2014 – 2015
ANNUAL REPORT

75 Years of Advancing Learning 
& Transforming Scholarship



C&RL News December 2015  604

Karen A. Williams
ACRL’s 76th President

What a wild ride this has been!

One highlight of my term in office was participating in ACRL’s 75th 
anniversary celebrations. Among the highlights were the publication of 
New Roles for the Road Ahead, a collection of essays including reflections 
on ways academic libraries can succeed in a changing higher education 
environment, and a special issue of College & Research Libraries looking 
back at a selection of seminal articles from the journal’s history. We were fortunate to be able 
to celebrate the association’s history while looking to the future at the ACRL 2015 Conference 
in Portland, Oregon.

I was heartened by the commitment of our membership to the future of the association as evidenced 
by the overwhelming participation in our 75th anniversary scholarship campaign, which raised 
more than $56,000 and allowed us to award an additional 75 scholarships for ACRL 2015. We 
continue to celebrate our past on the ACRL 75th Anniversary website at http://acrl.ala.org/acrl75/.

In addition to all of the anniversary events in Portland, I was very pleased to see so many academic and 
research librarians gather in person and online for a wonderful learning and networking experience. 
ACRL 2015 set a record with the combined registrant attendance ever for an ACRL conference, with 
3,390 face-to-face and more than 300 virtual attendees from all 50 states and 24 countries. By all 
accounts, attendees went home energized and ready to apply what they learned at their institutions.

This year, the association also concluded the process that began as a revision of our Information 
Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education so that they include current thinking on 
the creation and dissemination of knowledge, the changing global higher education and learning 
environment, and the expanding definition of information literacy to include multiple literacies. 
The task force appointed by the Board of Directors in 2013 to guide the process did an outstand-
ing job collecting ideas and comments from across the ACRL and higher education communities, 
leading to the development of the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education, 
and I would like to thank them for their commitment and hard work. Following a process that 
included several drafts and public comment periods, the Board took the official action of “filing”  
the Framework at the 2015 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Chicago. This action allows the Frame-
work to move forward as a dynamic, living document that can be changed in the future without 
needing a vote and full Board approval.

Our strategic goal area committees made significant progress this year.  As part of the Value 
of Academic Libraries goal, ACRL released a new report, “Academic Library Contributions to 
Student Success: Documented Practices from the Field,” which synthesizes results from over 
70 higher education institutions from across North America that recently completed team-based 
assessment projects. These projects, from the first year of AiA, resulted in promising and ef-
fective approaches to demonstrating the library’s value to students’ academic success.  The 
Research and Scholarly Environment Committee released an updated version of the Scholarly 
Communication Toolkit, added new presenters and venues to the Scholarly Communication Road 

Message from the President



December 2015  605 C&RL News

ACRL by the Numbers
Show, and participated in the planning for the ARL/ACRL Unconference held in conjunction 
with ACRL 2015 in Portland.

Serving as ACRL president is an honor and pretty darn cool any year, so I feel especially lucky 
to have this privilege when our association turned 75 and we had a year-long celebration. This 
report highlights a vibrant organization, fueled by the knowledge, energy, and commitment of more 
than 11,000 members. As noted in our conference tagline, ACRL continues to be “peer revered.” 

ACRL by the Numbers

Thirty one 
    librarians          and libraries 
received ACRL awards in 2015

2
,7

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 Lite
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 P
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 1
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2,224 Scholarly Communication 
Roadshow participants from more than 
600 institutions in 26 different U.S. 
states, the District of Columbia, 1 U.S. 
territory, and 3 Canadian provinces.

203 teams 
participating in the 

Assessment in Action 
program from 

41 states, the District 
of Columbia, four 

Canadian provinces, 
and Australia

More than 
$225,000 
was awarded to 

390 individuals 
for scholarships to 
ACRL professional 

development 
events from 

2012 to 2015

Thirteen formal 
liaison relationships 
with sister higher 

education associations

13
,8

09
 T

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IT

TE
R

 F
O

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R
S

   
6,

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3 

F
A

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O

O
K

 L
IK

E
S

Doctoral or 
Research 

43%

Comprehensive 
Masters I & II

24%

4-Year 
Baccalaureate

13%

Community 
College 

10%

Other 
10%

ACRL  
Personal Members

by Type 
of Institution

Nearly 1,400 
ads for job 
opportunities 
posted to 
ALA JobLIST 
by academic 
and research 
institutions 
in FY15



C&RL News December 2015  606

Ann Campion Riley
Vice-President/President-Elect

As ACRL’s 2014–15 vice-president, my focus has been on building 
rapport with state chapters and making diverse and representative  
appointments to committees and other groups. I like to think of making 
chapter visits as being on a listening tour, and I had some great visits. 
In Mississippi, Colorado, Oklahoma, and North Dakota, as well as my 
home state of Missouri, active members are doing great programming 
and working hard for the good of academic libraries. Seeing the various 
chapter conferences and meeting the wonderful volunteers were very enriching experiences 
for me. Reading about places and corresponding online are great, but they are not an adequate  
substitute for meeting members face to face and learning about their work, interests, and concern. 
ACRL supports these chapter visits financially, and I have realized this is one of more important 
things we fund as an organization. As a leader I feel so much more informed about the members 
than I did before I undertook chapter visits. Another heartening part of the experience was hav-
ing my feelings confirmed that we have so much more in common among types of academic 
libraries and locations than we have differences. Some consistent messages I heard included 
how much people appreciate the quality of ACRL continuing education offerings and how the 
costs of participating in organizations and meetings can be a barrier for many wishing to take 
part. Virtual participation is increasing, but the physical presence at conferences in particular 
is still valued.

Making appointments to groups has been very important also, as filling these volunteer jobs is 
essential to progress within the organization. ACRL is very fortunate to have many interested 
and engaged member volunteers, and each year some of those volunteers end up disappointed. 
I’m sorry about that, and hope that those volunteers who didn’t receive a committee appointment 
don’t become discouraged but persevere and keep volunteering in the future. The appointment 
process can be cumbersome, and the help of the assisting committees is very valuable. Mak-
ing contact with the chair of a group you want to join, either at the committee’s ALA Annual 
Conference meeting or in the time between Annual and Midwinter, can often be very helpful 
to achieving successful appointment to a committee or other group. Working to get the right 
people in the right job is just as hard or harder in a volunteer group as it is in your libraries.  
I tried very hard to create representative and diverse committees, and know that you all under-
stand the value that diversity adds to the work of the organization.

All of us on the ACRL Board of Directors are committed to providing value for our members, 
and continue to work to assure those paying their membership dues that we want to serve them 
and continue to engage with their needs. Another matter for discussion in the weekly confer-
ence calls among the current, in-coming, and past ACRL presidents has been how our planning 
efforts should relate to those of ALA as a whole. Current and incoming chairs of our goal area 
committees also attend the ACRL strategic planning retreat, and have become an important part 
of our planning efforts. With their help, the ACRL leadership continues to look to the future of 
the association.

I look forward to continuing to serve ACRL as president over the next year.

Message from the Vice-President



December 2015  607 C&RL News

I am so honored to have been a part of the historic ACRL 75th anniversary! 
ACRL marked the occasion in ways both large and small, and I want to 
thank ACRL’s 75th Anniversary Task Force chaired by Pamela Snelson, 
the editorial board of College & Research Libraries, the ACRL Board of 
Directors, donors who contributed to the Kick Start the Future Campaign, 
and the staff for a wonderful year-long celebration.

We were so lucky to have ACRL’s 75th anniversary coinciding with an ACRL Conference year. 
The ACRL 2015 Conference in Portland, Oregon, was a record-breaking dazzling success full 
of content, conversations, connections, and cake. I especially enjoyed the panel focused on the 
future of academic and research librarianship as envisioned by noted bloggers Steven Bell, Lorcan 
Dempsey, and Barbara Fister who expanded on their essays for ACRL’s commissioned New Roles 
for the Road Ahead: Essays Commissioned for ACRL’s 75th Anniversary. This thought provoking 
collection, edited by Nancy Allen, is well worth a read! It is available on the ACRL website at 
www.ala.org/acrl/sites/ala.org.acrl/files/content/publications/whitepapers/new_roles_75th.pdf.

Anniversaries do present the opportunity to look back and C&RL Editor Scott Walter and the 
editorial board invited readers to help identify seven landmark articles from the journal’s history 
for publication in a special anniversary issue, available at http://crl.acrl.org/content/76/3.toc. The 
opportunity to vote gave everyone a chance to read and reflect on the enduring significance of 
our rich history of scholarship. The featured articles were the subject of another excellent panel 
session at ACRL 2015.

ACRL’s 75th anniversary also offered an opportunity to invest in the future: our successful “Kick 
Start the Future” campaign raised more than $56,000 for early career and student scholarships 
(surpassing the original goal of $50,000). It was my pleasure to contribute to the campaign, to 
encourage former and current ACRL leaders and members to contribute, and to award more than 
179 conference scholarships. It was a joy to participate in the ACRL Scholarship Breakfast and 
meet the winners—all bright stars representing the next generation of leaders for the profession 
and ACRL. I look forward to engaging this talented group in the life and work of ACRL.

As we move toward our centennial anniversary, I invite you to support ACRL in advancing its 
Plan for Excellence. Your membership strengthens our voice when we advocate on behalf of 
academic and research libraries and librarians on issues such as student learning, new forms of 
scholarly dissemination, fair use, and the value of academic libraries to the higher education 
community. Renew your membership, encourage a colleague to join ACRL, and get involved. 
Together, we can advance learning and transform scholarship in the 21st century!

I especially want to thank 2014–15 ACRL President Karen A. Williams and the ACRL Board of 
Directors for their leadership in advancing the ACRL Plan for Excellence. I also wish to thank the 
many corporate colleagues, libraries, and Friends who so generously supported ACRL’s programs 
and 75th anniversary scholarship campaign. I want to also thank ACRL members, volunteers, and 
staff for the contributions they have made (and continue to make) to this exceptional community. 

Letter from the Executive Director
Mary Ellen K. Davis 
ACRL Executive Director



C&RL News December 2015  608

The Friends of ACRL donations support 
ACRL’s mission in key areas, including 
the Advocacy Fund, Board Strategic 
Plan Initiative Fund, Innovative Pro-
gramming Fund, Professional Develop-
ment Fund, RBMS Scholarships Fund, 
and the William Moffett Memorial 

Fund. Since the establishment of the Friends of ACRL, 728 donors have become Friends 
and contributed more than $195,000 to demonstrate their support for its initiatives. Money 
from the Friends Funds has been used to provide scholarships for ACRL professional 
development activities and to support the ACRL awards program through publicity and the 
creation of special presidential awards.

Thanks to those listed below for contributing to the Friends of ACRL in FY15 (Septem-
ber 1, 2014 – August 31, 2015). Founding Friends are shown in italics. A complete list of 
Founding Friends is available on the ACRL website at www.ala.org/acrl/aboutacrl/give-
toacrl/donate/friendsfound. A list of contributors to the 75th Anniversary Kick Start the 
Future Scholarship Campaign can be found at http://acrl.ala.org/acrl75/?page_id=250.

Friends of ACRL

PATRONS  
($1,000 or more)

Millicent Abell*
Carolyn Henderson Allen*

Anne K. Beaubien
Irene M.H. Herold*

John A. Lehner
Mary Jane Petrowski*π

Maureen Sullivan*

SPONSORS  
($500–$999)

CACRL Greater New York  
Metropolitan Area Chapter*

Vicki Gregory«
Ann Campion Riley*
Karen A. Williams*&

CONTRIBUTORS  
($250–$499)
Paul T. Adalian
Camila Alire*Ω

Susan M. Allen*
Steven J. Bell*

Charlotte B. Brown

John P. Culshaw*
Deborah B. Dancik*

Stephanie Davis-Kahl*©∆
Kathryn Deiss*&+

Julie and Scott Garrison*
Althea H. Jenkins*

Cassandra Kvenild*
R. Arvid Nelsen*
Joyce L. Ogburn*

Mary Reichel and Rao Aluri*
Robert F. Rose

Daniel Slive*
Elaine Smyth*

Susan Barnes Whyte*
Shali Zhang*

ASSOCIATES 
($100–$249)ACRL Distance  

Learning Section
Nancy H. Allen*

Judith M. Arnold*
M. Sue Baughman*
Matthew L. Beacom
Richenda L. Brim*
Susan Brynteson
Theresa S. Byrd*

Anne Marie Casey*
Debora L. Cheney*

Scott Collard*
Lynn Silipigni Connaway*

Ann Copeland*
Kate Corby*%

John J. Danneker≤
Mary Ellen K. Davis*

Mel DeSart*
Mark G. Dimunation
Jackie M. Dooley*

Erika Dowell*
Karen E. Downing*

Christian Y. Dupont*
Elizabeth A. Dupuis

Maggie Farrell*
Teresa Fishel*

Melvin R. George*
Nolen Harris*

Lisa J. Hinchliffe*
Melissa Hubbard

Athena N. Jackson*
Sarah H. Jeong*

Elizabeth L. Johnson*
William L. Joyce*

Lynne O. King
Kirsten M. Kinsley*

Diane G. Klare
Linda A. Kopecky*

Charles E. Kratz, Jr.*
Patricia A. Kreitz*

Mary A. Lacy*
Deborah J. Leslie*

Sharon B. Maderπ
Kathy L. Magarrell*

Debbie Malone*
Jerilyn Marshall*
Peter McDonald*

Beth McNeil*
Lori S. Mestre*%
W. Bede Mitchell
Marilyn Myers*
James G. Neal*

William N. Nelson*º
Jill Newby*

Margaret F. Nichols
Nancy P. O’Brien*◊µ%
Marilyn N. Ochoa*
Blynne K. Olivieri
Kathy A. Parsons*
Fernando Peña*

