FACAC / OCLC comparisons

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This year's FACAC survey contained a series of questions pertaining to Penn State students' use of library resources and services.  In order to see where our students stand with regard to international statistics in this area, I ran a comparison between the FACAC study and the OCLC Report, College Students' Perceptions of Libraries and Information Resources.  Looking at the two studies together yields some positive information regarding Penn State students information literacy skills.

Worldwide, 61% of college students use a library web site yearlyNearly 75% of Penn State students use the Libraries' web site at least yearly.

38% of college students used the library catalog at least once annually.  79% of Penn State students used the library catalog (The CAT) at least once last year. 

33% of college students report using library databases at least once.  At Penn State,  64% use databases at least once yearly.

Use of e-journals by Penn State students is lower; 40% locally compared with almost 60% of students worldwide.  I wonder if this the labeling on the libraries' web site impacted this statistic.  While some libraries call their list of databases "e-journals", we don't.

Use of e-books is nearly equivalent between the two groups.  Just over 30% for college students worldwide; 28% of Penn State students.

Use of ASK! (Get library help) is higher locally; 14% of Penn State students report using ASK! At least once in the last year; versus 8% of college students worldwide.

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