Deacquisition Guidelines
Joseph F. Smith Library
Brigham Young University - Hawaii
Building a quality collection of undergraduate research materials comprises two components:
- Selection and acquisition of new materials
- Deselection and weeding of older materials
When these tasks are accomplished with the needs of the university curriculum in mind and in partnership with faculty members and librarians, the outcome is a strong collection that better serves all university patrons.
The deselection of materials is not an activity to be undertaken lightly. It is expensive and time-consuming, and necessitates as much care and attention as does the acquisition and processing of new materials. It requires a cooperative effort and the support of both librarians and faculty members.
While the rationale behind building a collection is fairly obvious, the justification for deselection is less apparent.
Goals of a robust deselection program include:
- To gain additional stack space
- To strengthen the collection by making the remaining materials more accessible
- To eliminate items in physical conditions that prohibit their effective use
The following criteria will be used to identify materials for deselection:
- Superseded editions
- Worn, mutilated or badly marked items in poor condition
- Duplicate copies of seldom used titles
- Surplus copies of titles that are no longer in demand for supplementary use, or items that are represented in multiple titles when a better title is available
- Materials which are part of an incomplete set
- Materials containing subject matter inappropriate to the collection (i.e. programs no longer being offered)
- Materials which contain outdated, obsolete or misleading information
- Items with little or no use as determined by historical usage statistics that indicate a title has little application to student or faculty research needs
Procedure:
- Using the above criteria, librarians will identify 200-300 items at a time for consideration
- Librarians will email a list of materials under consideration to all faculty members
- Materials will be available for review during business hours in the Technical Services department of the Library for a two-week review period
- Faculty members will advise librarians of materials to be retained by the close of the review period
- Materials so identified will be returned to the stacks
- To prevent conflict of interest, materials selected for withdrawal will not be given or sold to individuals but will be donated to the Friends of the Library of Hawaii
- Deselection activities will proceed during the Fall, Winter and Spring semesters/terms on a bi-weekly basis