John Popko*
Henry F. Raine*

Joan Roca*
Dana C. Rooks*
Sarah Schmidt

Edwin C. Schroeder
Sarah E. Sheehan*

Lise Snyder*
Jill Sodt*

David Szewczyk
Lorelei Tanji*
Suzy Taraba*

Elaine C. Tennant
Julie B. Todaro*

C. Anne Turhollow*
Scott Walter*

Patricia A. Wand*
Robert Wedgeworth*
Janice D. Welburn*

Beth Whittaker*
Cherry Williams*
James Williams*

Barbara J. Wittkopf*
Anne E. Zald*



December 2015  609 C&RL News

FRIENDS  
(Up to $99)

Friends of ACRL

Anonymous
Siobhan Abrams

Jaena Alabi*
Carol M. Allen*
Kristine Alpi*

Katelyn M. Angell*
James E. Arsenault
Mario A. Ascencio*
James P. Ascher

Elizabeth L. Bagley*
Tiffany Baglier*

Anne M. Bahde*
Jody Bailey*

Kimberly M. Bailey*
Lynn N. Baird*

Fagdeba A. Bakoyema*
Lora Baldwin*

Deepa Banerjee*
Sandra Barclay*
Inga H. Barnello*

Frederick Barnhart*
Virginia L. Bartow
Andrea Baruzzi*
Penny M. Beile*
Christina Bell*
Lucy Bellamy*
Rickey D. Best

Amanda Binder*
Wayne Bivens-Tatum*

Rebecca Blakiston*
Nataly R. Blas*

Cheryl L. Blevens*
Thomas A. Bolze
Sharon L. Bostick*
Cathleen Bourdon*

Melissa Bowles-Terry*
Marianne Bracke*

Laura R. Braunstein*
Martin Brennan*∆

Norman I. Buchwald*
Jeffrey S. Bullington*

Heidi Steiner Burkhardt*
Michaelyn Burnette*

Carolyn Caizzi*
Shawn P. Calhoun*

Stanley R. Campbell*
Victoria F. Caplan*

John F. Carey*
Mindy Carner

Lisabeth A. Chabot√
Mou Chakraborty*

Kimberly A. Chapman*
Madeleine Charney*

Diane Childs*%
Sally S. Chuah*

Zach Coble*∆
Margot Conahan*
Margaret M. Cook*

Matthew Cook*
Bryna R. Coonin*

Yolanda L. Cooper*
Monica H. Craig*
Kerry Creelman*

Patrick M. Crowley
Lisa Cruces*

Alice Daugherty*
Jeanne R. Davidson*

April C. Davies
Heather C. Dean
Jennifer L. Dean*

Sandra DeGroote*∆
Louise F. Deis
Marta Deyrup*

Emily Anne Dill*
Heather Dodge*
Anne Doherty*

Johanna R. Drucker
David L. Easterbrook*

Ellen Ellickson
Erin Ellis*

Jennifer L. Fabbi*
Sari Feldman*

Keith Michael Fiels*
Beth Filar-Williams*
Kathleen Finegan*

Janet S. Fore*
Elaine Franco*

David Free*
Jack Fritts*

Christine Fruin*∆
Jamillah R. Gabriel
Brian T. Gallagher*

Moriana Garcia*
Julia M. Gelfand*©

Constance D. Ghinazzi*
Katie E. Gibson*

Jane M. Gillis
Kevin Glick

Liorah Golomb*
Sara Russell Gonzalez*

Michael Gorman*
Carla Graebner

Megan R. Griffin*
Julia C. Gustafson*
Jill Hallam-Miller*
Rachel Hamelers*

Beatriz Hardy*
Eileen Harrington*

Arianne Hartsell-Gundy*
Barbara Harvey*

Elizabeth Haven Hawley
Sandra Hawes*

Melinda K. Hayes
Elspeth Healey

Mary B. Heinzman*
Brenna K. Helmstutler*

Philip Herold*
Jennifer Hill*
W. Lee Hisle
Adrian Ho*∆

Megan Hodge*

Claire Holmes*
Jeanne Hoover*

Rhonda K. Huisman*
Rosanne Humes*

Robin Imhof*
Kofoworola O. Jagboro*

ShuYong Jiang*
Jason Kovari

Molly Keener*∆
Barbara J. Kenney*
Patricia E. Keogh*

Andy Kivel*
Thomas Kmetz*
Rita C. Knight*
Karen E. Kunz*

Catherine Lantz*
Naomi J. Lederer*

Douglas K. Lehman*↑
Yue Li*

Steven M. Locy*
Megan C. Lotts*

Michael E. Luther
Cassandra Mackie*

Kara Malenfant*∆
Frances J. Maloy*

Scott Mandernack*∆
Estelle N. Markel-Joyet

Jeffrey D. Marshall
Heather Martin*
Jason Martin*
Piper Martin*

James McCloskey*
Hazel McClure*

Jill M. McKinstry*
Sara Memmott*
Laura Micham

Michelle S. Millet*
Rachel Minkin*

Kate S. Moriarty
Carol Moulden*
Zola Mumford*
Todd Mundle*

Ann K.D. Myers
Gregory Nelson*
Erin M. O’Toole*

David D. Oberhelman*
Chase Ollis*

Victoria Ondrla*
Mary Onorato*
Elizabeth L. Ott

John H. Overholt
Allison Payne*
Maureen Perry*

Pamela A. Perry*

Amanda Peters*
Timothy Peters*
Kevin Petsche*
John H. Pollitz
Sara Powell

Amy C. Prendergast*
Marguerite Ragnow*
Katherine L. Rankin

Kim G. Read*
Hannah G. Rempel*

Alison S. Ricker*
Charlotte Roh*∆

Christine Ruotolo*
Amanda Rust*

Annanaomi Sams*
Devin Savage*∆

Maxine Schmidt*
Robert Schroeder*

Molly Schwartzburg
Kim Schwenk

Kathryn Shaughnessy*
John Sheridan*

Yasmeen Shorish*
Christina L. Sibley*

Scott Silet*
Andrew Smith*
Brenda Smith*
Erin T. Smith*

Steven Allen Smith*
Michelle Y. Spomer*

Linda L. Stein*
Jennifer S. Stevens*

Claire Stewart*∆
Charles C. Stewart*
Shannon K. Struble

Andrew Stuart*
William J. Studer*

Nicole Sump-Crethar*
Shan Sutton*∆

Laura L. Taddeo*
Julie Tanaka*

Rene M. Tanner*
Terry Taylor*

Susan Trujillo*
Melissa S. Van Vuuren*

Helga B. Visscher*%
Tammy J. Eschedor Voelker*

Stephen Walker*
Leslie A. Warren
Kara M. Whatley*

Tanner Wray*
Jingfeng Xia*

Courtney L. Young*
Annie Zeidman-Karpinski*

Names in Italics = Founding Members

* In honor of the 75th Anniversary Campaign
√ = In honor of ACRL Staff
º = In memory of Charles E. Beard
% = In memory of Leslie Bjorncrantz

© = In memory of Julia C. Blixrud
↑= In honor of Imogene I. Book
«= In memory of Rickie Louise Brunner
Ω = In honor of Trevor A. Dawes 
∆ = In honor of Ray English
◊ = In memory of Emily Fabiano

≤ = In memory of Jose Manuel Palacios
π = In memory of Betsy Park
+= In honor of Mary Jane Petrowski
& = In honor of Shelley E. Phipps
# = In memory of Nadia Sophie Seiler
µ =In memory of Laurene Zaporozhetz

“As a former ACRL President, I was honored to be the ACRL 
2015 conference chair. The ACRL 75th anniversary coincided 
with the Portland conference, and supporting scholarships  

is, to me, the perfect way to celebrate and acknowledge  
the association’s contributions to the professional  

development and education of academic librarians.” 
 – Lori Goetsch, Friend of ACRL 



C&RL News December 2015  610

Annual Conference Programs
ACRL Programs at the 2015 ALA Annual Conference

— San Francisco —
	ANSS/LES/LPSS – Libraries Behind Bars: Education and Outreach to 

Prisoners 
	Arts – Framing and Enhancing Visual Literacy: Using the New ACRL 

Framework to Develop Effective Art Instruction
	DLS – Intentional Teaching Online: Using Instructional Design to Enhance 

Distance Library Instruction
	EBSS – Boots on the Ground: Making Academic Libraries Work for Veterans
	Individual Proposal – But We’re Neutral! And Other Librarian Fictions 

Confronted by #critlib
	Individual Proposal – Academic Integrity: An Opportunity for Faculty 

Development
	Individual Proposal – Putting Your Patrons in the Driver’s Seat: Assessing the 

Value of On-Demand Streaming Video
	Individual Proposal – Embeddedness-Plus: Combining Embedded 

Librarianship with Direct Marketing to Underserved Groups
	Individual Proposal – All the Data: Privacy, Service Quality, and Analytics
	IS – Aligning Learning Spaces with Pedagogy: The Instruction Librarian’s 

Role in Classroom Re/Design
	Liaison Assembly Committee – How Others View Us: Insights from Librarian 

Engagement in Higher Education Associations
	Library and Information Science Education Interest Group – Collaborative 

Infl uences of LIS Educators and Practitioners Regarding Hiring the Profession
	President’s Program – The Power of Mindset: Fostering Grit on the Way to 

New Roles
	Professional Values Committee – Should I Tweet That? Academic Freedom 

and Social Media
	Publications Coordinating Committee – Reducing the Fog around Publishing: 

Practical Strategies for Book Development, from Research to Writing
	RBMS (cosponsored by ALA-GLBTRT) – Curating Activism in LGBT 

History
	SEES/WESS – Beyond Tintin: Collecting European Comics in the U.S.
	STS – Unlocking the Sciences: Collaborative Research with Community 

Engagement through Citizen Science
	ULS – Look into the Crystal Ball: Future Directions for Higher Education 

and Academic Libraries



December 2015  611 C&RL News

ACRL 75th Anniversary

In May 2014, ACRL began a celebration of the association’s 75th anniversary. Following a new 
constitution that included the creation of self-governing divisions within the association, the ALA 
Council recognized its first division on May 31, 1940. That inaugural division was ACRL, the 
Association of College and Reference Libraries. It was not until 1956 that the word Research 
was substituted for Reference—in response to the Reference Libraries Section of ACRL joining 
a newly formed Library Reference Services Division. 

Among the highlights of the anniversary celebration this fiscal year were the publication of New 
Roles for the Road Ahead, a collection of essays reflecting on ways academic libraries can succeed 
in a changing higher education environment, a series of articles in C&RL News highlighting each 

decade in ACRL’s history, and a special issue of College & 
Research Libraries looking back at a selection of seminal 
articles from the journal’s history. ACRL celebrated the  
association’s history while looking to the future at the  
ACRL 2015 Conference. Anniversary events included 
special panel discussions, a timeline of ACRL history, and 
a celebratory cake cutting. In addition, a time capsule of 

artifacts including memorabilia from past ACRL conferences, the table of contents from the 
C&RL anniversary issue, and a copy of the ACRL Plan for Excellence, along with a variety of 
other items, was sealed at the 2015 ALA Annual Conference in San Francisco. The time capsule 
will be opened as part of the celebration of ACRL’s 100th anniversary.

The commitment of the ACRL membership to the future of the association was evidenced by the 
overwhelming participation in the 75th anniversary scholarship campaign, which raised more than 
$56,000 and created an additional 75 scholarships to be awarded for the ACRL 2015 Conference. 

More information on these and other activities are available throughout this report and on the 
ACRL 75th Anniversary website at acrl.ala.org/acrl75.

Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education

The ACRL Board of Directors appointed a task force in 2013 to update the Information Literacy 
Competency Standards for Higher Education, adopted by the association in 2000, so that they 
reflect the current thinking on the creation and dissemination of knowledge, the changing global 
higher education and learning environment, the shift from information literacy to information 
fluency, and the expanding definition of information literacy to include multiple literacies. To 
better equip students to navigate, understand and contribute in this dynamic information ecosys-
tem, the task force determined that a move from the traditional standards model to a framework 
was needed to allow for more creative and integrated information literacy learning outcomes. 
The Board took the official action of “filing” the new Framework for Information Literacy for 
Higher Education at the 2015 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Chicago. The Board also decided to 
defer sunsetting the Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education. More 
information on the Framework is available in the Student Learning section of this report.

Year in Review



C&RL News December 2015  612

ACRL 2015 Conference

More than 5,000 library staff, exhibitors, speakers, and guests attended the ACRL 2015 Confer-
ence, held March 25–28 in Portland, Oregon. ACRL 2015 set a record with the highest combined 
registrant attendance ever for an ACRL conference, with 3,390 face-to-face and more than 300 
virtual attendees from all 50 states and 24 countries. The number also included 1,250 first-time 
attendees, the highest recorded. Themed “Creating Sustainable Community,” the conference of-
fered more than 500 programs that explored a host of pressing issues affecting higher education. 
ACRL 2015 took place during ACRL’s 75th anniversary year, and to celebrate, special events 
and programs were held throughout the entire conference. ACRL held a fundraising campaign 
that awarded a record-breaking 179 conference scholarships, totaling $112,995, for librarians and 
staff to attend ACRL 2015. More information about the conference is available in the Education 
section of this report.

