The Institute of Education Sciences (IES) has released details of the changes to coverage within the ERIC database based on the reduced ERIC indexing contract. The IES and the ERIC team have conducted an analysis of coverage:
The Education Resources Information Center (ERIC) database is a significant database that is widely used by students for coursework and by academic staff and educational researchers for literature reviews, systematic reviews and industry projects.
The database is sponsored by the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), within the U.S. Department of Education. ERIC is available via their webpage and publisher platforms. Most University of Melbourne users access ERIC via the EBSCO or ProQuest platforms subscribed to by the Library.
In mid-March the Education Library team became aware of pending funding cuts to the U.S. Department of Education and indexed content in the ERIC database. To seek clarity, the Education Library team contacted the ERIC help desk on the 28th March 2025 – see their response below:
“The Department of Education is working with the Department of Government Efficiency to "reduce overall Federal spending" and "reallocate spending to promote efficiency" (EO 14222). As a result, the number of records added to the ERIC collection will be significantly reduced going forward. The number of actively cataloged sources will be reduced by approximately 45% starting April 24, 2025. Subject matter was not considered during the process to identify which sources would be made inactive. Please note that all records currently in ERIC will remain available.
There has been a delay in notifying publishers impacted by this content reduction due to the government reduction in force. Once publishers have been notified, a final list of retained sources (journals and non-journals) will be posted. We will provide more information about this list as soon as possible.”
Due to the subsequent reduction in staffing at the U.S. Department of Education, there has been further uncertainty about the ERIC database and the proposed level of indexing. Consequently, communication has been limited and information hard to come by.
In further news, Matthew Soldner, Acting Director (IES) announced on the 28th April that:
“the U.S. Department of Education, on behalf of the Institute of Education Sciences (IES), has renewed its contract with AEM Corporation to continue the work of ERIC.”
Currently, there are no specific details regarding the content impacted. We understand this is due to significant reductions in the workforce at the U.S. Department of Education. We know that the scope and comprehensiveness of the ERIC database will be impacted, and coverage of journals and grey literature will be reduced. As this is a dynamic issue, our team will stay in touch with our professional networks and platform providers to gather information.
We’re closely monitoring developments and as more information is provided, our team will develop and share advice with the FoE community on alternative platforms for literature discovery to support the learning, teaching and research needs of the Faculty.
For a full range of search tools and databases we encourage you to review the resources listed on the Educational Research Library guide.
For support with research resources, please contact us Educ-librarians@unimelb.edu.au. We’re here to help.