CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF E-RESOURCE
MANAGEMENT LIFE CYLCLE: AN OVERVIEW
OF THE LIFE CYCLE OF E-RESOURCES, NEW
MODELS FOR COLLECTION, DEVELOPMENT
AND ACQUISITION
BY
DR. MAS’UDU ADAMU KAZAUREI, mni
EXECUTIVE SECRETARY
NATIONAL BOARD FOR TECHNICAL E

INTRODUCTION
 The primary mandate of tertiary institutions is teaching and
research
 The primary goal of libraries in the institutions is to provide
resources that encourage and support teaching and research
(http://lib.hku.hk/ed/policies/erp:html)
 Over the years, libraries largely depend on print materials
comprising books, journals, periodicals etc to achieve their primary
objective of facilitation of teaching and research in tertiary
institutions
 Though print materials have the advantages of physical presence
and longevity, they equally have the disadvantages of occupying
space, high cost of transportation and the attendant risks, high
cost of purchase of new or updated materials etc
(http://www.ehow.com/info)

 The disadvantages of print materials and improvement in
information communication technology (ICT) have brought about
the use of E-RESOURCES (ERs) in the libraries of tertiary institutions
(Montgomery and Sparks, 2005)
 The use of ERs in the libraries is posing some challenges not
encountered with the acquisitions of traditional print library
materials
 The challenges are in areas of access, interface, technical support,
license, huge budgetary requirements etc (Sadeh and Ellingsen,
2005)
 This makes a capacity building programme on E-LIBRARY (EL) for
librarians of public tertiary institutions, with a theme “Acquisition
and Management of E-Library” relevant, timely and imperative

 The objective of the paper is to provide an insight into
E-Resources, their Management and models or policies
on their Collection, Development and Acquisition
 To achieve the said objective the order of presentation
in the paper will be as follows;
 Meaning and types of E-Resources
 An overview of the life cycle of ERs
 Meaning and process of ER Management
 Acquisition and Collection Development of ERs
 Conclusion and Recommendations

MEANING AND TYPES OF E-RESOURCES
 ER refers to any source of information encoded
and made available for access through the use of
a computer (www.loc.gov).
 The access can be remote or direct
 Remote Access refers to the use of ERs via
computer networks
 Direct Access refers to the use of ER via carriers
such as Discs,CD-ROMs, VCDs DVDs etc designed
to be inserted into a computerized device or its
auxiliary equipment

http://www.lib.uchicago.edu identified the
following types of ERs:
i. Electronic Books and Texts
ii. Electronic Journals
iii. Library catalogs
iv. Reference Sources such as dictionaries,
almanacs, encyclopedias etc
v. Statistical Sources
vi. Sound Recordings
vii. Image databases such as Art, Maps, Medical etc

 Libraries can acquire the best ERs based on the
following list of criteria;
i. Usefulness in serving the current or future
information needs of library users (staff and students)
ii. Reputation of the information provider
iii. Amount of unique information provided
iv. Scholarly content
v. Content is available only in digital form
vi. No or low risk of accidental or deliberate removal
(www.loc.gov)

AN OVERVIEW OF THE LIFE CYCLE OF E-RESOURCES
 The lives of ERs are as complicated and
challenging as those of human beings: ERs are
born, and at times they also die or are
reincarnated under a different name or in a
different shape; they form families and the
families may unite with other families, quarrel, or
split up; treaties between families are signed and
can be later discarded ( Saden and Ellingsen,
2005)

The life cycle of an ER include the following stages:
i. Discovery; at this initial stage the librarian is aware or
made to be aware of a new or required ER. The
awareness can originate from staff and/or students,
advertisement, or a recommendation from a subject or
sectional librarian
ii. Trial; in many cases librarians will want to try out an ER
before deciding whether or not to purchase a license for
it. A trial enables the librarian to offer the ER to some or
all users and then base a decision on their feedback
iii. Selection; after the trial and getting the feedback from
users, the librarian decides whether or not to acquire the
ER

Iv Acquisition; if the librarian decides to subscribe to an ER,
then the acquisition process similar to that of print
resources is followed. However, additional detail is required
such as information about the license and the availability of
the resource to various categories of users comprising staff
and students
V Access; once an ER is acquired, the librarian ensures that
the intended users have access to it. This involves server
reliability, provision of links to sources, provision of the
plug-in software etc
Vii Decision to renew or cancel; an ER subscription is valid for
a defined period of time. When the period expires, the
librarian decides whether to renew or cancel the
subscription

MEANING AND PROCESS OF E-RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
(ERM)
 ERM is the practices and software systems used by libraries
to keep track of important information about electronic
information resources, especially internet-based resources
such as electronic journals, databases, and electronic books
(http://en.wikipedia.org)
 The development of ERM became necessary in the early
2000s as it became clear that print materials catalogs were
not designed to handle ER materials
 The idea of developing ERM systems emerged in 2001-2002
growing out of research by Tim Jewell at the University of
Washington