ACRL’s Plan for Excellence

This report highlights ACRL’s many accomplishments during the 2015 fiscal year across the 
three strategic goal areas highlighted in the Plan for Excellence—the value of academic librar-
ies, student learning, and the research and scholarly environment—along with the association’s 
enabling programs and services.

The Value of Academic Libraries

ACRL made significant progress on the association’s goal of assisting academic libraries in 
demonstrating alignment with, and impact on, institutional outcomes this year.

The association provides support and training to ACRL liaisons to other higher education orga-
nizations and disciplinary societies so that they are prepared to talk about the value of academic 
libraries in those contexts. In order to further influence national conversations and activities, 
ACRL members and staff have presented about the value of academic libraries initiative at 
several conferences, including the 2014 Assessment Institute, Library Assessment Conference, 
and Association for the Assessment of Learning in Higher Education.

ACRL’s Standards for Libraries in Higher Education continue to be an important compo-
nent of the Value initiative. The association licensed and offered five full-day workshops on  

Year in Review

“As a first-generation college graduate and an entry-level 
librarian of color, I have used my experience at ACRL 2015 

to further improve how I teach information literacy skills to 
all students, especially first-generation students of color.”

– Kenny Garcia, ACRL Member of the Week



December 2015  613 C&RL News

implementing the standards over the past year. More than 185 print copies of the revised 
Standards for Libraries in Higher Education were distributed this year, and the online version 
was visited nearly 17,000 times.

Members of the Value of Academic Libraries Committee continue to regularly highlight 
significant research and project reports on the VAL blog at www.acrl.ala.org/value/ and the 
Valueography at http://acrl.ala.org/valueography/. The committee also released customizable 
template posters that use research to highlight the value of libraries in November 2014. The 
posters are available online at www.acrl.ala.org/value/?page_id=954.

Assessment in Action Program
In September 2012, ACRL was awarded a National Leadership 
Demonstration Grant of $249,330 by the Institute of Museum 
and Library Services (IMLS) for the program “Assessment in 
Action: Academic Libraries and Student Success” (AiA). Part 
of ACRL’s Value of Academic Libraries initiative, AiA is being 
undertaken in partnership with the Association for Institutional 
Research (AIR) and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU). The grant 
supports the design, implementation, and evaluation of a program to strengthen the competen-
cies of librarians in campus leadership and data-informed advocacy.

The AiA program employs a blended learning environment and a peer-to-peer network over the 
course of 14 months. The librarians participate as cohort members in a one-year professional 
development program that includes team-based activities carried out on their campuses. An 
important component of the AiA program is establishing a learning community where librarian 
team leaders have the freedom to connect, risk, and learn together.

ACRL released a new report “Academic Library Contributions to Student Success: Documented 
Practices from the Field,” which synthesizes results from more than 70 higher education insti-
tutions from across North America that recently completed team-based assessment projects. 
These projects, from the first year of AiA, resulted in promising and effective approaches to 
demonstrating the library’s value to students’ academic success.

Fifty-five institutional teams were selected to participate in the third year of the program. The 
teams, representing all types of institutions, come from 24 states, the District of Columbia, and 
Australia. These teams join the 75 institutions that participated in the first year of the program 
and 73 from the second year. For a list of institutions from all three years of the program, visit 
the AiA program website at www.ala.org/acrl/AiA.

Eric Resnis, who serves in a dual appointment as assessment coordinator in the Center for 
Teaching, Learning, and University Assessment and as organizational effectiveness specialist 
in the Libraries at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, and John Watts, undergraduate learning 
librarian at University of Nevada–Las Vegas, were named as new facilitators for the program 
this year.

Year in Review



C&RL News December 2015  614

ACRLMetrics
To assist with evaluating library performance, ACRLMetrics added the 2013 ACRL survey 
data as well as selected IPEDS elements. This online product provides unprecedented access to 
the annual ACRL Academic Library Trends and Statistics Survey data as well as the biennial 
National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) Academic Library Survey data from 2000 to 
2013. ACRLMetrics facilitates performance analysis and decision-making with peer bench-
marking and customized reports for use in presentations, grant applications, self-studies, and 
strategic planning. 

Student Learning

The following activities are examples of ways ACRL moved towards achieving the association’s 
goal of assisting librarians in transforming student learning, pedagogy, and instructional practices 
through creative and innovative collaborations.

The ACRL Board of Directors appointed a task force in 2013 to update the Information Literacy 
Competency Standards for Higher Education, adopted by the association in 2000, so that they 
reflect the current thinking on the creation and dissemination of knowledge, the changing global 
higher education and learning environment, the shift from information literacy to information 
fluency, and the expanding definition of information literacy to include multiple literacies. To 
better equip students to navigate, understand and contribute in this dynamic information ecosys-
tem, the task force determined that a move from the traditional standards model to a framework 
was needed to allow for more creative and integrated information literacy learning outcomes. 
As noted earlier in this report, the Board took the official action of “filing” the new Framework 
for Information Literacy for Higher Education at the 2015 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Chicago. 
The Board also decided to defer sunsetting the Information Literacy Competency Standards for 
Higher Education.

To help with the implementation of the Framework, Sharon Mader was hired as ACRL visiting 
program officer for information literacy in February 2015. To further support the implementation 
of the Framework, the ACRL Board of Directors approved the creation of a new ACRL Frame-
work for Information Literacy Advisory Board in spring 2015. These member leaders will work 
with Mader to offer a range of expertise and perspectives that can positively and strategically 
shape the growth and development of the Framework.

The Student Learning and Information Literacy Committee compiled an annotated bibliography 
on threshold concepts, one of the educational theories underpinning the document. The list rep-
resents a wide variety of disciplines around threshold concepts and serves as an introduction to 
threshold concepts in the literature of educational theory. In addition, the ACRL 2015 conference 
featured ten panel sessions covering various aspects of the Framework, along with an update 
session on the document.

To facilitate additional information sharing, ACRL created an electronic list to provide a con-
venient spot for exchanging ideas about the Framework. The new list serves as an open forum 
for asking questions, posting professional development opportunities, and sharing examples of 

Year in Review



December 2015  615 C&RL News

how libraries are using the Framework. Additional information on the new list and other activi-
ties around the Framework is available through a dedicated website at acrl.ala.org/framework.

The Information Literacy Competency Standards for Higher Education continue to be widely 
cited as a benchmark in information literacy instruction. This year the standards were cited in 
numerous books, journal articles, and blogs along with ACRL’s own publications. More than 
325 print copies of the standards have been distributed this year, and the online version has been 
visited nearly 123,700 times, showing the level of engagement with the revision/Framework 
development process. Since its filing in February 2015, the online version of the Framework has 
been accessed more than 42,100 times.

A variety of e-Learning courses and webcasts, along with programs and preconference sessions 
at ACRL 2015, the ALA Midwinter Meeting, and ALA Annual Conference, provided additional 
opportunities for librarians to gain additional skills in these important areas.

Information Literacy Immersion Program
ACRL endeavors to improve members’ ability to teach and assess lifelong learning skills. To 
help librarians and institutions develop and implement information literacy programs on their 
campuses, the ACRL Immersion “Classic” Program was offered from August 2–7, 2015, at Seattle 
University. The program provided two tracks of intensive training and education for 85 attendees. 
The Teacher Track focused on individual development for librarians interested in enhancing or 
extending their individual instruction skills, while the Program Track focused on developing, 
integrating, or managing campus-wide and programmatic information literacy programs.

Fifty-five attendees participated in the Assessment and Intentional Teacher Tracks, held November 
19–22, 2014, in Nashville. The Assessment Track provided attendees with an understanding of 
assessment and information on how to use assessment as a tool to guide evidence-based class-
room, curriculum, and program development. The Intentional Teacher Track offered a mixture 
of structured and co-constructed learning segments, such as peer discussions, individual reading 
and reflection times, and participant-led communities of practice to help attendees become more 
self-aware and self-directed as teachers.

An additional 40 individuals participated in the Practical Management for the Instruction Coor-
dinator Track held March 25, 2015, in conjunction with the ACRL 2015 Conference in Portland, 
Oregon. This interactive one-day program addresses how to lead from within – developing the 
powers of persuasion to influence in multiple directions. Other topics included creating the right 
environment for a successful instruction program, understanding a broader campus environment, 
providing constructive feedback, and coaching for success.

Regional Immersion programs were held at the University of Alabama in May 2015 and the 
National University of Singapore in June 2015.

Year in Review

“I appreciate ACRL’s efforts to push our field  
forward and its capacity to spur conversations that 

help shape our profession, whether it’s through 
professional development opportunities,  

disseminating LIS research, or creating documents 
like the Framework for Information Literacy.” 

 – Eamon Tewell, ACRL Member of the Week



C&RL News December 2015  616

Year in Review
Information Literacy Resources
Eleven e-Learning seminars and webcasts provided opportunities to learn more about information 
literacy and student learning-related topics. Topics of the e-Learning opportunities included From 
Tutorials to Courses: Building an Engaging Online Learning Experience for Your Audience; Beyond 
Worksheets: Using Instructional Technologies for Authentic Assessment of Student Learning; Collabo-
rating for Student Success: Libraries and High Impact Educational Practices; Google It or Go Elsewhere; 
Librarians Collaborate! Working across Two- and Four-Year Institutions to Teach Transfer Students 
Information Literacy Skills; Moving from Impossible to Manageable: Helping Students Manage and 
Focus Research Topics; and You’re Doing it Wrong: Ten Rules to Break to Create Awesome Tutorials.

Several ACRL sections additionally sponsored information literacy-related programs at the 2015 
ALA Annual Conference. See page 610 for a full list of program topics.

ACRL continues to publish a variety of information literacy and learning monograph titles. Class-
room Assessment Techniques for Librarians, Not Just Where to Click: Teaching Students How 
to Think about Information (PIL #68), and Teaching Information Literacy Threshold Concepts: 
Lesson Plans for Librarians were published this year.

Intersections of Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy
The ACRL Intersections of Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy Task Force con-
tinued its work in promoting the connections between these two areas of the Plan for Excellence 
by proposing and delivering sustainable professional development opportunities building on the 
ideas and recommendations in the Intersections white paper. The task force presented a three-
part ACRL e-Learning webcast series in winter 2014–15 focusing on strategic collaborations for 
scholarly communication and information literacy, job descriptions for new roles, and copyright. 
A panel on the Intersections topic was also held at the ACRL 2015 conference. Plans are underway 
for additional Intersections professional development opportunities in the coming year.

Research and Scholarly Environment 

ACRL’s scholarly communication program actively promotes a commitment to the greater good 
through the transition to a more open system of scholarship. ACRL released a new version of its 
popular Scholarly Communication Toolkit with updated content in September 2014. The toolkit, 
developed and maintained by the ACRL Research and Scholarly Environment Committee (ReSEC), 
continues to provide content and context on a broad range of scholarly communication topics, in-
cluding expanded information on data management. It provides links to examples of specific tools, 
including handouts, presentations, and videos for libraries to use on their own campuses, and for 
library school students seeking to incorporate these issues into their course work. The toolkit is also 
widely used by libraries in conjunction with Open Access Week, an annual global event promoting 
open models of scholarly communication. The ACRL Scholarly Communication Toolkit is freely 
available online at acrl.ala.org/scholcomm.

ACRL established a new Digital Scholarship Centers Interest Group this year to provide a forum 
for discussion and the exchange of ideas. The association also raised awareness of important 



December 2015  617 C&RL News

Year in Review
scholarly communication issues by offering a free ACRL Presents… webcast, “Celebrating 
Fair Use Week: Does Fair Use Really Work?” during the February 2015 celebration of Fair 
Use Week. Another ACRL Presents... webcast held in October 2014, “Celebrating Open Ac-
cess Week: Scholarly Communication Initiatives at Academic Libraries,” helped librarians 
better understand the landscape, collaborations with faculty and students, and connections to 
information literacy.

ReSEC selected four sites from eight applications to host the subsidized version of our popular 
workshop “Scholarly Communication: From Understanding to Engagement” as road show 
events this spring and summer. The institutions selected to host the 2015 road shows are Au-
burn University Libraries (Auburn, Alabama), Iowa State University Library (Ames, Iowa), 
Tri-College University Libraries (Fargo, North Dakota), and University of South Carolina 
(Columbia, South Carolina). The workshop focuses on access, emerging opportunities, intel-
lectual property, and engagement. When the 2015 workshops are complete, the road show 
will have visited 26 different states, the District of Columbia, 1 U.S. territory, and 3 Canadian 
provinces. The 36 workshops offered over the program’s six years will have reached more than 
2,200 participants from more than 600 institutions. ACRL also makes the workshop available 
to other interested institutions.

The Scholarly Communication Road Show added two new presenters this year—Katie Fortney, 
copyright policy and education officer for the California Digital Library, and Anali Maughan 
Perry, associate librarian for collections and scholarly communication at the Arizona State 
University Libraries.

