Book Review: Rightsizing the Academic Library Collection

Rightsizing the Academic Library Collection. By Suzanne M. Ward. Chicago: ALA Editions, 2015. 168 pages. $60.00 softcover (ISBN: 978-0-8389-1298-0).

The author, the current head of collection management at Purdue University Libraries (West Lafayette, Indiana) and a long-time proponent of meeting user information needs with innovative collection development practices as reflected by her extensive record of scholarship, has written a provocative work that can serve as both a wake-up call and catalyst to action for academic librarians who manage collections. Ward introduces readers to the concept of “rightsizing,” a term adapted from the corporate world that can be used to encapsulate activities done to increase a library’s overall floor space by reducing space devoted to storing physical collections. Effectively organized into five chapters, Rightsizing the Academic Library Collection provides a brief historical account of the state of affairs for academic library collections today, argues for the uncluttering and routine culling of physical collections based on current user needs, shows how to use a variety of data to make informed decisions, gives examples of actual rightsizing projects that can be duplicated, shows best practice workflows, and gives a glimpse into workable solutions that can be applied to make a library more relevant to its users. And, according to Ward, it is the user’s needs (scholarly or otherwise) and positive library experiences that should provide the impetus for librarians to “rightsize” (as opposed to supersize or wrongsize) their resource collections (viii).

Chapter 1 sets the tone by explaining how a large portion of academic libraries arrived in the twenty-first century with bloated physical collections with declining or, at best, static use by campus constituents. In all, the author did an impressive job constructing a literature review of the major research involving use studies of library collections and their relevant findings. The only drawback was the lack of inclusion of e-book use findings, which is steadily growing despite the lack of a matured format.1 Ward suggests wholesale adoption of electronic resource formats to distill physical collections to only those items that have demonstrated use to current users. Rightsizing is akin to adjusting a food recipe by mixing the right ingredients to get the desired results depending on the diner’s taste expectations. In the library’s case, librarians come up with the correct mix of resources in terms of formats, plus provide the necessary services to access information on the basis of predetermined rules and procedures. Whenever possible, libraries engaging in rightsizing practices must involve other nearby, system, consortial, regional, and potentially national libraries to ensure that the preservation of discarded items is done.

Chapter 2 focuses on how past practices of collection building, such as repeatedly purchasing resources on the basis of “just in case” notions or via large approval plans, have put academic libraries at odds with current users. Most libraries have run out of space even when able to add more space or relocate physical items to other storage facilities. Collections contain many resources that receive little or no use for a variety of reasons. Ward wants librarians to move from the old paradigm to a new one that morphs to “just in time,” another concept borrowed from the corporate world. This requires reducing print collections except in the case of major research institutions where comprehensiveness in collections is desired.

Chapter 3 takes librarians through the rightsizing process, from start to conclusion. Emphasizing the development of a goal or plan, already having a weeding plan in place, and transparent communication, Ward gives readers several approaches to making withdrawals of their physical collections. Exploiting technological innovations, such as multifaceted report generation, can more efficiently assist in the rightsizing process. Information on costs associated with undertaking similar projects was purposely not given, as each library is unique in terms of their situations. Instead, readers might benefit at this point from detailed instructions on how to calculate such expenses using staff salaries, hours of involvement, square footage needs, annual costs of physical item storage, or even if local regulations allow for the disposal of printed material in landfills. Other formats like VHS or microform disposal may incur additional costs as well, as they can be hazardous to the environment. In the end, Ward importantly emphasizes that there are costs, possibly more severe that can affect the usability of a library’s collection, by not engaging in a rightsizing project.

Chapter 4 is devoted to how best to manage the overall rightsizing project. Proper care must be exercised to select and task one person with the authority and responsibility to oversee the rightsizing project from start to conclusion. The author importantly outlines the many eco-friendly ways of disposing a library’s withdrawn items. Libraries should carefully consider any additional time spent on these activities versus recycling or simply giving the materials away. Ward provides a thorough checklist of issues for project managers to be mindful of and an extremely detailed step-by-step instruction for the withdrawal of physical journal titles that are duplicated electronically in JSTOR. The author also goes through a similar process for print books and audiovisual items, but in a less specific way. Ward reminds readers that rightsizing is an iterative process and does not end with the conclusion of a current project. Simply put, continual assessment and evaluation of all collections must be done.

In conclusion, Ward reiterates the rightsizing mantra for library collections. She predicts (on the basis of past trends) that the library of the future will rely less on physical collections and more on electronic counterparts. Physical collections will not totally go away but rather be focused solely to meet current user informational requirements or have special local interest. Libraries will need to accept that fewer print copies will remain and most non-research-based academic libraries need to adopt access over ownership collecting philosophies; especially with electronic formats. New modes of material acquisition that put users at the helm of selection, such as patron-driven acquisition (also known as demand-driven purchasing), allow more titles to be available for instant use and purchase than would ever be feasible under the traditional title by title purchasing model. The reviewer appreciates Ward’s acknowledgement that librarians will still have a role to perform in this process, but less so for patron/demand-driven or big deal/package collections unless special profiling is needed. Ward predicts the rise of regional and/or national collections that will function as preservers of knowledge. These collections would not necessarily be located in single libraries and could be spread out collaboratively. These libraries would not engage in rightsizing activities as per a previously created agreement. But this type of an arrangement is also dependent on funding and space, both of which can potentially run out at any given time. It is also in this last chapter that Ward only briefly mentions the need to weed e-book collections, despite the fact many libraries have had e-books for over fifteen years and that there is a growing body of literature on this subject. To be fair, while starting to gain attention, “the corpus of published library literature on e-book weeding is still small compared to that of published library literature on print book weeding,”2 but not less important.

Rightsizing the Academic Library Collection is a wonderful addition to works on collection development and management. Administrators, library directors, collection development librarians and LIS students all would benefit from reading Ward’s book. After reflecting on this work, other issues worth pondering are the short- and long-term effect of student-centered selection; how well this type of a collection will serve future institutional research needs; and if a majority of users will ever truly become comfortable having a majority of digital-only materials. User selection presumes that users know what it is they need and have the ability to judge quality. The findings on whether or not populating resource discovery systems with all sorts of articles, books, videos, theses, and digitized items helps or hinders users’ attempts to meet their specific informational needs has yet to be determined as well. Resource discovery tools and the materials indexed within them might very well qualify for their own dose of rightsizing. After all, should not libraries strive to provide access to information that Google cannot locate in the interest of remaining distinctive and relevant to all campus constituents? Yet, until publishers and libraries work together to find a way to remove the restrictive barriers associated with lending and borrowing e-books, homogeneity in collections will dominate—not distinctness. However, if a library suffers from a lack of space, static or decreasing budget, low gate counts, and a declining use of physical collections, then performing rightsizing activities is definitely part of the solution toward attaining importance and relevance. For “no useless lumber is more useless than unused books.”3—John N. Jax (jjax@uwlax.edu), University of Wisconsin—La Crosse, La Crosse, Wisconsin

References

1. One such example would be Alain R. Lamothe, “Factors Influencing the Usage of an Electronic Book Collection: Size of the E-book Collection, the Student Population, and the Faculty Population,” College & Research Libraries 74, no. 1 (2013): 39–59.
2. Mike Waugh, Michelle Donlin, and Stephanie Braunstein, “Next-Generation Collection Management: A Case Study of Quality Control and Weeding E-Books in an Academic Library,” Collection Management 40, no. 1 (2015): 17–26.
3. John Cotton Dana, A Library Primer (Chicago: Library Bureau, 1900), 15.