Abolish the periodicals department: How one library restructured
- From: J Flenner <varney@[redacted]>
- Subject: Abolish the periodicals department: How one library restructured
- Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2007 10:04:07 -0500
[NOTE: The date should read: January 2007. jf]
http://www.ala.org/ala/acrl/acrlpubs/crlnews/backissues2007/january07/abolishperiodicals.htm
Abolish the periodicals department: How one library restructured and
redistributed the work
Association of College & Research Libraries
C&RL News, January 2006
Vol. 68, No. 1
by Bob Schoofs
As academic libraries strive to meet the challenges of the 21st century,
we need to examine new ways to fulfill our educational mission. Simply
continuing to do things the same way we always have is no longer an option.
On the one hand, technology is rapidly changing how we go about our
work. On the other hand, competition among institutions of higher
learning is such that only those who provide the best educational
experience for their students will thrive.
Faced with these challenges, college and university libraries have
implemented a variety of reorganizational strategies. A review of the
literature provides copious examples.
More recent examples include the excellent article by Mori Lou Higa and
others describing changes at the University of Texas Southwestern
Medical Center1 and the collection of articles edited by Bradford Lee
Eden, which deals specifically with the reorganization of library
technical services.2
For its part, Grand Valley State University (GVSU) has taken the unusual
step of doing away with its periodicals department. This article will
explain how and why this happened.
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