Collection Management Plan: Material types
Monographs (including e-books)
Monographs are purchased in both print and electronic formats, although electronic books are preferred for high demand and reference material and to support flexible learning.
E-books may be purchased individually or in collections.
Journals (including e-journals)
The Library prefers to subscribe to journals in electronic format.
Other electronic resources
Other electronic resources may include indexing and abstracting services, Government documents, working papers, conference proceedings, databases, datasets, websites, image files, sound files, etc.
Criteria for selection
Depending on the type of material being considered and the particular subject area, selection criteria may include:
- Relevance to the needs of the University's teaching, learning and research programmes
- Coverage and currency of content
- Depth of the existing collection in the subject
- Collecting levels in the subject
- Quality
- Availability
- Cost
- Language
Criteria for electronic resources may also include:
- Licence terms and conditions offered by the publisher
- Delivery format
- Ownership rights (whether leased or licensed)
- Interface functionality
- Relationship to the print version
- Reliability and stability of access
- Compatibility with the Library’s proxy server
- Availability of usage statistics
Criteria for creating local digital collections include:
- Demand for access
- Condition of original
- Rarity
- Reuse potential
- Availability of Rights clearance
- Retention of the integrity of original
- Value as a teaching, learning and research resource
Preservation
Preservation guidelines recognise the importance of training and prevention in maintaining the collections for ready access and long term research. Binding and mending programmes are in place for serials and monographs, and most items are processed to preserve the lending period of the material. Rare and expensive material is held in closed access collections. The Library prioritises material for digitising or preservation microfilming. A Disaster Preparedness Plan has been developed to support the physical collection and an IT Disaster Recovery Plan to ensure continuity of service.
Relegation and deselection
A programme of stock revision ensures that the physical collections are relevant to users’ needs and that best use is made of the available space. Relegation is the transfer of material to storage, while deselection is the permanent withdrawal of material. Print material that receives little use but continues to have value as a research resource is relegated to storage. Other material may be deselected. Final decisions on deselection and relegation remain with the University Librarian.
Categories to be considered for relegation:
Print material (monographs and serials)
- Low use
- Superseded
- Available online
The following criteria may also be used (and may vary from discipline to discipline)
- Condition
- Publication date
- Current teaching, learning and research profile
- Foreign languages which are not related to teaching that language or literature
- Ephemeral serial titles or serial titles not indexed in a major index
Categories to be considered for deselection:
Print material (monographs and serials)
- Duplicate copies of material already identified for relegation
- Superseded textbooks
- Outdated material
- Material in poor physical condition that is beyond repair and/or material that can contaminate other items
- Material relating to disciplines that are no longer taught or researched
- Fragmented runs of non-current serials
The electronic collections are not generally reviewed in the same way as print although titles may be suppressed when their deselection is appropriate.
Intellectual freedom
The Library and Information Association of New Zealand (LIANZA) Statement on Intellectual Freedom March 2002 states that librarians have a responsibility to ensure that the selection and availability of information materials is governed solely by professional considerations and that they should neither promote nor suppress opinions and beliefs expressed in the materials with which they deal.
