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college archivists - a summary



Title: college archivists - a summary

Here is a summary of the responses that our Library Director, Jonathan Miller, and I received to our queries about how to manage requests to move periodical runs to Special Collections. Thank you to everyone who responded. Our current thinking in this specific case is to leave them where they are, be clear with the faculty member involved and work with him to improve use of those titles, and consider a medium-rare (gotta love that phrase!) location for some titles in our collection.

Archives & Archivists / Ex-Libris listservs
Transfer to a "medium-rare" storage area (4)
Transfer to reserves
Transfer to Special Collections (those volumes are rare and fetch a good deal of money)
Keep in the general stacks and show the faculty member the OCLC search results (i.e. the titles really aren't that rare) (2)

Keep in general stacks for the "wow factor" of students stumbling upon something old and interesting
Obtain a microfilm use copy and remove originals to Special Collections
Keep in the general stacks based on their low artifact value - library processing has made them less valuable on the collector's market

New Directors/Collib/Obegroup listservs

Try to accommodate reasonable requests, but place more value on 19th century titles than 20th century titles
Transfer originals to Special Collections and consider the purchase of reprint or microfilm for the stacks
Transfer titles that are heavily used as part of a class assignment to Special Collections as a preservation measure
Rely on the current security system and the fact that students probably don't know the value of such materials
Use this request to create a clear collection development statement for Special Collections and to reiterate security for the entire collection

Transfer to a "medium rare" storage area
Keep in the general stacks based on their low artifact value - library processing has made them less valuable on the collector's market (2)

Keep in general stacks for the "wow factor" of students stumbling upon something old and interesting


Jamie Nelson
Special Collections Librarian
Augustana College