A. PURPOSE OF THIS STATEMENT:

The Collection Development Policy guidelines are intended to clarify for librarians, faculty, students and other interested persons the purpose of the Barnard Library collection and the reasons for the selection or deselection of a particular item. This policy addresses all collecting, regardless of format or location within the library.

B. DESCRIPTION OF BARNARD COLLEGE AND THE BARNARD COLLEGE COMMUNITY:

Barnard College, founded in 1889, is an affiliate of Columbia University with the mission of providing a liberal arts education to undergraduate women. The affiliation allows reciprocal registration and library use (among other things) between the Barnard College community and the Columbia University community. Because of this agreement the Library does serve patrons from Columbia University, but the Library’s collection is meant to support Barnard College’s mission: undergraduate education in the liberal arts.

C. GOALS OF THE COLLECTION MANAGEMENT & DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM:

Ensuring appropriate collection development in all subjects studied at Barnard College is the main goal of the Library’s collection management policy. Specifically, the Library aims to maintain a collection which is relevant to the majority of Barnard College students’ research interests and level of knowledge and learning.

The process of collection development includes:

selection
weeding
evaluation

D. INTELLECTUAL FREEDOM AND CENSORSHIP ISSUES

The Library subscribes to the American Library Association’s policies on intellectual freedom as expressed in the Library Bill of Rights (see attached).

E. COLLECTION OVERVIEW

1. History:

Early collection development efforts have led to a strong core collection in the social sciences and humanities. Particularly noteworthy is the Library’s collection of first edition English and American novels. The collection is also particularly strong in women’s studies. Librarians evaluated the women’s studies collection in the 1980s and filled in existing gaps; the Library continues to buy heavily in this area. In 1994/95 the Columbia and Barnard libraries agreed that Barnard would become the collection for dance.

In the sciences the Library has historically collected at a minimum level, on the basis that the majority of science classes do not require textual research but rely instead on readings from textbooks which are purchased for Reserve. The Library continues to rely on its relationship with Columbia to fulfill the research needs of its science majors.

2. Subject areas emphasized in the Library:

Art : American and Western European painting and sculpture.
Literature : American and English
Women’s Studies : Humanities and social sciences with an emphasis on the United States and Western Europe.

3. Collection locations (alphabetically listed):

Archives is housed in the basement of the Library and is maintained by the Barnard Archivist.

Barnard Alumnae books are located in the reading room on the 1st floor of the Library. This collection is built solely upon gifts and the books are not added to CLIO.

Barnard Chemistry is located outside of the Library building in 804 Altschul.

The Circulating collection is located on the 2nd and 3rd floors of the Library.

Locked cases are located on the 3rd floor of the Library and currently house materials which are non-circulating. Eventually all of these books will be evaluated for transfer into the circulating collection or the Treasure Room as appropriate.

Media Services is on the 3rd floor of the Library and its collection includes audiocassettes, CDs, records, laserdiscs and videos.

Microfilm and microfiche are located on the 2nd floor of the Library.

Periodicals are located on the 2nd floor of the Library.

The Reference collection is located on the 2nd floor of the Library.

The Reserve collection, located on the 1st floor of the Library, is a closed stack collection of material required for Barnard courses and other undergraduate courses taught by Barnard faculty. Material removed from Reserve is evaluated and added to the circulating collection as appropriate.

Scores & Libretto are located on the 3rd floor. They are not actively collected.

Storage is located in the basement. In 1995 the library began to clean out this area and move into it back runs of periodicals, reference serials, and an overflow of Archive material.

The Treasure Room (Special Collections) is located on the 2nd floor of the library and material in this room is paged by staff. Housed in the Treasure Room are:

The Overbury collection, a gift from Bertha Overbury, of 3300 special and first editions as well as manuscript materials by and about American women authors.

The Gabriela Mistral Collection, which consists of the personal library of Nobel Prize-winning poet.

A small collection of rare books.

No additions are currently being made to any of these collections.

F. ORGANIZATION OF THE COLLECTION MANAGEMENT & DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM:

The Dean of Barnard Library & Academic Information Services provides overall direction for collection development policy.

Circulating and Reference collections: (a) The head of technical Services ensures breadth of coverage in all appropriate subject areas. (b) A designated collection development specialist oversees selection and management of the major collection areas of the library (see E2). (c) Other librarians contribute in accordance with individual subject expertise. (d) Faculty are consulted whenever necessary.

