College and Research Libraries C. JAMES SCHMIDT and KAY SHAFFER A Cooperative Interlibrary Loan Service for the State-Assisted University Libraries in Ohio* This paper describes the cooperatively funded reference and interli- brary loan service located at Ohio State University which serves the twelve state-assisted universities in Ohio. During its first year, fiscal year 1969-70, this service received 7,126 requests, filled six out of seven requests, and provided other locations for two-thirds of the . unfilled requests. Each request cost approximately $2.44 to fill, exclusive of photocopy charges, and required .514 man hours. Mean cycle time for processing was 5.45 working days. AT THEIR SEMIANNUAL MEETING in April 1968, the directors of the libraries at the twelve state-assisted universities in Ohio (Inter-University Library Coun- cil) discussed various aspects of inter- library loan activities. Three issues seemed to dominate this discussion: ( 1) that eleven of these universities were borrowing heavily from one-Ohio State University; (2) that undergraduates were generally excluded from interli- brary loan services; and ( 3) that inter- library lending was expensive and time- consuming. The ALA Interlibrary Loan Code is something less than liberal in its philoso- phy. The ALA model code for state, re- o Expanded and revised version of a paper presented at the semiannual meeting of the Dayton-Miami Valley Consortium-Library Di- vision meeting in Dayton, Ohio, on Wednes- day, November 19, 1969. Mr. Schmidt is a doctoral fellow in the School of Library Science at Florida State University, currently on leave as head of undergraduate libraries at Ohio State Uni- versity. Kay Shaffer is IULC-RAILS librar- ian at Ohio State University. gional, and local interlibrary loan agree- ments is not much better. As usual, un- dergraduates receive lowest priority. For example, under the national code, an un- dergraduate would be denied a service at his college library which he could get through his local public library if he could convince them that the material was badly needed. To paraphrase the code, an undergraduate apparently does no research worthy of the name, and in any event, does not contribute to the "furtherance of knowledge" which "is in the general interest." As a result of the April 1968 discus- sions, Ohio State University prepared a proposal to establish a cooperatively funded interlibrary loan and reference service dedicated to serving the eleven member institutions-all of them state- assisted university libraries-in Ohio. This proposal was presented · to the IULC at its October 1968 meeting and approved. The service, RAILS (Refer- ence and Interlibrary Loan Service), be- gan operations July 1, 1969. This paper is a report on the RAILS experiment based on data through June 30, 1970, I 197 198 / College & Research Libraries • May 1971 i.e., the first twelve months of operation. The primary mission of RAILS is to in- crease access to the resources of Ohio State University libraries and to do so in a way which simplifies the user's task as much as possible. Members of the Ohio College Library Center, which includes the eleven RAILS participants, have been extended direct borrowing privi- leges by OSU for their faculty. In ad- dition to special loan privileges, RAILS also offers professional reference assist- ance to all students and faculty of its member institutions who call or visit the Ohio State University libraries. The first problem we encountered in setting up RAILS was the usual lacunae in the literature of librarianship. 1 No- w here were we able to discover bench- mark data on turnaround time, unit costs, predictors of level of activity, etc., for interlibrary loans. This being the case, the initial budget and staff struc- ture were based primarily on best esti- mates. The estimated budget and the ac- tual expenses are compared in Table 1. TABLE 1 FINANCES IULC-RAILS FISCAL YEAR 1969-70 Estimated Actual Salaries and wages $13,976.00 $13,771.20 Fringe benefits -0- 1,982.33 Equipment 400.00 166.00 Communications (Post- age, Telephone, Teletype) 400.00 1,290.00 Travel -0- 200.00 Photocopies ( 1,500/ member@ $.03/copy) 450.00 Photocopies ( 1,500/ member@ $.05/copy) 825.00 $15,226.00 $18,234.53 The budget deficit can be attributed primarily to three sources: omission of fringe benefits in the original budget es- timates; an unrealized expectation that photocopy charges would be made at cost ( $03.5/page); and a large under- estimate of communication costs (post- age, telephone, teletype ) . We have analyzed the data from our first year to develop some measures of cost and performance for administrative purposes. These data show an annual level of activity of 7,126 transactions. If the total transactions for the year are divided into the total expenditures ( Ta- ble 