COMPETENCY F

“Use the basic concepts and principles related to the selection, evaluation, organization, and preservation of physical and digital information items.”

Statement of Competency F

The most important mission of a library institution is to connect individuals with the information they seek to meet their educational, recreational, and other needs. When you speak about libraries with most people, this is probably the most recognized role that they readily identify with the institution. In order to connect people with the information they need, libraries serve the role of storing this information (also known collectively as a collection). Traditionally, the collections of libraries have been primarily made up of physical printed materials such as books, journals, newspapers, and magazines and other serials. Today, information in our world comes packaged in a variety of formats, the most rapidly-growing area of which is digital. The role of collection building and maintenance is highly specialized in nature, and is crucial in connecting the library’s community with the information they both want and need. The tasks, activities, and functions involved in collection building and maintenance of libraries fall under the umbrella of collection management. Gregory (2011) defines collection management as “the process of information gathering, communication, coordination, policy formulation, evaluation, and planning that results in decisions about the acquisition, retention, and provision of access to information sources in support of the intellectual needs of a given library community” (p. xiv). The role of collection management librarians is to perform a variety of selection, organization, evaluation, and preservation tasks in relationship to the collections of their libraries to ensure that library users can access the information they require in an efficient, accurate, and lasting way.

Selection

Collection development is an aspect of collection management “that has primarily to do with decisions that will ultimately result in the acquisition of materials” (Gregory, 2011, pg. xiv). The selection process is the heart of collection development because it is through this process that librarians decide which materials and resources should be added to the library collection. Through the years there has been much internal debate within the information field about just what to select for library collections. There have been two disparate selection philosophies that librarians have grappled with in their selection duties; this is often referred to as the “demand” verses “quality” debate (Disher, 2007). The quality philosophy promotes the idea that libraries have been entrusted with the altruistic goal of bettering the collective intelligence of the community (Disher, 2007). This is achieved through purchasing materials and resources that support and improve the emotional, educational, and cognitive levels of the public. On the opposite end of the spectrum is the demand philosophy, which advocates that libraries, who use the public’s money to buy materials for library collections, should only purchase that which users want, even if it seems overly trendy, counterproductive, or low-brow (Disher, 2007). As this issue is not black and white, most librarians tend to favor a position that rests somewhere between these two different selection philosophies when it comes to deciding what materials to add to their library’s collections. Indeed, as collection budgets continue to decline and as competition from other information-providing organizations grows, librarians today are faced with the fact that they must give library users what they want, or else become victim of neglect or non-use (Disher, 2007).

But just how do library professionals select what materials to include in their library collections? There is no one standard selection process that every library uses, and this is due in part to the unique nature of each library and of the communities in which they are embedded. Selection criteria and guidelines will vary from library to library, depending on the specific mission and goals of the particular institution. There are, however, a variety of popular criteria that are used by collection development librarians to aid selection decisions. Vicki L. Gregory (2011) outlines the following general criteria that should be considered by collection development librarians when making selection decisions for their library’s collections (p. 61):

User needs and wants, as evidenced by the library’s own needs assessment.
Holdings in other libraries available to patrons and the availability of materials via interlibrary loan or other cooperative resource-sharing agreements.
Relationship of proposed acquisition to the collection – does it fill a gap or meet a need, or is it simply something fun to have?
Suitability for the intended audience - this criterion obviously depends greatly upon the setting and clientele of the library.
Public attention, including critical reviews, web hits, movies, and other positive publicity for the title.
Relevance to community needs. Decisions on relevance should be based on the library’s needs assessment, information and requests from library users, circulation and interlibrary loan information, plus any other sources of information that reflect possible user needs.
Price must obviously be considered by smaller libraries as an essential criterion. Librarians should always be on the proverbial lookout for the best resource that they can afford to satisfy user needs.
Like other big decisions having long-lasting impact, choice of formats of items must be considered carefully.
Availability for purchase - is the material still in print or is it easily obtainable from a secondhand dealer at a reasonable price?