The first-ever unconference sponsored by the ARL/ACRL Institute on Scholarly Communication 
was held in March 2015, in Portland, Oregon, in conjunction with the ACRL 2015 Conference. 
During this community-driven experience, attendees shared skills, learned what has worked at 
other campuses, and built plans for their library’s scholarly communication program throughout 
the day. More than 25 additional sessions at ACRL 2015 focused on scholarly communication 
issues. To help strengthen the connection between scholarly communication and information 
literacy, ACRL’s Intersections of Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy task 
force presented a three-part e-Learning webcast series, From Awareness to Transformation: 
Intersections of Scholarly Communication and Information Literacy in 21st-Century Academic 
Libraries, in winter 2014–15.

ACRL published two books, Getting the Word Out: Academic Libraries as Scholarly Publishers 
and Meaningful Metrics: A 21st Century Librarian’s Guide to Bibliometrics, Altmetrics, and 
Research Impact, focusing on scholarly communication issues this year.

The ACRL Scholarly Communication Discussion Group, the Scholcomm discussion list, and 
the ACRL/SPARC Forum on Emerging Issues in Scholarly Communication continue to be 
important venues for strengthening the association’s role in supporting new models of scholarly 
communication. Regular articles on scholarly communication issues and trends in C&RL News 
play an important role in disseminating a body of knowledge for the field.



C&RL News December 2015  618

Enabling Programs and Services

In addition to the three Plan for Excellence goal areas, ACRL serves its members, along with 
the academic and research library community, through a wide variety of programs and services. 
Highlights of the regularly recurring operations relevant to the ability of ACRL to lead academic 
and research librarians and libraries in advancing learning and scholarship are reported below.

Member Engagement
ACRL’s membership activities build on retaining core membership while recruiting from new 
and diverse communities. As of August 31, 2015, ACRL had 11,181 members, an increase of 
1.55% (171 more members) from FY14 (11,010). There are currently 10,472 personal members, 
690 organizational members, and 19 corporate members.

ACRL continues to explore new models for member connections. The ACRL 101 program at 
the ALA Annual Conference educates members and potential members on the wide range of as-
sociation activities and opportunities for participation. For the third year, the association held a 
virtual orientation session for incoming leaders. A number of ACRL committees, interest groups, 
sections, and the Board of Directors are working virtually and taking advantage of ALA Connect 
and other virtual meeting systems to keep the work of the association moving forward year round.
 
As of August 2015, 6,353 individuals “like” the official ACRL Facebook page  
(www.facebook.com/ala.acrl) and 13,809 people follow the association on Twitter  
(https://twitter.com/ALA_ACRL). Many ACRL sections, including AFAS, Arts, CLS, IS, LES, 
LPSS, and WGSS, have Facebook pages or groups for their members and other interested parties. 
ACRL’s scholarly research journal College & Research Libraries also maintains Facebook and 
Twitter presences. These online presences provide avenues for information dissemination and 
connection with, and between, members. The ACRL Pinterest site (www.pinterest.com/acrlala/) 
provides a visual picture of the association, including images of award winners, members of 
the week, ACRL publication covers, and more. As of August 2015, 378 people follow ACRL’s 
Pinterest presence. 

The ACRL Insider blog (www.acrl.ala.org/acrlinsider/) continues to keep readers current and 
informed on the activities, services, and programs of the association and features weekly profiles 
of ACRL members. The biweekly ACRL Update e-newsletter, along with publications and e-
Learning course announcements, continue to be distributed to more than 13,000 subscribers to 
increase awareness of ACRL activities.

Year in Review

“Through ACRL, I will always be able to  
find new ways to change and grow in  
the profession as well as people who  

will support me along the way.”  
– Meagan Lacy, ACRL Member of the Week



December 2015  619 C&RL News

ACRL 10,472 709 11,181 11,010 +1.55% 
AAMES 298 33 331 289 +14.53% 
AFAS 248 8 256 194 +31.96% 
ANSS 473 32 505 424 +19.10% 
Arts 757 43 800 747 +7.10% 
CJCLS 1,205 113 1,318 1,236 +6.63% 
CLS 2,504 154 2,658 2,476 +7.35% 
DLS 1,505 54 1,559 1,471 +5.98% 
EBSS 791 75 866 779 +11.17% 
IS 3,946 209 4,155 3,989 +4.16% 
LES 568 10 578 496 +16.53% 
LPSS 418 38 456 412 +10.68% 
RBMS 1,610 76 1,686 1,585 +6.37% 
SEES 176 19 195 152 +28.29% 
STS 1,222 89 1,311 1,229 +6.67% 
ULS 4,001 150 4,151 4,019 +3.28% 
WESS 450 23 473 421 +12.35% 
WGSS 569 20 589 437 +34.78% 

Total Personal Section 
Affiliations                     21,887

Academic Library 424 1 425 355 +19.72% 
Services to International Students 
Digital Badges 93 0 93 N/A N/A 
Digital Curation 1,012 5 1,017 935 +8.77% 
Digital Humanities 352 1 353 N/A N/A 
Health Sciences 583 3 586 494 +18.62% 
Image Resources 340 4 344 264 +30.30% 
Librarianship in 188 2 190 154 +23.38% 
For-Profit Institutions 
Library and Information 476 4 480 246 +95.12% 
Science (LIS) Education 
Library Marketing and 321 2 323 N/A N/A 
Outreach 
Numeric &  311 0 311 244 +27.46% 
Geospatial Data
Residency 99 0 99 59 +67.80% 
Technical Services 568 4 572 331 +72.81% 
Universal Accessibility 290 0 290 193 +50.26% 
Virtual Worlds 169 1 170 130 +30.77% 

Total Personal IG 
Affiliations                       5,253

Note: The ACRL Digital Scholarship Centers Interest Group was added as a dues products September 1, 2015. 
Membership figures will be available for FY16.

Year in Review
ACRL Communities of Practice Membership Statistics

ACRL   Organizational August 2015 August 2014   
Sections Personal and Corporate total  total Change 

ACRL  Organizational August 2015 August 2014   
Interest Groups Personal and Corporate total  total Change



C&RL News December 2015  620

ACRL continues to sponsor participants in the ALA Emerging Leaders program. This year’s five 
ACRL-sponsored emerging leaders were Crystal Boyce (sponsored by STS), Rachel Gammons 
(sponsored by Arts and LES), Alexandra Hauser (sponsored by CLS), Rebecca Marrall (sponsored 
by ULS), and Melissa Ringle (sponsored by ACRL).

As part of its commitment to furthering diversity in librarianship, the association is supporting 
Stephanie Everett as its 2015–16 Spectrum Scholar. Everett is a student at Kent State University. 
Since 1999, ACRL has contributed $102,500 to the ALA Spectrum program, sponsoring 12 
ALA Spectrum Scholars, and has awarded more than 20 Spectrum Travel Grants consisting of 
registration and a travel stipend to help Spectrum Scholars attend every ACRL conference since 
2005, with a total value of more than $20,000.

In addition, ACRL assists scholars through mentoring and conference assistance. In 2003, ACRL 
founded the ACRL Dr. E. J. Josey Spectrum Mentor Program and Committee to encourage ALA 
Spectrum LIS students to pursue academic librarianship. Since then, the committee has paired 
more than 120 Spectrum Scholars with a trained mentor from an academic library and will be 
again working to pair interested current scholars and scholars from the incoming Spectrum class. 
The committee has been implementing assessment tools to gather and measure feedback from 
mentors and mentees about the use and effectiveness of the mentoring program, which will be 
used to refine the program as future cohorts use and review the data gathered.

Communities of Practice
ACRL has dozens of opportunities for members with similar interests to “meet up” through its 
communities of practice. Sections, Interest Groups, and Discussion Groups provide formal or 
informal ways for members to connect and work on projects that contribute to the profession.

Sections
ACRL provides special connections for members, both virtual and personal. ACRL sections 
offer 17 vibrant and dynamic communities that nurture individual development and foster a 
deeper connection to the profession. Sections also hosted dozens of special events (socials, 
dinners, receptions) at the ALA Midwinter Meeting and ALA Annual Conference to create 
community among new and continuing members.

Interest Groups
As of August 2015, ACRL’s 14 interest groups — Academic Library Services to International 
Students, Digital Badges, Digital Curation, Digital Humanities, Health Sciences, Image Re-
sources, Librarianship in For-Profit Educational Institutions, Library and Information Science 
(LIS) Education, Library Marketing and Outreach, Numeric and Geospatial, Data Services 
in Academic Libraries, Residency, Technical Services, Universal Accessibility, and Virtual 
Worlds — have attracted 5,226 members, with an average membership of 373. The Digital 
Curation Interest Group currently has the most members (1,017). The Digital Scholarship 
Centers Interest Group launched September 1, 2015, bringing the total number of Interest 
Groups to 15 beginning in FY16. Approved by the ACRL membership in the 2008 ALA/
ACRL election, interest groups provide a way to easily create a “home” within ACRL for 
topics and issues of interest to the profession.

Year in Review



December 2015  621 C&RL News

Discussion Groups
ACRL’s 22 discussion groups are designed to gather together interested parties to discuss 
issues and always-important informal networks for exchanging ideas and problem-solving. A 
listing of Discussion Groups is available on the ACRL website at www.ala.org/acrl/aboutacrl/
directoryofleadership/discussiongroups/dgs.

Awards
Through its awards program, which recognizes the achievements of academic and research librar-
ians and libraries, ACRL provides a platform for librarians to bring notice of their work to their 
broader communities. Since 1923, the ACRL Awards Program has recognized and honored the 
professional contributions and achievements of academic libraries and librarians. This special 
recognition by ACRL enhances the sense of personal growth and accomplishment of our mem-
bers, provides our membership with role models, and strengthens the image of our membership 
in the eyes of employers, leadership, and the academic community as a whole.

In 2015, 31 outstanding individuals and institutions received ACRL 
awards recognizing their accomplishments. ACRL’s top honor, the Aca-
demic/Research Librarian of the Year Award, was presented to Robert 
A. Seal, dean of university libraries at Loyola University Chicago. Seal 
was cited for his commitment to international library cooperation along 
with his reputation as a strong, visionary leader and as a caring mentor 
to new and experienced academic librarians.

ACRL continues to present the Excellence in Academic Libraries Award 
to recognize the staff of a community college, a college, and a university 
library for exemplary programs that deliver outstanding services and 
resources to further the educational mission of their institution. This 
year’s recipients were Santa Fe College in the community college category, Amherst College 
in the college category, and Purdue University in the university category. The award, sponsored 
by ACRL and YBP Library Services, includes a presentation ceremony on the campus of each 
award-winning library. 

Publications
ACRL’s publications program was very active during 2014–15, publishing 12 new books, which are 
listed in the accompanying table. ACRL monographs are available in a variety of e-book formats 
through the ALA Store and Amazon. Libraries can also purchase ACRL e-books through EBSCO.

Serials
Association members continue to receive print copies of College & Research Libraries 
News (C&RL News), ACRL’s news magazine and publication of record, as a perquisite of 
membership. C&RL News is also available by subscription. As noted earlier in this report, the 
association’s scholarly research journal College & Research Libraries (C&RL), is an online-
only, open access publication. ACRL is proud to make quality research freely available to 
the higher education community as it models new practices in scholarly communication.  

Year in Review

Robert Seal,  
2015 Academic/Research  

Librarian of the Year



C&RL News December 2015  622

Year in Review

ACRL AWARD WINNERS 2015

Division Award Winners
 Academic/Research Librarian of the Year Award (Donor: YBP Library Services) 
Robert A. Seal, Dean of University Libraries, Loyola University Chicago

 Excellence in Academic Libraries 
(Donor: YBP Library Services)
University: Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana;
College: Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts;
Community College: Santa Fe College, Gainesville, Florida

 Hugh C. Atkinson Memorial Award
(ACRL, ALCTS, LLAMA, LITA) Brian Schottlaender, University of California-San Diego

Section Award Winners
 CJCLS Library Program Achievement Award (Donor: EBSCO Information Services) 
Andrew G. Truxal Library, Anne Arundel Community College

 CJCLS Library Resources Leadership Award (Donor: EBSCO Information Services) Mary 
Ann Sheble, Oakland Community College

 CLS Innovation in College Librarianship Award Melinda Beland, Angie Cox, Melissa 
Gevaert, Anna Hollingsworth and Linda McLaury, University of Northern Iowa

 DLS Routledge Distance Learning Librarianship Conference Sponsorship Award 

(Donor: Routledge/Taylor & Francis Group) Christina Sibley, Arizona Western College

 IS Ilene F. Rockman Instruction Publication of the Year Award (Donor: Emerald Group 
Publishing Limited) Emily Drabinski, Long Island University-Brooklyn

 IS Innovation Award Michelle Keba, Michael Schofi eld, and Jamie Segno, Nova Southeast-
ern University

 IS Miriam Dudley Instruction Librarian Award (Donor: ACRL Instruction Section) Lisa 
Janicke Hinchliffe, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

 RBMS/Leab Exhibition Catalogue Awards (Donor: Katharine Kyes Leab and Daniel J. Leab 
Endowment) CATEGORY 1 WINNER (EXPENSIVE): The Grolier Club; CATEGORY 2 WINNER (MODERATELY 
EXPENSIVE): Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library at the University of Toronto; CATEGORY 3 WINNER 
(INEXPENSIVE): Saint Louis University Libraries, Archives and Records Management; CATEGORY 
4 WINNER (BROCHURES): Bruce Peel Special Collections Library at the University of Alberta; 
CATEGORY 4 HONORABLE MENTION (BROCHURES): The Getty Research Institute; CATEGORY 5 WINNER 
(ELECTRONIC EXHIBITIONS): The Eda Kuhn Loeb Music Library at Harvard University

 WESS De Gruyter European Librarianship Study Grant (Donor: de Gruyter Foundation) 
Katharine C. Chandler, Free Library of Philadelphia

 WGSS Achievement in Women’s Studies Librarianship Awards

Career Achievement Connie Phelps, University of New Orleans

Signifi cant Achievement Nancy Goebel, University of Alberta Augustana Campus



December 2015  623 C&RL News

Year in Review
RBM: A Journal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Cultural Heri-
tage is published twice yearly in print and online, and is available 
by subscription. ACRL also publishes the Choice suite of products, 
including Choice magazine and Choice Reviews Online.

