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Collection Guidelines - Collection Management

Deselection (weeding)

1. Overview

Deselection or weeding of library materials is an important collection management activity that ensures the collection is responsive to change and remains current and relevant to the teaching, learning and research activities within the University. Deselection ensures the quality of the collection is high, whilst unnecessary, outdated or worn out material is removed or replaced.

The library faces the challenge of accommodating new volumes each year with no extra space available for storage, therefore collection growth must be balanced by regular weeding. It is recognised that some print resources will always have value to clients both in the present and in the future or have intrinsic value or significance: these will be excluded from deselection. An increasing number of print resources are being replaced by online equivalents and these are candidates for weeding consideration.

2. Definitions

Weeding: the discard and disposal of materials from the Deakin University Library collection.
Transfer: moving of materials from their present location to another location within the Deakin University Library collection.
CARM: Deakin University is as a member of the CARM (CAVAL Archival and Research Materials) Centre Consortium. The CARM centre is owned by a number of Victorian Universities and aims to provide a centralised, environmentally controlled storage facility for low use, research or last copy materials.
Relegation: transfer to the CARM Centre and relinquishment of ownership of the item to the CARM Centre consortium.
Disposal: the removal of items no longer required and not relegated to CARM.

3. General principles of deselection:

• The Library collection should be relevant and responsive to the teaching, learning and research activities of the University. Outdated, innacurate or no longer useful materials will be evaluated regularly for possible de-selection
  
  
• The currency of information is particularly important in some disciplines such as health sciences, information technology, business & law. The Library will implement a weeding schedule to more frequently check these discipline areas against the de-selection criteria to ensure an up to date and relevant collection
  
  
• The following categories of serials will be evaluated regularly for possible de-selection
  
  • Serial titles no longer relevant to the teaching, learning or research of the University
  • Print titles where an online equivalent is held. Exceptions are identified in the guidelines below.
  • Incomplete, patchy or short runs of titles
  • Superseded titles where the content is no longer deemed useful for teaching, learning or research
  • Print titles replaced by microfilm
  • Duplicate holdings of low use titles
    
    
• The following monograph materials will be evaluated regularly for possible de-selection:
  • Titles that are no longer relevant to the teaching, learning or research of the University
  • Material that is out of date, innacurate, damaged or badly worn
  • Material that has low use over recent years (this may vary according to the discipline)
  • Multiple copies of reading list materials once their relevance to the teaching curriculum ends
  • Superseded editions of monographs
  • Superseded editions of Deakin course materials
  • Resources in formats that have become technologically redundant and their research value does not justify transcription to another format or if copyright restrictions prohibit this. Examples include some audio-tapes, 5¼ inch floppy discs or older video-tape format
    
    
• Some monograph material is ineligible for deselection. These include::
  • items on current reading lists
  • items deemed valuable or significant
  • items that are deemed core or seminal works
  • items whose conditions of ownership do not allow deselection. These include AGPULS (Australian Government Publications University Libraries Deposit Scheme), Royal Society of Victoria and Cultural Gifts Scheme (previously Taxation Incentive for the Arts Scheme)
    
    
• The Library will relegate weeded items that are scholarly in nature and last copy in Victoria to the CARM facility whenever possible.

4. Responsibilities

Library staff are responsible for conducting ongoing evaluation of the collection to ensure it remains high quality and relevant. Library staff will check last copy status of weeded items to ensure these items are relegated to CARM. The Special Collections and Preservation Coordinator will advise on high value or significant items. The Manager, Collections and Access can advise on materials ineligible for deselection.