Progress on the Collections Project

At the end of August 2020, the Department of Library Services (DLS) launched a project to compile an inventory of all physical library collections. The overall aim of this project is to establish an accurate reflection of all information resources for improved retrieval, access and visibility.

The first leg of the project focuses on the physical book collections, and consists of three phases. In the first phase, items from the shelves are scanned and problem items are removed, to be fixed by the library technical service unit. Student workers are also trained and used to assist with the replacement of obsolete or non-functional barcodes and to add items on the system.  Once corrected, these items are moved back to the shelves. In the second phase, faculty libraries are provided with a list of items which were not inventoried, but are on the system. Staff must search for these missing items and, when found, they are scanned again. Records of items which cannot be found are then removed from the system. In some cases, information specialists may recommend the acquisition of replacement copies. During the last phase, intensive shelve reading is done, to ensure all items are placed at their correct locations.

Although the DLS aimed to finish the project by the end of 2021, progress was much slower than initially anticipated. At the end of July 2021, just over 50 percent of the collections were scanned, 20927 item records were added to the system and 19956 records were updated.

The second part of the project focuses on the journal collection, and, particularly, in identifying ways to facilitate access to older content. The practice of replacing high-use print journals with electronic “backfiles” or archival files has been an established solution in many academic libraries worldwide. Although this might be a costly exercise, investing in backfiles of all core journals would be a solution for the libraries to free up more space, reduce local storage costs, and complete migration to online resource provision (which is currently high in demand). A task team is assigned to investigate the removal of printed items of which current backfiles are owned, as well as the expansion of online archived collections. To ensure inclusivity of all user needs and assurance that all preservation mandates are covered, this is done in collaboration with the faculty libraries.

We soon realised that although these projects are much bigger than what we initially planned, the value of all our efforts would be priceless! Not only would users have a more pleasant engagement with the physical collections, the DLS would also be able to establish a more supportive, data driven platform for future strategic plans (e.g., enabling staff to identify items to move to off-site storage) – given that all of the DLS’ space, budgets and user needs support decisions are centred around our collections.

Overview of the collections project.

With the help of student workers, the project progresses well.