ACRL News Issue (B) of College & Research Libraries RESEARCH FORUM. Institutional research services: A profile B y Gail Hitt Director o f Institutional Research Fordham University 1 ­ ­ ­ T h e article “ T a p p in g your local cam pus re ­ sources,” (C& RL News, July/August 1984) sug­ gests th a t academic librarians who plan to perform research consult the campus Office of Institutional Research as a first step in the process. Services and inform ation available through offices of institu­ tional research, planning, and development could be helpful beyond the initial research design phase, described by the authors. As an adjunct to the valu­ able suggestions offered in the Engeldinger and F u article, potential researchers may find useful some specific inform ation on the dimensions of w h at is term ed “institutional research.” This background knowledge of the institutional research function can assist librarian interactions w ith institutional services offices. First, librarians will be pleased to learn th a t in­ stitutional researchers have a professional associa­ tion. T he Association of In stitu tio n al Research, w ith headquarters at Florida State University, T al­ lahassee, publishes a journal, Research in Higher Education, a newsletter and m em bership direc­ tory, sponsors the Jossey-Bass quarterly series, N ew Directions fo r Institutional Research, and conducts an annual meeting, the Forum . Institutional research is distinguished from gen­ eral research on higher education by its focus on the college, university, or m ulti-cam pus system. The role of in stitutional research is to evaluate aca demic program s and assemble relevant inform a tio n for p la n n in g p ro g ram s an d a llo catin g re sources. T he institutional research office combines E u g e n e Engeldinger and Tina Fu, “T apping Your Local C am pus R esources,” C & R L N ew s 45 (July/August 1984): 348-350. the com plem entary tasks of institutional account­ ing and educational research and evaluation. The accounting function provides the objective infor­ m ation base necessary for evaluation and research. Research m ay be quantitative or qualitative. Its purpose is to support the planning functions of col­ lege and university leaders in such areas as: budget­ ary practices, curriculum development, student enrollm ent, retention and attrition, new -student m arketing strategies, faculty evaluation, facilities planning, instructional quality. Institutional re­ search functions at the center of the complex of cam pus interrelationships w hich involve faculty, facilities, and students. Tasks perform ed by institutional services offices include external d ata reporting to state and federal agencies (HEGIS reporting), professional and ac­ crediting associations; internal d ata reporting and dissemination to support adm inistrative decision processes; d ata collection and docum entation in support of grant development; policy analysis and planning. It is p ru d en t to state clearly the tem poral im pli­ cations of the activities described above. Institu­ tio n a l services offices o p e ra te u n d e r p la n n e d deadlines—daily deadlines, and clearly defined ac­ ademic calendar year deadlines. Because these of­ fices are com puter dependent, and interdependent w ith other campus service offices, m alfunction in university com puter services has serious im plica­ tions for its work. Federal and state reporting re­ quirem ents, as well as grant proposal deadlines, are very heavy in the fall months of each year. So the librarian who is greeted at the research office w ith a cheerful, unhurried welcome in April may not have a telephone call returned prom ptly in Oc­ tober. 552 / C& RL News November 1984 / 553 How can institutional research services be spe­ cifically h elpfulto librarians who plan research? If we think of the institutional research office as the statistical docum entary archive of the campus, its student trends studies could be tapped for correla­ tion w ith library trends studies, for example. L i­ brary collection building activities could be an a­ lyzed against patterns, plans, and projections of academic departm ent activities. In a complex insti­ tutional or m ulti-campus setting, the Institutional Research Services Office presents one source for a wide range of academic d ata w hich cover the total institution. The d ata it presents to state and federal agencies are public and publishable. Stephen K. Stoan’s2 clarification of the differ- 2S tep h en K. S to an , “ R esearch a n d L ib ra ry ence between research skills and library skills high­ lights the im portance of prim ary sources for per­ sons e n g a g e d in re s e a rc h . T h e in s titu tio n a l research office is the prim ary source for available statistical d ata pertinent to the librarian’s institu­ tion. For a view of institutional research beyond one’s own campus, there will be in Portland, O re­ gon, on April 28-M ay 1, 1985, the 25th annual m eeting of th e Association of Institu tio n al Re­ search. The AIR Forum them e is “Prom oting Ex­ cellence Through Inform ation and Technology.” Librarians can obtain program and attendance de­ tails from their campus institutional research of­ fice. Skills: An Analysis and In terp retatio n ,” College and Research Libraries 45(March 1984):99-109. Put your research to work ALA’s L ibrary Research Round Table has an­ nounced two annual, related events: the 1985 Re­ search C om petition and the 1985 Research F o­ rums. Both involve papers reporting research but only one involves a prize. In both cases eligibility is not lim ited to LRRT members. In the Research Com petition a prize of $500 will be aw arded to the w inning paper which will be presented by the author at a LRRT m eeting during the 1985 ALA Annual Conference. The deadline for subm itting entries is February 1, 1985. A copy of the guidelines and an application m ay be ob­ tained from the ALA Office for Research. For fu r­ ther inform ation, contact Mildred Lowe, D irec­ tor, Division of Library and Inform ation Science, St. John’s University, Jam aica, NY 11439; (718) 990-6161, x6200. The Research Forum programs at ALA Annual Conference consist of research presentations fol­ lowed by discussion periods. A notice of intent is re­ quired and due by December 15. Selection deci­ sions will be m ade at the M idw inter Meeting; final notification of acceptance will be sent by February 1, 1985. Submittors should emphasize m ethodol­ ogy and significance of research findings for library and inform ation science. Forms may be obtained from the ALA Office for Research. For further in­ form ation, contact Pam ela Snelson, Periodicals D epartm ent, D rew University Library, Madison, NJ 07940. New office will aid scholarly communication The A m erican Council of L earned Societies, New York, has announced the establishment of a new O ffice of S cholarly C o m m u n ic a tio n an d Technology w ith h eadquarters in W ashington, D .C . The director of the Office will be H erbert C. M orton, a publisher and economist who formerly was head of publications programs at the Brook­ ings Institution and Resources for the Future. M or­ ton has a Ph.D . from the University of Minnesota, has taught at Minnesota and D artm outh College, and is the author or co-author of numerous books and articles. The new Office will: •m o n ito r change and disseminate inform ation about im portant changes in the system of scholarly com munication; •c re a te closer relationships between m ajor ac­ tors in th e system (such as research lib raries, learned journals, publishers, academic adm inistra­ tors, and corporate firms in the com puter indus­ try); • i n i tia te studies on how w ell th e system of scholarly com m unication is working; and •explore how technological change affects the way scholars think about their work, not simply how they do their work. The establishment of this Office represents an in­ stitutional com m itm ent to the goals set forth in Scholarly Communication: The Report o f the N a­ tional Enquiry (1979), sponsored by the American Council of L earned Societies. ■ ■