Wendi Kaspar, policy sciences librarian at the Texas A&M University 
Policy Sciences and Economics Library, was appointed the next editor 
of C&RL in June 2015. Kaspar will serve as editor designate from July 
1, 2015, to June 30, 2016, when she will assume full editorial respon-
sibility. In the position of editor, Kaspar will also serve as chair of the 
C&RL Editorial Board. Her extensive publishing experience includes 
serving as co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Academic Librarianship
(2012–14) and co-editor-in-chief of Library Leadership & Management (2010–12). Kaspar 
succeeds Scott Walter, university librarian at DePaul University in Chicago, as C&RL editor. 
Walter began his term as editor in 2012.

Mark Shelton of Harvard University was appointed to the post of C&RL book review editor 
in October 2014. Currently head of collection development at Harvard’s Gutman Library, 
Shelton has written numerous book reviews for C&RL and Collection Building, in addition 
to serving as a library advisory board member for a variety of publishers.

A 75th anniversary special issue of C&RL was released online in March 2015. The issue 
contains commentary essays on a series of seminal articles from the journal’s history selected 
by the journal readership, along with republished versions of those articles, an introductory 
essay from editor Scott Walter, and a look at the future of publishing in scholarly societies. 
The special issue is freely available on the C&RL website.

As part of its social media program, the journal hosted two online fora this year. Each forum 
highlighted a new C&RL study with a free, live, expert panel comprised of the study’s authors 
and additional subject experts. “Degrees of Impact: Analyzing the Effects of Progressive 
Librarian Course Collaborations on Student Performance,” held in December 2014, featured 
authors of a study conducting a rubric assessment of fi rst-year seminar research papers to 
analyze the level of instruction it takes to improve information literacy learning. Held in 
May 2015, “A Survey of Campus Coordinators of Undergraduate Research Programs” fea-
tured a panel sharing the fi ndings of a study, which included two parts: a survey of libraries 
that gauged current support for undergraduate research programs and an investigation of 
how undergraduate research program coordinators perceive and value library support for 
undergraduate research. May also featured a forum on the “Future of the ‘Research’ in the 

“I love getting C&RL News in the mail and reading it. I 
really do! Our colleagues do some excellent work and 

as a new librarian, I am grateful for this publication 
which help me refl ect on my approach, gain exposure 
to new perspectives, and grow my knowledge base.”

– Isabel Gonzalez-Smith, ACRL Member of the Week



C&RL News December 2015  624

ACRL Insider
	The blog keeping the world current and informed on ACRL activities, services, and programs.

ACRLog: Blogging by and for Academic and Research Librarians
	The offi cial blog of ACRL features posts on current issues in academic and research 

librarianship from the blog team.

ACRL TechConnect
	Blog covering innovative uses of technology in academic and research libraries.

ACRL Value of Academic Libraries
	Trends and issues related to the ACRL Value of Academic Libraries initiative.

Keeping Up With…
	Online current awareness publication featuring concise briefs on trends in academic 

librarianship and higher education.

New Publications in 2014–15
	2013 Academic Library Trends and Statistics
	Assessing Liaison Librarians: Documenting Impact for Positive Change (PIL #67)
	Classroom Assessment Techniques for Librarians
	Diffi cult Decisions: Closing and Merging Academic Libraries
	Digital Humanities in the Library: Challenges and Opportunities for Subject Specialists
	Getting the Word Out: Academic Libraries as Scholarly Publishers
	Meaningful Metrics: A 21st Century Librarian’s Guide to Bibliometrics, Altmetrics, and 

    Research Impact
	Navigating the Future with Scenario Planning: A Guidebook for Librarians
	Not Just Where to Click: Teaching Students How to Think about Information (PIL #68)
	Owning and Using Scholarship: An IP Handbook for Teachers and Researchers
	Teaching Information Literacy Threshold Concepts: Lesson Plans for Librarians
	The Living Library: An Intellectual Ecosystem 

ACRL Magazines and Journals
 College & Research Libraries—Offi cial scholarly journal of ACRL; six bimonthly 

issues per year
 College & Research Libraries News—Offi cial news magazine of ACRL; 11 issues per 

year (July/August combined)
 RBM: A Journal of Rare Books, Manuscripts, and Cultural Heritage—A journal of theory 

and practice covering all aspects of special collections librarianship; two issues per year

CHOICE Publications
 Choice magazine—Book review journal of ACRL, includes special editorial features 

and reviews; published monthly
 Choice Reviews on Cards—Choice reviews, and just the reviews, on cards; 

published monthly
 Choice Reviews Online Version 3.0—The current web version of Choice magazine; 

provides 24/7 access to all of Choice’s editorial content, including all reviews pub-
lished since September 1988 plus a customizable monthly e-mail bulletin 
(www.cro3.org).

ACRL PUBLICATIONS

Year in Review



December 2015  625 C&RL News

Association of College & Research Libraries,” including wide-ranging discussion of what 
ACRL needs to do to remain central to the work of librarians as researchers and evidence-
informed practitioners.

C&RL continued to experiment with new models of scholarly communication by adding 
altmetrics statistics for all articles to the journal website this year.

C&RL’s Facebook and Twitter presences are home to updates on pre-print and current articles, 
book reviews, highlights of past articles from the journal’s history, and exclusive content 
from C&RL editors and researchers.

ALA JobLIST
ALA JobLIST (joblist.ala.org), the online career center 
operated since 2006 by C&RL News in partnership 
with American Libraries and ALA’s Office for Human  
Resource Development and Recruitment (HRDR), offers 
services for both job seekers and employers. The site published more job ads in FY15 than 
in any year since its launch in FY07, with many of the ads announcing multiple available 
positions. JobLIST also reaches thousands of followers with links to helpful career and job 
search information on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and LinkedIn. Face-to-face services are 
made available through the ALA JobLIST Placement Center, operated by HRDR at major 
ALA and ACRL conferences, which has also offered occasional webinars and other virtual 
development opportunities throughout the year.

CHOICE
The 2014–15 fiscal year was a year of change at CHOICE, a publishing unit at ACRL. Easily 
the most important of these changes was the acceptance, in February 2015, of the CHOICE 
Strategic Directions document by the ACRL Board of Directors. The document outlines our 
plans over the next three years for expanding the range of services and publications CHOICE 
provides and proposes a program to rebrand CHOICE to position it as a publisher to multiple 
audiences, both traditional (librarians) and new (faculty and students), through a diversified 
portfolio of products.

The first of these new tools was the launch of a Choice tablet app over the summer of 2015. 
Available for download through the App Store and Google Play, the app is currently being 
offered free to all Choice subscribers. Key features include the ability to play ACRL-CHOICE 
webinars inside the app and to view editorial content not available in other formats, including 
topical information from the ACI Scholarly Blog index.

Editorial changes to Choice were much in evidence this past year, with the addition of two 
new columns, “Ask an Archivist,” an editorial feature—in interview format—intended to 
spotlight special collections, and “Guest of Choice,” a platform for leaders in the library 
community to discuss issues of importance. Future months will see the introduction of new 
tools that will enable rapid discovery of community college resources and the publication of 
Choice bibliographic essays on the LibGuide platform. All the while, Choice kept pace with 
contemporary scholarship by once again publishing more than 7,000 reviews. As an expression  

Year in Review



C&RL News December 2015  626

Year in Review
of the continued interest in the publication, visits to Choice Reviews Online increased by 
15% during the academic year, with subscribers accessing over half a million pages on the 
site per month.

This past January saw the 50th publication of Choice’s prestigious Outstanding Academic Titles 
list. This year’s list singled out 694 of the most noteworthy titles of 2014, representing selections  
from 54 academic disciplines, for exceptional praise. This year also witnessed the vigorous 
expansion of the ACRL-CHOICE webinar program, with the hosting of 32 presentations 
designed to connect the library community with publishers and other content providers 
around topics of common interest. An archive of the complete series is available on the 
Choice YouTube channel.

Resources for College Libraries (RCL), a copublishing venture with ProQuest, continues to 
be enhanced with new edition updates and annual revisions, and finished the fiscal year with 
strong subscription sales. A new version of the database, RCL 3.0, was launched during the 
summer of 2015, featuring an improved user interface, responsive design, mobile and tablet 
accessibility, and improved performance using cloud computing services from Amazon. At the 
same time, Choice staff, under the direction of Anne Doherty, added 1,932 titles to the RCL 
database during our annual update to RCL subjects, bringing the total number of resources 
contained in the combined RCL and RCL Career Resources close to 90,000. RCL is now also 
embedded in ProQuest’s new Intota collection assessment tool, widening both the reach and 
the utility of the RCL database. 

Finally, Choice’s social media presence expanded significantly in FY15, including topping 
10,000 Facebook likes.

Reports, White Papers, Online Publications
As part of its 75th anniversary celebration, ACRL published “New Roles for the Road Ahead: 
Essays Commissioned for ACRL’s 75th Anniversary” in March 2015. Authored by well-known 
bloggers and thought leaders Steven J. Bell, associate university librarian at Temple Uni-
versity, Lorcan Dempsey, vice-president of OCLC research and chief strategist, and Barbara 
Fister, academic librarian at Gustavus Adolphus College, the collection features a series of 
20 essays, including reflections on ways academic libraries can succeed in a changing higher 
education environment, take advantage of opportunities, and think about the best ways to 
deliver both ongoing and innovative services to students and faculty. ACRL members provided 
commentary on the draft of the report, much of which was incorporated into the final work. 

ACRL released the first in a two-part set of Occasional Reports on academic library construc-
tion and renovation in February 2015. Authored by Christopher Stewart, “Building with Pur-
pose: A Quantitative Overview of U.S. Academic Library Construction 2000–2014” presents 
a rich set of data on, and analysis of, new library construction over the past 14 years. The 
analysis presented in Stewart’s report examines new library construction through a framework 
of institutional characteristics, which provides an opportunity to identify patterns in terms of 
where libraries are investing in new space. This information also provides evidence of shifting 
institutional intentions and aspirations for the library building. A forthcoming second report 
will cover academic library renovations in the same period.



December 2015  627 C&RL News

Year in Review
Keeping Up With…, ACRL’s online current awareness publication series, continued issuing 
concise briefs on trends in academic librarianship and higher education. Each edition focuses 
on a single issue, including an introduction to the topic and summaries of key points, along 
with implications for academic libraries. The series’ offerings this year included informa-
tion on competency-based education, critical librarianship, the Framework for Information 
Literacy for Higher Education, iBeacons, learning analytics, library value, net neutrality, 
and the ed tech surge.

Blogs/Social Media
ACRL continued to leverage social media and other new technologies to deliver content 
over the past year. 

ACRLog (acrlog.org) is now heading into its ninth year of operation. The blog, which dis-
cusses the issues of the day in academic and research librarianship, featured 60 posts from 
the blog team and assorted guests in FY15. 

The ACRL Insider blog (acrl.ala.org/acrlinsider) continued to distribute information on 
publications, events, conferences, and other association activities to the membership and 
beyond. There were 228 posts to ACRL Insider during the fiscal year. The Member of the 
Week feature continues to highlight the diversity of the association and remains one of the 
most popular features of the blog.
 
The ACRL TechConnect blog (acrl.ala.org/techconnect) is a moderated blog covering in-
novative projects, emerging tech tools, computer programming, usability, design, and more. 
There were 28 posts to ACRL TechConnect during the fiscal year.

The ACRL Value of Academic Libraries blog (acrl.ala.org/value) covers trends and issues 
related to the association’s Value of Academic Libraries initiative. There were 40 posts to 
the blog during the fiscal year.

Several ACRL communities of practice also manage content blogs focused on their spe-
cialties. As noted in the member engagement section, ACRL social media presences on 
Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest provide news and avenues for engagement with 
the association.

Standards, Guidelines, and Frameworks
The development of standards, guidelines, and frameworks for all areas of academic and 
research librarianship is a core service of ACRL. These documents are a key ACRL con-
tribution to the profession. As previously noted, the Framework for Information Literacy 
for Higher Education was filed in February 2015 as one of the constellation of information 
literacy documents from the association. The new ACRL Statement on Intellectual Freedom 
was approved by the Board of Directors at the 2015 ALA Annual Conference. The online 
versions of ACRL’s standards, guidelines, and frameworks were accessed nearly 300,000 
times this fiscal year.



C&RL News December 2015  628

Year in Review

Preconferences / Workshops @ ALA Midwinter Meeting and  
Annual Conference
ACRL preconferences continue to provide academic and research librarians with tips, tools, 
and new ways of thinking.

