Hello
friends! Ashley here, again.
As
I am unable to work in my library as we are under a safer-at-home mandate, I am
flying by the seat of my pants for this month's blog post (all my notes/ideas
are on my work computer), so I thought I’d change it up a bit this month. I’m
curious...how do you weed? Do you have freedom in your library to get rid of
things as you see fit? Does your director have to approve every discard? Do you
have to wait until certain staff members are on vacation or at a meeting and
sneakily and quickly discard a pile you’ve been waiting to get rid of? I have
been in all of these situations myself at one time or another. I am fortunate
enough that I am currently free to do as I please when it comes to weeding my
collections, as is our children’s librarian.
There
are several ways in which I weed: usage reports, random sightings of sad
looking books on carts or in the stacks, and physically touching/opening/examining
every item shelf by shelf. Each type of weeding has it merits and drawbacks.
Usage reports are great for finding items that haven’t been checked out in
years, but miss books that have been used so much they are falling apart, as
well as skipping over outdated books that are full of mis-information. Finding
dingy books on carts is a great way to find items that are loved and need to be
replaced, but misses the items that might still be sitting on a shelf
somewhere. And going shelf by shelf is very time consuming, but I have found
this to be the best way to find damaged items and keep our collection nice and
in working order. And if you are in charge of a digital collection, don’t
forget those should also be weeded, so patrons have less data to sift through
to find the items they want. Each type of weeding is useful in its own way, but
only you know what works best for you and your library. If you try something
and don’t like it, don’t keep doing it. Find a way that you are comfortable
with and make it your own.
If
you have trouble finding time, or are concerned about upsetting patrons/staff,
try doing things a little differently. Here are some ideas to help you get
started:
Do
one section of shelving when you have a few spare minutes. By only doing one
section every week or so, you space out the materials you are getting rid of,
causing less patron (and staff) kickback than when they see huge piles being
discarded at once.
Going
through collections book by book is a way to find issues that are easily
missed. Example: When we did our picture book re-organization project, I handled
every single book and found a number of items that were damaged beyond help
(missing pages, moldy, etc.). Now, I go through a shelf at a time in all of our
collections looking for all sorts of damages and either note, discard, or
replace these items.
Looking
to get rid of a collection? Maybe you have a VHS or audiocassette collection
that you have been wanting to get rid of for years. Start by getting a report
of items that haven’t gone out in the last year. After a few months, run
another report of items that haven’t gone out in, say, 6 months. If you still
have a lot of materials left, get a report of when they were last used. Once
you get down to one section of shelving, take a handful here or there until
there’s nothing left. If you have something that is a local treasure, see about
putting it in a special place (such as a local history collection). Or, you
could just make the whole lot disappear at once, but that might raise alarm in
patrons.
Happy
weeding!
Resources
of interest:
Guest post by: Ashley Borman, Technical Services Librarian, Clintonville Public Library