1 ) less photocopy charges, the re- sultant estimated cost per transaction is $2.44, exclusive of copying costs. This translates into .514 man hours per trans- action. It must be pointed out that this cost is unidirectional; i.e., for "loans to" only, because RAILS does no borrow- ing from its members. The unit cost and time data, although useful for plan- ning the future of RAILS, are less meaningful than they might be because of the absence of comparable data in the literature and because we did not amortize collection or equipment costs (most of the necessary equipment was secured at no cost from the surplus in- ventory on campus), nor did we com- pute per square foot costs for physical plant maintenance. Based on the first year ( 1 July 1969-- 30 June 1970) of operation, we discov- ered some interesting facts about our eleven users. Using rank-order correla- tions (Table 2), we found that the vol- ume of usage of RAILS by its members does not correlate with size of collection ( r = -.236). 2 The correlation coefficients with enrollment ( r = .400) and with number of subscriptions ( r = .373) are stronger than with size of collection but are still not statistically significant. It is also interesting to note that the correla- tion between volume of usage and per- cent of request unfilled ( r = - .105) is only modestly negative, indicating that users are not noticeably deterred by a "no" from the system. Given these correlation coefficients, we suspect that the dominant factor in- fluencing usage of RAILS is the service orientation of the library director and Cooperative Interlibrary Loan Service I 199 staff at each member institution. If this orientation could be measured, we could probably test the validity of this hypothesis. 3 Furthermore, geographic proximity of a RAILS member to other significant library collections may also influence the usage of RAILS. All other differences aside, contrast the location of Ohio University in Athens, Ohio, with that of Cleveland State University, for example. An analysis of the kinds of requests received by RAILS (Table 3) indicates that photocopies fill approximately 71.3 percent of the requests, virtually all of which are of journals; 28.7 percent of the requests are for books. 4 This con- trasts with data from a survey complet- ed recently at Case Western Reserve which reported that among academic libraries in Ohio, "loaned items" (as contrasted with photoduplication re- quests) accounted for 81.26 percent of the ILL activity. 5 We also found that about one request in six cannot be filled for one or more of the following reasons: the item is not owned; is in circulation; is on reserve; or occasionally, is inex- plicably lost. In order to measure more precisely the effect of different factors on the ser- vices of RAILS, a 10 percent random sample of all transaction slips was select- ed for detailed analysis. Table 4 shows the breakdown of the sample by type (Loan, Photoduplication) and by status (Filled, Unfilled). The sample totals (Table 4) and the population totals ( Ta- ble 3) are very similar. The percent of unfilled requests in the sample ( 17.7) compares realistically with the percent unfilled in the population ( 17.4); the breakdown by type is also comparable ( 71.3 percent photoduplication in the population versus 66.5 percent in the sample). Analysis of the sample by quarter (Table 5) confirms what the monthly statistical reports from RAILS during 200 I College & Research Libraries • May 1971 TABLE 3 RAILS STATISTICS BY INSTITUTION FOR FISCAL YEAR 1969-:..._70 No. pages No. requests No. vols. No. unfilled Total photocopy photocopy lent requests requests Akron 1706 132 Bowling Green 4705 179 Central State 138 16 Cincinnati 1265 133 Cleveland State 3187 380 Kent State 4884 552 Miami 1641 227 Ohio University 5805 802 Toledo 837 97 Wright State 1442 186 Youngstown State 8763 990 Total 34,373 3,694 the year had indicated; i.e., that neither the mix by type nor the mix by status varied widely during the year. The re- quests for loans always ranged between 29-36 percent and the unfllled requests always ranged between 14-19 percent. However, an analysis of the mean cycle times for a request by quarter (Table 6) revealed that as the volume increased, so did the mean cycle time. The excep- tion to this was the summer quarter 1969 which was the time in which search sequences, duplicating procedures, and routines were being established. The ap- parent relationship between mean cycle time and volume of activity may, upon further study, reveal some interesting data on optimal workload per employee. The sample was analyzed to deter- mine the reasons for the unfilled re- quests. It had been feared by some that the added demands on the collections of Ohio State by RAILS might prove a dis- service to the university's primary clien- tele