Collection Policies

The Library builds collections and consortial relationships in support of the curricular and research needs of the University's current academic departments, centers, and programs. The Library's research-level collecting is aligned with University goals for achieving national prominence in graduate education. It endeavors to provide ongoing support for established and recognized programs and to build, to the extent possible, retrospective collections for newly charted University-sponsored directions. In addition, the Library attempts to identify those collecting areas which closely reflect the undergraduate curriculum, class enrollments, intensity of use, new course offerings, and which must be supported by strong local holdings.

» Definition of Collecting Levels

Interdisciplinary & Broad Disciplines

Recognizing the potential for fragmentation in a department-by-department approach, the Library has always set aside funds for interdisciplinary needs.  As recent scholarship has shown an increasing tendency to cross traditional boundaries and as new technologies have made possible scholarly products that serve a wide range of scholarly interests and purposes, there is a need to formally recognize these trends in the Library's collecting practices.  In addition there is a growing recognition that the differences that distinguish scholarship within broad disciplines -  use of different primary materials, research approaches, vocabularies, and methodologies - are reflected in differing needs for monographic vs. serial literature, historical vs. current materials, new vs. traditional formats, access vs. local ownership of materials.