Maine Shared Collections Strategy Collection Development Subcommittee Meeting
January 31, 2012
10-12, Colby College, Miller Library Conference Room

Attending: Joan Campbell, Christy Coombs, Brian Damien, Valerie Glenn, Lanny Lumbert, Susan MacArthur, Peggy O’Kane, Deb Rollins

The meeting primarily consisted of a discussion as to how to tackle (and divide) the roughly 4 million volumes we are concerned with, without reviewing on a title-by-title basis. The group reviewed the sample “Shared by 5” data that was sent after the last meeting; Venice from Maine InfoNet had created a review file of the sample titles in URSUS, which allowed Deb to extract item level data for those titles (date the record was added, total checkouts, status, etc.)

Of the 212 sample titles, 204 were in URSUS, resulting in 803 items held by partner libraries. 142 of these were non-circulating. Of the remaining 661 items, 146 had 0 total checkouts, (23 of those had been added between 2001 and 2012), and 256 had 5 or fewer total checkouts (38 of those were added between 2001 and 2012).  Deb was asked to share her spreadsheet with the group so that all could review the URSUS data.

Valerie will ask Venice to share her approach with the non-URSUS library systems people so that we can have item level data from all of the grant partners to review at the next meeting.

The group struggled to identify ways to break down the items for analysis/decision-making. Overall it was agreed that children’s books should be considered a separate category, and that fiction should be separate from non-fiction. Dealing with “Maine” items will be a challenge, as they will span all categories. Brian suggested one way to segment some of those items would be to identify Maine imprints.

It was suggested that we develop a formula (flow-chart?) for decision-making, based on the number of copies, the number of total checkouts, the date the item was added, etc. Peggy volunteered to send Valerie her ideas re: decision points.

Valerie mentioned that there was an opportunity for the group to schedule a webinar with OCLC folks to go over WCA and how to use it more effectively. She will attempt to schedule the webinar for viewing at the next meeting. The primary discussion topic at the next meeting (following the training) will be the decision-making formula.