Librarians have long used data to describe their collections. Traditional measures have simply been inputs and outputs: volumes acquired, processed, owned, or circulated. With the growth since the 1990s of cultures of assessment, librarians have sought statistics that are evaluative rather than simply descriptive. More recently, exponentially increasing journal prices and an economic recession have intensified the need to make careful purchasing decisions and to justify these to administrators. A methodical evaluation of a library collection can help librarians understand and meet user needs and can help communicate to administrators that the library is a good use of the institution's money.
Collection Evaluation in Academic Libraries: A Practical Guide for Librarians equips collections managers to select and implement a method or several methods of evaluating their library collections.
It includes sections on four tools for evaluation:
. Comparison to peer institutions
. Core lists
. Usage statistics from circulation and ILL
. Citation analysis
Chapters on each of these approaches present the advantages and disadvantages of each method, instructions on data collection and analysis-with screenshots-and suggested action steps after completing the analysis. With a unique combination of step-by-step instructions and discussions of the purpose and role of data, this book provides an unusually thorough guide to collection evaluation. It will be indispensable for collection development librarians and anyone looking to strengthen the culture of assessment within the library.
Autorentext
Karen Kohn is Collections Analysis Librarian at Temple University in Philadelphia, where she serves on the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in Collections Committee and the Open Education Group. She also teaches Introduction to Collection Analysis through Library Juice Academy and serves on the editorial board of portal: Libraries and the Academy. She is the author of Collection Evaluation in Academic Libraries: A Practical Guide for Librarians (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015) and has published articles in College & Research Libraries, Journal of Academic Librarianship, Journal of Documentation, Collection Management, and portal.