Acquiring, cataloguing and processing materials (print and electronic)
Building the library collection
Library resources were significantly improved in 2003 due to a 12.4 per cent increase in the budget allocation for the acquisition of library materials. Of the available funds of $12.5 million, 28.5 per cent was spent on print journals, 36.1per cent on licensed electronic resources and
35.5 per cent on print monographs. This continues the trend of previous years for an increased proportion of the budget to be spent on electronic resources and a decrease in the number of print journals, 9518 titles at the end of 2003. The strong Australian dollar was of benefit to the library collection budget.
The library had sufficient funds to significantly increase the range of books in the collection - 37,305 new titles were received this year, a 16.7 per cent increase on 2002. Across all branches 47,261 print volumes and 7528 non-book items were catalogued, a 15.8 per cent increase over 2002. The total number of bibliographic records in the catalogue as at 30 January 2004 was 1,577,356. A highlight of the year was the updating of a wide range of reference works, such as encyclopaedias, handbooks, and statistical compendia.
The library purchased access to around 1800 new electronic journal titles in 2003, from a number of major publishers including Elsevier, Wiley, Blackwell and Oxford University Press. In addition the library has added around 15,000 electronic books to the catalogue, including Australian titles. Major subject areas covered include engineering and information technology.
There were some significant additions to the library's database holdings, including American National Biography Online, Transport, Clinical Evidence, and an extension of the backfile of Web of Science to 1987.
The library also took the opportunity to acquire some large backsets of electronic journals, and several other major electronic resources requiring one-off payments. A major acquisition was The Eighteenth Century Collection Online. This resource consists of digital images, fully text searchable, of 150,000 English language books printed in the 18th century, primarily in Great Britain. It is being purchased over three years.
A number of electronic journal backset packages in various disciplines were ordered from Elsevier. These backfiles (in conjunction with the agreement for access to current volumes) enable access to all volumes of the titles covered. The library plans to continue to extend this access as funds permit. Areas already covered include biological sciences; computer science; organic chemistry; chemical engineering; environmental science, business and economics and psychology. An agreement with the Institute of Physics now provides electronic access to all their journals including a comprehensive backset 1874-1993. This reinstates access to a number of titles cancelled in 2000 by the library.
Monash University Library now provides access to 19,009 electronic journals through the catalogue and the faculty ejournal web pages. The catalogue also includes records with links to 20,698 electronic books, 628 databases and over 7000 other online resources. Additionally the library provides access to Early English Books Online and The Eighteenth Century Collection Online.
During the year the library refined its programs for loading vendor-supplied records for electronic resources into the library catalogue. Wherever possible the library sources catalogue records from the vendors of electronic resources to speed the loading of information to the catalogue. Regular refresher loads are undertaken for the major aggregator databases to keep the holdings information in the catalogue up to date. Where no record could be obtained library staff undertook the cataloguing. The catalogue records were used to automatically generate the faculty-based lists of ejournals on the web.
Improving accessibility of databases through the website
After the library catalogue, the databases front page was the most heavily used library web page. 2003 saw a major redesign of the databases pages on the library website. A program was developed by library information systems staff to generate these web pages from catalogue records. The new pages provide access via broad subject headings or through an A-Z list of resources. There is a short description of each resource to guide library users in the selection of appropriate titles for their information needs.
Improving accessibility through the library catalogue
A number of initiatives were undertaken to improve the coverage and quality of the library catalogue:
- Cataloguing of two major donations to the Rare Books Collection - the Dr Richard Travers collection and the Australian Medical Association collection - continued.
- Cataloguing of Australian sheet music and scores backlog was completed.
- Cataloguing of Yiddish and Hebrew works in the Giligich Yiddish Collection and the Laura and Israel Kipen Judaica Collection was completed.
- Full records, including all records for Australian Bureau of Statistics publications, replaced over 7000 sub-standard catalogue records.
- A program to "harvest" name authority records was implemented and checking of output commenced. A total of 372,892 name authority records were matched.
- A new form was implemented for the addition of records to the catalogue for selected web resources.
- Regular monthly checks of URLs in catalogue records were undertaken and broken links fixed or removed. An accuracy rate for links of 98.1per cent was achieved.
- There was major effort to reduce the number of items with "Missing" or "In Process" status.
- Location codes and holdings information for serials in the Hargrave-Andrew Library were improved.
- Ongoing quality checks were run and problems addressed.
Preserving the collection through appropriate storage and treatment
Weeding and storing the print collection
All branches were involved in weeding, and, in varying degrees, projects to reorganise the collections. A substantial weeding program was undertaken at Hargrave-Andrew Library in preparation for refurbishment. Considerable weeding was also completed in the stacks and reference collection areas of the Pharmacy Library. Progress was also made towards weeding the compactus of unwanted materials at the Peninsula Library.
Managing the library's microform collections
During 2003 the library continued to expand its microform collection as a storage solution. Where appropriate microform collections where purchased, as an alternative or a replacement for print materials that presented storage and preservation issues. For example, print copies of some newspapers were replaced with microforms.
Improving management of binding
A technical specification for the binding of journals was prepared and a request for tender released. The review looked closely at the service and products from the binders used by the library and made recommendations for the future selection of external binding providers to ensure quality of materials, technical specifications and cost are of a suitable standard. |
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 The library acquisitions budget, totalling $12.5 million in 2003, was divided into roughly three types of acquisitions - monographs (ie. books, videos, CD-ROMs - 'physical' format non-journal items), print journals and electronic resources. |
