Cost-Saving Innovations Help Librarian Earn Association Honor
By Marketing and Communications | 09-20-2024
Innovative strategies that have saved students over $2.2 million in textbook costs last academic year helped John Ballestro, director of acquisitions and collection strategies at the Texas A&M University Libraries, earn The Association of Former Students Distinguished Achievement Award in Librarianship.
The award was presented at a Sept. 19, 2024 ceremony in Evans Library by Jason Whisenant, AFS director of communications.
“This year, John has truly distinguished himself, making him a deserving recipient of the award,” said Susie Goodwin, executive associate university librarian for organizational development and planning, at the ceremony. “His work has a very real and tangible impact on student success.”
Ballestro and his team strategically spent $77,000 on collections purchases to support OpenEd, a major Libraries initiative to offset the rising cost of textbooks. That investment resulted in students’ saving more than in the 2023-24 academic year $2.2 million on textbooks and course materials this fall.
His approach sprung from an inventive notion: focusing library acquisition efforts on purchasing materials for course use. “That was no easy feat,” said Goodwin.
The idea included creating workflows to source new types of data and perform in-depth analysis of the data.
“The sheer number of courses in spreadsheets that John analyzed is mindboggling,” said one of Ballestro’s award nominators.
Ballestro, who joined the libraries in 2014, thanked everyone who he’s worked with at Texas A&M.
“We’ve really built something special and I’m grateful to be part of it,” he said.
Ballestro joins a remarkable legacy of Texas A&M librarians as the 39th recipient of the prestigious honor. Additional thanks go to the Office of Academic Affairs and the Office of Faculty Affairs for coordinating the selection and scheduling the award ceremony.
Texas A&M University Libraries
Written by: Richard Nira & Ivy Mestrovic | Media Contact: Matthew Kennedy, matthew.kennedy@tamu.edu
About Texas A&M University Libraries
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