Subscription Review FAQ

Until FY2024, the Western Libraries had been using carryforward to offset inflation and postpone the need for subscription cancellations. With no need for cancellations, the subscription review became an opportunity to assess and adjust our collection proactively. However, the use of carryforward to postpone cancellations has always been a stopgap measure and the Libraries had been simultaneously planning for significant subscription reductions in FY2028 or FY2029. Recent university budget challenges accelerated this timeline. The FY2024 roll-up of unspent state funds from across the university—which have been used to balance the instructional budget for FY2025 and protect Western’s institutional reserves—means that the Libraries’ collections carryforward is gone, and Western will be confronting subscription cancellations starting this year. 

The Libraries will strive to maximize access to research materials through aggregator databases, resource sharing networks, and Open Access. Our interlibrary loan services can deliver articles in as little as a few hours, and we may be able to source some content from open repositories at other institutions. Our Subject Teams are also available to explore specific research needs and identify strategies for obtaining materials as efficiently as possible. Lastly, for new or emerging research areas, we continue to welcome new subscription requests. While adding new subscriptions in this budget environment will be challenging, it is not impossible, and we will do our best to meet Western’s evolving research needs. 

The Libraries received a one-time infusion of $75,000 in FY2022 to help offset inflation, as well as a base increase of approximately $130,000 in FY2023 that was allocated as part of the university’s internal budgeting process. While these one-time and recurring funds have both been helpful in delaying the need for cancellations, they have not provided the steady, reliable collections budget growth needed to sustain subscriptions long-term.  

The Libraries has a long-standing commitment to preserving the Resource Access Budget and sheltering it from operational pressures and needs. At the same time, we must also preserve our operating budget, which funds critical student services, facilities maintenance, and the wide range of library efforts that give meaning—and life—to our collections.

A Subscription Task Force worked to develop the current process throughout 2019 and 2020, building on earlier work by the Libraries’ Scholarly Resources Group, a group made up of librarians and other collections experts. We recognize that the current process is five years old and are working to review its efficacy.

ILL costs are not an explicit part of the subscription review process. However, an analysis from 2019 puts Western’s average cost per ILL transaction at approximately nine dollars, making ILL a more affordable means of access than subscription for the majority of our lowest-scoring titles. Additionally, the Libraries reviews ILL transactions on an annual basis to watch for journals that might be more affordable via subscription than via ILL.

Throughout summer and fall, Libraries personnel collect data on Western’s hundreds of subscriptions. These data represent a blend of quantitative and qualitative criteria (detailed in the Subscription Scoring section), each of which contributes a number of points towards a resource’s final score. Librarians use the lowest-scoring resources, as well as considering the broader landscape of our subscriptions portfolio, to generate the draft cancellation list, accumulating enough titles to reach our reduction target (approximately $29,000 in FY2024) and offset any new subscription requests. Each subscription’s score will be included on the draft cancellation list. These scores are just the first stage in our decision-making process and will be supplemented by important qualitative feedback gathered throughout fall and winter.

The Libraries looks at evaluation criteria in two stages. First, we apply a variety of qualitative and quantitative criteria to generate subscription scores and the resulting preliminary draft cancellation list. You can read more about these ‘stage one’ evaluation criteria (qualitative and quantitative) under Subscription Scoring.

In addition to the criteria used to generate the initial draft cancellation list, the Libraries gathers extensive qualitative input from students, faculty, and staff throughout fall and winter. These criteria—which center around what is important to you and your discipline—supplement the stage one data and provide critical context for final cancellation decisions. Everyone in the Western community is strongly encouraged to respond to our subscription review feedback survey, which is typically distributed in February, so that the Libraries can make well-informed cancellation decisions. 

Even without budget pressures compelling us to make reductions, making regular changes to our subscriptions portfolio—like cancelling existing subscriptions so we can add new ones—ensures that library collections remain aligned with current student, faculty, and staff needs. The university curriculum is changing all the time and we need to ensure that library collections are appropriately dynamic. 

Usage statistics are provided to the Libraries by most (though not all) publishers and vendors. 

Many vendors provide usage reports that adhere to a standardized format (called COUNTER), detailing the number of full-text downloads (for journal articles), full-text section requests (e-books), searches and results clicks (databases), or multimedia content unit requests (streaming media). These standard metrics allow for relatively straightforward comparisons among subscriptions of the same format type. 

Other vendors provide non-standard usage reports, which are incorporated as best as possible into existing library workflows and analysis. 

Usage of print journals is tallied each time a print volume is removed from the shelf for use. 

Three-year CPU is equal to cost (each title’s most recent calendar year unit price as established by the publisher) multiplied by three, then divided by use (total number of uses over the past three calendar years). For journals, one use is equivalent to a single full-text article download (in either PDF or HTML format). 

The Libraries subscribes to several full-text databases, such as Academic Search Complete, Business Source Complete, and ProQuest Newsstand. Western also owns perpetual access rights to all JSTOR journal content. Collectively, these article databases offer access to the full text of many journals, magazines, and newspapers. 

In some cases, full-text article databases are not an exact substitute for a full journal subscription. Coverage may not include every article, letters to the editor, book review, or graphic (illustrations, charts, or maps). Western can provide access to this content via ILL or per-article purchasing, however. Additionally, many of the journals included in these types of databases have “embargo periods.” This means that the publisher of an embargoed title does not allow the database to release the full-text content for a predetermined length of time. Typically, databases are useful for accessing content older than 1 or 2 years. 

Students, faculty, and staff will be invited to review potential cancellations in Winter Quarter and submit any retention requests via individual survey. Individuals will not be limited to a fixed number of requests; however, everyone should keep in mind that the Libraries will need to identify nearly $29,000 in cancellations in FY2024, and in order to add any new subscriptions we will need to cancel an equivalent dollar amount from existing subscriptions on top of that $29,000 target. 

If a journal is used regularly as part of instruction, the usage should reflect that curricular need. To make sure your students’ use is counted, always provide access to course readings via course reserves or a permanent link embedded in Canvas—not by sharing the PDF. The Libraries Course Reserve staff or Subject Teams can help you build permanent URLs or add library resources to Canvas. 

No. The Libraries will continue to identify effective means of providing books (and other owned resources with one-time costs) to its users. 

Yes! Anyone may request a new subscription via the Libraries website. Requests received during Fall Quarter will be considered under the current year’s subscription review; titles requested in Winter, Spring, or Summer will be considered the next academic year. If selected for purchase, new subscriptions will begin the following year (e.g. a title submitted in Fall 2024 will be considered during the 2024-25 subscription review and, if selected, will start January 2026). 

Support open access and contribute a pre- or post-publication version of your scholarly work to Western CEDAR, the university’s institutional repository.  In this way, your scholarship and creative activity will be available at Western and worldwide.  CEDAR is a service of Western Libraries in partnership with the Graduate School, the Office of the Provost, and the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs. By showcasing Western’s scholarly and creative works, CEDAR facilitates global discovery and promotes open access and sustainable scholarly communication. Robust participation in open access by scholars worldwide is the best long-term approach to help transform current, publisher-controlled scholarly communication models. 

Be aware of publisher policies regarding authors’ retention of copyright. Insist on the right to self-archive your work in CEDAR or other open access repository. Contact westerncedar@wwu.edu to learn how to retain your rights. 

Consider publishing with professional associations, societies, and other organizations that employ effective, sustainable means of distributing scholarly information. If you serve on the executive or editorial board of a scholarly society, encourage the organization to publish its journal(s) open access.