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Collection Services Annual Report 2012-2013: Goals 2012-2013

Evaluate Existing Divisional Job Descriptions

Collection Services has updated job descriptions for the Assistant Director for Collection Services and for the Content Management Coordinator and The Coordinator for Access Services. Currently Coordinators are working with Division members and the Human Resources Department to update additional job descriptions. We anticipate that this process will be complete in 2013-2014.

Cross-Train Student Workers

During 2012-2013 Collection Services employed almost 80 student workers. The majority of those students were trained in circulation services and were cross-trained and scheduled at the circulation desks at the James B. Duke, Maxwell Music, and Sanders Science Libraries. We cross-trained and shared students between Circulation and Interlibrary Loan / Scan & Deliver Services as needed. Students from across the Division have worked on shifting, deselection, inventory, and shelving. The Collection Services student assistance have even assisted with Discovery and Outreach Services projects.

Cross-Train Among Divisional Deparments

This is an ongoing goal and Collection Services continuously attempts to identify new and better ways to cross-train and support each other.

Tom Neal working on a microform shifting project-

Continue to Examine Workflow for Increased Efficiency & Codify Workflow

In 2012-2013 we concentrated on identifying, clarifying, and codifying our existing practices and work-flow. One of our principal initiatives for the year was streamline our approval plan process. Several factors influenced this decision. First, our approval plan profile was fine-tuned to the point where we had very few returns. Additionally, faculty participation varied across the disciplines, frequently leaving librarians to make the accept/reject decisions. The greatest benefit of this change is that books are processed sooner and delivered to the shelves—and thus available to our patrons—in a much shorter time frame and invoices are paid sooner. This change has met with wide faculty and librarian support. The only reservation expressed thus far concerns the retention of more expensive books without a review period. Negative impact to work-flow has been outweighed by the advantage of this new system.

We assessed our gifts process from the ground up, establishing a work-flow involving Liaison Librarians and reducing the amount of time from receipt to outcome. We created an Online Gifts Donation Form and a bookplate pdf that can be edited and produced in-house. We developed a LibGuide outlining our gifts policy.

We clarified our facilities policies and practices. We developed a James B. Duke Porch Policy, and introduced an online porch reservation form.  Access Services became not only responsible for providing student worker staffing and supervision for branch libraries but for generating the yearly schedule for each library. We simplified and publicized our Winter Weather procedure and have established a hazardous weather practice as well.

We verified and promoted our process for selection of books, journals, databases, videos, and for publications for those associated with Furman University. In conjunction with Outreach we initiated our system of database and journal review and selection.

We have updated and streamlined for acquiring and facilitating access to electronic resources.

We updated and streamlined our  work-flow for acquiring and facilitating access to electronic resources.  Working with Outreach and Discovery services we created a process so that both old and newly acquired electronic reference sources are available in both the Reference Tools LibGuide and the catalog. It is our hope that, with our new catalog and discovery service, we will no longer have to maintain these separate lists.

We acquire Springer eBooks each year through a PASCAL consortial purchase.  EBL was also adding new Springer publications to our catalog as a part of our EBL Patron-Driven Acquisition program. In 2012-2013 we worked with our EBL support staff to have Springer Books suppressed from the catalog. From this point forward Springer books will no longer come in the EBL Patron-Driven Acquisition program. Additionally, we’ve established a work-flow so that eBook received from other sources are suppressed in our EBL PDA as well. In this way we avoid duplicate spending. eBook deselection is a growing trend in academic libraries –

Moroni, A. E. (2012). Weeding in a digital age: shelf clutter can be a problem for ebooks as well. Library Journal, 137(15), 26+.

We have have established processes that will facilitate the deselection of eBooks from our collection as necessary. This includes adding a note to Millennium records for books we have rented and/or purchased through our EBL DDA.

 

Assess and Adjust our Electronic Resource Collection as Necessary

This is an ongoing goal; towards this end our two biggest accomplishments for 2012-2013 include acquiring EBSCONET® Usage Consolidation and establishing unmediated access to Copyright Clearance Center Get It Now.

Patron Driven Acquisition Program

InterLibrary Loan Patron Driven Acquisitions

The Furman University Library ILL / PDA Pilot began on March 25, 2013 and officially ended on May 3, 2013. During that time, 3 items were selected for purchase, ordered and received. The first 2 books were ordered, received and cataloged within 9 days, and the remaining book took a mere 3 days to arrive on the hold shelf. It was decided that the number of items being added to the collection through this means would not be a burden on the staff processes involved, and the pilot period was thereby concluded by instituting ILL / PDA as a regular practice.

To date, nearly 3 months from the pilot start, a total of 9 items requested by 5 faculty members and 1 student have been added to the collection. The longest turnaround time has been 19 days for a single item, and the shortest, 2 days, with an average of 8 days turnaround. A few of the books were already queued up for the acquisitions plan with YBP, and shipping was expedited. Considering that all of the books were newly published and not yet available through ILL, the only other recourse would have been to cancel the requests and ask the patrons to resubmit in 4-6 months, as has been our practice in the past. This procedure provides exponentially better patron service.

Parameters

ILL criteria:

  • Print monographs, audio CDs
  • Not owned by Furman Libraries
  • Not available from PASCAL libraries
  • Not a University Press book
  • Not older than 2 years
  • No music scores, foreign publishers, foreign language
  • Content meets general acquisitions profile requirements including Leisure
  • Acquisitions criteria:
  • Price under $100
  • Can be ordered and arrive within 2 weeks, standard shipping only

ILL workflow:

  • Create ILLiad queue “Being purchased/PDA” for items sent to Acquisitions. This status is viewable by the patron in their account.
  • Send High Priority email to Acquisitions with patron name, title, author, publisher, date, and indicate if intended for Leisure Collection.
  • If denied by Acquisitions, route to Awaiting Borrowing Processing
  • If and when completed, cancel request with “Reason for Cancellation” being “Purchased/PDA”

Acquisitions workflow:

  • Search for Items according to criteria. If not located or available in correct format, out of stock or print, or not able to be delivered within designated or reasonable time frame, an email will be sent notifying ILL that the item is not available for PDA.
  • If available for purchase, Acquisitions flags order record for RUSH processing with notification for ILL, places hold on patron record and on Leisure Collection, if indicated. Selector will be noted as ILL/PDA.
  • Acquisitions receives item, notifies ILL by email that the item is in the building, and Cataloging RUSH processes before delivering to Circulation.