In addition to these general criteria, there are some specific selection criteria that are used to examine a considered item or resource more closely. Again, these will vary by the type of material itself, but some examples of common specific selection criteria are (Rubin, 2010, p. 372):

Authority: Knowledge and reputation of the author, or of the organization producing the item.
Appropriateness: Match of the item to the intended users.
Accuracy or timeliness: The accuracy of the content and its currency.
Physical characteristics: The quality of the binding, paper, or material on which the information is stored, the size and quality of the print.
Collection fit: The contribution the item makes to the collection, the appropriateness of a particular item in relation to the collection development plan, and the balance it provides to other points of view.
Demand: The popularity of an item and the likelihood of use by library patrons.
Content: The quality of the information or narrative and the clarity of its organization.
Special characteristics: The availability of such features as indexes, bibliography, notes, prefaces, introductions, teacher guides, and interpretive material.

While some of these general and specific criteria are applicable in the selection of electronic resources and digital items, these particular items have characteristics which require consideration of some special criteria (Gregory, 2011). Questions collection development librarians should consider when selecting digital materials include: Does the electronic resource fill in gaps of the print collection, does it duplicate information or material already in the collection, or will the library replace a current print resource with an electronic resource? Is the electronic resource available for purchase, or does it require licensing? For licensed materials like e-books, are there limits on total number of checkouts before the license must be renewed? Are there limits on how many users can access and use the electronic resource at the same time? Considering these types of questions can help librarians determine if an electronic resource or digital item is a good fit for inclusion in their library’s collection.

In addition to these general and specific selection criteria, collection development librarians also use a variety of selection tools to aid their selection duties. Selection tools are important because it is impossible for a librarian to read, watch, listen, or explore every single material or resource they are considering for inclusion in the library’s collection. Popular selection tools include reviews, recommended and “best of” lists, catalogs and shelf-lists from publishers, and directories and bibliographies (Disher, 2007). Reviews in particular are used by many librarians to aid them with selection. While reviews do have some limitations such as coverage gaps (the percentage of items reviewed versus the total number of items published or created), differences in opinion (subjectivity), and non-standardized rating systems (not uniform across review sources), they can be quite useful to collection development librarians (Disher, 2007). Reviews can help librarians to confirm assumptions about items, identify special features of the material, and ultimately provide support for or against buying a particular item for the collection (Disher, 2007).

Lastly, becoming a good selector requires several important characteristics. First, library professionals must be aware of their own personal selection tendencies and biases. Remaining objective is a crucial part of selecting because collection development librarians have an obligation to build the most appropriate collections for the library community. When library professionals are aware of their personal biases, they can be sure to favor them less and to carefully balance their selection decisions. Additionally, it is important for collection development librarians to be aware of their library’s unique mission, vision, and goals in order to select the best materials to fulfill them.

Organization

Organization of the library’s collection is important to both library professionals and library users. In the United States, most libraries use one of two popular classification systems, the Dewey Decimal System (DDS) or the Library of Congress (LOC). The purpose of these systems is to classify and organize materials by their subject matter. The Dewey Decimal System uses the following main classes (Rubin, 2010, p. 130):

000 – Generalities

100 – Philosophy, Parapsychology and Occultism, Psychology

200 – Religion

300 – Social Sciences

400 – Language

500 – Natural sciences and Mathematics

600 – Technology (Applied Sciences)

700 – The Arts

800 – Literature (Belles Lettres) and Rhetoric

900 – Geography, History, and Auxiliary Disciplines

In the DDS, each class is further subdivided at the hundred divisions, and numbers are placed after a decimal point in order to identify the item more specifically by subject.

The Library of Congress classification similarly groups items by subjects, but these classes begin with alphabetic letters, rather than numbers like DDS. The Library of Congress classification uses the following main classes (Rubin, 2010, p. 131):

A – General Works
B – Philosophy; Psychology and Religion
C – Auxiliary Sciences of History
D – General and Old World History
E-F – American History
G – Geography; Maps; Anthropology; Recreation
H – Social Sciences; Economics and Sociology
J – Political Science
K – Law (General)
L – Education
M – Music
N – Fine Arts
P – Language and Literature Tables
Q – Science
R – Medicine
S – Agriculture
T – Technology
U – Military Science
V – Naval Science
Z – Bibliography; Library Science

