Education Dept.’s Biennial Report Examines State of Academic Libraries

Academic libraries lent about 10.5 million documents to other libraries in the 2012 fiscal year and borrowed some 9.8 million from their peers and commercial services during the same period, according to report released on Friday by the National Center for Education Statistics, the Education Department’s statistical arm.

Those totals are lower than what the NCES reported in its previous survey of academic libraries, which reported the lending of 11.2 million documents and the borrowing of 10.2 million during the 2010 fiscal year.

“Academic Libraries: 2012 First Look” is the latest in a biennial NCES survey that also includes data on staffing, spending, collections, and other services at academic libraries in two- and four-year degree-granting postsecondary institutions in the United States.