The Weeding Handbook

The Weeding Handbook

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15

I'm heading into a much-needed weeding project at my library, and this book was really helpful in many different ways in how to tackle things. Not only does it go section-by-section and talks about topics you may need, what can stay, what can be weeded, etc., but it also includes several helpful tips for the things around weeding projects that you might not think of. Messaging for the masses, getting your staff on-board, interviews with actual librarians at actual libraries about their weeding projects, some (full) example collection development plans with annotations to consider, it's quite comprehensive. One of my favorite things I pulled from here was a sample weeding schedule, which breaks down a collection by month, and gives you target areas to review/weed each month. Obviously it needs to be tailored to your specific collection, but it's a handy jumping off point for a large project like mine.

It does try to state absolutes in a field where, as we all know, nothing is absolute, but if you're able to read critically and understand that things may be different in your specific collection and how to apply the knowledge, there's a lot of good here.

November 14, 2023