Why did we choose to use FTE for Special and Academic Libraries and number of staff for Public and School Libraries?
When LTLS was developing the cost structure for CLaSS, we initially used the FTE data as calculated on the Annual Profile Summary. This is based on using a 40-hour week. It became clear that this did not make sense for most public and school libraries as many of them are not open 40 hours per week. For example a library with 3 staff members who together work 40 hours would have 3 people able to attend events but only 1 FTE staff. For this reason, we are using number of staff for public and school libraries. For academic and special libraries we are using FTE because these institutions are generally open 40 hours and the FTE numbers are a more accurate measure of the number of staff eligible for CLaSS events.
