Special Projects

In order to keep myself busy and increase my knowledge of different aspects of library work, I have volunteered for two special projects.

The first of these is a collection development project. Texas State has a major creative writing graduate program, with visiting instructors like Tim O'Brien and Dagoberto Gilb, there are also many famous guest lecturers. However, the Texas State Library's modern fiction collection does not reflect the talent from the program. In fact, when the author Aimee Bender came to speak and present, the library did not have a single copy of her books. To remedy this situation, I have volunteered to go through short story, poetry and fiction indexes to determine which books we have and which books we need to flesh out the collection. I request the books through the library's online request form, and the books will be ordered. This project has awakened in me an interest in collection development that I was previously unaware of. It is exciting to be involved in developing a dynamic collection of literature. Now I wonder how I could become involved in collection development. What kind of training and experience do I need to be successful in collection development. Naturally I took a course on collection development in library school, but surely I need more training than that. Perhaps another masters decree so I can specialize, or are there general collection development librarians? With so much good information about books out there, and the advice of faculty it seems like you would not have to be very specialized to create a good collection. Hmm.

The second project that I am working on is for the University Archives. I am going through the University's morgue files, that is, files with news and information about employees, visitors and others connected with the University in some way. I am scanning all documents and 2 photos from each file in order to create digital files that can be accessed for ready reference. This project is fun and interesting and it even requires some independent thought and problem solving ability, so I have been excited to work on it. So far I have just been rehousing the files in acid free folders, but I plan on beginning the scanning process next week. I like that I have the opportunity to use my preservation and special collections training. I am considering attending a digital preservation seminar in November, in Seattle presented by the NEDCC.