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Frequently Asked Questions

Q1: Report COUNTER 5 and/or COUNTER 4

• For line 61A, run "CalState - 61A. Total E-book & E-media Usage" in "Run in the IZ" folder. For line 61B, run "CalState - 61B. E-serials Usage." These reports use COUNTER 5 metrics TR_B1 and TR_J1. Make sure that you have these reports harvested/uploaded to Alma for all vendors that provide you with these e-resources.

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• From 2023, ACRL no longer provides separate lines to report COUNTER 4 usage. If you choose to add COUNTER 4 usage to COUNTER 5 usage for lines 61A and 61B, use the corresponding reports in the "Run in the IZ/COUNTER R4 Usage" folder. The metrics that were preferred in the past instructions for COUNTER 4 are BR1 and MR1. If BR1 and MR1 are not available, BR2 and MR2 can be reported. If COUNTER 4 usage and non-counter statistics are added to lines 61A and 61B, add notes to the lines.

Q2: 21. Ongoing Commitments to Subscriptions 

• Line 45 (External Contributions from Consortia / Network(s) / System Office) was removed from the ACRL Benchmark survey in 2023.
• From 2023, all campus libraries will add the Chancellor Office’s allocated funds on behalf of the libraries for the ongoing subscription for the Electronic Core Collection, etc. in Line 21. Ongoing Commitments to Subscriptions) in the 2022-23 ACRL survey. The amount for each campus is listed under the CO allocated funds on ECC, etc. column in the 20yy-yy CO expenditures to report to ACRL.xlsx spreadsheet distributed by Ying Liu.
  • If the library receives access to e-collections, catalog platforms, discovery services, or other e-resources through one or more centrally funded systems or consortia arrangements for which it does not pay fully and/or directly (for example, funding is provided by the state on behalf of all members), enter the amount paid by external bodies on its behalf. If the specific dollar amount is not known, but the total student FTE for the consortium and amount spent for the academic members are known, divide the overall amount spent by the institution’s share of the total student FTE. The consortium or system office may make a value-per-FTE metric available for all members of the consortium.
  • Do not include expenses paid through an annual consortium fee. Report those expenses under line 25 “All other operations and maintenance expenses.”
• Please continue to add the dollar amount for your campus under the Systems/Services/Bibliographic Utilities column (in the spreadsheet) to your own library expense in Line 25 (All other operations and maintenance expenses).
• If you did not receive a copy of the "CO expenditures to report ACRL" spreadsheet, please contact Ying Liu.

Webinars

Wednesday, October 28, 2020 - eCAUG presentation on Using Alma Analytics for ACRL/IPEDS annual library statistics

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