1st Edition

Evaluating Acquisitions and Collection Management

By Linda S Katz Copyright 1991

    Here is an in-depth book on the process of evaluating your acquisitions and collection management programs. No project, no matter how ingenious or innovative, will be granted support by a funding agency without a solid evaluation plan. Evaluating Acquisitions and Collection Management discusses the reasons evaluation is held in such high regard by administrators. The authors describe a variety of evaluation activities that cover both qualitative and quantitative approaches. The first section of the book covers current trends and the impact on collection development and acquisitions, and how the evaluation of collections can reveal patterns of program support that can then be compared between peer institutions. Other topics include the process of assigning relative value to acquisitions activities, performance appraisal, and methods for improving procedures of acquiring materials. Acquisitions librarians and administrators will find this book extremely helpful in streamlining their acquisitions and collection management programs.

    Contents Introduction
    • Complement or Contradiction: The Role of Acquisitions in the Access Versus Ownership Dynamic
    • Budgeting for Users: Rethinking the Materials Budget
    • Threats and Opportunities: Collection Development in a Changing Research Library Environment
    • Collection Development for the Nineties: A Context for Evaluation
    • Translating the Conspectus: Presenting Collection Evaluation Results to Administrators
    • Variations on a Theme: Evaluating the Acquisitions Department
    • Evaluating Acquisitions Service: New Concepts and Changing Perceptions
    • The Acquisitions/Collection Development Departments as Service Units in Academic Libraries: A Less Traditional Evaluative Criterion
    • Vendor Performance Evaluation as a Model for Evaluating Acquisitions
    • Evaluation Under the Gun: Not Necessarily Inferior
    • Performance Evaluation of Collection Development and Acquisitions Librarians
    • On Performance Consultation with Bibliographers: A Non-Rational and Non-Machiavellian Perspective
    • Evaluation of Searching
    • Service Through Automation: Sharing Fund Accounting Information

    Biography

    Pamela S. Cenzer, Cynthia I. Gozzi