Dangling red tags are marking periodicals that have one-year subscription rates of $1,000 or higher.
Prepare for sticker shock if you're headed for the journal shelves in the Science Library. Dangling red tags are marking periodicals that have one-year subscription rates of $1,000 or higher. Some rates, such as the $19,396 for Nuclear Physics A & B, match the cost of a new midsize car. Relatively lower rates, such as $4,159.13 for Neuroscience Letters, still take your breath away.
The overall cost of academic journals has risen 156 percent in the last 10
years, led by steep increases for scientific and medical periodicals,
particularly commercial publications. Today, Brown spends 106 percent more on
journals than it did in 1990, yet buys 20 percent fewer periodicals than 10
years ago. The library's annual materials budget is $5 million. Of that, $3
million goes to acquiring periodicals and $500,000 to purchasing electronic
information sources.
As part of "Seeing Red," faculty and graduate students were recently asked to
identify journals important to their teaching and research, whether or not
Brown currently owns the publications. Library staff will use the survey
results to make the wisest use of the materials budget and to craft a
collection of scientific journals to best meet the needs of the campus
community. One possible outcome is that the Sciences Library may choose to
acquire seldom-browsed items article by article to allow purchase of more
urgently needed materials, Mizer said.
"This is not a subscription cancellation project," he said. "Each title in the
collection will be evaluated based on its importance as indicated in the survey
results. We will take a hard look at those journals that don't turn up on
anyone's lists and at needed titles Brown doesn't own." Indeed, in the last
decade, library staff have identified and culled seldom-used journals and those
with sharply escalating prices or badly delayed publication dates, leading to
cost savings of more than $250,000 in subscriptions.
Among its strategies to save money yet remain a top-flight research library,
the Brown library is actively pursuing group purchase agreements and package
discounts. Today, 25 percent of Science Library periodicals have a package
discount, and about one in three online products have a group-purchase
contract. Brown is also a member of several academic associations developing
cost effective alternatives to commercial publication such as shared databases
of scientific papers.
To learn more, contact Mizer at 3-2686, or Frederick Lynden, director,
Scholarly Communication and Library Research, 863-2946.
When it comes to the cost of an annual subscription for scientific or medical
journals, there are "lots of titles in the $5,000 area and 20 that stand out
above that level," said Sam Mizer, manager of the Sciences Serials Department.
These subscriptions include a balance of journal packages as well as single
titles. The top 10 priciest:
Top 10 priciest periodicals