't surprising, if you listen to the stats recited by Bill O'Malley, a nearly 30-year veteran of collection development at URI. In 1972, O'Malley says, the libraries purchased about 35,000 books. Last year, by contrast, less than 7000 were purchased. Journal titles have been cut three times, with a fourth looming for next year.

Why? Because the URI library acquisitions budget has been level or diminishing for more than a decade, a time when journal subscriptions and technology costs have risen substantially. "It's hard to keep up with less money," says Eleanor Uhlinger, head of the Pell Library at URI's Bay Campus, which received a $150,000 cut this year.

Eleanor Uhlinger

Certainly the library isn't the only URI program crying out for funds. "Everybody wants their issue to be the best-funded and the most important," says Assistant Provost Cliff Katz. The problem, many say, is that state funding is woefully inadequate. As Uhlinger notes, "Nobody's got a full budget this year." And yet, the spending of $60 million on a new basketball stadium, $30 million for Internet wiring across campus (and the possible allocation of $26 million for dorms), reflects how some needs are clearly prioritized.

Considered in this way, the library crisis isn't simply about students failing to find books or journals they need for history papers or biology labs. It prompts fundamental questions about values in higher education, the role of technology, the institutional profile to which URI aspires, even the role of libraries in every Rhode Islander's life. URI and the state are certainly not alone in struggling with these questions and similar funding challenges, but institutions in other states are managing these needs while still protecting their library. The problem can be reduced to a simple question of priorities. Either libraries are a priority for the state and URI administration, or they are not.

AN ANALOGY FOR the current URI library situation would go something like this: there's a hail storm parked over every library nationwide, and it's called "technology costs and serial inflation." While other universities, with similarly low state support, have given libraries the cover of cozy homes, musty garages, and even keeling tin sheds, the URI library is covered by a small umbrella that could be blown away if you don't point it just right.

"Right now, the library is in the worst-case scenario," says chemistry professor William Rosen. Rosen has increasingly come to rely on the Brown University library, 45 minutes away. Library staff and the faculty senate have consistently asked for funding increases to meet library needs, but none have been delivered to date.

In talking with URI faculty, the symbolic value of a good library prefaces practical consideration. "Most faculty think of the library as the center of the institution," says anthropology and sociology professor C.B. Peters, chair of the faculty senate. "It's symbolic of the university's commitment to the preservation and discovery of knowledge."

But asked if he agrees, Katz quickly says, "No . . . People are the center of the institution."

URI President Robert Carothers, whose leadership faced harsh criticism last year from the Board of Governors of the state Office of Higher Education, seems to view the library as a service commodity, rather than a symbol or fundamental piece of the institution. "The real question facing universities today . . . is whether to focus on acquisitions or access," Carothers says. "For the last decade, URI has been building access to information systems . . . Colleges and universities will not long be able to maintain discreet library collections, but will have to become part of regional and even a national library system."

Carothers cites the HELIN system as "a step in that direction." HELIN is an online catalogue linking the collections of URI with Rhode Island College, Community College of Rhode Island, Providence College, Johnson & Wales University, Salve Regina, and Roger Williams, but not Brown. On the down side, HELIN is slow -- five- to 10-day delays are not unusual -- and it removes the browsing factor. Peters compares HELIN to online book shopping. "You lose the aspect of being in the stacks," Peters says. "You cannot do the browsing kind of research that we all like to do." Still, HELIN is, indisputably, a good thing, and URI is the biggest library in it. As such, says Paul Gandel, vice provost and dean of the office of information services. "We, as an important institution of the state, have to pull our weight . . . If HELIN is going to grow, it's important that URI libraries grow."

As for state's role in the library problem, Rhode Island ranked 45th of 50 states in 1999 for higher education expenditures, which is consistent with previous years. These low allocations are part of a larger, regional tradition, as public universities in the Northeast operate with less state support, and higher tuition costs, than their Midwestern and Western counterparts. (Connecticut, however, ranks sixth nationally in state support.) Compounding this tepid support for higher education was the credit union failure eleven years ago. Indeed, URI's funding, which plummeted from $67 million in 1989 to $52 million in 1993, has just now risen back to the 1989 level. When adjusted for inflation, however, the current $73 million level is still less than in 1989. "We are operating the institution on less money than in 1990," says Katz.

Yet places with less state support -- such as the University of New Hampshire and the University of Vermont -- spend a higher proportion of money on their libraries. In fiscal year 1998, URI's acquisitions budget ranked sixth among the six New England public research institutions, and was a full one-third less than the next lowest spenders -- UMaine and UNH. In fiscal 2000, UNH's revenue from tuition and the state was 5 percent greater than URI's, but library expenditures were 22 percent higher. As head librarian Claudia Morner explains, UNH's president has committed to increasing the library budget by 12 percent each year. At the University of Vermont, "The administration has done a very good job of protecting the acquisitions budget," says Peter Blackmer, assistant to the library dean.

UNH and UVM charge at least a couple of thousand dollars more in tuition and fees than URI, and herein lies another piece of URI's unique challenge: Although the university's tuition is lower than some of its fellow public schools in New England, its tuition cost, as related to median family income in the state, ranks fifth highest in the US, state officials say. The tuition cap, which allows for a 3.5 to 5 percent increase annually, is truly necessary to keep the university somewhat affordable for Rhode Island families.