Both of these organization systems help to classify materials in libraries by assigning them call numbers. Call numbers are important to librarians because they provide specific information about the subject and content of the material. It is important to keep in mind the fact that these organizations of library collections were specifically created to help librarians find specific items on the shelves of libraries (Disher, 2007). What this means is that these classification systems create organization that can often be confusing and often intimidating to users who are unfamiliar with them. Sometimes users come to libraries without a specific item in mind, rather they are interested in browsing library collections for something that piques their interest (Disher, 2007). Unless users are quite versed in classification systems and their specific intricacies, the organization systems based on these classification systems may not cater to the way users look for information. Instead, some argue that library collections should present their materials with the library user in mind instead (Disher, 2007). This is important, because part of the goal of the library is not only to match users with the information that they need but to do so in an efficient way, so that the time of users isn’t wasted (Disher, 2007). For example, many public libraries are really good about crafting their fiction sections in a way that caters to needs of library users. These areas are usually broken down into many different sections (by genre) that can include mysteries, romance, science-fiction, fantasy, westerns, and others. This organization system is useful in saving the time of users as the materials are “filtered” toward specific user needs within this very broad area (Disher, 2007).

Evaluation

Evaluation and assessment of library collections are part of the cycle of duties that collection management librarians are responsible for. It is important for every library to assess its collection on an on-going basis for a variety of reasons. First, this evaluation can help librarians determine if the collection is effectively supporting the mission and goals of the library. Second, the ever-shifting tastes, needs, and interests of the library’s community makes evaluation of collections necessary to make sure they reflect and keep up with these changes. Lastly, the process of evaluation provides a comprehensive description of a library’s existing resources, which provides an important picture of the collection’s strengths and weaknesses.

Like most other aspects of collection management, there are a variety of methods to conduct evaluation of library collections. There is no method that is right for every library and for every situation; rather, most libraries use a mix of methods for better results and more useful evaluation (Gregory, 2011). Popular evaluation methods include: the checklist method, in which collections are checked against subject-matter specific bibliographies or lists, and circulation statistics, which are a valuable tool that provides data about the frequency of checkout, use, and turnover of library materials. Electronic materials and digital resources require evaluation as well, but these necessitate special consideration by collection management librarians. Methods such as transaction or web log analysis, network usage analysis, and data from vendor-supplied statistics are some of the ways that electronic materials and resources can be evaluated (Gregory, 2011).

Weeding (also known as de-selection) is a collection management process that goes hand-in-hand with evaluation in public libraries (Gregory, 2011). After an evaluation of a collection is completed, resulting findings are meaningless unless they spur action. One of the most common resulting actions that librarians take after an evaluation is weeding of the library collection. Gregory (2011) outlines seven important reasons why libraries should weed their collections (p.120):

To stimulate circulation
To save space
To save time
To enhance appeal
To establish credibility
To respond to community needs and interests
To make room for new technologies and formats

Again, there is no standard way that weeding occurs in libraries. What is important is that weeding occurs routinely in libraries, because this results in collections that are better crafted to meet the needs of library users. A popular weeding technique used by many libraries is checking for condition of physical items; if a material is worn, damaged, or dirty, it is removed from the collection. An example of an organized weeding methodology is the Continuous Review, Evaluation, and Weeding (CREW) method, developed by the Texas State Library and Archives Commission. The CREW method is intended to provide guidance to librarians and staff in small and medium sized public libraries about how to cull materials from their collections that are outdated and no longer useful (Larson, 2012). This method uses the general MUSTIE (Misleading, Ugly, Superseded, Trivial, Irrelevant, Elsewhere available) criteria to determine if a material should be weeded from the collection. The CREW method manual also provides weeding suggestions for materials based on their Dewey Decimal Subject area and circulation statistics. While digital items and resources share many of the characteristics of physical items in a library’s collection, it is also important for these items to be subject to ongoing evaluation and weeding.

Preservation

Preservation has traditionally been seen as the job of just a few of the largest research libraries who have the resources to maintain archival collections (Gregory, 2011). Many argue instead that preservation is an important aspect of collection management in every library, because that which is collected “is not very useful if it is not preserved” (Gregory, 2011, p. 185). Vicki L. Gregory (2011) defines preservation as “involving all those library activities aimed at preventing, retarding, or stopping the deterioration of materials, so that the intellectual content may be saved for future users” (p. 185). Traditionally, preservation has meant the safekeeping of physical materials, such as books and papers, from the ravages of time, light, moisture, and human hands (Gregory, 2011). This has resulted in many long established preservation strategies developed and used to maintain physical artifacts. Today, an increasingly important issue to the area of collection management is the preservation of digital items. This task is more problematic than the preservation of physical items because digital materials are ephemeral in nature, meaning they can change or even disappear before they can be captured and preserved (Gregory, 2011). Unlike the preservation of physical items, ignoring digital items does not lead to longevity of the information contained within. Instead, these items require constant attention, reformatting, and transferring in order to ensure preservation, access, and use by future users. This issue will continue to grow in importance in the collection management duties of all librarians as demand and production of information in digital format increases in the future.

