Regarding the journal titles cancellations, about 1/3 of the title were in a package of titles from Elsevier. The remaining titles are from a variety of vendors. Cancelling the Elsevier package will save the university $400,000 right now, in FY21, and an additional $400,000 in FY22. In addition, we canceled several other databases resulting in a savings of $44,863. These cuts are part of the budget reductions NMSU incurred in FY21 because of reductions in its state appropriation.
Regarding journals titles that were cancelled, please know that access to back issue content we previously paid for is guaranteed to continue. Moving forward faculty and student will have access to new articles in these journals through our purchase-on-demand services, interlibrary loan or document delivery. We are a dedicated Research University and remain committed to providing access to resources to assist in the scholarly endeavors of the faculty.
Academic Libraries across the country, especially during this pandemic, have experienced a perfect storm because of inflationary prices for journal packages with a constrained flat or negative collection budget. The reality is the budgets have not absorbed the previous years’ inflationary impacts. Many university libraries dropped their Elsevier packages in the past several years due to unsustainable price increases; which, have well exceeded the cost of inflation in past years. A recent example of Elsevier cancellation occurred in 2019 included the University of California system.
The NMSU Library is working with the university administration to create a new revenue stream specifically for library materials. It is our hope that, in time and opportunity, additional funding will be realized to support restoring some, if not all, journal titles. We view this situation as temporary. Sharing with you several articles from other academic libraries that are experiencing the same issues.
Elsevier Ends Journal Access for UC System
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2019/07/11/elsevier-ends-journal-access-uc-system
https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2020/04/10/unc-chapel-hill-cancels-big-deal-elsevier