One workshop was held before the 2015 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Chicago:
	 Tackling Textbook Costs through Open Educational Resources: A Primer  

     (held in collaboration with the ARL/ACRL Institute  
     for Scholarly Communication and SPARC)

Four preconferences were held before the 2015 ALA Annual Conference in San Francisco:
	 Data Visualization: Tools, Techniques, and Practice
	 Reflective Teaching: Self-Evaluation to Assess and Improve Your Teaching  

     Practice (Instruction Section preconference)
	 Storytelling 101: Craft Narratives to Engage and Persuade
	 Writing Data Management Plans Across the Curriculum

e-Learning Seminars and Webcasts
Delivered through Moodle, online seminars provide participants with a dynamic and flexible 
approach to continuing education. Offerings in 2014–15 were:
	 Community College Libraries: More Relevant than Ever
	 From Tutorials to Courses: Building an Engaging Online Learning Experience  

     for Your Audience
	 Managing Change in Academic Libraries
	 Preparing for Accreditation 
	 Using Qualitative Research Strategies to Assess Library Services and Programs
	 What You Need to Know About Writing Data Management Plans

The association also expanded its offerings of Webcasts, using an online community hosted 
by LearningTimes, to deliver real-time, interactive programming over the web. Offerings in 
2014–15 were:
	 Action Research to Bridge Academic Scholarship and Everyday Practice
	 Assessing Faculty Perceptions and Use of OER and the Implications for Libraries
	 Beyond Worksheets: Using Instructional Technologies for Authentic Assessment  

     of Student Learning
	 Collaborating for Student Success: Libraries and High Impact Educational  

     Practices
	 Finding Your Role: The Subject Specialist and Digital Humanities
	 Google It or Go Elsewhere
	 Information Literacy/Scholarly Communication Intersections Series Part 1: How  

     to Start the Conversation in Your Library
	 Information Literacy/Scholarly Communication Intersections Series Part 2:  

     Incorporating Scholarly Communication into Liaison Job/Position Descriptions

ACRL promotes continuous learning  
through preconferences, workshops, and e-learning



December 2015  629 C&RL News

Year in Review
Education
ACRL continues to offer a wide range of professional development programs and events to meet 
the needs of today’s academic and research librarians.

ACRL Conference 
More than 5,000 library staff, exhibitors, speakers, and 
guests from all 50 states and 24 countries attended the 
ACRL 2015 Conference, held March 25–28 in Portland, 
Oregon. Themed “Creating Sustainable Community,” 
the conference offered more than 500 programs that ex-
plored a host of pressing issues affecting higher education. Key topics included the changing 
nature and role of academic and research librarians, libraries as partners in higher education, 
scholarly communication, libraries and social justice, assessment, and trends in information 
literacy instruction, along with a variety of technology-related subjects such as e-textbooks, 
mobile services, and social media.

ACRL 2015 also featured a Virtual Conference, which enhanced the experience for onsite 
attendees as well as providing a venue for participation for those not able to attend in person. 
Virtual Conference participants have access to more than 200 Slidecasts (PowerPoint pre-
sentations synced with real-time audio) from every contributed paper, invited paper, panel 
session, and TechConnect presentation offered at the face-to-face conference in Portland for 
the next year. The Virtual Conference also included 12 live webcasts, which allowed librar-
ians to interact in real time, as well as more than 30 asynchronous virtual poster sessions.

ACRL 2015 took place during ACRL’s 75th anniversary year, and, to celebrate, special events 
and programs were held throughout the entire conference. ACRL held a fundraising campaign 
that awarded a record-breaking 179 conference scholarships, totaling $112,995, for librarians 
and staff to attend ACRL 2015.

	 Information Literacy/Scholarly Communication Intersections Series Part 3:  
     Integrating Copyright Into Information Literacy Instruction

	 Librarians Collaborate! Working across Two- and Four-Year Institutions to Teach  
     Transfer Students Information Literacy Skills

	 Moving from Impossible to Manageable: Helping Students Manage and Focus  
     Research Topics

	 Precision Googling: Techniques to Extract Exactly What You Want from the  
     Largest Search Engine

	 Reaching Out to International Communities Through Student Engagement,  
     Outreach Services and Embedded Librarianships

	 The Search for Meaningful Metrics: Scholarly Impact and The Role of Academic  
     Libraries

	 Virtual Reference 101
	 Weed It and Reap: Successful Strategies for Re-shaping Collections
	 You’re Doing it Wrong: Ten Rules to Break to Create Awesome Tutorials



C&RL News December 2015  630

The ACRL 2017 conference, themed “At the Helm – Leading Transformation,” will take 
place March 22–25, 2017, in Baltimore.

ACRL @ ALA Annual Conference
ACRL preconference sessions at the 2015 ALA Annual Conference in San Francisco provided 
information on crafting effective narratives, data management plans and visualization, and 
reflective teaching. The ACRL President’s Program featured Thomas Hoerr, noted author 
of Fostering Grit, and OCLC research scientist Constance Malpas discussing the emerging 
higher education landscape in order to learn to embrace its challenges, celebrate mistakes, 
persist in the midst of setbacks, and focus on continuous learning to re-invent ourselves and 
our libraries. 

ACRL sponsored an additional 18 section, committee, and individual programs in San Fran-
cisco on topics such as academic freedom and social media, curating LGBT history, data 
services, education and outreach to prisoners, instructional design, making libraries work 
for veterans, streaming media, visual literacy, and more. A list of programs is available in 
the table on page 610.

56th RBMS Conference 
The 56th Annual RBMS Conference, Preserve the Humanities! Special Collections as Liberal 
Arts Laboratory, was held June 23–26, 2015, in Oakland, California. The conference explored 
the role of special collections libraries in the context of larger trends in the humanities and 
higher education. Highlights included talks on special collections and instructional collabora-
tion, undergraduate education, classrooms as liberal arts laboratories, donor relations, social 
media, and leveraging collections to shape the humanities. This year’s event featured ten panel 
sessions, five discussion sessions, three plenaries, thirteen seminars, and four workshops, along 
with nine posters and tours of historic Richmond, California; the University of California 
(UC)–Berkeley campus; African American Museum and Library at Oakland; Oakland Public 
Library Oakland History Room; the UC–Berkeley Museum of Vertebrate Zoology; and the 
UC–Berkeley Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life.

Leadership Institutes
ACRL again collaborated with other higher education associations to offer the Women’s 
Leadership Institute, held December 2–5, 2014, in Laguna Niguel, California. The institute 
is an experience that brings together women from administrative and student affairs functions 
across institutions of higher education.

Year in Review

“The wide range of opportunities to both learn 
and contribute, from conference presentations 

and discussions to webinars and ACRL  
publications, has been invaluable to my 

growth as a librarian and scholar.”  
– Rachel Borchardt, ACRL Member of the Week



December 2015  631 C&RL News

Year in Review
Online Learning
The ACRL e-Learning program offered 25 e-Learning events consisting of 18 webcasts and 7 
multiweek courses this year on a variety of topics, such as community college library issues, 
preparing for accreditation, data management, OER, research metrics, managing change, and 
more. A full list of ACRL e-Learning offerings is in the chart on pages 628 and 629. More 
than 515 individuals and 158 groups, representing more than 1,110 individuals, participated 
in this year’s e-Learning offerings.

ACRL Presents… Webcasts
The ACRL Presents… program offers free occasional webcasts on issues of broad interest 
and importance to the academic and research library community. ACRL Presents… webcasts 
offered this year included “An Update on the New IPEDS Academic Library Component” 
(October 2014), “Celebrating Open Access Week: Scholarly Communication Initiatives at 
Academic Libraries” (October 2014), “Celebrating Fair Use Week: Does Fair Use Really 
Work?” (February 2015), “Putting the Framework for Information Literacy into Action: Next 
Steps” (March 2015), and “Teaching Information Literacy Threshold Concepts” (July 2015).

Scholarships
Knowing that professional development is essential to the success of academic and research 
librarians, especially during an economic downturn, we awarded more than $137,000 in 
scholarships this year. Thirty-eight scholarships were awarded for the ACRL e-Learning 
program, the Immersion Program, and 56th RBMS Conference.

As part of the celebration of ACRL’s 75th anniversary, the association awarded a record-
breaking 179 scholarships for the ACRL 2015 Conference. Scholarships were awarded in six 
categories, including early- and mid-career librarians, support staff, and Spectrum Scholar 
travel grants, amounting to a total of $112,995. Funding for 75 of these scholarships (more 
than $56,000 in value) was raised through the ACRL 75th Anniversary Kick Start the Future 
Scholarship Campaign. The association expresses its sincere appreciation to the individuals 
and groups who participated in the 75th anniversary campaign. Their support enables ACRL 
to build the skills and capacities of the next generation to serve the academic and research 
library profession and create a sustainable community.

Advocacy
Continuing the association’s focus on advocacy, ACRL aims to increase its communication on 
major trends and issues in libraries and increase its influence in public policy affecting higher 
education. ACRL’s continued work in the scholarly communication arena, especially as a mem-
ber of the Library Copyright Alliance (LCA), helped the association to meet these objectives.

“ACRL 2015 was a chance for me to learn what my field 
was all about, to meet new people and find new ideas 
and inspiration to excel. Being at the conference this 
year was such a delight.  With help from donors and 

ACRL, early career academic librarians have the chance 
to feel like they really belong in this inspiring field.” 

– Nimisha Bhat, ACRL 2015 scholarship recipient



C&RL News December 2015  632

Year in Review
Legislative Advocacy
Public policy issues affecting higher education remain an essential focus of the strategic plan. 
Each year, the ACRL Government Relations Committee, in consultation with the ACRL 
Board of Directors and staff, formulates an ACRL Legislative Agenda. Drafted with input 
from the ACRL Scholarly Communications and Copyright Committees, along with additional 
committees, ACRL leaders, and ALA Washington Office, the legislative agenda is prioritized 
and includes objectives for legislative action at the national level on issues that may affect 
the welfare of academic and research libraries. The 2015 ACRL Legislative Agenda focuses 
on two issues that the U.S. Congress has recently taken, or will most likely take, action on 
in the year ahead: access to federally funded research and curbing government surveillance. 
The agenda also includes a watch list of policy issues of great concern to academic librarians. 
Issues on the watch list include net neutrality, copyright reform, fair use, “making available” 
right, preservation and reproduction exceptions, orphan works, and the Digital Millennium 
Copyright Act. Legislation on these issues is not likely to arise and, moreover, ACRL does not 
believe that any legislation about these issues is necessary. 

ACRL joined 21 other scholarly societies this year in a statement protesting proposed changes 
to the structure of the University of Wisconsin system that threaten to undermine tenure, shared 
governance, and academic freedom in Wisconsin. ACRL also joined a variety of organizations 
around the world in denouncing a new sharing and hosting policy for Elsevier journal articles 
that impedes access to information.

This summer, ACRL joined a broad coalition of more than 90 education, library, technology, 
public interest, and legal organizations in a letter calling on the White House to take admin-
istrative action to ensure federally funded educational materials are made available as Open 
Educational Resources (OER) that are free to use, share, and improve. The executive action 
envisioned by the coalition would build upon the Administration’s strong leadership in advanc-
ing public access to publicly funded resources with a strong Executive Branch-wide policy for 
the open licensing of educational, training, and instructional materials created with federal funds. 

ACRL President Karen A. Williams and ALA President Courtney Young commented on net 
neutrality and why it matters for higher education in a column for CURRENTS, a publication 
of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

As noted above, ACRL continues to be an active partner with ALA and the Association of 
Research Libraries (ARL) in the LCA. Over the course of the past year, LCA has taken action 
on a number of important issues by issuing comments on pending legislation and court cases, 
joining briefs, and releasing papers and guides on a wide range of copyright and fair use issues, 
including unlocking technology, assistive technologies, Internet consumer protection, copyright 
and 3-D printers, exemptions for audiovisual works for nonprofit educational programs, anti-
circumvention measures for MOOCs, and exemptions for motion picture excerpts and literary 
works distributed electronically.

Partnerships with Higher Education
ACRL continues to work with higher education associations to strengthen both partnerships and 
the profession. The association collaborated with members of the Council of Higher Education  



December 2015  633 C&RL News

Year in Review
Management Associations to offer the 2014 Women’s Leadership Institute. This program brought 
together mid-level administrators from across campus functional areas to share experiences, de-
velop a better understanding of the campus as a workplace and culture, and create new networks 
and networking skills. 

As mentioned in the Value of Academic Libraries section of this report, the Association for 
Institutional Research and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities partnered with 
ACRL to receive a National Leadership Demonstration IMLS Grant for the ongoing “Assessment 
in Action (AiA): Academic Libraries and Student Success” project.

ACRL maintains liaison relationships with a number of higher education associations through the 
Liaisons Assembly. ACRL currently has formal liaison relationships with the American Anthro-
pological Association (AAA), American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), 
American Association of Community Colleges (AACC), American Political Science Association 
(APSA), Association for Information Science and Technology (ASIST), Association for Library 
and Information Science Education (ALISE), Association for the Study of African American Life 
and History (ASALH), Council of Independent Colleges (CIC), Modern Language Association 
(MLA), National Resource Center for The First-Year Experience and Students in Transition 
(NRC-FYEST), National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA), Society for College and Uni-
versity Planning (SCUP), and Society for Information Technology and Teacher Education (SITE).

ACRL also maintains working relationships with a variety of additional associations, including 
the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS), American Institutes for Research (AIR), 
Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU), Association of Research Libraries 
(ARL), Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE), Coalition for Networked 
Information (CNI), Council of Higher Education Management Associations (CHEMA), Interna-
tional Federation of Library Associations (IFLA ), Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources 
Coalition (SPARC), and more.

