Everyone has been very helpful. I now have a better idea of what to do. I've
collected the responses that were only sent to me for those asking that I post
the
suggestions:**********************************************************************************************************When
weeding in these sections these are my recommendations:
1) I would keep recent printings of books by these authors. Patrons are more
likely to select recent printings over older printings, particularly if there
are issues of condition.
2) If you are uncomfortable getting rid of a book, go on addall.com/used and
search there to see how much reading copies of the book are going for. If the
lowest price you find there is above $20.00 or $40.00 or whatever threshold you
think might be a pain point for an average congregant to buy their own copy,
then keep the book. If you follow this step I think you will assuage some of
the anguish you are experiencing in the weeding process.
If your patrons feel like the collection isn't static I expect that they will
be more interested in making regular visits. It is a great thing to have all
the classics, but, at least the visual of newness is what people are used to in
retail situations, and I think that many people view library collections in the
same way that they shop.
Weed through your patrons eyes.
**************************************************************************
Look them up in WorldCat. If a “classic” (that is not circulating in your
collection) is easily accessible from one of your local libraries or through
ILL then you can get rid of it guilt-free. If it appears to be “rare,” you
might want to keep it just in case.
This is how I weeded our middle grade chapter book collection a few years back:
· I pulled all of the old/dated books that no one had checked out in
forever and put them on a cart.
· My Teen Library Aide searched for each one in WorldCat and put aside
any that were not available in other Illinois libraries.
· There were very few! Depending on what it was I either sent it to
Andrea Rapp in Cincinnati who maintains a collection of historic Jewish
children’s books (if she wanted it), put it back on the shelf, or pitched it
and bought a fresh, new, more attractive copy for the library (if available).
· All the rest we boxed up for a non-profit to pick-up.
I’m planning to do the same thing with my adult fiction collection which also
desperately needs to be weeded. It was supposed to be a summer project but you
know how that goes . . .
Rachel HausLibrary DirectorCongregation of Moses Fisher LibraryKalamazoo MI
__
Messages and opinions expressed on Hasafran are those of the individual author
and are not necessarily endorsed by the Association of Jewish Libraries (AJL)
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