[Mcls-print-storage] MI-SPI food for thought

[Katherine Mason]

Hi Everyone

I'm working on a review of the Library Science section (Z and ZA) of our
collection and am looking at our MI-SPI retention list in this area.

We have titles in our retention list that serve very little useful purpose
at this point. Examples include: "Word for Windows 6.0 slick tricks" and
"WordPerfect 6 for Windows insider".

Are there any ideas on how can we better fine tune our retention lists to
reflect our library type, 'local' collecting goals, etc? Of course we'll
retain these titles. I won't lie, I was quite excited to weed out all of
the old computer and software manuals. Hopes dashed!

Another question: are we trying to preserve for circulation 2 copies of
every book in our collective circulating collections without regard to its
utility? The examples I provided are nearly 20 years old. WordPerfect 6 for
Windows was released in 1993.

And these examples are more benign than this: we have older copies of First
Aid and CPR manuals on our retention lists. Yes, this is a weeding failure
on our library's part - we should NOT have a National Safety Council's 1994
"Essentials of First Aid and CPR" in our collection. Outside of a
specialized medical history collection, it is a disservice for us to keep
this title in our collection.

So I wonder if MI-SPI can't have some sort of conversation about this in
preparation for our next refresh. I will ensure that EMU keeps the titles
we agreed to retain as part of the MI-SPI agreement. In the future I'd like
to see if there is anything we can do to fine-tune our holdings to reduce
the likelihood of having to retain 'bad' information like outdated first
aid manuals or 'minimally useful' information like superseded software
manuals.

What are your thoughts or experiences with this?

Stay cool
Kathie

Kathie Mason
*Collections Librarian*
Eastern Michigan University Library
955 W Circle Dr
Ypsilanti, MI 48197
734-487-2541
ORCHID 0000-0002-8447-6078
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