The Library Collections Annex provides an opportunity to shape on-campus library collections; to improve environmental conditions for the long-term preservation of library materials; and to reconfigure on-campus libraries, in order to provide cost-effective space for continued growth of the collections.

The Library is committed to timely and accurate physical and electronic delivery from the Annex to the campus. Users may also conduct research at the Annex, which is a ten-minute drive from campus with convenient parking and a fully furnished reading room containing a public workstation, photocopier, and microfilm and fiche readers.

The selection of library material for the Annex is extremely important. To this end, the Library has established general principles for selection, and library selectors will work with faculty and other users during Semester II, 2004, to design specific guidelines for each academic discipline.

General Selection Principles

• Selection of materials for the Annex is a group effort involving library staff, faculty, and other interested library users.
• Identifying materials to be shelved in the Annex will be part of a larger process of shaping the Library's on-campus collections to make them more responsive to the needs of readers across all disciplines.
• We will strive to shelve the most used and frequently consulted materials in the
on-campus library stacks. We will use the Annex primarily to shelve less frequently used library materials.
• The Annex will also accommodate those fragile library materials, which will most benefit from the improved environmental conditions, and increased security that the Annex provides.
• All materials shelved in the Annex will be cataloged in Josiah, the Brown University on-line public access catalog, with clear indication of their location.
• As curriculum and research interests evolve, library materials may be sent to the Annex or returned to the main campus.
• Once the shelving capacity of the on-campus libraries has reached an optimal level, library staff will perform regular and routine selection of materials for the Annex.
• Even with the best intentions and efforts of the selectors and users, some selection decisions may result in the inappropriate assignment of library materials to the Annex. Such assignments will be corrected as they are identified, and input from library users will be welcome.

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Comments to: Samuel_Streit@brown.edu
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