Recommendation Procedures

The following procedures apply to published monographs, videos, and compact discs. Other materials (e.g. periodicals, databases, microforms, government documents), are handled on a case-by-case basis.

Tools and Help

Tools (provided by the library to help in making recommendations)

• reviews from Choice (overviews of recent, high-quality publications);
• publisher catalogs and/or specific recommendations from departmental liaison librarians;
• order cards, which outline the required information.

Liaisons

The Director of the library appoints a professional librarian to be a liaison to each academic department.





Recommending Specific Titles

Each department is responsible for forwarding recommendations to the library.




Be Timely!

Materials may take several months to be sent from a vendor. Anything needed in a more timely fashion needs to be marked as "Rush."

Each department is responsible to send in recommendations in a timely manner vis-a-vis the budget and purchasing cycle. (It is necessary that the budget for each discipline be allocated to orders by March 1st of each year.)



Check the Library Catalog

Be aware of what we already have. The academic department is asked to check the Library Catalog and make sure Lake Forest College does not already own the desired work.



Clearly Identify the Desired Work

Specific information is needed to identify a work. (If a work has multiple editions, the latest will be acquired unless otherwise specified).



• Title, author, edition, and format (book, video, CD, etc.) are essential
• Publisher and date are usually required
• ISBN is very helpful
• The name of the requestor is needed for tracking purposes. Write your name next to desired titles on the Choice cards or other publications.




Clearly Note Special Needs

Exceptional information about a title should be clearly noted. e.g:

• a specific edition desired
• multiple copies needed for a large class assignment
• RUSH - (needed within 2 weeks)
• NOTIFY ME - to get a note when it arrives
• Reserve (specify course by number)




Send the Recommendations to the Right Person

Check with your department to see if you have a member of your department handling library orders for your discipline. Some departments route all requests via a single member of the department, while others have individual faculty send requests directly to their departmental liaison librarian.

Ordering Policy

The Lake Forest College Library acquisitions process supports and implements the criteria established in the Director's Collection Development policy. Some important principles of that policy and how they affect acquisitions are outlined below.





A) Materials are acquired primarily to directly support the coursework at Lake Forest College.

The library can only allocate a limited amount of resources to support faculty research that is not directly related to coursework. Access to advanced research materials are primarily supported through interlibrary loan service or referrals to research collections.





B) Faculty recommendations are the primary source of building our collection.

Your input is vital if our students are to have ready access to useful materials.





C) Multiple copies of a work are acquired only to meet exceptional user demand.

The budget, size, and usage patterns of the library indicate only one copy per title is usually acquired.



D) The library does not acquire textbooks required for a course.

Most textbook titles are constantly being updated, making the current edition out-dated in a brief period of time.



E) The library does not reimburse faculty without pre-approval for the purchase of a book for the library.

It is much more efficient and cost-effective for the library to purchase materials directly from wholesale book vendors. The library receives significant discounts, does not pay for tax, shipping or handling, and has time and cost-efficient means to pay these vendors.





F) Orders for a fiscal year need to be in by March 1st.

Only materials actually physically received by May 31 may be charged to the fiscal year budget ending that date. As it can take 2-3 months to receive a some specialized titles from vendors, it is very important that titles ordered for a specific fiscal year budget be received by March 1st.





G) New serials titles cannot normally be added.

Due to extremely high inflation and limited budgets, new serial titles (e.g. journals) cannot be added without first dropping other titles to cover the cost. (Price increases for academic journals often average 10% or more per year.) Periodicals represent a different audience than monographs (few journals are written specifically for the undergraduate reader) and represent a different, ongoing, inflationary commitment of library resources.

Student Suggestions

The library welcomes recommendations from students as to what titles to purchase. We should note that we do not purchase textbooks, nor does the library maintain a large collection of popular fiction. Students are welcome at the Lake Forest (Public) Library, which houses a large collection of popular fiction and magazines just two blocks down the street on Deerpath.