and provoke an adverse reaction. However, the data in Table 7 indicate that the same materials were rarely in demand simultaneously by both groups of users. Nearly half of the unfilled re- quests ( 46.4 percent) could not be sup- plied because the title requested was not owned. If the three most common 134 97 478 186 104 857 45 25 89 45 22 199 160 168 713 221 172 950 106 60 394 440 357 1576 99 46 254 115 51 352 134 139 1264 1,685 1,241 7,126 TABLE 4 NuMBER OE REQUESTS IN 10% RANDOM SAMPLE BY TYPE AND STATUS % F UF 100.0 PD 87.9 12.1 (N=47l) 66.5% Loan 71.3 28.7 100.0 33.5% (N=237) ( N=583) ( N=l25) ( N=708) 82.3% 17.7% PD = Photocopy F = Filled UF = Unfilled causes for unfilled requests are com- bined, they account for nearly nine cases out of ten, or 87.2 percent. As an added service to RAILS members, other loca- tions were .automatically provided for unfilled requests whenever possible un- less instructions to the contrary were re- ceived. Thus, as noted on Table 7, for two-thirds of the unfilled requests, users were given location information. Tables 8, 9, and 10 analyze the sample by the medium of communication used, by language of publication, and by type or format of publication. In spite of our urgings to be more flexible, RAILS mem- bers seem to prefer the standard ALA interlibrary loan form as the medium of communication, although the volume by -~ I I I l Cooperative Interlibrary Loan Service I 201 1969 1970 Day(s) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10- 14 15-19 20- 24 25-29 30- 39 40+ Mean : Median : TABLE 5 DISTRIBUTION OF TR ANS ACTIONS IN 10% RANDOM SAMPLE BY QUARTER AND BY TYPE AND STATUS % % Loa n PD F UF July- Sept. 29.1 70.9 86.0 14.0 Oct.- Dec. 36.0 64.0 84.0 16.0 Jan.-March 35.1 64.9 80.5 19.5 April- June 31.1 68.9 81.6 18.4 ( N=237) ( N=471 ) ( N=583 ) ( N=l25 ) 33.5% 66.5% 82.3% 17.7% TABLE 6 ANALYSIS OF CYCLE TIMES BY QUARTER Summer Fall Winter Percent (f) (£) (f) 28.7 203 (23) (74) (46) 18.6 132 (16) (37 ) (51) 17.4 123 (15) (24) (49) 8.1 57 (2) ( 11) (27) 7.3 52 (12) (6) (18 ) 3.4 24 (6) ( 1) ( 10) 1.3 9 ( 2) (1) (2) 1.3 9 (3) (2) (3) .6 4 0.0 ( 0) (1) (2) 5.2 37 (4) (10) (14) 2.8 20 (2) (5) (6) .8 6 (1) (1) ( 4) 1.3 9 0.0( 0) 0.0( 0 ) (7) 1.8 13 0.0( 0) (1) (9) 1.4 10 0.0( 0) (1) (3 ) 100.0 (N=708) ( N=86) ( N=l75) ( N=251 ) 5.45 4.06 3.77 6.59 3.00 3 .00 2.00 3.00 TABLE 7 TABLE 8 ( N=86) (N=175) (N=251) ( N=196) Spring (f) (60) (28) (35) (17) (16 ) (7) (4) (1) (1) (9) (7) 0.0( 0) (2) (3) (6 ) ( N=196 ) 6.09 2.00 ANALYSIS OF REASONS FOR ANALYSIS OF TRANSACTIONS BY UNFILLED REQUESTS CoMMUNICATION MEDIUM Percent % Not owned 58 46.4 Percent F UF I tern missing 27 21.6 ALA form 80.2 83.3 16.7 ( N=568) Issue not received 24 19.2 Teletype 13.0 77.2 22.8 (N=92) In use 11 8.8 Telephone 6.6 80.9 19.1 (N=47) N oncircula ting 4 3.2 In person 0.2 100.0 0.0 (N=l) Oth er 1 0.8 100.0 (N=583) (N=125) ( N=708 ) 125 100.0 Other locations provided in 83 of 125 cases or 66.4%. 202 I College & Research Libraries • May 1971 TABLE 9 ANALYSIS OF TRANSACTIONS BY LANGUAGE OF PUBLICATION % % F UF English 85.9 83.4 16.6 (N=608) Western Europeana 11.7 79.5 20.5 (N=83) Slavic & East Europeanb 2.4 58.8 41.2 ( N=17) Oriental 0.0 0.0 0.0 (N=O) 100.0 ( N=583) ( N=125) (N=708) a Non-English but Roman alphabet. b Non-English and non-Roman alph ab et (excluding oriental). TABLE 10 ANALYSIS BY TYPE OF PuBLICATION Serial a Monograph Thesis Govt. Doc. Microform Other % F 65.7 88.6 26.1 72.4 2.5 66.7 3.0 42.9 2.3 93.8 0.4 33.3 100.0 (N= % UF 11.4 27.6 33.3 57.1 6.2 66.7 (N= ) (N=465) (N=185) ( N=18) ( N=21) ( N=16) (N=3) (N=708) a Published at regular intervals (includes mono- graphic series and conference proceedings) . teletype can be expected to increase as more members install equipment. The volume by telephone does not yet justi- fy an outward W A TS line, although this too may change. The analysis by lan- guage reflects an overwhelming majority ( 85.9 percent) of the requests for En- glish language materials. Although Ohio State is at or near the level of primary excellence in Slavic materials, this col- lection does not seem to be in great de- mand among RAILS members. Analysis by type of publication (Table 10) re- flects the same pattern shown in Table 4; i.e., that photoduplication (usually for journals) comprises a large majority of the business of RAILS. Given that Ohio State has long participated in both NUC and ULS, this majority may indicate that the serials holdings are stronger than the monograph collection. Finally, the sample was analyzed to determine the effect of different varia- bles on the mean and median cycle times. As shown in Table 11, it takes longer to report that a request cannot be filled than to fill it. The time required to copy an item makes the mean time for a photocopy transaction longer than when the original copy is lent. The mean time