EBV Library Media Center

Weeding/Deselection

Deselection policy

Adopted 26 August 2004

The media center is the information center of any school.  As such, it is important that material be current, accurate, and in good condition.  Deselection, or weeding, constitutes a continual process by which material is removed that does not meet the selection criteria.  Heavily worn material that meets the selection criteria will be repaired or replaced. 

A healthy collection is one that meets the information needs of the school, including the curricular needs of teachers.  The collection should also be attractive, current, and accurate, and unbiased.  A collection that does not meet these criteria misleads the library patron; the collection must meet qualitative and quantitative measures of the school.

Consistent with the EBV policies and procedures handbook, material that has been determined out-of-date, damaged, etc., are “to be given to local schools or other recipients as determined by the Management Team.” (Handbook on Procedures, 10.05)

The EBV media center deselection policy follows the CREW method:

Continuous

Review

Evaluation and

Weeding

The CREW method uses an acronym, MUSTIE, to indicate when an item should be removed from the collection. MUSTIE stands for:

Misleading and/or factually inaccurate;
Ugly (worn out beyond mending or rebinding);
Superseded by a new edition or a better source;
Trivial (of no discernable literary or scientific merit);
Irrelevant to the needs and interests of your community;
Elsewhere (the material may be easily borrowed from another source).

Other criteria used when deselecting include:

Condition

Age

Frequency of use

Multiple copies

Currency/Accuracy

Deselection is a continual process, but an attempt will be made to weed particular sections of the collection on a rotating basis.  The media center director will remove titles of deselected books and keep a record of what is removed and what section has been weeded.

Library home

The library exists to meet the informational needs of the entire school population. It supports, complements, and expands the instructional program of the school. It provides a learning environment which promotes inquiry, creativity, enrichment, self-direction, and communication of ideas through print and non-print media. The library is fully automated with a collection of over 15,000 materials.
Internet access is available to students and faculty.