Media: The media Services librarian selects material based primarily on faculty requests and areas of known interest.

Reserve: The Access Services librarian coordinates the selection of material for the Reserve collection. This collection is built entirely upon faculty requests for course-specific material.

G. MANAGEMENT OF THE COLLECTION: PRESERVATION, REPLACEMENT, DESELECTING, STORAGE.

Simple in-house mending and commercial binding and re-binding for high-use and non-replaceable items does take place. Lost items or items in poor physical condition will be replaced (if available in print) after consideration of the following factors:

Was the item frequently used (particularly in the past 5 years)?
Is the item’s content of continuing value? The intellectual worth of an item will be determined by consulting reviews and/or major subject bibliographies.

Similar criteria exist for the deselection/withdrawal of an item:

Was the item rarely used (particularly in the past 5 years)?
Is the information contained within the item out-of-date or no longer relevant to the Barnard curriculum?
Is the item in poor physical condition?
How many copies of the title are available at either Barnard or Columbia?

Older reference titles and backruns of periodicals that are rarely consulted but still of intellectual value are placed in storage. There are no plans to place circulating material in storage.

Faculty will be consulted when additional assistance in making a replacement or withdrawal decision is required, i.e. in those subject areas not well-handled by a librarian’s subject expertise.

H. GENERAL SELECTION GUIDELINES:

1. The institutional goals stated in B and C provide the framework for selection. The major responsibility and top priority of the Library lie with the teaching program at the undergraduate level. The Library acquires materials to serve faculty needs only if the materials can also be used by the undergraduate student body. In other instances the Columbia University Libraries’ research collections are available to the faculty, as is interlibrary loan. At a much lower level of priority, the Library serves the College community by limited purchasing of recreational and general information materials.

2. Specific considerations in choosing individual items include some or all of the following:

lasting value of the content
enduring interest in the subject
level of treatment (in reviews "undergraduate," "upper-division undergrad" or "college level")
strength of present holdings in the same or similar subject areas
cost
suitability of format to content (e.g. is an item more useful in print or on CD-ROM)
authority of the author or reputation of the publisher

3. Rules-of-thumb that apply to all acquisition decisions have been defined as follows: :

Textbooks are normally not purchased, except for the Reserve collection.

Duplicates are rarely purchased, except for the Reserve collection.

For high-cost/low-demand items, holdings of nearby libraries are considered in determining whether or not to acquire.

With the exception for foreign language dictionaries, the library acquires primarily English language reference and research sources.

The majority of selections are current publications. Retrospective purchasing is occasionally warranted but, given the difficulty and expense of obtaining out-of-print and reprinted material, the library gives first priority to buying valuable current publications of long-term worth, thus preventing a future need for retrospective buying.

Hardcover binding is preferred for material known to be of continuing interest to the Barnard community, or anticipated to be of high-use. Paperbacks will be purchased when cloth is not available or when the difference in cost between cloth and paper is extreme.

4. Primary selection tools are:

Choice
Library Journal
New York Times Book Review
Women’s Review of Books

5. Non-reviewing sources are perused to keep up with current publications in certain subject fields. However, since these sources do not provide useful reviews, selection from them is minimal and limited to a very few subject areas, primarily women’s studies and literature. Examples of these types of sources are:

Chronicle of Higher Education
Publishers’ catalogs

6. Faculty requests are welcome and the Library will acquire materials that are in accord with the CollectionDevelopment Policy.

The American Library Association affirms that all libraries are forums for information and ideas, and that the following basic policies should guide their services.

1. Books and other library resources should be provided for the interest, information, and enlightenment of all people of the community the library serves. Materials should not be excluded because of the origin, background, or views of those contributing to their creation.

2. Libraries should provide materials and information presenting all points of view on current and historical issues. Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.

3. Libraries should challenge censorship in the fulfillment of their responsibility to provide information and enlightenment.

4. Libraries should cooperate with all persons and groups concerned with resisting abridgment of free expression and free access to ideas.

5. A person’s right to use a library should not be denied or abridged because of origin, age, background, or views.

6. Libraries which make exhibit spaces and meeting rooms available to the public they serve should make such facilities available on an equitable basis, regardless of the beliefs or affiliations of individuals or groups requesting their use.

 

Adopted June 18, 1948, amended February 2, 1961 and January 23, 1980 by the ALA Council.

Information provider:

Unit: American Library Association (ALA)

Email: Edward.Valauskaus@ala.org

Posted: 1994-04-15