[PADG:2314] Re: uncatalogued backlog condition surveys

[jennifer hain teper <jhain@xxxxxxxx>]

To answer both Sherry and Deb's questions in one message, yes we are trying to coordinate our survey with the ARL efforts, and no, i didn't get a host of responses from my post of August 1, 2003. 

unfortunately, we didn't get much feedback from the original PADG posting.  One woman had done a survey of a collections of uncatalogued bibles, but she didn't have much to add about it that varied from a more traditional condition survey.  I got a lot of feedback (relatively, that is, i only got about 6 replies) from folks talking about how to do a survey and the forms they use.  If other folks have done these, they didn't reply.  I did get one helpful message from Alison Walker of the national preservation office in the UK, stating that the NPO had experienced a difference in condition between catalogued and uncatalogued collections while doing their UK-wide preservation assessment of 50 libraries and archives.  She also pointed out the you cannot add the significance of the items into the survey if they are uncatalogued.  Her concern stated in the last sentence was echoed by Jan Paris.  I do believe that the survey is not a great tool to actually BASE repairs on, all it will do is give us a basic idea of the problems we'll be facing.  It will not give us enough information to actually devise a plan and start prioritizing, since we do not know the value or potential use of these items, both of which are key elements in prioritizing repairs.

Currently, we are approaching 70% completion on a survey of over 4,000 randomly sampled items.  Personally,  i think the survey will be very useful for us, since we are currently planning the development of a full conservation lab and staffing (and need to get an idea of what we'll be facing in the coming years), as well as planning for the submission of a potential grant for the cataloguing of our backlog (which will have a preservation component).  it has also clearly addressed the need for cleaning and boxing for a large number of the items.  However, i do not know that under different circumstances that the time involved in doing such a survey would give adequately useful results.   The graduate assistant working on the survey and i are currently drafting a publication on the design and implementation of the survey, but i'll be happy to share the survey tool if folks are interested.  it's a little too lengthy and at times a little ambiguous except to the GA who designed it, in my opinion.

About the ARL "exposing hidden collections" conference.  I was fortunate enough to attend this conference and discuss the survey we're doing.  Although people were interested in the survey, and preservation was certainly a concern for this materials, most agreed that some significance or value must be placed on the items first before any significant efforts on the part of preservation/conservation. should be expended.  The idea of doing a basic condition assessment while doing an inventory addressed this somewhat.  Everybody was in relative agreement that the first step that needs to be taken is to find out what's IN the collections/backlogs and then plan from there.  for a summary of the conference, see http://www.arl.org/collect/spcoll/ehc/info.html.  we hope that the data we draw from our survey can serve as a guide to other institutions as they plan for the preservation of similar backlogs, but we will not be able to address the use/value of the items surveyed until they are catalogued or thoroughly inventoried, which could be quite a time away.

hope this helps.

jennifer

At 05:36 PM 3/8/2004 -0500, you wrote:

I'm interested in this topic as well.  Is anyone on the list
coordinating their condition survey with efforts by ARL to unearth
hidden treasures?  Below is a blurb from a meeting of the ARL Hidden
Collections Task Force:

"Conferees met in small groups to talk about what was needed to help
their libraries or archives address the challenge of providing access to
uncataloged and unprocessed special collections. A number of ideas and
recommendations emerged.  There was particularly strong consensus around
the idea to promote a shared commitment to certain themes and subject
matters as a route to encourage cooperative action among libraries and
archives.  One example of such a shared theme, mentioned frequently, was
the huge problem of unprocessed or barely processed pamphlets and
printed ephemera, faced by many.  Other ideas for encouraging
inter-institutional strategies to expand access to hidden collections
included blending arrearage reduction efforts with preservation and
retrospective conversion approaches, leveraging digitization efforts,
and the sharing of expertise across and between libraries and
archives."

Topics that emerged from the ARL Task Force meeting included women, the
national infrastructure, political pamphlets, immigration and immigrant
communities.  It's not yet clear how the interlibrary cooperative action
would work but it would make sense even within a library to reduce the
amount of materials handling by combining condition assessment with
creation of a brief accession record or finding aid.
Deb

Debra McKern                                                Phone:
202/707-9156
Baseline Inventory Program Director             Fax: 202/252-2094
Library of Congress LJ-G56
Washington DC  20540

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 08 Mar 2004 15:59:56 -0600
From: Sherry Byrne <sbyr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: padg@xxxxxxx
To: padg@xxxxxxx
Subject: [PADG:2311] Re: uncatalogued backlog condition surveys

Hi Jennifer.  I just came across your query and wondered if you got
any
responses about surveying uncataloged or cataloged special collections
materials.  I would also be interested in your set of questions for
your
survey.  This is something that we want to do at some point.

Sherry

Sherry Byrne
Preservation Librarian
1100 E. 57th Street, Room 150
Chicago, IL  60637
sbyr@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
(773) 702-9313 voice
(773) 702-6623 fax

~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~ ~*~
Jennifer Hain Teper
Head, Conservation Unit
Main Library, Room 44
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
1408 West Gregory Drive
Urbana, IL 61801
(217) 244 - 5689
jhain@xxxxxxxx