Professional Documents
Culture Documents
(2017),"Training needs analysis based on mismatch between the acquired and required levels of collection management skills
of academic librarians", Collection Building, Vol. 36 Iss 1 pp. 20-28 <a href="https://doi.org/10.1108/CB-06-2016-0012">https://
doi.org/10.1108/CB-06-2016-0012</a>
(2017),"Collection development in Tawang monastery libraries", Collection Building, Vol. 36 Iss 2 pp. 77-88 <a href="https://
doi.org/10.1108/CB-12-2016-0037">https://doi.org/10.1108/CB-12-2016-0037</a>
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Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to highlight collection development activity in UK higher education libraries and to place it within both a
conceptual and strategic context.
Design/methodology/approach – This paper uses a theoretical approach to collection development and content strategy derived from literary
theory to contextualise debates. It uses current examples from collection management within UK academic libraries.
Findings – This paper suggests that collection development is not exclusively a library practitioner activity but needs to be considered within a wider
context that takes account of multiple strands of collection selection and management. Collection development cannot be considered in isolation
but alongside collection management and in relation to content strategy.
Research limitations/implications – This paper includes consideration of the topic of collection development that is influenced by other
disciplines, notably literary theory. This suggests that research in library science should include input from other disciplines.
Practical implications – This paper includes implications for content development within academic libraries that suggest that a re-focus at the
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Introduction and are beginning to articulate this. But it does not follow that
these changes have found their way into library policies despite
Collection development is a core activity within UK academic
being recognised in library practices.
libraries. UK academic libraries have created collection
This paper addresses how strategies and policies need to
development policies that reflect the perceived requirements
change, have started to change or indeed have changed. In
of their respective communities to support the education and
particular, it re-frames the issue of collection development
research missions of their parent institution and, in many
within the wider context of content strategy and emphasises
cases, to emphasise on the uniqueness of their local
this as central to a coherent approach to content and,
collections. Collection development is routinely carried out,
therefore, library collections. Inevitably, in any discussion of
although not necessarily always explicitly articulated.
collection development, the issues addressed merge into a
Although there is a significant scholarly record to support it as
discussion of collection management, and there are instances
a central function of libraries, particularly in North America
where library collection development policies directly address
(Gregory, 2011), UK academic libraries have not universally
collection management. This is in no small part due to the
exposed their policies and practices to close scrutiny. Policies
close relation between these two areas of practice. Where these
may have been created some time ago, have not always been
two come together is in addressing content strategy as each fall
subject to review and renewal and largely represent a
under this heading. At times, collection development and
print-based view of the library collection. This is not to
collection management appear to be two sides of the same
undermine the importance of print, or print culture, and it is
coin, and in the examples given in this paper, it will be shown
not to suggest that libraries have ignored digital content and
how the activity of one can inform the activity of the other.
collections. However, UK collection development policies do
Indeed, in addressing content strategy as a whole, it is
exhibit a custodial perspective that does not necessarily take
important that each factor is taken into consideration and
into account content that is neither owned nor curated by the
should not be considered in isolation.
library. Things do need to change and they are beginning to do
The UK higher education sector is the context for this
so. In particular, the print-based view of library collection is
paper, and the examples used are taken from this setting. This
being eroded, and some libraries have long since recognised
does not, however, preclude non-UK libraries from, it is
hoped, finding the points raised here as pertinent. In
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on particular, the more philosophical sections of this paper are
Emerald Insight at: www.emeraldinsight.com/0160-4953.htm included as they are specifically conceptually transferable and
Collection Building
36/1 (2017) 29 –34 Received 28 September 2016
© Emerald Publishing Limited [ISSN 0160-4953] Revised 28 September 2016
[DOI 10.1108/CB-09-2016-0026] Accepted 12 November 2016
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Collection development in UK university libraries Collection Building
Stuart Hunt Volume 36 · Number 1 · 2017 · 29 –34
can readily be applied, or discarded according to belief, by the Increasing numbers of e-books also compound this. The
wider library community. They are, however, included to vocabulary of collection development and collection
emphasise that library science needs to be informed by other management is now out-dated and out of step with how
disciplines and practices. libraries actually operate even when this is not specifically
This paper is not a literature review of the exhaustive recognised. For this reason, libraries should exercise caution
scholarly record for collection development. Little would be in the use of collection-based terminology and, better, shift
gained by repeating well-articulated and well-rehearsed their thinking to content. Content strategy should replace
arguments. In contrast to the non-UK world, collection collection development and collection management. This is
development has not traditionally been widely taught in UK no mere semantic trick of substituting one word for another. It
library education and is often a skill learned or acquired “on is not enough for the university library to substitute the word
the job” by the library practitioner. content for the word collection and simply re-package current
It is hoped this paper does, along with a selective overview policy. Rather, there needs to be a conceptual change in the
of the UK landscape, challenge the central premises of understanding of how library strategy conceives content.
