Return on Investment: Libraries and Student Retention

Abstract

Using data on libraries collected by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) and the Association of College and Research Libraries (ACRL), as well as fall-to-fall retention rates obtained from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) of the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES), this study employs statistical measures of association to analyze the relationship of both library expenditures and number of professional library staff to student persistence. The strongest relationships found were those between student retention and total library expenditures, total library materials costs, and serial costs for institutions categorized as baccalaureate colleges within the Carnegie Classification System. The most significant relationship between persistence and number of library professional staff was discovered to occur at doctoral-granting institutions.