Then there's the matter of the URI endowment -- the most prominent evidence of a good economy -- which, at $64.3 million, is six times bigger than 10 years ago. The library endowment is growing at a similar rate, from $500,000 in 1990 to approximately $3 million this year, which will pay about $151,000 in interest directly into the library budget in fiscal year 2000. And yet, as Peters argues, the notion of private money bailing out a public commodity is problematic. "Increasingly in public education, our first reaction to budget shortfalls is to go to the private sector," he says. "But that's sort of giving up on the idea that [URI] is a public good." Indeed, if there was a broader understanding of URI libraries as a cornerstone of the state system, which they are, rather than a library for the exclusive use of URI attendees, public support might be stronger.

John Burkett, an economics professor and former library committee member, recalls being told, "The library isn't a sympathetic cause to big donors" (Andrew Mellon and Bill Gates, notwithstanding, apparently). URI foundation chair Bob Coleman denies any such message, however, and he cites the endowment's growth as evidence of an aggressive attempt to raise library funds.

BILL HOLLAND, commissioner of the state Office of Higher Education, acknowledges that the URI library, in being level-funded over the last several years, "Has been a little bit neglected," and he knows it is a concern among faculty. Holland then points to the state's $30 million technology plan, in which 114 buildings at URI, RIC, and CCRI will be wired. In so doing, Holland seems to imply that such attention on technology comes in lieu of the library collections. "Even the dean of URI libraries, Paul Gandel, has a background in telecommunications," Holland says. "Technology supports research."

And the library is paying for it. Although the technology initiative doesn't count against library acquisitions money in practice, it does count in theory, or symbolically, just as the $60 million convocation center, aka basketball palace, and the dorm renovation bond money count: tens of millions of dollars is a large commitment from the state and its taxpayers. The library is suffering from technology costs quite directly, too, as its budget must absorb the costs of hardware inside the library, and Internet access, which totals more than $500,000 a year, not to mention necessary CD-ROM, electronic journal, and on-line database acquisitions.

None of this is to say that technology, or a new basketball stadium, or nice dorm rooms, are bad. Holland and the university are right, of course: technology does support research. And for any university to be prosperous, it must attract good students, notes Peters. A prospective undergraduate may not appreciate the difference between a library with a budget of $5.9 million versus one with $13 million. But he or she will note whether the Internet is accessible from dorm rooms, how fast the access is, and how worn the buildings around them are. Yet these commitments can be slippery slopes. "With technology, you're always one purchase away from being up to speed," Peters says. "But the faculty feels that damage done to the library is permanent."

MUCH OF THE INFLATIONARY hail storm for libraries started in the early and middle '80s, when costs for academic journals started a rise that is now estimated at 207 percent. This is partially a result of publishers passing on new technology infrastructure costs to the consumers. But it's also a factor of greed, says Brown University Librarian Merrily E. Taylor. Academic journals publishers operate in a monopoly, and especially in the case of scientific, technical, and medical journals, professionals require these to perform their work and keep abreast of their fields. "They're so expensive because they can be," Taylor says.

Even the very best (and best-funded) libraries in the country, American Research Libraries (ARL), are suffering; they currently spend, on average, 170 percent more on serials while subscribing to 6 percent fewer than in 1986. At URI, 241 serials were cut just in 1996. "We've been canceling the very expensive journals," O'Malley says, citing Applied Mathematical Modeling, which cost $9000 per year and Archives of Insect Biology and Biochemistry, which was $3500. Math and science journals have been particularly hard hit, since they're more expensive. If no substantial budget increases occur, Gandel and O'Malley say, another $250,000 cut in journals will take place next year.

As professors such as Daniels feel forced to use textbooks instead of varied sources, one certain result is a declining understanding of different sources of information. "Students tend not to learn what's a good online journal and what's a bad," says David D'Andrea, who taught history at URI for two years after receiving his BA in history there and his PhD from University of Virginia. There is a for-credit information literacy course at URI, however, to tackle source analysis and related themes.

Paper journals are only part of the tempest. Other growing expenses come in the form of software and networks -- CD-ROM and on-line databases and indexes, electronic journals, aggregate journal collections, and networks of libraries that share database licenses, publishing agreements, even entire collections, such as HELIN. In addition to complicated issues of archival and double subscriptions between electronic and print versions, sticky copyright issues arise -- think Napster but with electrical engineering or molecular biology and biochemistry journals -- and use can be pricey for that reason. To keep up, universities are joining coalitions to try to lower costs.

More fundamentally, other universities are protecting library acquisitions budgets by giving them additional funds or raising more money. Still, Taylor says the Brown library is, "Just keeping its head above water" through fund-raising and a commitment from the administration to increase the budget between 5 and 5.5 percent each year.

IT'S NOT FAIR to compare URI with Brown, because they're different in principle and function -- URI is a public university and should be perceived as a public good. And still, other public universities suffer similar challenges and still manage to protect their library collections, both as public libraries and vital components of a thriving, research university. Why has URI failed to do this? Asked about the lack of library funding, Katz says, and then repeats in several different ways, "You need to back way up. We need to give you an overall picture."

Faculty are more or less united in the belief that a lack of state funding is to blame for the library's slide. As Rosen says, "Bob Carothers has done the best he can." But asked about library support, Holland, the commissioner of higher education, says, "We can raise the question, but we can't make the decision [of how to spend URI's allocation]." In other words, the administration must decide the importance of the library budget. Carothers has requested additional library money for next year, but even state approval doesn't guarantee that the money would go to the library, he cautions. "We still have to set priorities," Carothers says.

Certainly, students are likely to be charmed by URI's overall picture and its technological, physical, athletic and other components. Such details are calculated, after all, to woo a larger, better, and more diverse student body. These students aren't likely to notice the eroding quality of the university's libraries. But then again, people can only appreciate the value of a great library if they have the chance to use one.

Kathleen Hughes can be reached at khughes[a]phx.com.