Our library would love to be able to track in Populi which books have been taken off the shelves and used (but not checked out). Since Populi's library only handles Check-in/Check-out transactions, there is no way for us to record which books are being used "in house."
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8 comments
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Rebecca Chartrand I'm currently using a web-based program a student whipped up for me. These statistics are crucial for cataloguing and accreditation. Having a built-in in-house circulation system would be beneficial as the information would be linked to the books instead of floating around in cyberspace.
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Rebecca Chartrand I want to bump this again! My web-based program is not longer working, and I would desperately like a built-in in-house circulation monitor that could make ordering and discarding books much easier. Please create an in-house tab!!!
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Meegs Johnson I'm thinking of making a "in house" user for this very purpose, since this request is over 10 years old...has anybody tried that? Thx
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Adam Sentz What is typically recorded about these resources?
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Meegs Johnson Hi Adam-
Simply that they were used (in house, somebody took it an item off the shelf and used it but did not check it out).
When you do collection development (buying, de-accession) you make decisions based on usage. In IPEDs, I am almost positive they tell you to NOT count in-house circulation, so it is nice to be able to separate it out.
When you are deciding to keep a book or toss it, in-house use is an important metric. Also, if books in a certain area are getting a lot of use, it might be a reason to buy more in that area. At this library, the average book weighs over 5 pounds, so people often do not want to drag around big art books, but they DO use them. Thanks for asking! Meegs
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Adam Sentz OK, so in-house is always within the library and not elsewhere on campus? Also, this might seem like a dumb question, how do you know if someone used a book within the library if they just go get it off the shelf? Do they have to go through library staff to access resources?
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Meegs Johnson Good question- here we might use library barcodes in the future for a maker space to track use (so I could see it being used elsewhere on campus, but that is a bridge not yet crossed)
But the 'how do you know they used it question is valid" ...it is the squishy thing about in-house use- it is just a gage of interest (somebody might browse all the "how to draw faces" books but only check out three)-
But they also may pull a bunch of painting books and take lots of pictures as reference (that happens a lot here). Here, the only thing they have to go through staff to access is reserves (which are counted as checked out, even if it really just "in house use" since they are, literally checked out for two hours) and special collection stuff often mediated use (You do have to go through staff for some of our delicate stuff). But you cannot check out special collections, so in my case, it is good to know that every year, four sections of a class are going to be shown a certain color theory book...and when I leave, the next librarian would know it is a heavy use item).
In public libraries I've worked at, in the little kids section we didn't bother with in-house use - every book would get pulled off the shelves because that is what kids do...it is kind of a judgement call, it is necessary for every single book, it just helps.
I've never worked with a catalog that does NOT have this feature (I am OLD, I've worked in libraries for over 30 years) and I've seen some pretty dramatic faculty reactions to any kind of weeding projects (LOL, picketing! Calls for the library director to be fired!), so you have to have clear justification for why you are doing your job.
There are lots of people who just cannot throw a book out, and can't bear the thought the library is not keeping everything, but collection policies in academic situations are really about supporting the current curriculum (unless you are an R1 school), there is a cost to maintaining every square inch of shelf space, and they are not going to build us a bigger library. So being able to demonstrate what gets used is helpful.
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Adam Sentz Meegs Johnson - Thanks, I think I get it now.
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