Resources for SJSU Librarians

Librarians enhance their collections based on their own knowledge and experience. It takes place at designated times, when the Dean of Research and Scholarship or the Faculty Directors make an announcement, usually with a time frame, such as "We are open to collection enhancement at this time; please place orders no later than May 1st."  You will use Rialto to place your collection enhancement requests. 

For collection enhancement, you may wish to use some of the following resources, as well as journals, reviews, and materials you find on your own: 

Occasionally, your faculty will contact you requesting access to specific materials. In turn, you can review their request, ascertaining that we don't already have access to the materials. If the material is not a duplicate, you can select the item in our ordering platform, Rialto, and submit the request. A general workflow for Faculty Requests;

1. Faculty asks librarian for specific item, usually by email.
2. Librarian checks to see if we already have the item in OneSearch. If so, share the permalink with the faculty.
3. If we don't have the item, check our ordering platform, Rialto. Is the item available in the. U.S.? If it's an ebook, are there restrictions to how many users may access? Is the item under $500? 
4. Submit the order within the ordering system. Since most faculty requests are considered rushes, email Technical Services to indicate the rush. 
5. Technical Services or Electronic Resources will email you when the item is available. Verify link and share with the faculty. 

When you place an order for books or ebooks, you will want to use Rialto, which is our current vendor. 

Please use the following resources, which contain directions ad screenshots, to place orders.

Reading List by Leganto is a tool used to create reading lists and integrate your list in Canvas courses. Librarians and instructors can add electronic articles, streaming media, digitized content, physical materials, and more into a single list so students can access all their course materials in one place.  

We have multiple tools and resources to help you analyze your collection. In general, you do not need to analyze your collection unless a special project is assigned. 

VHS/DVD policy 

The library collection policy is to not buy or hold any physical VHS, DVD, or cassette tape media.  Institutional streaming options are the way to add most films and audio to the collection. 

The library does still have collections of audio on Vinyl and CD, but is not adding to these collections except in special circumstances.

IRC resources

BACKSTORY

IRC had about 3,500 DVD and VHS titles available for loan.  Last summer, prompted by space issues in their building, the IRC team boxed up all of this inventory and moved it to the library. The majority of the content is still in Tech Services as I am slowly going through it to determine usability (i.e. physical condition), alternate availability, and duplication by title.  All of these items are inventoried in Alma, but currently most are suppressed from OneSearch because they are not publicly accessible, being in TechServices.  

COURSE RESERVES

We pulled out all the DVD's and VHS's with recent loan history from IRC and made them accessible in the Course Reserves area.  This subset is discoverable in OneSeach. They all have call numbers starting with letter X (view in OneSearch).

HOW TO HELP TEACHERS

If you get a request from a professor looking for a DVD or VHS they historically showed in class and now cannot find through IRC or need to make available asynchronously, please work with them to 

1. Check if the video is in library Course Reserves already
2. Email the library acquisitions team to help find streaming options
3. If there is no streaming option for the title, I recommend: a) request a physical copy be ordered and placed in Course Reserves ; or  b) check if SJPL has the DVD (they have a large circulating, video collection)

ADDED NOTES

We are not planning to have any video materials available in the open stacks. Any videos for physical circulation through SJSU will be in Course Reserves in future.

Please reach out to Jill Strykowski if you have questions about the processing of IRC resources. Any questions about purchasing of additional video content should be directed to Acquisitions

Condition assessment of physical items

1. Items brought down by Access Services

In the process of re-shelving and loaning books, various members of the Access Services team find books that have damage.

Examples of damage AS looks for: 

1. Hardback book with a broken or damaged spine
2. Paperback book with missing or loose pages
3. Audio CD with broken jewel case
4. Audio LP with a crack or scratch
5. Book with water damage
6. Book with very heavy mark-ups and underlining or writing 
7. etc.

Theses items are brough down to Technical Services (L-35) for assessment and potential repair. 

