Welcome, A.B. Freeman School of Business Faculty!

This page provides information about what sort of services the library can provide to Freeman's faculty. 

Please use the menu at the left to navigate to additional information about Turchin Library's support for faculty.

The Turchin Library purchases academic resources to enhance and support the scholarly and educational interests of the Freeman School of Business.  These resources include monographs, scholarly journals, market monitoring, data sets, data feeds, and other non-traditional sources.  

Our principles for collection are:

1).  Supporting faculty research as widely as possible by purchasing resources that can serve multiple research aims.

2).  Keeping classroom resources up to date by tracking use, benchmarking against our peers, and keeping abreast on newer resources.

3).  Supporting the longer term goals of the school by investing in resources that can be broadly used in school-wide initiatives; things like certification programs, experiential learning resources, or energy and environmental data.

4).  In some circumstances, providing non-curricular support in the form of data resources that can enhance Freeman’s operational abilities.

New purchases are subject to review and approval, both internally within the School of Business and by different entities within the university.  These include requirements like legal review, IT security , and purchasing approval.  To help demystify some of this, this guide explains Tulane's data-buying process.  The library has helped to acquire datasets for individual faculty, areas, and collaborations with other institutions, in addition to the broader, all-access resources the library administers.    

The Turchin Library exists to support faculty research; faculty are strongly encouraged to reach out to the library if they are interested in a new resource.  Two types of purchases are detailed here, differentiated as to the source of funding- purchases entirely through a faculty member's T&R budget, and institutional purchases, paid for in-part, or entirely, through the library's budget.

T&R Budget Purchases for Research Materials

The library's role in these purchases is entirely within a support capacity; the library plays no role in assessing the research value or content of a dataset.  Here's how the process works, and how the library can help.

1).  Internal approval

New data purchases require the approval of the Senior Associate Dean for Faculty & Research.  The librarian is asked to review the purchase for the Senior Associate Dean based on these factors:

A).  Availability: Whether we already have access to these data through one of our existing subscriptions or elsewhere on campus.  Sometimes, access to a dataset is available through one of our existing feeds- e.g., third party content within Bloomberg's, LSEG'S, or S&P's universes.  On occasion, one of the other libraries (HTML-Main, Law, and the Mattas Medical Library) may already be purchasing the resource in question; the librarian can facilitate access for Freeman faculty in these situations.

B).  Price: Are there cheaper options through another vendor for this content.  This is mainly applicable in situations like bespoke data curation and custom pulls.  Obviously, some resources have unique features (e.g., a distinct time range) that are critical to the purpose of the research; in these cases, the librarian will simply note that no other options exist for this resource.

C).  Access & Use: The librarian will assess if there are issues that make access to the resource difficult to use.  This is not a reason to advise against the purchase; it's a step that can help clarify if there are requirements needed for the purchase to be completed, e.g., extra storage in cases with a large transfer or security necessities for datasets with personally identifiable information.

2).  Signature

University policy requires that all contracts with outside parties are signed by designated personnel; for Freeman, that's the Dean of the School, or the Chief Business Officer.  The Dean's Office requires legal review prior to signing a contract.

Legal review is completed by Tulane's Contract Management Services; it is a lengthy process, and their staff request a minimum of one month for review to be completed.  The librarian will act as a point of contact with legal.

3).  Purchasing Approval

Tulane's procurement department requires "sole source justification" for a new purchase.