Collection Development Policy

Collection development policies are documents created by librarians that serve as blueprints for the collection management operations of the library as a whole (Gregory, 2011). These policies are usually comprised of a description of practices, guidelines for decision making, and provisions intended to protect against unwarranted pressures to acquire, not to acquire, or discard certain types of materials (Gregory, 2011). It is important to stress that the audience for these policies are both library staff members and the broader community of library users. The policy therefore is useful in explaining directly to users the procedures, policies, and rationale behind the functions performed by the collection management department. For library staff, the policy is helpful in ensuring consistency in procedures and practices when it comes to collection management duties (Gregory, 2011). This consistency is important because it is the responsibility of collection development staff to reflect the goals and objectives of the library in the collections they are building. Aspects related to the selection, organization, evaluation, and preservation of the library’s collection must be addressed in the collection development policy. Additionally, the following information should be included in a policy document: statement of purpose, background of the library’s community, statement of responsibility for collection management, mission, goals, and objectives statement, identification of target audience, budgeting and funding, selection and evaluation criteria, analysis of collection subject fields and formats, collection maintenance and weeding, intellectual freedom, and special collections (Gregory, 2011). Ultimately, the collection development policy is a crucial document for the library to effectively communicate with the community and with library staff about the specific roles and responsibilities of the collection management department.

Evidence

Evidence 1: LIBR-266- Collection Development Policy Manual

This collection development policy manual was created for LIBR-266: Collection Management. This manual was produced by myself and two other classmates throughout the course of the semester. The policy manual was created for a fictitious public library (Roald Dahl Public Library), with a specific focus on children’s, young adult, and teen services. My role in the group was team leader, and required much responsibility and delegation of tasks in the creation of our collection development policy manual. My tasks as group leader included: creation and maintenance of a group folder on Google Drive, setting deadlines for individual group member work, coordinating and leading synchronous group meetings via Skype, copy-editing each group member’s individual contributions, and collating and formatting our final policy manual into a cohesive document.

The collection development manual is comprised of 11 chapters, totaling over 140 pages of work. Each chapter focuses on a different aspect of collection management. The topics discussed in the policy manual include: the description of the (fictitious) library and its community, the types of materials available in the collections, selection procedures, review sources, acquisition procedures, budget and funding, evaluation and weeding, marketing, and reconsideration policy and procedures. In order to write each chapter, extensive research was done of the professional literature, in addition to the consultation of the policy manuals of similarly-sized public libraries. The in-depth nature of this course assignment provided a delving into all of the major topics related to the field of collection management. This helped me develop not only a greater understanding of these topics, but also of the real work involved in creating from scratch a policy document. In fact, I was surprised to see that the policy manual developed by my groupmates and I were much more in-depth and longer than the real collection development policies we consulted.

I took this course concurrently during my collection management internship at the Oakland Public Library. Working on the collection development policy while working in collection management helped me to understand how the theory of what I learned could be applied in real-life. Additionally, working on the policy manual for this course also helped me to better understand the roles and responsibilities of collection management at my library of employment. I even had the opportunity to put into practice many of the things researched and written for the policy manual. For example, I had the opportunity to try out some of the marketing and promotion strategies that were researched for Chapter 8 of the policy manual.

While the policy manual was written with an overall public library system in mind, my group chose to focus specifically on the children’s and young adult departments. These collections require special considerations when it comes to selection, evaluation, maintenance, weeding, and preservation. It is my hope to work as a youth or children’s librarian in a public library upon completion of the SJSU MLIS program. The creation of this policy manual provided me the opportunity to learn about several relevant topics that I surely will encounter in my future career. Additionally, I had the chance to learn about many excellent selection tools and resources that I will definitely have the chance to use in selection of materials and resources.

