Library Scan Narrative of Cleveland State Community College
Library Scan Narrative
Of
Cleveland State Community College
Submitted by Becca Tedesco
IS590 Rural Library Management
University of Tennessee School of Information Sciences
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Library Scan Narrative of Cleveland State Community College
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Abstract
The purpose of the Library Scan Narrative is to provide an overview of the materials, services,
staff, facility, users, and finances of the Cleveland State Community College Library, located in
Cleveland, Tennessee. Statistics were presented from data sets collected from the Cleveland
State Community College and personal interviews were conducted with the library director and a
support staff member of twenty-two years. An analysis of these attributes indicated that staffing
and budget are the two most limiting factors of the Cleveland State Community College Library
and that expansions of those areas can increase the amount of services offered and better
represent a greater majority of library patrons.
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The Cleveland State Community College (CSCC) Library is centrally located on the
campus of Cleveland State Community College in Cleveland, Tennessee and provides service for
the college’s students, faculty, and staff and the community of Bradley County. Although the
college was originally founded in 1967, the CSCC Library was established two years later in
1969 with a collection of 12,516 volumes (Little, 1978). Due to the success of the institution, in
1971 the library expanded its physical building and doubled the size of the collection by adding
75,000 books (Little, 1978). This expansion project updated the library building to its current
size of 20,554 square feet and a layout of one main reading room; nine rooms for various library
features, including an archives, café, and study rooms; and six staff offices (Video Ideas
Technology, 2014).
In 2009, the CSCC Library terminated the use of CSCC Library Cards and instead opted
to utilize the college-wide CSCC Identification cards for item checkouts (Staff Member B,
2014). Due to the fact that these cards are issued upon student enrollment or on the first day of
orientation for new employees, it can be estimated that every student, faculty, and staff member
of CSCC has a college identification card, which in turn permits them access to checkout library
materials. According to the most recent count during the Spring 2014 semester, CSCC consisted
of 2,062 full time equivalent students and 201 employees, combining for a total of 2,263 library
users in the Spring 2014 semester. Unlike college-affiliated library patrons, community users
must request a community patron card by completing the proper paperwork and updating it
annually (Staff Member B, 2014). Currently, there are 40 active community patron accounts,
which combines with the college-affiliated users for a total of 2,303 current library users.
The CSCC Library has a collection of 57,649 books, 71,189 electronic books, 60
databases, 111 paper journal subscriptions, 103 microfilm titles, and 7,519 media items mostly
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consisting of course DVDs (Cleveland State Community College, 2014). Additionally, the
library also receives several local and national daily newspapers, including The Cleveland Daily
Banner, Daily Post Athenian, New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. Over the past 5
years, the size of the library’s physical book collection has reduced by approximately 4,300
items as a result of intense collection review projects. According to the library director, (Staff
Member A, 2014), this is a process that will continue until each categorical collection has been
reviewed and meets the library’s standards of currency and relevancy to the academic curriculum
that it supports.
The CSCC Library’s operating hours directly support the needs of the host academic
institution. During the more heavily populated Fall and Spring semesters, the library is open
from Monday through Thursday from 7:30 AM to 8:00 PM, Fridays from 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM,
and Saturdays from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM, resulting in a total of 63 hours per week, with eight
of those occurring after 6:00 PM. During the Summer semester, which offers fewer classes and
has lower enrollment numbers, the hours are reduced to Monday through Thursday, 7:30 AM –
6:30 PM and Fridays from 7:30 AM to 4:30 PM, with the building closed on Saturday and
Sundays, resulting in a total of 51 hours per week, with only two after 6:00 PM . The library is
also open during interim periods when classes are not in session, but operates on significantly
reduced hours (Foskey, 2014).
In order to accommodate the late hours and year-round availability, the library has seven
employees on staff, which equals an employee to patron ratio of 1 to 329. Of these, two are
professional librarian positions that oversee reference services and information literacy
instruction, one is a professional director position, and four are paraprofessional support staff
positions (Foskey, 2014). According to the library director, of the seven employed staff
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members, there is a combined total of more than 50 years of direct CSCC experience. In addition
to the three professional staff members, one paraprofessional staff member also has a Master’s
Degree in Library and Information Science and another is currently in the process of obtaining
one, while the other two support staff each have Associate’s Degrees (Staff Member A, 2014).