Organizational Effectiveness and Vitality

ACRL sustains the fiscal resources, staff expertise, and organizational structure necessary to 
advance the association’s Plan for Excellence.

ACRL Staff
The 2015 fiscal year included several changes to the ACRL staff. Elois Sharpe joined ACRL 
as program coordinator in October 2014, filling a position vacated when Allison Payne was  
promoted to program officer. Elizabeth Caris was hired as a program coordinator but left the staff 
in July 2015 to continue her graduate studies. Sharon Mader joined ACRL as visiting program 
officer for information literacy this year to assist with the implementation of the Framework for 
Information Literacy for Higher Education.

Many of you have had phone and e-mail contact with ACRL’s staff, of which there are 15.75 
FTE positions in Chicago and an additional 23.5 FTE at the Choice office in Middletown, 
Connecticut. Take a minute to “meet” ACRL’s diverse staff on the association website at  
www.ala.org/acrl/aboutacrl/staff/contactacrl.



C&RL News December 2015  634

ACRL Sponsorships for 2015

Magna Cum Laude ($20,000–34,999)
EBSCO Information Services
Elsevier

Cum Laude ($7,500–19,999)
Alexander Street Press 
American Psychological Association 
Ex Libris North America  
Innovative Interfaces  
SAGE 
Springer  
Taylor & Francis Group 
The UC Berkeley Library 
University of Pittsburgh  
West Virginia University Libraries  
YBP Library Services

Dean’s List ($3,000–7,499)
Antiquarian Bookseller Association of 
    America
Atlas Systems  
Brick Row Book Shop  
CCS Content Conversion Specialists
Emerald Group Publishing 
Form & Reform
The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation  
IEEE  
IOP Publishing
Kansas State University  
McGraw-Hill Professional
Nature Publishing Group | Palgrave  
    Macmillan 
OCLC
Oxford University Press  

Colleagues

ACRL expresses its sincere appreciation to the following sponsors for their generous  
donations to the various programs and events we have offered throughout the year. Thanks 
to your support, ACRL members benefited from enhanced programs and services this year. 

Pennsylvania State University Libraries  
Princeton University Library  
Purdue University Libraries  
Thomson Reuters  
University of Houston Libraries  
University of Iowa Libraries  
University of Washington 
University of Wyoming Libraries  
William Reese Company

Mortar Board (Up to $2,999)
AAAS
Adam Matthew Digital
AMALIVRE
American Chemical Society
Anonymous
Antiquariat Botanicum
Appalachian State University - C. G. Belk Library
Archival Products
Ars Libri
Arthur Fournier fine & rare
ASME
B & L Rootenberg Rare Books
The Bancroft Library
Bartleby’s Books
Baylor University
Begell House Publishers
The Bibliographical Society of America
Bolerium Books
Bonhams
The Book Shop
Books Tell You Why
Boston Rare Maps
Brepols Publishers
Brigham Young University
Brill USA
Bromer Booksellers
Bruce McKittrick Rare Books
California Digital Library
California Rare Book School
Carl Blomgren Fine Books
Carpe Diem Fine Books
Casalini Libri
Charles Babbage Institute, University of  
    Minnesota
Charleston Library Conference and Against  
    the Grain

Sponsorships

Dean’s List (continued)



December 2015  635 C&RL News

Sponsorships

ACRL Sponsorships for 2015

Coconut Rose Rare Books & Autographs
Colby College
College Library Directors Mentor Program
Columbia University
CRC Press/Taylor & Francis Group
Credo Reference Limited
Dartmouth College Library
Data-Planet
Davar Antiquarian Books
Dawson’s Book Shop
Denison University Libraries, William Howard  
    Doane Library/Seeley G. Mudd Learning Center
DePaul University Libraries
Division Leap
Eclectibles
Emory University
Erasmus Boekhandel
Eric Chaim Kline Bookseller
Estates of Mind
Florida Atlantic University
Florida State University
G. Gosen Rare Books & Old Paper
Geographic Research/Simply Map
The George Washington University
Harper’s Books
HARRASSOWITZ Booksellers and Subscription  
    Agents
Hollinger Metal Edge
IET USA, Inc.
Ingram Content Group
J. Willard Marriott Library at the University of Utah
James Arsenault & Company
James M. Dourgarian Bookman
Jarndyce Antiquarian Booksellers
Jeff Weber Rare Books
Johanson Rare Books
John Howell for Books
John Windle, Antiquarian Bookseller
JoVE - Journal of Visualized Experiments
Julia Gelfand
Juxta Editions
Ken Lopez Bookseller
Ken Sanders Rare Books
Kenneth Karmiole Bookseller
Knovel
Liber Antiquus, Early Printed Books & Manuscripts
Libros Latinos
Linfield College
Locus Solus Rare Books
Lorne Bair Rare Books
Loyola University of Chicago
Lux Mentis Booksellers
Macalester College
Maggs Bros.
Marc Selvaggio, Bookseller
Marquette University Libraries
Martayan Lan Rare Books
Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.
Michael Laird Rare Books
MIT Libraries
Moe’s Books
Morgan & Claypool Publishers

Musinsky Rare Books
North Carolina State University
Nudelman Rare Books
Oberlin College Library
Ohio Wesleyan University Libraries
Orbis Cascade Alliance
Oregon State University Libraries and Press
Pacific University
Palinurus Antiquarian Books
Philadelphia Rare Books & Manuscripts  
    Company
Phillip J. Pirages Fine Books and Manuscripts
Preservation Technologies
Puvill Libros
Rabelais
Rice University-Fondren Library
Richmond Public Library Foundation
Rittenhouse
Rockefeller University Press
Routledge/Taylor & Francis
Roy Young Bookseller
Royal Books
Royal Society of Chemistry
Rulon-Miller Books
SAE International
Santa Clara University Library
Simon Beattie Ltd.
Southern Methodist University
SPIE
Tavistock Books
Temple University Libraries
Ten Pound Island Book Co.
Thomas A. Goldwasser Rare Books
Thomas Library, Wittenberg University
Tulane University Libraries
University of Arizona Libraries
University of Arkansas Libraries
University of California, Irvine Libraries
University of Colorado at Boulder Libraries
University of Idaho
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
University of Kansas
University of Massachusetts Amherst Libraries
University of Minnesota Libraries
University of Montana, Mansfield Library
University of New Mexico Libraries
University of Oregon Libraries
University of Puget Sound
University of San Diego
The University of Texas at Austin, Harry Ransom  
    Center
Utah State University Libraries
Walkabout Books
Walter de Gruyter Stiftung
Washburn University Libraries
Washington University in St. Louis
White Fox Rare Books and Antiques
Whitman College Library
Willamette University Library
Winston-Salem State University
Wolters Kluwer Health Ovid

Mortar Board (continued)Mortar Board (continued)



C&RL News December 2015  636

President
Karen A. Williams
University of Arizona

Vice-President/President-Elect
Ann Campion Riley
University of Missouri

Past-President
Trevor A. Dawes
Washington University 

in St. Louis

Budget & Finance 
Committee Chair
Cynthia K. Steinhoff
Anne Arundel Community College

ACRL Councilor
Douglas K. Lehman
Wittenberg University

Executive Director (Ex-offi cio)
Mary Ellen K. Davis
ACRL/ALA 

Directors-at-large
John P. Culshaw
University of Iowa

Julie Ann Garrison
Grand Valley State University

Julia M. Gelfand
University of California-Irvine

Irene M. H. Herold
University of Hawaii–Manoa

Marilyn N. Ochoa
State University of New York-

Oswego

Loretta R. Parham
Atlanta University Center 
Woodruff Library

Kim Leeder Reed
College of Western Idaho

Susan Barnes Whyte
Linfi eld College

ACRL Board 2014–15 (l to r): (back) Julie Ann Garrison, Loretta R. Parham, 
Mary Ellen K. Davis, Susan Barnes Whyte, Irene M. H. Herold, Kim Leeder, 
John P. Culshaw, Julia M. Gelfand, (front) Cynthia K. Steinhoff, Ann 
Campion Riley, Karen Williams, Trevor A. Dawes, Douglas K. Lehman

ACRL Board of Directors, 2014–2015

ACRL Board of Directors, 2014–2015



December 2015  637 C&RL News

The ACRL Board of Directors, Budget & Finance Committee, and 
Executive Director again carefully reviewed and monitored budget 
performance over the course of the 2014–2015 fiscal year in light of 
the slow recovery from the global economic recession. Despite budget 
challenges, ACRL’s careful stewardship of its resources allowed the 
association to serve its members well and advance its strategic initia-
tives. What follows is a summary of ACRL’s budgetary performance 
highlighting both operating revenue activity and budgetary outcomes. 

FY15 ACRL Budgetary Performance: 
A Fiscal Year-End Summary as of August 31, 2015
Due to the large swings in revenue caused by the biennial ACRL Conferences, comparisons with 
the most recent conference year are provided for ACRL. Choice revenues/expenses are reported 
separately to provide a clearer picture of the two operations.

ACRL FY2015 FY2015   FY2013 VARIANCE 
TOTAL ACTUAL BUDGET VARIANCE  ACTUAL FY13 to FY15

Revenues $5,282,284 $4,454,395 $827,889 $4,751,514 $530,770 
Expenses $4,604,875 $4,576,550 $28,325 $4,069,726 $535,149 
NET REVENUE $677,409 ($122,155) $799,564 $681,787 ($4,378)

CHOICE FY2015 FY2015   FY2014 VARIANCE 
TOTAL ACTUAL BUDGET VARIANCE  ACTUAL FY14 to FY15

Revenues $3,017,391 $3,000,891 $16,500 $3,030,955 ($13,564) 
Expenses $3,150,447 $3,233,565 ($83,118) $3,063,119 $87,328 
NET REVENUE ($133,056) ($232,674) $99,618 ($32,164) ($100,892)

Factors Affecting ACRL Budget Outcomes
Fiscal year 2014–2015 closed with positive net revenues thanks to careful budgeting and continu-
ous monitoring and adjustment of expenses by the ACRL Board of Directors, Budget & Finance 
Committee, and the Executive Director to control revenue and expense expectations in response 
to the effect of the global recession. Economic conditions have affected libraries, higher education 
and the nonprofit sector in general, and reduced resources available to purchase association goods 
and services. Recovery within this sector is slow. 

It should be noted that 2015 was a conference year, so ACRL recognized revenue from registration 
fees and other income sources associated with a conference. The total revenue for the 2015 ACRL 
Conference in Portland, Oregon, in March was $2,670,947, or $532,058 (24.88%) more than bud-
geted. Face-to-face conference registrations of 3,390 surpassed that of Philadelphia, which had the 

Financial Report
Cynthia K. Steinhoff 
Budget & Finance Committee Chair



C&RL News December 2015  638

largest face-to-face registration prior to the Portland conference, at 3,079. Conference expenses of 
$1,891,879 were $51,118 (2.78%) more than budget, which can be at least partially attributed to the 
higher number of registrations. Donations from ACRL Colleagues and sales of exhibit booths at the 
conference also exceeded revenue projections. It is important to note the significance of conference 
revenue on the operations of ACRL. This revenue helps to support to ACRL programs and services 
that do not generate revenues, e.g., scholarly communication, liaisons to higher education, value 
of academic libraries, ALA conference programs, standards, member governance structures, etc.

ACRL Revenues
As with other years, some categories performed better than others, contributing to revenue growth 
in some budget lines and deficits in others. Highlights in revenue and expense budget lines include:

• The sponsored ACRL/CHOICE webinars came in at double the budgeted figure as 
vendors have appreciated a new channel to reach target customers. ACRL webinars 
generated $150,413 in gross revenues or 50% more than budgeted.

• Classified advertising revenues generated 13% or $43,250 more than budgeted. 
• Surprisingly, print advertising in C&RL News also outperformed budget by 41% or 

$34,529, while online ad sales underperformed by 25% or $34,036—in part a result of 
an overly optimistic outlook while budgeting online ads. 

• While membership increased 1.55% in FY15 (one of only two ALA divisions to have 
an increase), revenues just missed budget coming in .024% or $1,540 below budget 
with revenues of $646,245. This slight increase in membership is most likely tied to 
interest in attending the ACRL Conference as a member. Dues revenue has held fairly 
stable since the Board began exercising its authority to increase dues no more than the 
HEPI index.

• After a several years of sluggish performance, book sales took a dramatic leap due to 
many in-process manuscripts being published in FY15. Gross revenues came in 54% 
ahead of budget at $306,820.

• Gross sales of ACRL’s Metrics and Trends and Statistics products were also up $22,919 
or 28%, thanks in part to new consortial sales. These products returned revenues in 
excess of expenses due in part to pre-paying some production costs in FY14.

ACRL Expenses
• ACRL total expenses without Choice at $4,604,875 were $28,325 (0.62%) more than 

budgeted. This small variance actually masks expense savings in a number of categories 
including salaries, professional services, lodging and meals, web operating, program 
allocations (funds budgeted for things such as reimbursements to members, unplanned 
strategic initiatives, etc.) and printing. Expenses were over budget in editorial services, 
mailing services, and meal functions (due to increased attendance at events). The other 
factor contributing to the slight overage in expenses was the transfer of $150,000 to the 
long-term investment (which was planned, but not budgeted as an operating expense).

• Due largely to the success of the ACRL 2015 Conference, ACRL contributed nearly 
$800,000 to ALA’s General Fund through the indirect cost charge of 25.4%.