collection development and, by extension, collection It is only recently that UK academic libraries have started to
management. Examples are used where they illustrate and consciously talk in terms of content strategy rather than
support the positions being made. At base, this paper is largely collection development (Hunt, 2014). Relatively few UK
an opinion piece and reflects the personal perspective of the academic libraries have, at present, developed a content
author, albeit one informed by both practical and strategic strategy, but this is starting to change, and there is a move
management experience. towards taking this up as something for libraries to do. The
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Collection development in UK university libraries Collection Building
Stuart Hunt Volume 36 · Number 1 · 2017 · 29 –34
deployment of content is the act of writing. Every use of University of Bristol, materials in some of the smaller
content in context is writing. “Every text is eternally written collections, such as the Medical Library, can be seen to work
here and now” (Barthes, 1993). The act of deploying content much harder than materials in the Arts and Social Sciences
is the act of writing. This can be contrasted with the collection Library. Comparing collection size against circulation data
which has a fixed identity. The collection is conceived of as a shows significantly more usage of the smaller Medical Library
unitary whole, and its constituents are seen as artefacts. This collection over both three and seven year periods. Stock in the
places the collection closer to a museum than the library where Medical Library also renews more frequently because of the
the collection is of interest in its totality, as an artefact, as a nature of the disciplines covered and the scholarly output and
whole. Applying Barthes’ work further through the definitions publishing cycle. Arts and Social Sciences Library materials,
of readerly and writerly texts (Barthes, 1990), content in this on the contrary, circulate far less frequently, yet the persistent
context is conceived of as writerly: argument is that these more monograph-heavy disciplines
The writerly text is a perpetual present, upon which no consequent language
require historic collections irrespective of their use. Evidence
[. . .] can be superimposed; the writerly text is ourselves writing, before the can be a potentially highly political tool in discussions with
infinite play of the world [. . .] is traversed, intersected, stopped, plasticized faculty in rationalising some collections.
by some singular system [. . .] which reduces the plurality of entrances, the
opening of networks, the infinity of languages.
Collections are, on the contrary, readerly and define the reader Changing models changing practices
as the recipient of a fixed and static text. The collection is, Patron-driven collection development has emerged through
therefore, in Barthes’ vocabulary readerly. It is not re-written the widespread adoption of patron-driven (or demand-drive)
in the way that content is.
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Collection development in UK university libraries Collection Building
Stuart Hunt Volume 36 · Number 1 · 2017 · 29 –34
time, worked with recommendation schemes for specific titles, subject has its own budget. Instead what is now emerging is a
new service offerings and wider institutional drivers are move towards budgeting at the higher category level, dividing
introducing new developments. The National Student Survey by different requirements such as reading list and research
(NSS), completed annually by final year undergraduate needs.
students in the UK and concerned with the total educational Open Access (OA) monograph publishing is increasing both
experience, has been instrumental in bringing change to with new or newly resurgent university presses within the UK.
library content development practices. The NSS has a single Knowledge Unlatched, which offers libraries to collectively
question about libraries, Question 16, “The library resources “unlatch” monographs making them OA, presents an
and services are good enough for my needs”, which survey interesting model. This is, in effect, collaborative content
respondents mark on a scale of agreement or disagreement. development, as Knowledge Unlatched requires multiple
Institutional scores are available at the question level and by institutions to pledge money upfront to gain significant funds
academic discipline. Free-text comments are also made to release titles. The number of titles has increased year on
available to institutions. These responses are being used by year, with the current-year three 2016 lists comprising 343
UK universities to identify less well performing areas and to titles. This is a significant increase compared to the previous
develop both library-wide and discipline-based strategies for year. Although recognising this as collaborative content
response. The typical response across the sector is to target development, it does raise the question if libraries are
resource expenditure, either from within existing resource or committing to the content, because they believe in the
as additional resource made available by the parent university, underlying principles of OA above and beyond the actual
at the less well performing subject areas. Responses include content available.
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Collection development in UK university libraries Collection Building
Stuart Hunt Volume 36 · Number 1 · 2017 · 29 –34
being located in some cases at a considerable distance from within the context of the both co-operative and competitive
the institution, as is the case for some universities within higher education environment.
central London. Any store will also entail service costs for Collection assessment is an integral part of collection
transporting materials to and from the remote store. As a development and also of collection management, as it moves
counter-part of collection development within the library, forward into content strategy and management. The
there ought to be collection development for the remote well-known work on conspectus by the former Research
store, where relegation is seen from both the perspective of Libraries Group (RLG) is helpful is categorising collections
removing titles from the library and also adding them to the and still has meaning at present. For example, the Library of
store. One ought not necessarily to imply the other, Congress has taken the decision to continue using the RLG
especially when the total cost of ownership is taken into categorisation in their Collection Policy Statements (Library
account. Alternative models for supply may well be more of Congress, 2015). In the UK, similar work took place at the
appropriate, with remote storage being dedicated to unique University of Leeds with the creation of a collection
materials that need to be retained. categorisation scheme (Leeds University Library, 2013). This
At a community level, there is an increasing awareness of categorisation is now increasingly becoming the subject of
the need for collection management and development. The interest within selected UK research libraries as a means of
space driver is clearly a significant factor in this. New library developing policy and can inform institutional content
buildings, or refurbishments to existing buildings, also have a strategy at an effective level. The categorisation need not be
significant influence. Over the past five years, the UK higher applied to the print collection only, as it had been conceived,
education sector has seen an increase in the number of new but can be expanded to consider content irrespective of
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library buildings. Integral to these has been discussion about format. The categorisation, although directly indicating
what should be in these new libraries and how much of the collection strengths and supporting collection management,
library’s historical collection should be included. Thus, space also highlights collection development priorities, indicating
planning for both high- and low-density storage is a driver. specific areas for collecting or not as appropriate.