 The Digital Library Federation (DLF) began work in May
2002 to develop standards for ERM data
 The standards were published in 2004 as Electronic
Resource Management: Report of the DLF ERM
Initiative
 Apart from the DLF initiative, there other successful
ERM systems developed like Gold Rush developed by
the Colorado Alliance of Research Libraries, HERMS
designed at John Hopkins University and Tri-College
Consortium developed by a consortium of libraries in
the U.S (Holly yu and Breivold, 2008)

 The process of ERM involves the following stages;
i. Investigate; this involves searching for relevant and up to date
software systems to be used in ERM
ii. Acquire; this entails procurement and purchase of the required
ERM software systems
iii. Implement; this involves the application of the acquired software
systems in ERM
iv. Evaluate; this entails measurement of performance of the applied
software systems in achieving ERM objectives
v. Review; this involves making necessary adjustments in the
application and performance of software systems to ensure
achievement of ERM objectives
vi. Cancel/Replace; this involves cancellation and replacement of the
software systems that failed to achieve the pre-determined ERM
objectives

 The ERM stages can be depicted in a graph as
follows;

ACQUISITION AND COLLECTION DEVELOPMENT
OF E-RESOURCES
 Library acquisition and collection, development
of ERs is a process of meeting the information
needs of users in a timely and economical
manner using internal as well as external sources
of information (http://en.wikipedia.org)
 Collections are developed by librarians and
library staff by acquiring materials over a period,
based on assessment of the information needs of
the library’s users

 In addition to ongoing materials acquisition, library
collection development includes the following;
i. the creation of policies or models to guide material
selection
ii. replacement of worn or lost materials
iii. removal (weeding) of materials no longer needed in
the collection
iv. planning for new collections or collection areas
v. cooperative decision-making with other libraries or
within library consortia

 Acquisition and collection development policy/model comprise the
following stages:
i. Goal setting in areas of meeting the information needs of users
ii. Environmental scanning to identify areas of strengths,
weaknesses, opportunities and threats in acquisition and use of
ERs
iii. Development of acquisition and collection development
strategies putting into consideration issues of costs and time
iv. Implementation of strategies which involves assigning specific
tasks to staff and the required resources to accomplish the said
tasks
v. Evaluation of implementation of strategies which involve
measurement of performance in achievement of the set goals
and review of strategies for determination of further goals-this
makes the process cyclical and continuous.

 The acquisition and collection development
policy/model can be depicted as follows;
 Collection Development Acquisition Model/Policy
Goal Setting
Environmental Scanning
Devt of Acquisition Collection
Strategies
Implementation of Strategies
Evaluation of Strategies

 There are number of sites published primarily
by libraries or library organizations that are
intended to aid in acquisitions and collection
development work
 Such sites typically publish or link to
acquisition lists, collection development
policies, demonstration projects, publishers,
vendors, other libraries, and directories of
discussion groups

 Such sites include
 http://www.library.vanderbilt.edu/law/acqs.html
 http://www.arl.org/collect/
 http://130.15.161.74/techserv/qacq.html
 http://www.lib.unc.edu/acq/
 http://link.bubl.ac.uk/acqlink
 http://www.itcompany.com/inforetriever/acqserd.htm
 http://www.uvm.edu/~bmaclenn/backexch.html
 http://lists.swetsblackwell.com/mailaman/listinfo/backserv
 http://www.ala.org/Content/NavigationMenu/ALCTS/Publi
cations6

CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Due to rapid development in ICT, there has been
growing need for ERs in the libraries of tertiary
institutions. In their response to the increasing
demand for ERs by both staff and students, many
tertiary institutions have commenced E-Library
services. This development is posing serious
challenges in areas of access, technical support
and finance. To address these and similar other
challenges related to E-library, the following are
recommended;

i. Librarians should ensure that ERs serving the current and future
informational needs of users are acquired from reputable providers
ii. Librarians should ensure that the contents of ERs meet the stated ERM
goals and needs of users
iii. Librarians should ensure that the acquired ERs are made available
campus wide and accessible to both staff and students
iv. Librarians should ensure that required equipment for the use of ERs like
computers and soft wares etc are made available in the library,
laboratories etc
v. Librarians should ensure that servers are functional and reliable
vi. Librarians should ensure that registration and licenses of software are
completed and up to date
vii. Finally and very importantly, tetfund in liaison with chief executives of
tertiary institutions should ensure that the required finance is available
for librarians to achieve above and similar other recommendations to
make E-libraries operational and functional in tertiary institutions

REFERENCES
Holly U and Breivoid, S. (2008). Electronic Resource Management in Libraries:
Research and Practice. New York: Hershey
Montgomery, C.H & Sparks, J.L. (2000). The transition to an electronic journal
collection: Managing the organizational changes. Serials Review, 26(3), 4-
18
Sadeh, T & Ellingsen, M. (2005). Electronic resource management systems:
the need and realization. New Library World, Vol. 106, No 5/6 pp 2-12
http://lib.hku.hk/ed/policies/erp.html, Retrieved October 13, 2014
http://www.ehow.com/info_8498882_advantages-disadvantages-print,
Retrieved October 13, 2014
http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/e/net/types.html, Retrieved October 14, 2014
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collection_development, Retrieved October 15,
2014
www.loc.gov/acq/devpol/electoronicresources.pdf, Retrieved October 15,
2014