Submitted by Midwest Chapter/MLA Membership Committee: Katherine Chew, Chair; Anne Beschnett, and Mary Pat Harnegie
The Midwest Chapter Executive Board wanted to survey the membership to get a sense of how well the Chapter was serving its membership, what are the demographics of the current membership and if there were ways in which the Chapter could improve or better serve its members.
Four hundred and seven (407) emailed survey invitations were sent out to the membership on May 23rd, 2011 and the survey closed on June 11th, with one reminder email sent June 3rd. The invitations included both 2011 paid memberships and 2010 paid memberships that had not yet renewed. This was done to increase the survey pool and capture members who may consider themselves part of Midwest Chapter, but had not, as yet, renewed their membership. Also, if they had chosen not to renew, but they responded to the survey, their reasons for not renewing could be captured by one or two of the questions.
There were two hundred thirty two (232) responses, with two hundred nineteen (219) fully completed for a response rate of between 54-57%. Some members reported issues with trying to access the survey, which could have been due to either browser or firewall restrictions. The survey contained sixteen (16) questions, a mixture of radio button, ranking and open ended questions.
The following is Part I of a report of the results of the survey. Part II will be published in the Summer 2012 issue of MIDLINE.
The Questions and Their Responses
Question 1: Please choose one of the following age groups.
54% of survey respondents indicated they are over the age of 50. Over 10% of survey participants did not supply a response, so these results may not be truly indicative of the overall age distribution of the response pool.

Question 2: How many years have you worked as a health sciences librarian?
Responses indicate a highly experienced survey population, with 60% of respondents having more than 11 years of experience, and over a third with 20 or more years of experience.
Question 3: In which type of library do you work?
Almost half of all respondents are from an academic institutions (health sciences or non-health sciences), with almost 40% coming from a hospital library. However, when comparing strictly academic health science libraries to hospital libraries, the split is almost even between 38% and 39% (respectively). 
Question 4: Are you in a solo position (the only librarian)?
Only 1 out of every 4 (roughly) respondents report working in a solo position. 
Question 5: In which state is your library located?
The percentage of respondents to the survey generally corresponds to the percentage of overall memberships between the states, indicating a representative sample of the geographic distribution of the membership. Over half of the respondents were from Illinois, Minnesota, and Ohio. 
Below is a table of state representation of the membership (2010 & 2011) as of the survey period from the membership database.
| State |
Membership Count |
% of respondents to survey |
| Illinois |
86 |
49% |
| Indiana |
35 |
51% |
| Iowa |
36 |
53% |
| Kentucky |
30 |
67% |
| Michigan |
32 |
56% |
| Minnesota |
46 |
61% |
| North Dakota |
14 |
50% |
| Ohio |
82 |
59% |
| Wisconsin |
41 |
54% |
| Other (MO;NJ; TX; SD) |
5 |
80% |
Question 6: How many years have you been a member of the Midwest Chapter/MLA?
57% of survey respondents have been members for 6 or more years, with almost 40% holding a membership for over 11 years, indicating many longstanding members of Midwest Chapter/MLA.
Question 7: Which type of Midwest Chapter membership do you currently hold?
The overwhelming majority of respondents hold a personal membership, with less than 5% of survey respondents indicated a student membership, which suggests that recruiting MLS/MLIS students for membership could be explored. However, student memberships might not constitute a significant part of the membership due to the fact that MLIS/MLS programs generally take only 2-3 years to complete, so students memberships are only available to individuals for a short period of time before they would move to a personal membership.
Question 8: What are your reasons for joining Midwest Chapter? Check all that apply.
Professional development, networking, and CE opportunities were the top three responses for reasons for joining MLA. Over half of the respondents indicated that affordability was a reason for joining the chapter. 
Question 9: Please rank the following member benefits with 1 (least important) and 5 (most important). Conference /CE course discounts and colleague networking had the highest proportion of important (3) to most important (5) rankings, while the MIDLINE Newsletter and ConnectMidwest Blog had a higher proportion of low importance rankings (1 or 2). 
10. What do you feel is the most important benefit you receive from being a member of the Midwest Chapter? Question #10 was an open-ended response question, but due to the way people responded, it lent itself well to the creation of a WordCloud. Networking, continuing education and the annual conference were the most often mentioned terms.