Libraries do not want to shift legacy collections to a new build
without first considering if they should be retained. Similarly, Conclusions
some university libraries are being built on the basis that other Collection, or content, development is a complex picture
smaller site libraries will be incorporated in to the new build, across UK universities. Although different practices may
with the obvious consolidation that this involves. Data here in occur at the local level, there are stronger similarities than
making the necessary decisions are central to planning. there are differences between institutions. The drivers are, for
Within the UK, the collection management community has the most, part the same; supporting the education and
emerged with a specific identity and has formed around the research missions of their institution. The balance in how
work of the JISC Collection Management Community different methods and models are used may reflect the wider
Advisory Board. This was originally formed as an outcome of focus of the institution as a whole, between education and
the JISC Collection Management Tool (CCM) project and its research. A key driver that should not be under-estimated for
associated Board and now has a wider remit to advise on all UK university libraries is that of the student experience.
collection management and bibliographic data tools to Across the sector, this has become a central factor in library
support collection management (Massam, 2016). This is done strategic planning.
through the running of community events on collection At the strategic level, libraries are, either explicitly or
management and related activities. implicitly, moving towards a content-centred, rather than a
The Copac CCM tool allows libraries to analyse their collection-centred, approach, including content development.
collections, or parts of their collections, against other Content development as and content management are
institutions at a title level. As a collection management tool, it constituents of content strategy. It is not sustainable for UK
can also be potentially used for collection development, academic libraries to cling to historic collection development
enabling individual institutions to understand what practices. The landscape has become far more complex, with
constitutes a specific collection, for example, by discipline an increase in the models, methods and means for content
when supporting a new programme within the university procurement. Demand as a driver has more clearly moved to
(Elder and Massam, 2016). the fore, and automated tools and data-driven methodologies
Emerging from the CCM project is a wider collaboration are increasingly being used to address this.
between the White Rose Libraries of the Universities of Leeds, Many tools and approaches that are available and used for
Sheffield and York. Working with the Online Computer collection management can and are additionally being used for
Library Centre (OCLC) GreenGlass service, the libraries will content and collection development. This is increasingly the case
analyse their print collections with a view to establish a joint where an “above campus” or consortial approach to content is
approach to strategic collection management. This approach adopted. The UK is yet to establish a truly distributed national
of consortial collection management also points the way research collection, and such an aspiration still seems far off. At
towards a similar content development strategy. It highlights this time, only effective regional co-operation such as in the
the “above campus” aspect of content and how this can be devolved nations of Wales and Scotland seems likely.
incorporated into individual library strategic planning. The UK universities, as a content creators, are directly
challenge for libraries is to stop seeing content from impacting on content development as libraries seek to support
the perspective of custodianship and ownership. Whether this the education and research missions of their parent institution.
can and will be achieved remains to be seen, particularly Open Access content, research data, locally created open
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Collection development in UK university libraries Collection Building
Stuart Hunt Volume 36 · Number 1 · 2017 · 29 –34
educational resources and the outputs of institution-based Massam, D. (2016), “Jisc collection management community
publishing houses need to be made available and curated by advisory board”, available at: https://blog.mimas.ac.uk/ccm/
the library. As content creation moves closer to the library, w p -co n ten t/u p lo a d s/sites/13/2016/05/Col l ect i on-
there is a shift towards access to, and the curation of, locally Management-Advice-and-Oversight-May-2016.pdf (accessed
created content, and the library is increasingly a partner in 27 September 2016).
this. Content strategy, then, is focussed upon facilitation and Orgel, S. (2015), The Reader in the Book, Oxford University
access to external content and to internally created content. Press, Oxford.
UK Research Reserve (2016), available at: www.ukrr.ac.uk
(accessed 27 September 2016).
References
Barthes, R. (1990), S/Z, Blackwell, Oxford. Further reading
Barthes, R. (1993), “The death of the author”, Image – Music –
Jisc Copac Collection Management Tools (2016), available at:
Text, Fontana, London.
https://ccm.copac.jisc.ac.uk/ (accessed 27 September 2016).
Elder, R. and Massam, D. (2016), “Using Copac data to
Knowledge Unlatched (2016), available at: www.
benchmark collections”, Performance Measurement and Metrics,
knowledgeunlatched.org/ (accessed 27 September 2016).
Vol. 17 No. 2, pp. 194-202.
National Student Survey (2016), available at: www.
Gregory, V.L. (2011), Collection Development and Management
thestudentsurvey.com/ (accessed 27 September 2016).
for 21st Century Library Collections: An Introduction,
OCLC (2016), “OCLC sustainable collection services and
Neal-Schuman Publishers, NY/London.
GreenGlass”, available at: www.oclc.org/support/training/
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