Purpose & Goals

The last five years have brought significant and historic change to libraries and to the world at large. From 2018-19 to 2022-23, three events greatly impacted use across Columbia University Libraries: 1) the Covid-19 pandemic, 2) library renovations, closures, and moves, and 3) programmatic and enrollment changes on campus. While most people can intuit how visit trends changed during Covid-19, analyzing comprehensive library visit trends can provide a window into how library use trends have evolved. This poster utilizes ID card entrance data for all visitors to Columbia University libraries. Our anonymized visitation data is robust– with over 2.7 million visits in fiscal year 2022–23 and over 7,000 average visits per day. Significantly, we retain demographic data to describe our visitors’ roles, school affiliation, and time of visit. As such, our innovative dataset has the ability to speak to library trends with granularity that is often not possible. In this poster, we address the following questions: In terms of library use, have we returned to pre-pandemic levels? How have various user groups’ visitation rates changed since 2018? How can we best evaluate the use of space? What does space use look like today? How do our policies and protocols affect in-person library use? This time of significant change exposed that our metrics to understand library use trends are limited. The raw number of entrances into a library does not tell the whole story. In this poster, we experiment with alternative metrics to assess and understand library use patterns from new angles. By using innovative metrics, we investigate who is coming to our libraries, when, and postulate why.

Design & Methodology

Library entrance data uncovers patterns that are otherwise obfuscated inside our decentralized and frequented library system. When entering a Columbia University library, visitors must swipe their Columbia ID card to enter the inside of the building. Each swipe of an ID card yields demographic information associated with the respective visitor. While swipe card entry systems were primarily implemented for campus security, Columbia University Libraries have extracted entrance data for our own use in Assessment & Analytics. Significantly, we preserve demographic data on our visitors’ roles, school association, and time of visit. Utilizing our detailed library visit dataset, we experimented with creative metrics to better understand library use and space. These metrics include tools to assess use of library space, proximity, unique visitors, average visits per student enrolled in a specific school, demographic trends of visitors, and so on. Our metrics provide a look inside the complex world of library visitation.

Findings

Over the past five fiscal years, Columbia has seen a rise in enrollment across all schools, at a rate of 11%. With this increase in enrollment, it is vital to understand Columbia University Libraries’ capacity to support these additional students. For certain student groups, use of library space has increased since 2018, while other groups have seen a decline. Morningside undergraduate students have seen an increase over the past five years, surpassing their pre-Covid numbers. In general, Morningside graduate students and non-students, e.g. faculty, staff, alumni, and retirees, have not fully returned to their pre-Covid visitation numbers. Since 2018, Columbia University employees have seen a decline in library use. New working arrangements, such as increased hybrid and remote work schedules, are likely the cause of this decline. Library visit trends were also affected by library policies. Policies that allow food, drink, and noise may create a more casual, group environment than silent work study spaces. Hours may similarly influence visit trends. Libraries that are open late into the evening, may be preferred for longer, evening study sessions. The location of academic classes and their proximity to libraries may affect library foot traffic. Libraries within Columbia’s central campus may experience higher foot traffic than libraries that are outside the main gates of the Columbia campus. Similarly, libraries that are proximal to student residences may see higher rates of use. Finally, Columbia University has recently expanded its campus into Manhattanville, an area about 15 blocks uptown from the primary Columbia campus in Morningside. As part of this expansion, some schools relocated classes and library services to Manhattanville. This transition of students to another campus affects library use trends in Morningside.

Action & Impact

Within our institution, library use trends can inform decision-making and policy changes. The eight libraries included in this research all have different policies, hours, and locations on campus that may affect their user base and visit trends. In the light of our results, we systematically report and share our findings with the library administration and staff. By disseminating our findings, we can review food, drink, noise, and other policies and make adjustments that better accommodate our users. In these ways, library use trends can inform decision-making through 1) the Covid-19 pandemic, 2) library renovations, closures, and moves, and 3) programmatic and enrollment changes on campus.

Practical Implications & Value

The swipe card data Columbia University Libraries collects and analyzes is not broadly available. Most institutions who have entrance data at all have high-level gate counts and do not have detailed demographic information on their visitors. With such a rich dataset, we hope to share our insights and the potential of creative metrics. There is no one number that can explain the use of library facilities. Library use is complex and constantly affected by external and internal factors. The implementation of multiple metrics, in combination with one another, can create a highly valuable, holistic view of what library use looks like.

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