ACRL Net
ACRL’s net revenue of $677,409 is better than budgeted by $799,564. This is more than 600% 
better than the budgeted net of ($122,155). The large swing in net is a result of not only the huge 

Financial Report



December 2015  639 C&RL News

success of the ACRL 2015 Conference, but also the expense savings listed above. This brings 
ACRL’s net asset balance to a healthy $5,002,115, which will allow the association to adjust 
to changes in the environment, and to seek other strategic opportunities for the development of 
new programs and services. A big challenge is to identify a major initiative that could be funded 
with part of the net asset balance. Another challenge is to develop programs and services that 
would contribute net revenue.

Long-Term Investment (LTI)
ACRL’s Long Term Investments (LTI) showed a net gain of $87,269 through the final quarter 
of the fiscal year, increasing from $3,040,255 to $3,127,523, after a transfer of $150,000 from 
the ACRL operating budget. The award endowments all had losses reflecting the challenging 
market this year with the Oberly Award endowment ending at $28,144 (down $1,261), the Leab 
Award endowment ending at $42,788 (down $1,185), and the Atkinson Award endowment at 
$153,218 (down $6,990). The ACRL endowment ended the year at $2,903,373. While this is an 
increase of $96,704, because ACRL transferred $150,000 into the LTI, one could say that ACRL 
actually lost $53,296). 

The Future 
The current economic climate has depressed many of ACRL’s traditional revenue streams when 
compared to the years prior to the recession, and this is likely to continue. Recovery from the 
recent recession is moving slowly. A bright spot is that ACRL’s membership increased by 1.55% 
this year, though this is less than in conference years in the past, which averaged a 3% membership 
increase. The membership increase in 2013, another recent conference year, was less than 1%.

Future budgets will incorporate revenue from newer programs and services (e.g., workshops on 
using ACRL’s new standards and the Framework for Information Literacy for Higher Education, 
consulting services, and increased opportunities for online advertising). ACRL will continue to 
look for additional revenue opportunities with programs and services that members need. While 
ACRL looks for ways to grow its revenue streams, the association has also been working to trim 
administrative expenses. Staff continues to look for ways to streamline procedures and automate 
processes where possible. The goal is to moderate expenditures to be more in line with current 
revenue expectations, while aligning the budget to support the Plan for Excellence. With a robust 
net asset balance, ACRL is considering judicious spending of a portion of the balance to invest 
in sustainable new programs and services to retain and attract members.

CHOICE
At 4th close, CHOICE finished FY15 with revenues of $3,017,391, $16,500 (0.55%) better than 
budget but a shortfall of $13,564 (0.4%) to fiscal 2014. Expenses came in at $3,150,447, beat-
ing budget by $83,118 (2.57%) but $87,328 (2.9%) above last year’s spending. As a result, at 
-$133,056, CHOICE net revenue bested budget by $99,618 but fell short—by some $100,892— 
of last year’s results. 

Choice magazine subscription revenue continued its ongoing decline of approximately 6% an-
nually, while circulation also tracked recent history by dropping 10.5%, the difference between 
the two rates attributable to subscription price increases. Circulation of Choice Reviews on Cards 

Financial Report

continued on p. 642



C&RL News December 2015  640

OPENING RESERVE LEVELS AS OF SEPT. 1:   

ACRL Operating Reserve Fund $4,647,434 $4,324,706 $4,324,706 
ACRL Long-Term Investment Fund  $2,561,564 $3,040,255 $3,040,255 
 (including award endowments)  
CHOICE Operating Reserve Fund $3,049,671 $3,017,507 $3,017,507 
CHOICE Long-Term Investment Fund $823,273 $895,640 $895,640 
TOTAL $11,081,942 $11,278,108 $11,278,108

ACRL LTI Fund Net Interest $73,710 $32,265 $96,704 
 (excluding award endowments) 

MEMBERSHIP DUES AND OTHER 
 Dues $648,844 $647,785 $654,494 
 Standards and Licensing Fees $87,491 $41,500 $21,694 
 Miscellaneous Donations $8,000 $60,500 $87,269 
 Awards $14,700 $10,460 $14,200 
 Special Events $16,030 $15,200 $18,210 
Subtotal $775,065 $775,445 $795,867

PUBLICATIONS 
 CHOICE $3,030,955 $3,000,891 $3,017,391 
 C&RL $40,751 $17,776 $19,060 
 C&RL News $518,085 $558,647 $585,773 
 RBM $35,993 $34,095 $39,923 
 Nonperiodical Publications $192,108 $199,589 $313,551 
 Library Statistics $95,461 $81,015 $103,934 
Subtotal $3,913,353 $3,892,013 $4,079,632

EDUCATION    
 Institutes $266,063 $324,438 $321,036 
 ACRL Conference ($26,026) $2,138,889 $2,670,947 
 Preconferences & Workshops $188,073 $171,146 $264,380 
 Annual Conference Programs $21,350 $16,000 $17,400 
 Web CE $97,613 $99,855 $150,413 
Subtotal $547,073 $2,750,328 $3,424,176

SPECIAL PROJECTS    
 Friends of ACRL–Restricted $42,684 $7,185 $35,677  
 Friends of ACRL–Operating $0 $0 $0  
 IMLS Grant $79,704 $82,558 $91,920  
IMLS Grant Cost Share $79,704 $37,500 $0

Total Revenue $5,235,491 $7,455,286 $8,299,675 
 CHOICE Revenue $3,030,955 $3,000,891 $3,017,391 
 ACRL Revenue without CHOICE $2,204,536 $4,454,395 $5,282,284

 FY2014 FY2015   FY2015 
SOURCES OF REVENUE ACTUAL BUDGET   ACTUAL

ACRL Executive Summary 2014–2015 (unaudited; report as of Oct. 16, 2015)

Financial Report



December 2015  641 C&RL News

MEMBERSHIP ACTIVITIES    
 Membership Services* $121,667 $131,346 $185,781 
 Executive Committee & Board $218,961 $205,281 $194,933 
 Advisory $45,117 $44,107 $77,494 
 Standards Distribution $15,050 $30,621 $5,429 
 Awards $41,866 $39,883 $36,752 
 Chapters $22,444 $19,905 $23,079 
 Committees and Interest Groups $98,744 $125,447 $132,232 
 Sections $92,409 $92,939 $88,182 
 C&RL Over Revenue $63,257 $67,973 $43,871 
 C&RL News Over Revenue $0 $0 $0 
 Liaisons to Higher Ed. Organizations  $40,142 $53,433 $47,059 
 Special Events $25,219 $24,748 $27,256 
 Information Literacy $43,648 $33,405 $45,090 
 Scholarly Communication $67,354 $81,809 $58,245 
 Value of Academic Libraries $3,134 $52,234 $18,687 
 Government Relations $20,290 $36,829 $26,282 
 Scholarships $18,250 $89,300 $77,595 
 Annual Conference Programs $51,409 $61,987 $52,767 
Subtotal $988,961 $1,191,247 $1,140,734

SPECIAL PROJECTS   
 Friends of ACRL–Restricted $3,915 $7,185 $56,838 
 Friends of ACRL–Operating $49,387 $52,436 $84,180 
Subtotal $53,302 $59,621 $141,018

PUBLICATIONS    
 CHOICE $3,063,119 $3,233,565 $3,150,447 
 C&RL $40,751 $17,776 $19,060 
 C&RL News $430,721 $537,884 $446,431 
 RBM $29,884 $34,294 $32,739 
 Nonperiodical Publications $182,316 $198,176 $259,236 
 Library Statistics $95,157 $87,686 $86,501 
Subtotal $3,841,948 $4,109,381 $3,994,414

EDUCATION    
 Institutes $265,764 $316,013 $281,964 
 ACRL Conference $155,421 $1,851,889 $1,909,873 
 Preconferences & Workshops $194,328 $171,551 $248,583 
 Web CE $60,214 $66,371 $65,714 
Subtotal $675,727 $2,405,824 $2,506,134

FUNDED PROJECTS   
 IMLS Grant $79,704 $82,558 $91,920 
 IMLS Grant Cost Share $34,361 $51,227 $29,849

Total Expenses $5,590,384 $7,810,115 $7,755,311 
 CHOICE Expenses $3,063,119 $3,233,565 $3,150,447 
 ACRL Expenses without CHOICE $2,527,263 $4,576,550 $4,604,875 

Financial Report
 FY2014 FY2015 FY2015 
 OBJECT OF EXPENSE ACTUAL BUDGET  ACTUAL 



C&RL News December 2015  642

ACRL Net without CHOICE ($322,728) ($122,155) $677,409 
CHOICE Net ($32,164) ($232,674) ($133,056)

 
Transferred to CHOICE LTI Fund $0  $0 $0 
Transferred to ACRL LTI Fund $0 $150,000 $150,000 
Mandated ACRL Operating Reserve $831,653 $863,210 $863,210

CLOSING RESERVE LEVELS AS OF AUG. 31:   
 
ACRL Operating Reserve Fund $4,324,706 $4,202,551 $5,002,115 
ACRL Long-Term Investment Fund  $3,040,256 $3,074,162 $3,127,523 
 (including award endowments)   
CHOICE Operating Reserve Fund $3,017,508 $2,784,833 $2,884,451 
CHOICE Long-Term Investment Fund $895,640 $918,155 $848,318

TOTAL $11,278,110 $10,979,701 $11,862,407

NET REVENUE AND FY2014 FY2015 FY2015 
FUND BALANCES ACTUAL BUDGET  ACTUAL 

Financial Report

Notes: ACRL’s fiscal year runs from September 1 through August 31. Actual numbers shown are rounded from 
two decimal places; therefore, subtotals may not precisely represent column totals due to rounding. Salaries and 
operating costs are allocated to each budget project and are not presented as a separate line item.

fell below 300, but cards remain highly profitable, with a contribution margin of $89,422 (60%). 
Overall, then, Choice print revenue matched budget but fell $51,112 (6.8%) when compared to 
FY14. Subscription revenue from Choice Reviews Online (CRO) rose 7.4% over prior year, but 
failed to yield the anticipated 11.5% gains included in the budget, despite the inauguration of sales 
initiatives in the Pacific Rim and vigorous efforts closer to home to recoup lost income from multisite 
licenses. CRO circulation growth has been flat for five years now, with circulation varying by no 
more than 27 subscriptions (2%) from its annual average of 1,132 in any of the years since 2011. 

A bright spot for FY2015 has been the continuing strength of Resources for College Libraries. 
RCL subscription revenue had been budgeted to fall dramatically due to the planned elimination 
of the Bowker Book Analysis System (BBAS), which included RCL in recent years. Problems 
with the release of the successor program to BBAS delayed discontinuation, resulting in income 
for RCL only slightly below that of last year. 

Unexpected gains in print advertising drove a $64,000 improvement in overall Choice advertising 
revenue. Print revenue rose $43,633 (11.9%) against a more modest $20,919 (13.65%) gain in 
CRO ad spending, this latter a disappointing performance compared to the 32% gain in digital 
advertising the year before.

Another bright spot for CHOICE this year was the ACRL-CHOICE webinar program, which 
doubled budgeted revenue amounts on gross revenues of $155,000. CHOICE hosted 32 sponsored  

continued from p. 639



December 2015  643 C&RL News

Budget & Finance Committee, 2014–2015
Cynthia K. Steinhoff, Anne Arundel Community College, chair 
Carolyn Henderson Allen, University of Arkansas
Fannie M. Cox, University of Louisville 
Brian J. Doherty, New College of Florida 
Diane G. Klare, Wesleyan University
John A. Lehner, University of Houston
Kevin Wade Merriman, Yale University
Joan Roca, Minnesota State University Mankato
Judith C. Russell, University of Florida 
Edwin C. Schroeder, Yale University
Theresa C. Stanley, Pima Community College
Ann Campion Riley, University of Missouri, ex-offi cio
Mary Ellen K. Davis, ACRL/ALA, ex offi cio
Allison Payne, ACRL/ALA, staff liaison

Financial Report
webinars, averaging 384 registrants and 151 (39%) participants per session. Additionally, par-
ticipants and others logged an average of 300 post-webinar sessions in the archives on YouTube 
and elsewhere. During FY15 CHOICE and ACRL split both revenue and expenses from the 
program. The success of the sponsored webinar series speaks to the desire of vendors to com-
municate directly with customers.

Licensing, also called royalty income, stems from 3 sources: licenses for Choice reviews, licensing 
of Resources for College Libraries to various platforms, and several miscellaneous categories 
generating small amounts of revenue. Royalty income saw a decline of $103,451. 

Publications-related expenses exceeded budget by $119,350. This is attributed to increased 
expenses for technology, including software maintenance costs, the Choice tablet app, and 
unbudgeted webinar costs. 

Strict budget discipline kept expenses below budget for the second year in a row, although direct 
spending did increase by $61,637 over the prior year, and total spending, at $3,150,448, exceeded 
prior year by $87,329. The continuing use of student interns has not just helped to reduce costs; 
their fi ne efforts have materially contributed to editorial efforts, including the production of the 
new “Ask an Archivist” feature, almost entirely the work of Wesleyan seniors.

CHOICE had a net loss of $133,056, which was 42.81% better than budget.

CHOICE continues to look for economies in operations. The webinar program has created a new 
revenue stream, but its long-term viability remains to be proved. The CHOICE strategic plan, 
approved by the ACRL Board in February of this past year, outlines a program of new product 
development that hopefully will provide a needed infusion of cash to counter the decline of our 
magazine product.