This presentation discusses how the use of collection mapping transformed outdated and unbalanced print collections at Florida SouthWestern State College into collections directly supporting student learning. A collection map is a data driven picture of specific areas of library collections. This approach differs from past approaches to collection development as it doesn't focus on a breadth of subject areas striving to develop a large collection of many volumes that students could possibly find useful, but rather, considers various factors including program enrollment figures, reference interactions, and course content to develop a collection that contributes to the quality and integrity of academic programs. The presenter will explain methodologies used, including the creation of collection maps, and share results the project has yielded for FSW's Rush Library.

1. Transforming Library Collections and
Supporting Student Learning with
Collection Mapping
Arenthia Herren, MA, MLIS (aherren@fsw.edu)
Head of Print Collections, OER Librarian, Chair of
Libraries
Florida SouthWestern State College

3. ● Established in 1962 as Edison Junior
College
○ 3 campuses
○ 1 center
● Carnegie Classification: Assoc/Pub4:
Associate's—Public 4-year Primarily
Associate's
● Member of the Florida College System
● Open enrollment

4. FALL 2019 Enrollment Data

5. Florida SouthWestern State College
● Graduates of Florida SouthWestern State
College's nationally accredited Associate of
Science in Dental Hygiene program, have had
100% pass rates on the National Board Dental
Hygiene Examination for the past 17 years.
● Graduates of Florida SouthWestern State
College's nationally accredited Associate of
Science in Radiologic Technology, have had 100%
pass rates on the certification examination for the
past 8 years; this pass rate ranks the program
nationally in the top 15%

6. FSW Libraries
4 library locations
8 full time
librarians
2 adjunct librarians
9 full time library
assistants
6 part time library
assistants
Annual Operating
Budget ~$1.5
million
Member of the
Florida Academic
Library Services
Cooperative
Richard H. Rush Library, Thomas Edison campus, Ft.
Myers, Florida SouthWestern State College
Image source: https://wcgfl.com/project/fsw-rush-library/

7. An Introduction to
Collection Management
and Development

8. Collection Management: withdrawing and
maintaining resources
Some criteria for withdrawing materials:
● Physical condition (worn, stained, torn, etc.)
● Relevancy (both to the specific discipline and our college
curricula)
● Age
● Duplication
● Superseded by new edition
● Circulation statistics (how many times has the title been
checked out?)
Two Charles Dickens novels, withdrawn for condition

9. Collection
Development:
selecting materials
New books for the FSW collection
Criteria varies but most often considers:
● Publisher
● Publication date
● Edition
● Price
● Relevancy
● Duplication

10. Why are
collection
management
and collection
development so
important?
57% of FSW’s print collection was 15
years or older in 2014

11. SACSCOC Standard 11.1 The institution provides adequate
and appropriate library and learning/ information resources,
services, and support for its mission.
Support for documenting this standard include:
• Description of library collections in terms of the programs and levels of programs offered.
• Collection development policies and evidence of implementation.
• Evidence that the institution’s library-related resources support all its educational, research, and public service programs wherever
located or however delivered.
(SACSCOC 2018)
Accreditation Standards and Library Collections
SACSCOC: Southern Association of Schools
and Colleges Commission on Colleges

12. Why the FSW libraries needed a focused
collection plan:
● Very large collection but low circulation
● Collection in poor condition
● Out of date
● Recommendations from SACSCOC review in 2012

13. Very Large Collection but Low Circulation

14. The Collection Was in Poor Condition
ANTS!

16. Published in 1966
YIKES!

17. Why the FSW libraries needed a focused
collection plan:
● Very large collection but low circulation
● Collection in poor condition
● Out of date
● Recommendations from SACSCOC review (2012)

18. How we started to fix our collections:
Asked questions:
● Why isn’t our collection circulating?
● Are we supporting classroom learning with our collection?
● How do we create a collection that students will use?

19. Low circulation: Is it eBooks?
● Overwhelmingly prefer print
● Prefer ease of access electronically but
print out sources (Foasberg 2014)
Foasberg, N. n. (2014). Student Reading Practices in Print and Electronic Media. College &
Research Libraries, 75(5), 705-723.

20. Low
circulation: The
books were
GROSS!

21. How we started to fix our collections:
Asked questions:
● Why isn’t our collection circulating?
● Are we supporting classroom learning with our collection?
● How do we create a collection that students will use?

22. Determined our goals for the collection:
● decrease the overall age of the collection
● align the collection with the college’s programming and curriculum
● shift from a subject area driven collection plan to a curriculum driven collection plan
● increase student use of the circulating print collection

23. Goal: Decrease the overall age of the collection
● Started MASSIVE weeding project in
Spring of 2015
Criteria when withdrawing titles
● Condition
● Age
● Edition
● Usage
● Relevance to curriculum
That time I weeded the Qs so much that I broke a book cart

24. Weeding the Collection:
Academic Year # Volumes Regular Circ. Collection
2014-15 55,240
2015-16 42,109
2016-17 41,234
2017-18 35,010

26. 2014:
57% of print collection 15 years or
older
2018:
36% of print collection 15 years or
older

27. Determined our goals for the collection:
● decrease the overall age of the collection
● align the collection with the college’s programming and curriculum
● shift from a subject area driven collection plan to a curriculum driven collection plan
● increase student use of the circulating print collection

28. Goal: align the collection with the college’s programming and curriculum
Collection Mapping:
“A process that provides statistical information and defines the broad character of a
collection of information and literary resources but requires many informed human
judgements if it is to provide useful results.” (Bushing 2006) assessment tool