for government documents is the highest of all, possibly because of the complex forms of entry for many docu- ments. Western European languages show a smaller mean than other lan- guage groups, with Slavic the highest. The telephone is the quickest medium of communication, followed by the tele- type, and finally, mail. The teletype may well become more competitive as for- mats become more widely standard- ized.6 One of the major innovations RAILS has been able to effect is to reduce the level of detail and verification demand- ed of the user. Requests are handled as they come without imposing the bur- dens of complex forms and precise data on users. In spite of this, or perhaps be- cause of it, the in-house cycle time for a request averages 5.45 working days, although frequently only one work day (eight hours) is required. However, there does appear to be a direct rela- tionship between degree of accuracy and/ or detail in a requester's citation and the length of the in-process time period. (Mean of 4.20 for requests which did not need verification compared with 11.05 for those which did.) This would tend to encourage verification by re- questers, particularly when speed is im- portant, but the RAILS staff is reluctant to become too insistent on this point since their willingness not to require extensive verification is viewed as a user service and a significant improvement over the regular ILL procedures. Finally, the location of the item re- Cooperative Interlibrary Loan Service I 203 TABLE 11 COMPARISON OF MEAN AND MEDIAN CYCLE TIMES (IN WoRKING' DAYs ) Total Sample Status Filled Unfilled Type of request Loan PD Type of publication Serial Monograph Thesis Govt. Doc. Microform Other Language of publication English W estern European Slavic, etc. Oriental Medium of communication ALA form Teletype Telephone In person Need for verification Yes No Location (filled only) Main Library Other quested in the system affected operation- al performance. Most university librar- ies, Ohio State among them, have sepa- rate libraries for the sciences and certain other disciplines scattered around the campus. If an item was located outside the main library, the cycle time doubled. CoNCLUSION The future of RAILS is assured for at least a second year ( 1 July 1970-30 June 1971) with the present member- ship. In the meantime, a few private colleges in Ohio have inquired about participation in the system, and explora- tion of funding under Title III of LSCA by including other types of libraries as members has begun. It is fair to say that RAILS is a success. This new addition to a growing list of successful cooperative ventures among academic and/ or special libraries in Ohio augurs well for the future. This is espe- cially true in view of Wyman Parker's (£) Mean Median 708 5.45 3.00 583 4.21 3.00 125 11.22 4.00 237 6.06 2.00 471 5.14 3.00 465 5.14 3.00 185 5.99 2.00 18 3.19 2.00 21 11.67 5.00 16 2.47 1.00 3 5.50 3.00 608 5.63 3.00 83 2.76 2.00 17 7.32 2.00 0 0.00 0.00 568 5.67 3.00 92 4.24 3.00 47 2.51 1.00 1 1.00 219 11.05 3.00 579 4.20 3.00 298 2.84 1.00 285 5.64 4.00 pessimistic observations when he wrote The Possibility of Extensive Academic Library Cooperation in 0 hio for the Ohio College Association in 1963. At that time he wrote: Interlibrary loan is not the answer to this need of large resources by students who are now required to do individual work on the college campus. In fact, interli- brary loan has broken down already. (p.7) It is a pleasure to announce that inter- library loan is alive and well and living in Ohio. REFERENCES 1. An exception to this generalization is Vern M. Pings, Interlibrary Loans: A Review of Library Literature, 1876- 1965 (Detroit: Wayne State University, School of Medi- cine, Library, Biomedical Information Ser- vice Center, 1966). The author notes: "No sound quantitative data exists either on the flow of documents or on the cost of sup- porting such services." ( p.17) 2. Hubert M. Blalock, Social Statistics (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1960), p.317. 204 I College & Research Libraries • May 1971 3. See for example Fred L. Adair, "The De- velopment of a Scale to Measure the Ser- vice Orientation of Librarians: Preliminary Investigations" (Ph.D. diss., University of North Carolina, 1968). 4. The average photoduplication (journal) re- quest is for 8.2 pages and an average book request is for one volume. 5. A. J. Goldwyn and Edward Verhosek, A Study of Extra Institutional Use of Libraries by Ohio Academic Personnel (Cleveland: Center for Documentation and Communica- tions Research , School of Library Science, Case Western Reserve University, 1969), p.71. 6. See for example Warren Bird and G. S. T. Cavanagh, Teletypewriter Exchange System for Interlibrary Communication (Durham , N.C.: Duke University Medical Center Library, 1968 ) .