Summer is here. This is supposed to be the quiet time on campus, right? Hmm…

Well, quiet or not, I’m spending some time over the few months between terms doing a bit of research on monograph budget structures and allocation formulas. There are some interesting models in the literature. Adelphi University reported moving to a percentage-based budget that ties library allocations for a department to the university’s allocation to that department (Smith, 2008). Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, adopted a “cognate discipline” approach, grouping departments together (Paris, 2007). And Monash University in Australia described (some time ago, now) their practice of allocation to each of the branch libraries on their campuses rather than specific departments (Evans, 1996).

Some of the less traditional methods I’ve found in my reading so far came from the University of Hong Kong Libraries and Texas A&M. HKU adopted a modified zero-based budgeting approach in which deans were asked to justify increased spending for library resources in their area. Requests were vetted by a committee in the library (Chan, 2008). To me, this seemed like an awful lot of work for all concerned to distribute only 5% of the budget. Texas A&M opted to structure most of their monograph budget into five larger funds, down from more than 200 budget lines (and I thought my 60-odd funds were cumbersome…) (vanDuinkerken, 2008).

What’s been interesting is the diversity of approaches. The methods of structuring acquisitions budgets and allocating dollars (pounds, euros, what-have-you) among them are as varied as the libraries themselves. Indeed, I haven’t found any model that I would adopt wholesale, but find pieces in many of them that I like.

So what about your libraries? Does anyone have a great way of doing this that they’d like to share?