29. How we create our Collection Maps
For the program specific maps:
-Collected information about the program:
-enrollment numbers
- accrediting bodies and requirements
-Matched the subject areas covered by program to the Library of Congress subject
classifications
-Ran shelf reports for the identified LoC classifications

30. Library of Congress Classification
Outline:
Class L – Education
Subclass LB- Theory and Practice
of Education
LB1050.9-1091: Educational
psychology

31. Shelf Report for Collection Map: Science Gen Ed.

32. Collection Map 2015

33. How we create our Collection Maps
For the general education courses
- Used college catalog to identify the core general education courses
- Linked elective general education courses to core classes (if possible)
- Photocopied the table of contents of the textbooks for each course
-Matched the subject areas covered by program to the Library of Congress subject
classifications
-Ran shelf reports for the identified LoC classifications

34. General Education
Collection Map: Humanities

35. How we create our Collection Maps
Directions for General Education Collection Maps
· Using the shelf reports given to you for your chosen area, fill out the table on the collection map
· Weed materials that are on your campus if needed (make suggestions to other campuses, highlight those titles you’d
consider weeding on the excel sheet and share with me and I will distribute)
o Consider:
● Age
● Condition
● Relevancy

36. How we create our Collection Maps
Directions Continued:
Ordering:
Create an order of new materials to update or fill out the collection for your area. If you notice another campus may need
some additional materials make note of that and share it with me. If there’s a title that you find that you feel all locations
should have a copy of make note of that, and we will consider an eBook copy.
o Consider:
● Table of contents for the textbooks given to you for your area
● Does this class require research projects?

37. Files Librarians receive to complete
Collection Maps
- Shelf lists for the subclassifications that related to their area
- Templates for the collection map to fill in data from shelf lists
- Scans of the table of contents for the textbooks for each course in their area

38. How can Collection Maps transform your
collection?
● Targeting specific degrees/courses increases the availability of quality resources for
students
○ Buying titles thoughtfully
○ Weeding
■ Makes “good stuff” more “discoverable”
○ Creates better partnerships between the librarians and classroom faculty

39. * 2017-18
data
unavailable
** 2019-2020
represents
August 19-
Feb 2020

40. Collection Map for LIT 2000 General Education Core Class

41. Literature Titles 2017-2018 and 2018-2019 AYs, Lee/Thomas Edison Campus

42. Benefits of Collection Mapping
● Scaleable
● Promotes thoughtful purchasing
● Promotes weeding→ current collection
● Allows for budget planning
○ Allocating funds to specific collection needs
■ Future needs planning
● Connects librarians with curriculum and faculty
○ Better collections
○ Reference help for students
● Data!

43. 11.1 The institution provides adequate and appropriate
library and learning/ information resources, services, and
support for its mission.
Support for documenting this standard include:
• Description of library collections in terms of the programs and levels of programs offered.
• Collection development policies and evidence of implementation.
• Evidence that the institution’s library-related resources support all its educational, research, and public service programs wherever
located or however delivered.
(SACSCOC 2018)
Super easy documentation!

44. Unmet Goals (so far!)

45. Determined our goals for the collection:
● decrease the overall age of the collection
● align the collection with the college’s programming and curriculum
● shift from a subject area driven collection plan to a curriculum driven collection plan
● increase student use of the circulating print collection

47. Low circulation: Is it eBooks?
-Overwhelmingly prefer print
-Prefer ease of access electronically but print
out sources (Foasberg 2014)
Foasberg, N. n. (2014). Student Reading Practices in Print and Electronic Media. College &
Research Libraries, 75(5), 705-723.
Data from Enis, M. (2018). Academic:Survey: Print for reading, "E" for research.
Library Journal, 143(7), 14.
- Prefer ease of access to eBooks
- “Students view print books as easier to
read and ebooks as easier to obtain.”
(Enis 2018)

48. Low Circulation: Is it Online?
Academic Year Enrollment
2014-2015 615
2018-2019 667
Enrollment for Online sections of ENC 1101: Composition I

49. Yale University Circulation Trends (Linden 2018)

50. Yale University Circulation Trends (Linden 2018)

52. Some unexpected
benefits of FSW’s
collection mapping

53. SPACE!
Weeded 20,581 titles
Removed 2 runs of
shelving
Room for 4 more study
tables

55. References
Bushing, M.C. (2006) Collection Mapping: an Evolving Tool for Better Resources and Better Access. Signum 3, 9-19.
Enis, M. (2018). Academic:Survey: Print for Reading, "E" for Research. Library Journal, 143(7), 14. Retrieved from
http://db07.linccweb.org/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.db07.linccweb.org/docview/2023000623?accountid=10674
Foasberg, N.(2014). Student Reading Practices in Print and Electronic Media. College & Research Libraries, 75(5), 705-723.
Johnson, P. (2009). Fundamentals of collection development and management( 2 edition). American Library Association
Library of Congress (n.d). Library of Congress classification outline-L-education [PDF file]. Retrieved from
http://www.loc.gov/aba/cataloging/classification/lcco/lcco_l.pdf
Linden, J., Tudesco,S. & Dollar, D. (2018). Collections as a Service: a Research Library’s Perspective. College & Research Libraries, 79 (1), 86.
https://doi.org/10.5860/crl.79.1.86

56. Contact Me:
Arenthia Herren
Florida SouthWestern State College
Email: aherren@fsw.edu