Announcing the New Undergraduate Foundation Collection (UFC)

Thrilling news: the Undergraduate Foundation Collection (UFC) will continue for another two years! The UFC is a suite of essential, foundational databases for meeting the needs of undergraduate learners from the smallest college to the largest university. It was originally launched in 2008 on a two-year license term thanks to funding support from the Ministry of Advanced Education and Labour Market Development. That funding, provided in response to Campus 2020 recommendations, ended this year, and the BC ELN Office has been working hard to determine if and how the UFC could be sustained going forward.

A critical step was a survey carried out in January of this year with partner libraries. From the survey we learned that there was broad support for the concept of a 'core suite' of databases. Among the products in the original collection, Ebsco's Academic Search and Business Source ranked very high in importance to the libraries, but there was little consensus on which other products were 'core'.

Therefore we commenced negotiations with the vendor around a revised UFC containing a smaller range of databases. An offer was finalized in April and put to libraries for their approval. It included controlled cost increases over two years, discounts for Academic Search Complete and Business Source Complete subscribers, and a 67% discount off what the pricing would have been outside a core suite model. In total 30 partner libraries said yes to the offer.

The "new" UFC will run until May 31, 2012, and will consist of Academic Search Premier and Business Source Premier. Renewal will not be automatic; there will be a consultation process similar to this year so that partner libraries can give direction on content and other aspects of the license.

Converting the UFC to a library-sustained model is a tremendous achievement for BC post-secondary libraries. All libraries are benefiting through discounted pricing and low annual increases, and tens of thousands of BC learners benefit through increased access to content.

For more information on the UFC, please see: http://www.eln.bc.ca/view.php?id=1825