The National Center for Education Statistics released its state of the Academic Libraries 2004: (I don't know why its a year and half old or why they can't get more current info. Perhaps its the pace that those bespectacled women work at.)
During fiscal year 2004, some 155.1 million circulation transactions took place in academic libraries across the country. That means about every second 5 people were checking out books, periodicals or accessing academic libaries online.
Of the 3,700 academic libraries in the US, 24 are open 24/7. At least the students have a safe place to sleep.
In a typical week, 1.4 million academic library reference transactions were conducted.
And all those numbers are about what happened a year and half ago.
So, what's going on now? Are students not using their academic libraries? It doesn't look like they are staying away to me.
What do you think?
The complete report can be found here.
Another post that may interest you:
The State of Academic Libraries - part 1
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