These books are reviewed for repair based on the following 

1. Whether a repair is at all possible. 
   For example, sometimes books come down missing whole chapters or with severe water damage, or very heavily written on with pen and highlighter. These things cannot be fixed. 
2. How many copies are held within the CSU consortium
   If we have the only copy in the 23 campuses we will allow time and materials for more extensive repairs
3. How long the repair is likely to take 
   If the repair can be done quickly, the team will do it without considering the rarity of the book. If the repair is extensive, and looks like it will take a long time, the team will only do it if the book is of same rarity, based on holdings information in the CSU OneSearch and OCLC WorldCat.

2. Deselected items

Items chosen by selector librarians and approved by relevant teaching faculty for deselection are brought down to Technical Services (L-35) for condition assessment, offer-up and donation. 

Lists of items approved for deselection are brought down to L-35 to be inspected for condition.
Items which have the following damage will be discarded as not eligible for donation to another institution:

1. Heavy notation, highlighting or underling in pen
2. Missing or heavily torn pages
3. Broken spines or covers
4. Water damage or stains

Based on guidance from Academic Senate, items being removed from the library collection must be offered-up to the other libraries in the consortium.  Other CSU libraries are informed of the offered titles, via the listserv for the Unified Library Management System's (ULMS) Technical Services forum. The other CSU libraries are given forty-five (45) days to claim any titles. 

Any unclaimed titles are donated to the San Jose Public Library, which sends qualified books to Better World Books for resale (see BWB acceptance criteria).  Any proceeds from these sales, are keep by SJPL as donated funds. 

I've had a few questions recently from people asking about ways to dispose of personal books and media (i.e. VHS, DVDs, CD's). So, I thought I'd just send the information I have to the whole library.

1. Books in GOOD condition - Most books in good condition can go to Better World Books (see BWB acceptance criteria). I keep an open drop box near the liaison shelves in L-35: Tech Services (see below map). When this box is full, I add them to the pallets that go out for SJPL.  Any proceeds from the resale of these books goes directly to SJPL as donation funds. 
2. Books in BAD condition - Technical services has a system for recycling damaged, unrepairable books through campus waste management. I keep an open dropbox for these to the right of the entryway to Tech Services (see below map), which can be identified by the attached, pink disposal slip
3. Friends donation  - While we do not currently have a 'Friends of the King Library' group that will take donated items for this public library branch, there are Friends groups associated with other SJPL branches. You can look on the SJPL website here to see what the donation rules are for the branch group near you. There are a few places that will accept old magazines, encyclopedias, textbooks, CD's, DVD's, LP's, etc. No one takes VHS (or other old magnetic media) or damaged items.
4. VHSs, floppy disks, CD-roms,  etc. - Unfortunately, these outmoded electronic mediums have no resale value except in rare cases. In most cases the best thing you can do is recycle them. Check recyclestuff.org to find recyclers near you for these items.
5. Vinyl records, and CDs or DVDs with some resale value -  I am partial to taking these into Amoeba music since I live near the store in Campbell. But places like Amoeba are very particular about what they accept. If you don't think your items will have resale value with them, check recyclestuff.org to find someplace near you to recycle them, or check the Friends donation list. Some of the groups will take these.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Note: I got almost all of my information on materials donation and recycling from my pals in SJPL tech services. SJPL has a robust media donation and recycling program. Thank you Public Library!

-- Jill Strykowski (1 Feb. 2025)

Alma

Alma, which is owned by Ex Libris, is a unified library services platform.  It is the backend of OneSearch.

Alma Analytics

Alma Analytics is a tool used for analyzing your collection. SJSU staff has created templates for common reports. Please see the Ordering tab for specific instructions. 
 

Leganto

Leganto is a software program that offers Reading Lists. It integrates with Canvas so that faculty instructors can create reading lists in their courses with links to electronic sources in the library. 

OneSearch

OneSearch is the library's forward-facing online catalog, or discovery service. 

Rialto 

Rialto is an ordering interface that is integrated with Alma. See the Ordering tab for instruction on how to use.

Tech Services

Tech Services refers to the library team which manages orders. When contacting Tech Services, you may wish to email both Bernadette Humphrey, Head of Resources & Analytics, bernadette.humphrey@sjsu.edu, and Elena Seto, Acquistions/Contracts Analyst, elena.seto@sjsu.edu.