Speaking in the ROI-al We: On the Need to Create a Return-on-Investment Calculator for Academic Libraries of Community Colleges and Regional/Undergraduate Four-Year Institutions

Abstract

In response to “times of austerity” and the precarious funding situation that higher education finds itself in, the author examines how academic libraries might quantify their goods and services as a means of demonstrating to campus administration the value of the library. By utilizing Return-On-Investment (ROI) libraries can attach dollar amounts to perceived “free services” (such as reference help, interlibrary loan, and computer labs). Public libraries have used ROI calculators such as the Weiner ROI Model but academic libraries have heretofore not made much use of the ROI model. By building on the Weiner model, the Louisiana Chapter of the ACRL hopes to build a ROI calculator that academic libraries of any size can use; to that end, the ACRL-LA has taken preliminary steps in the development of such a tool.