Library Collections – A Revolution in Knowledge and Access

Cowles Library is committed to sustaining the instructional and research needs of a community of faculty teacher-scholars and their students with access to a comprehensive set of scholarly information resources. The Library Faculty has brought together a world-class collection of knowledge resources – most available in a digital format. This is a vast amount of rich scholarly content, data, and images. The Library has been at the forefront in providing new search and discovery tools that can quickly access and organize the most relevant content, even down to the discipline and course level.

The last twenty years has been one of the most revolutionary periods in libraries since the creation of the printing press. During this time period the library and library users have moved from an almost-entirely print based world to one where most materials are available electronically over the internet. Prior to this time period, people had to come to the library to use the materials in person, and in print.

In the last ten years alone, the library has increased access from around 1500 print journal subscriptions to nearly 130,000 online journal subscriptions. The library has fewer print books than a decade ago, but now provides access to over 152,000 electronic books, so the overall book collection is up. Increasingly, the library directly allows the user to select and acquire needed resources through the a process called Patron Driven Acquisitions (PDA).

The library now provides access to over 173,000 ebooks via PDA and over 12,000 print books. This system is essentially a “pay for need” system that allows the library to leverage its budget for overall resource needs, providing a much larger depth and breadth for materials.

Another transformative change is the resurgence of collaboration between academic libraries. Cowles Library entered into a collaborative with four central Iowa libraries called the Central Iowa Collaborative Collections Initiative (CI-CCI), the first collaborative of this kind in Iowa. It will greatly expand access to content for the member libraries users. The driving philosophy of this group is that of a “shared collection.” The combined holdings of the Central Iowa Collaborative Collections Initiative is over one million volumes, and a potential purchasing power of over four million dollars. Drake’s students and faculty have access within 24 hours (week day) to the books held by this group of libraries.