Page 134 - DLIS001_FOUNDATION_OF_LIBRARY_AND_INFORMATION_SCIENCE

Unit 7: Academic Libraries

Books of a more advanced nature for the benefit of the teachers and also for the use of the Notes
more precocious students;

A wide range of reference books such as general and subject encyclopedias, language and
subject dictionaries, hand-books, manuals, biographical and geographical tools Carrier
handbooks, Competition Success, General Knowledge; gazetteers, atlases;

A browsing collection of light reading material like travelogues, humour books, art
books, biographies, fiction etc.

A select list of learned journals as well as popular ones, including back volumes;
Audio-visual learning and teaching kits to include films, film strips, pictures, audio cassettes
and discs, video-cassettes, etc.;

Computer-aided teaching and learning material.
On the size of the collection, educationists hold the view that a representative college library
should, have at least 50 books per student. Thus a college library, with an enrolment of about a
thousand students; should have at least 50,000 volumes. In addition, it has to have advanced
books for the teachers, the management and other users:

Collection Policy

The quality of the collection has, to be determined on the basis of a well thought-out acquisition
policy. This policy is usually laid down by the Library Advisory Committee. The selection
process is supported by groups of experts who have the knowledge and background of the
literature in their respective fields of specialisation, and are fully conversant with current
publications. The librarian and his/her staff, using global selection tools, should bring to the
attention of experts; worthwhile titles on various subjects and help to build a stock which is
oriented towards learning and teaching requirements. As has been mentioned, in the earlier
sections, the professional staff should be fully aware of the publishing and book selling trades,
in addition to a broad understanding of the different ramifications of subjects in which the
library acquires material.

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Caution The whole acquisition activity has to be invariably based upon accepted standards
and procedures to ensure smooth how of work.
The collection could be live and active, only if there is a policy of weeding, out older text books
and other overused books or unused books. This is important because these books occupy
precious and costly shelf space. Related to this is the policy regarding loss of books. In an active
library, there is bound to be loss of books, a reasonable percentage of this loss, must be written
off. In modern times, when prices are going up each day, the libraries must go for resource
sharing networking. All needed material can no more be acquired by a single library. Therefore,
various libraries shall have to pool up funds and rotate materials between them through the
rules of sharing.

Processing and Organisation

A college library should give sufficient attention and thought to the processing and organisation
of the collection for shelving and display. The classification scheme chosen should fulfil the
following criteria:
The system should have a general acceptance of users;

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