CSCC is a part of the Tennessee Board of Regents, which is the seventh largest hiring education
system in the United States and an affirmative action and equal opportunity employer (CSCC
Human Resources, 2014). Currently, four of the seven CSCC Library employees, or 57%, are
female, which closely reflects the average 51.15% of females in the library service area
(Cleveland State Community College, 2014). One library employee identifies as Asian, a race
that is represented by an average 0.5% of the service area, while the other six employees (86%)
identify as Caucasian, which represents an average 93.3% of the service area (Cleveland State
Community College, 2014). Although the library does not allow for volunteers, it does have
student assistants during the Fall and Spring Semesters who are either paid or offered
scholarships through the college. During the Spring 2014 semester, the library hosted six
scholarship students who were each expected to work 75 hours throughout the semester and one
work study student who could work a total of ten hours per week.
The CSCC Library operates under an annual budget of $472,828, which is distributed
throughout the fiscal year of July 1 to June 30. The majority of the library budget, or $244,880, is
allocated to the salaries of the seven staff members, followed by the $42,000 of capital funds for
books, and then $35,290 allocated to electronic data (Cleveland State Community College,
2013). The library can also acquire additional funding for displays and exhibits by applying for
campus committee funds or external grants.
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The CSCC Library’s collection is organized by the Library of Congress Classification
system and includes general, law, Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETAL),
children and youth, bestseller, and archive sections. Over the course of 2013, a total of 5,106
books circulated, or 2.2 books per capita, with the reserves, children’s literature, and general
literature receiving the most consistent activity (Cleveland State Community College, 2014). As
a community college, the CSCC Library still maintains high children’s literature circulation due
to its support for the college’s Early Childhood Education Program. These circulation numbers
do not account for the library’s robust Interlibrary Loan program that allows patrons to borrow
materials not found at CSCC from other libraries or for the circulation from course DVDs and
other available electronics (Staff Member A, 2014). Despite lower circulation numbers, in 2012
the library received 178,963 visits with the most traffic occurring between 10:30 AM – 12:30
PM (Cleveland State Community College Library, 2012). When average by the total 3,303
library users, the annual door count translates into 77.7 library visits per capita, suggesting that
patrons are utilizing other library services such as computers, printing, reference, and study
spaces. From January to December 2013, the Reference Desk received 1,038 total questions, 988
of which came from students, seven from faculty, ten from staff, and 32 from community patrons
(Cleveland State Community College Library, 2013).
In support of its mission to stay abreast of new trends in emerging technologies (Foskey,
2014), the CSCC Library offers mobile devices for patron use, including 30 iPads, five Android
tablets, and 15 Dell laptops. Additionally, the library has 60 computers available for use, free
Wi-Fi, one book scanner, one flatbed scanner, one copy machine, a Promethean Board, an Apple
TV, and is the main printing hub on campus. The CSCC Library also keeps a web presence
through Facebook, Wordpress, Twitter, and its official website
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(http://clevelandstatecc.libguides.com/home). According to a recently distributed student survey,
90%, or 1,855.8, of the represented student population indicated having used library computer
services, while 92%, or 1,897, of the represented student population claimed to have used
printing services (Cleveland State Community College Library, 2014).
The CSCC Library strives to offer programs that both engage users and support the needs
of the college. According to the library director, the library has recently shifted the focus of its
programs to enforce retention rates amongst students, as the college is experiencing low
enrollment numbers from already established students (Staff Member A, 2014). Of these
programs, the most consistent is Pages, the campus book club initiative that the library supports
in conjunction with the Humanities department. Each Fall and Spring semester, three books are
offered that up to twenty students and five faculty or staff members per title can register for.
These groups of 25 meet three times throughout the semester to discuss the respective book
while sharing coffee and refreshments. It is a highly successful program that reaches maximum
capacity each semester, and as recently as April 2014, 98% of 110 surveyed students indicated
that they would be interested in participating in the initiative (Cleveland State Community
College Library, 2014).