Evidence 2: LIBR-266- Reading Log, Parts I & II

This reading log (parts I and II) was created for LIBR-266: Collection Management. The purpose of this assignment was to explore the many print and online sources available on collection management outside of our course textbook and readings. This assignment was, in part, developed in tandem with the collection development policy manual assignment. The assignment entailed looking for readings related to the different topics of the chapters of the policy manual. Our professor provided us a list of readings discovered by previous students, and our challenge was to find new resources to review in our reading logs. The reading log is divided into sections, with the chapters of the policy manual as the headings of these sections. Each section includes a bibliographic citation of the resource and a summary and evaluation of it. This was quite a large assignment, and in total we were responsible for reading and reviewing a total of 350 pages of professional works from the field of collection management.

This assignment was useful in providing examples and real-world scenarios of collection management theory that we learned through our course textbooks. Additionally, issues of topical importance, such as providing access to underserved groups and the challenges of preserving digital items, were introduced to me. Overall, this assignment provided the necessary backbone needed to ground the chapters of the collection development policy manual assignment in the real world issues that must be addressed by the field. What I learned through completing these readings and the reading log helped me to gain a better understanding of the challenges that are faced in today’s world of collection management, and has better prepared me to handle them in my future career.

Evidence 3: LIBR-294- Collection Development Internship Final Report

This final report was created for LIBR-294: Professional Experience: Internships. I had the opportunity to complete a semester-long internship at the Oakland Public Library (OPL), a public library system in California, in the collection development department. I chose this internship because I was interested in gaining experience behind-the-scenes in a public library department, because my work experience had already provided me with many front-line tasks. Additionally, my collection development internship at the OPL gave me the chance to work closely with the selection, evaluation, maintenance, and preservation of physical and digital materials and resources for adult users. My focus, both at work and in school, had mostly been on children’s and youth librarianship, the area of which I am most interested in for my future career. I had the opportunity to complete this internship while also a student in LIBR-266: Collection Management. It was very useful for me to apply the real world theories that I learned about in class during my internship tasks and duties. The internship was also a great resource of information professionals that I could consult with if I had questions about things I learned in class. For example, my group needed information about vendors for video games for our teen library collection, and I was able to talk to several teen librarians involved with collection development at the OPL about this. The final report documents all of the work I completed during my internship, matched to a series of learning outcomes that I crafted before I began my work at my internship site.

As I mentioned, part of my responsibility for the internship class was to write several learning outcomes that I hoped to achieve through the course of my work at the internship site. The five learning outcomes that I developed are all related to the field of collection management:

Develop knowledge and insight of the importance of collection management and collection development in a public library setting.
Expand professional knowledge of the types of materials available in various collections, and how to develop, maintain, and evaluate these in the context of user needs.
Employ professional collection management techniques to select, evaluate, assess, and maintain a variety of library materials and collections.
Strengthen interpersonal communication skills in a professional library setting, and participate as an active and contributing member of a collection management department.
Perform a variety of collection management duties and tasks to gain hands-on experience of the day-to-day activities of an active collection management department.

In my final report, I discuss each of these learning outcomes in relationship to the tasks I completed during the time of my internship to show how I successfully met it. Additionally, I discussed any issues or problems that arose in trying to meet the learning outcome. Lastly, I provided examples of my work that I created during my internship as supporting material to show how I accomplished the learning outcome. Overall, my experience as a collection management intern at the OPL provided me with invaluable experience and knowledge about working in a modern public library collection management department. My final internship report showcases just some of the many things that I learned and became skilled at through the work I completed at the internship site. This knowledge has made me proficient in several areas in the collection development field, and has prepared me to complete this type of work in my future professional career.

References

Disher, W. (2007). Crash Course in Collection Development. Westport, CT: Libraries

Unlimited.

Gregory, V. L. (2011). Collection development and management for 21st century library

collections. New York, NY: Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc.

Larson, J. (2012). CREW: A weeding manual for modern libraries. Austin, TX: Texas State

Library and Archives Commission.

Rubin, R. E. (2010). Foundations of library and information science (3rd ed.). New York, NY:

Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc.

Evidence Files

Click to download the following files:

LIBR-266 Roald Dahl Public Library Collection Development Policy Manual

LIBR-266 Reading Log Part 1

LIBR-266 Reading Log Part 2

LIBR-294 Internship Final Report