The Jisc Library Hub Community Advisory Board (LHCAB), as advocates for the development of a cooperative approach to the management of both monograph and serials collections and bibliographic data, is recommending that libraries adopt a consistent approach to the recording of monograph retention commitments.
The purpose of this initiative is to enable Jisc Library Hub services to develop tools to support a step change in the collection management of monographs by the community. Following endorsement from the RLUK and SCONUL Boards, the LHCAB proposes that libraries adopt an approach to retention coding which could enable huge efficiencies in the management of monograph collections at institutional, regional and national level.
The draft recommendation below is issued to the community for comment.
Please provide any feedback to nbk@jisc.ac.uk by Friday 8th May 2020. The LHCAB will review comments and issue a final version of the recommendation by Friday 22nd May 2020
The consultation period has now closed.
A PDF copy of the statement is also available.
DRAFT Recommendation for the use of a standard retention code to facilitate effective UK collection management at national, regional and local level.
Statement:
The Jisc Library Hub Community Advisory Board (LHCAB) has worked to support the development of collaborative collection management tools and initiatives over many years. The success of the UKRR journals programme has demonstrated the potential for collaborative initiatives to be transformative in their impact on libraries. Following on from this success story there is an increasing appetite in the community for a collaborative approach to the management of monograph collections. Many institutions are already making decisions about their collections based on the principles of collection categorisation and are identifying retention commitments at a local level. The LHCAB considers that developing a methodology to capture these institutional retention commitments for monographs is key to making progress in the management of monograph collections moving forward.
While there are many complexities to navigate, ensuring that the community has the information required to make informed decisions in this area is fundamental to progress.
The National Bibliographic Knowledgebase presents a unique opportunity to the community to enhance collaboration by sharing retention information. Adopting a standardised approach to recording retention commitments will enable the data to be surfaced in the NBK service Library Hub Compare. This will facilitate data driven decision making which can impact local workflows and feed into strategy and policy making at regional and national level.
Following a short community consultation in June 2019, which drew positive responses, the LHCAB aims to drive forward development and adoption of a methodology to capture retention information. Following endorsement by the RLUK and SCONUL Boards, the LHCAB proposes that a standard approach to recording retention information in bibliographic records should be adopted by the library community as follows:
A commitment to retain code: NBK-R should be added to the MARC 583 field of the bibliographic record when an institution has made the decision to retain an item for a specified period. The specific copy retained can be identified in the institution’s item level record for internal use. The NBK will process 583 fields wherever they are found in the record.
This does not preclude the 583 field being used for other purposes, in which case the NBK retention code should be added to a separate instance of the 583 field (which is repeatable) to avoid any confusion with other information such as UKRR commitments or local information.
As a minimum, the following should be used:
583
$a retention statement
$c review date, in yyyymm, or yyyy
$5 library’s international MARC code
Example:
583 $aNBK-R $c202104 $5UkShU
Would describe an item designated for retention by the University of Sheffield, with a review date of April 2021.
To indicate an item held in perpetuity libraries may use a yyyy date of 9999.
Optionally, libraries may wish to use other allowed subfields within the 583 to provide more retention information. We would suggest the following may be of most relevance:
$j site of action: may be useful for recording remote storage
$l status: the condition of the retained item
$x non-public note: may be useful for recording which of multiple copies are to be retained.
$z public note: may be useful for recording the date on which the retention statement was applied to the item, how many of multiple copies are to be retained, or which part of the item is referred to in the $l
$3 material specified: where the retention statement only applies to a part of eg a multi-part item
Examples
583 $aNBK-R $c2030 $ldamaged $zlast four pages partially unreadable $5UkYoU
583 $aNBK-R $c202506 $xretain Law Library copy $z1 of 3 copies to be retained $5WlCaUW
583 $aNBK-R $c9999 $joff-site shared store $3volumes 1 and 2 $5UkHlHU
Please provide any feedback to nbk@jisc.ac.uk by Friday 8th May 2020. The LHCAB will review comments and issue a final version of the recommendation by Friday 22nd May 2020
The consultation period has now closed.
LHCAB April 2020