Another effort to increase retention and to support the college’s mission to create lifelong
learners is the library’s information literacy instruction. These sessions, which are led only by
professional library staff, are available upon request from faculty members and are specialized to
fit the content of each specific class. For the academic year of 2012-2013, an average of 42
instructors requested information literacy sessions, representing 58% of the faculty population
(Cleveland State Community College Library, 2013). Considering that most instructors teach
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multiple classes and that more than one information literacy session can be requested per class,
this is a library service that reaches a large amount of patrons.
In addition to information literacy instruction, the CSCC Library also offers a variety of
workshops that offer instruction of technology and academic skills. Of these, the APA and MLA
citation workshops are the most popular, as all 30 available spaces fill up each time the
workshops are offered, which averages from three to four times per semester (Staff Member A,
2014). The Apps for Education workshop, an instruction session focused on educational apps
that can enhance the curriculum of specific classes, has also been popular as it has been
requested seven times since the introduction of the program in January 2014. Other workshops,
such as the Digital Footprints, Apps for Productivity, and Welcome to Studio Connect sessions,
have proven to have inconsistent attendance, with numbers ranging from 1-6 students, and have
not been offered again since there initial launches in Fall 2013 (Staff Member A, 2014).
The staffing of the CSCC Library is the most limiting factor affecting the services
provided to patrons. At least two staff members, one to operate the Circulation Desk and one
professional member to staff the Reference Desk, must be available in the public service area at
all times, leaving only five staff members available to offer assistance in other areas at any given
time. When considering 7.5 hour work days, mid-day lunch hours, and the daily library operating
hours, few times are available when both programming and efficient public service can be
offered. In the recently distributed student survey (Cleveland State Community College Library,
2014), students indicated that longer library hours, especially during nights and weekends, were
strongly desired. However, without additional staffing, this modification will not be possible.
Additional staff members, especially at the professional level, would also allow for extended
information literacy instruction. Currently, only one instruction session can be offered at a time,
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creating a “first come, first served” priority for faculty, however with additional professional
staff members, other computer labs on campus can be utilized to offer simultaneous instruction
sessions.
The staffing of the Cleveland State Community College Library is directly connected to
the annual budget. Currently, over half of the $472,828 budget is allocated to staff salary and
benefits (Cleveland State Community College, 2014). Without an increase in the budget,
additional staff positions cannot be created, especially at the professional level due to the higher
salary grade.
An increase in both staffing and budget will also allow for a stronger focus on outreach to
more non-traditional and underrepresented student populations such as distance education,
evening, and satellite campuses. The library’s current services are centric to daytime campus
students, however potential improvements include remote instruction sessions, virtual workshops
and book clubs, on-site reference visits, and evening Pages sessions. Expanding the type of
services offered will allow the CSCC Library to support its mission “…to be an approachable
and accessible regional information resource that is sensitive to the needs of all users… (Foskey,
2014).”
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References
Cleveland State Community College. (2013). October budget: 2012-2013 [Data file], 48-49.
Cleveland State Community College. (2014). Fact book 2013-14: Volume XXII [Data file].
Retrieved from http://www.clevelandstatecc.edu/content/uploads/pdf/Fact_Book.pdf.
Cleveland State Community College Library. (2012). [Excel sheet and graphs illustrating annual
door counts from 2009-2012]. Annual door count.
Cleveland State Community College Library. (2013). [Graph illustrations based on online survey
results from Jan. 2, 2013 – Dec. 15, 2013]. Reference services, 2013.
Cleveland State Community College Library. (2014). [Data file collected from student survey
responses]. Student survey. 2014.
CSCC Human Resources (2014). Job listings at Cleveland State. Retrieved from
http://www.clevelandstatecc.edu/about/human-resources-job-listings-at-cleveland-state.
Foskey, A. (2013). About the library. Retrieved from
http://clevelandstatecc.libguides.com/about.
Little, S. (1978). Morning has broken: The story of Cleveland State Community College.
Walter Presswood (Ed.). Cleveland, TN: Cleveland State Community College, 13-33.
Staff Member B. (June 23, 2014). Personal Interview.
Staff Member A (June 24, 2014). Personal Interview.
Video Ideas Technology. (2014). [Interactive map of Cleveland State Community College].
Pointsmap. Retrieved from http://pointsmap.com/cscc/.