IMLS has a new survey comparison tool that is going to bridge a
gap that we've had between the way that people sometimes want
information out of our State library Administrative Agency
survey data and the way that we actually presented.
It's a dashboard online that people can access from a browser
window and it basically allows them to pull up different data
elements that are of interest to them and displays them in sort
of a colourful chart and graph format.
We know that this data that we've collected for years is
really rich and has lots of answers to questions that people
have out in the field, but in the past they've not been able
to answer those questions without cross referencing our
PDF reports.
Let's say a state wants to compare itself to a neighbouring
state or a state with a similar population size.
They would have to cross reference back and forth in APDF
from those different tables and now they can just select the
different states with a click of a button and have the comparison
graphs pop right up in front of them.
So it's really going to streamline the kinds of
answering of questions that states have had in the past.
And for example, you know, we know that the State library
administrative agencies have all varying sizes of staff and
different budgets and those are the kinds of different
comparisons that states can make.
There are some really typical questions that we get about
state Library administrative agencies, like which part of the
government they're housed in.
And you can see at a glance from this tool where that happens.
You know whether a state is part or a state library is part of
their education department or their Secretary of State's
office.
We also often hear you know how much is a state library spending
on databases?
Well, this tool will give you that information.
At a glance you can find out whether the state is sub
granting or not and how many grants it made in recent years.
So it's really giving us a lot of rich information that in the
past you would have had to comb through a lot of report data to
find.
So the SLA, a survey comparison tool, makes evident the kind of
data that we've been collecting for years in a fair, user
friendly format.
It's like an infographic on demand, customized for your
inquiring mind.
The State Library administrative agencies are one of IML s s most
important partners.
They help us administer about 2/3 of our grant making budget
every year, and they often provide an invisible layer of
support for libraries across the nation.
So we are really excited to feature their data and to help
make their work more apparent.