Subject Collection Development Guidelines

College of Education and Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies Subject Collection Development Policy

JMU Libraries supports James Madison University's College of Education and Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies Program with a collection that facilitates instruction and research, taking into consideration the College of Education’s diverse curriculum within all five departments, as well as the Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies Program’s curriculum of content-area education for future teachers. The education and K-12 juvenile collections are developed in accordance with the College of Education’s evolving undergraduate and graduate programs, including the departments of Early Elementary and Reading Education, Exceptional Education, Learning Technology & Leadership Education, Middle Secondary & Mathematics Education, and Military Science, the evolving programs within each department, and the early childhood, elementary, middle grades, and special education areas of the Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies program. Acquisitions and collection management of education and K-12 juvenile materials also support the library-wide mission of fostering environments that allow users to connect with ideas and information.

Collection Areas

The JMU Libraries education collection primarily falls under the L class of the Library of Congress Classification, with specific L call number ranges excluded based on subject areas that fall outside of the College of Education and Interdisciplinary Liberal Studies curriculum, as well as call number ranges collected by other liaison librarians for other programs and departments.

Included collection areas for the L classification are listed below:

Inclusion and exclusion of materials within these call number ranges will also be determined based on collection management reports that illustrate the current number of physical and electronic items in a call number range, the number of items circulating within that range, and the number of items added within that range. Weeding and purchasing decisions will also be based on these collection management reports as well as the general collection development guidelines for collecting and weeding.  

Additional call number ranges outside of the L classification will also be included to address the content-area focus of the education curriculum, such as materials in the arts, humanities, sciences, and social sciences; inclusion of materials outside of the L classification will be based on relevancy to the education program, and more specifically to the study and teaching of these content-areas.

The juvenile K-12 collection falls under 3 areas: fiction, non-fiction, and picture books. Selection of juvenile materials is primarily based on relevancy to the education curriculum and usefulness in developing lesson plans and supporting children’s literature use in the K-12 classroom. The collection is focused on award-winning titles and recommended books from children’s literature publications and reviews.

Textbooks and curriculum kits are not collected by JMU Libraries, but are collected and provided by the Educational Technology and Media Center in the College of Education.

Special projects will be considered based upon faculty requests and relevance to the curriculum. Currently audiobooks are included in the juvenile K-12 collection, but only award-winning audiobooks from the Capitol Choices Noteworthy Books for Children and Teens annual list.

Guidelines

Materials are considered for their subject, curriculum relevance, authoritativeness, currency, and price. User requests and appropriateness for the entire collection are also key criteria for consideration.

• Primary emphasis is on current materials.
• Primary formats are print and electronic. Other formats are purchased selectively to support the education curriculum. When deciding between print and electronic resource of comparable scope and information type, preference is given for print materials except when electronic materials facilitate accessibility, especially for study guides and interdisciplinary materials of interest to multiple departments. Electronic formats are notably favorable among education reference resources, study guides, and periodical collections.
• Materials are acquired primarily from the United States.
• English-language materials are purchased almost exclusively.

Responsibilities

The responsibility of acquiring and managing education and juvenile collections primarily resides with the Education liaison librarian. The liaison librarian works with education faculty within academic departments. Collection management activities are monitored and administered by JMU Libraries' Collection Development Committee, with expenditures authorized by the Dean of Libraries.

Updated March 29, 2012 by Jonathan Paulo.

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