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Excellence Gateway
This case study was produced by JISC RSC (Regional Support Centres) East Midlands on behalf of the Excellence Gateway.
Sector relevance: Further education colleges (including specialist colleges)
Keywords: Improving institutional effectiveness, learning centres and library services, management of learning resources
As part of a new build, Tresham Institute merged two sites resulting in the need not only to merge two existing library collections but also to significantly reduce the combined collection. Through a stock-take, organised cull of 3,000 titles, re-organisation to strict Dewey, and an accurately co-ordinated move, this was achieved on time and in a smooth manner.
Tresham Institute is a further and higher education college with campuses in Corby, Kettering and Wellingborough in Northamptonshire, and The Rutland College in Oakham, with nearly 3,000 full-time and 13,000 part-time students. The College is in the process of a major redevelopment project, the first stage of which is a brand new £20 million campus in Kettering that opened to students in September 2007 and combines the provision that was previously offered at two sites in the town.
The challenge to the library team was how to integrate the two collections held at the existing St Mary's and Windmill sites into one new collection. In particular, they had to plan for:
The first activity that was carried out was a stock-take of the two existing collections. This allowed approximately 1,000 titles to be removed from the system, as those resources were no longer there in reality, leaving 23,000 titles in total.
Checks were made as to the actual amount of shelving available in the new library once the space had been allocated roughly by thirds for resources, computers, and study areas. This was done by calculations on an average size basis of titles and then double-checked by doing some actual physical measuring of the shelves, as the same size shelves were being used.
Over the period of a year, the two collections were subject to weeding out by library and teaching staff. In some cases teaching staff liaised with colleagues whilst the collection was being revised, in other cases teaching staff approved the cull of titles that had been selected by the library staff.
The criteria used for the removal of titles was if:
Image 1: Tresham Library
One of the major changes was the decision to re-organise the resources from a subject-based arrangement to strict Dewey. This was seen as:
The existing collections were re-arranged into strict Dewey classification at the St Mary's and Windmill sites prior to the move.
It was decided to move the collections one-by-one, rather than at the same time, so that crates could be re-used and because there were constraints on the amount of space in which to unpack.
The lower parts of the shelving for each section were left empty when unpacking the first collection so that the second could be integrated as it was unpacked.
For the actual physical move the two teams of library staff were amalgamated to encourage new teamwork. Staff were given specific sections to micro-manage so that they could pack and unpack the resources in the way they wished, and to ensure that any hold-ups did not delay the whole process.
Fewer members of staff were involved when the crates were moved to the new site so that organisation could be managed more efficiently and the movers weren't getting instructions from lots of different staff.
In total, the collection shrunk from 23,000 titles to 20,000 titles at the new site. The reduction comprised:
The 3,000 titles that were culled, some 15% of the existing stock, were sent to Rwanda as part of a charitable donation scheme organised by colleges in the UK.
As part of the overall move, resources that were previously held by individual teaching staff were integrated into the central library collection as there is less space in staff rooms.
Good organisation of the moving process meant that the packing process was completed in two days, rather than the allocated three at both sites, thereby allowing some valuable respite before the moving and unpacking stages.
The actual move date for the overall College was changed from Christmas 2006 to June/July 2007. Whilst this gave more time to prepare the process, it did mean that the library collections were almost the last to leave the existing premises as exams were taking place. One example of a knock-on effect was that students were returning books to reception before they departed for their summer holidays.
The resources from the two collections have successfully been integrated into one new collection.
The use of the library at the new site has increased dramatically in the first year in comparison to the joint usage at the two old sites. This has been helped by a central location within the new build giving a high flow of students in the vicinity.
Lessons learned from the experience at Tresham are as follows:
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