The Need for a Weeding Policy

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The Need for a Weeding Policy

In a

School Library Media Center

Stephanie Wohl

FRIT 7132

Spring 2009


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The Need for a Weeding Policy

A school library media center is essential in supporting the classroom curriculum,

as well as encouraging recreational reading for all school staff and students. Because of

the importance of school media centers, it is equally important to properly maintain the

library collection. Attention must continually be given to the collection to maintain the

quality of your media center. To do this the library media center must have a weeding or

deselecting policy in place.

Weeding serves many purposes. When you maintain your collection through

weeding, you utilize the space of your library media center to better accommodate your

faculty and students needs. The appearance of your collection is one of a well-stocked

library, well cared for and looked after. A library media center that is cluttered gives the

appearance of disorganization. Weeding allows for better access to quality resources.

According to Doug Johnson, Small, but high quality collections are infinitely better.

And this is why. Continuous, thoughtful weeding: Rids your collection of racist, sexist,

and just plain inaccurate materials. Makes the good stuff easier to find and more

appealing. Sends the message that the library may not be adequately funded. (Johnson,

Sep/Oct. 2003).

Before weeding can begin in your media center, some steps, or a carefully

formulated plan must be in place. The first thing as the teacher librarian or media

specialist, you will want to evaluate your collection for weeding targets. One of the most

obvious would be those items that are out of date, misleading, or inaccurate. These titles


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We have always learned, and taught others, that books are special. Treat them with care.

Weeding seems like you are throwing them away. As you do your search through your

LMC, you will see the need, and understand why it is necessary, to weed your garden of

books and create space. Others may not. It will be your job to teach them. Another

obstacle will be time. It is hard to find time, with all that the LMS has to do, to take time

to weed. Weeding is, and should be a continual process. Information Power states,

Evaluated and updated regularly, the collections exhibit accepted and innovative

learning theories, effective teaching practices and materials, and current scholarship in

the subject areas. (90) SUNLINK Weed of the Month is a great online resource with tips

on evaluating, discarding, and maintaining your collection.

Bibb County does not have a specific weeding/deselecting policy. According to

Code IFBD 160-4-4-.01 in Bibb County Board of Education Policy Manual there is a

Material Resources section that provides standards pertaining to the Media Services

Department. These standards are in accordance with SACS CASI Accreditation

Standards for Quality Schools. The standard states, The school operates a library media

center that: Maintains a comprehensive materials collection consisting of current media,

books, reference sources, and periodicals in print and electronic formats that support

student learning, the curriculum, and the instructional program; and provides a balanced

collection of a minimum of 10 books per student (11). Bibb County needs a

weeding/deselecting policy with a clear purpose. The goals should be clearly developed

and stated in a way that when read by others, weeding is not something to be feared, but

understood. The policy should cover who, why, when, what, and how often the weeding

process should occur. By keeping the collection relevant to the curriculum, and the


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References

American Association of School Librarians. (1998).Information Power: Building

Partnerships to Learning. (88). Chicago and London: American Library

Association.

Bibb County Board of Education Policy Manual. Media Services. Retrieved from

http://www.bibb.k12.ga.us/images/media_policies.pdf

Johnson, D. (2003). Weed! Head for the Edge. American Library Association. Retrieved

from http://www.doug-johnson.com/dougwri/weed.html

Sunlink. Florida public schools consortium. Sunlink Weed of the Month Club.

www.sunlink.ucf.edu/weed/
http://www.bibb.k12.ga.us/images/media_policies.pdfhttp://www.bibb.k12.ga.us/images/media_policies.pdfhttp://www.doug-johnson.com/dougwri/weed.htmlhttp://www.sunlink.ucf.edu/weed/http://www.bibb.k12.ga.us/images/media_policies.pdfhttp://www.doug-johnson.com/dougwri/weed.htmlhttp://www.sunlink.ucf.edu/weed/

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The Need for a Weeding Policy