Dealing with Overdue and Lost Library Books in schools

A big part of our work as Teacher Librarians, librarians or assistants is following up on overdue library loans.

I was motivated to do this post after a Teacher Librarian wanted some guidance in how to address the issue in their school.

The idea of a book bond had been suggested, but I really think this idea wouldn't work and I have not come across a school yet to do it. 

In how I would approach the issue, this is how I would do it and I'll share what I mentioned with them but I do elaborate a little further on the content here:

1. Print the overdue notices as students from my experience have actually taken more notice if its on paper and someone reminds them. The emailed notices from experience tend to be ignored but don't scrap it altogether. Sometimes a student may simply forget that they have borrowed the book in the first place i.e. placed in locker. 

2. Pick a day of the week to run them off. It can be weekly or fortnightly.

3. Distribute them either via roll call classes or as I have done in one school, in their fortnightly year meetings. Year advisors/house masters/tutors etc will support you and keeps them in the loop too.

4. If overdues are a big problem within the school (one school I filled in at had 40% of students with overdue items), don't be afraid to draft up a letter (template can be requested via contacting me) for the student to take home to their parents. Can be used for the end of the year when finalising the return of all items.

If a student has an overdue item, standard practice has been to not permit any loans until the items are returned. This would push students to return the book/s. In public libraries, if your book is overdue, you will not be allowed to borrow or renew the items until all items are returned. Part of our role is preparing kids for the real world, and instilling these habits will help them when dealing with public libraries

Item Lost or Missing?

When a student loses the item, charge the student for a replacement. As part of the cataloguing process on systems like OLIVER for a new item, the purchase price of the item is entered into the system. In some schools, the student can go and purchase the replacement and hand it over to the library. In OLIVER for instance, you would report the lost item as missing.

And if a student is signing out, do not sign them off until they have either returned the item or paid the cost/s of replacing the item/s.

I forgot to mention this in my communication with the Teacher Librarian concerned, but is useful.

If a book is lost or missing, treat it as if it were overdue and suspend their borrowing privileges until the fee is paid.

Sometimes a student who loses an item might eventually find the item say six months later. If found, I would suggest providing a refund to the student as the item has been found and can be added back into the circulation system. However this would be more complex should the missing item have been weeded from the circulation as missing items might be automatically weeded after a set period. 

I have heard murmurs that one school here in Sydney will also charge an administration fee for processing lost items? I think that takes things a little too far as I feel just the replacement cost for the book is enough.  

Will need to research it a little further. 

Stocktaking Time (ii)

OK, a week has passed since I looked at stocktaking and have attended the webinar by Softlink. It was a good afternoon to be briefed on the stocktaking processes associated with OLIVER.

I think that there is really little to fear, even for those in DET schools who are moving over from OASIS to OLIVER. The big advantage that OLIVER has over OASIS is the interface and that you can see 20 results on a page as opposed to one so it can actually help you sort out items that are missing or poorly catalogued.

A bit like cooking, there is preparation for a stocktake which must not be overlooked like undertaking a simple housekeeping procedure to ensure that everything in the collection is on the system and to help identify items that are catalogued incorrectly.

And I liked how you can scan in barcodes once you have imported them to account for unscanned yet available items!!!

Don't ever fear closing a library just to do a stocktake, like they used to!!!

Stocktaking Time

For school libraries, its almost (or perhaps already) that time of year again - stocktaking time.

I am going through the process of stocktaking for the first time and I've been quite amazed at the simplicity of the process. I thought doing something like was daunting with alot of steps involved. This was the case until I was delegated with a good challenge - create a set of procedures based on the system used by the school and how to do with the diverse collections available.

It might appear to be a little time consuming at times because of the checks that have to be made with error reports and the like, but at the end of the day, we as librarians have to account for every single item that forms the collections within the library.

A big plus, is that it gives one the chance to correct the errors that may have arisen in cataloguing an item/s. We are human at the end of the day.

I am aware school libraries where collections have been in a state of disrepair. This blog is not about naming them and shaming them at all. In fact stocktakes have not been done or if done not properly. It raises issues in terms of managing the broader library. The consequences can be massive with items simply "disappearing" (or missing in more technical sense) when they are on the shelves. I have discovered that for myself with one school.

I also was reading a post this week on the NSWTL message board (Available to those with NSW DET email accounts) and one question came forward. For those outside of NSW, OLIVER is being introduced to all NSW Public Schools as the main circulation system for school libraries. The Teacher Librarian had asked whether or not a stocktake should be done following the transfer of data from OASIS.

It comes down to when the last stocktake was done. If it was done right before the transfer, I would say "No". If the Stocktake is yet to be done for this year and would normally proceed this term, I would suggest "yes", provided you have the Softlink Manual. It is not really that complex after all from what I found and applying it to the school library. I'll admit I've made a few small modifications to my procedures as I have gone along, which has been good for eyeing out any problems.

For those out there especially in the NSW DET Schools who are struggling, please feel free to get in touch with me.

Revisting Weeding in 2015 (II)

It has been a few weeks since I last reflected on my work to do with weeding the collection.

Things have slowed down a bit there, but have been encouraged by what I have managed to do. Time for me has been difficult as I contend with the other challenges of weeding the collection.

I have been impressed generally by the response of colleagues as they select books to be retained or to be disposed of. I have felt quite confident as I communicate about progress. Even as books have been moved into sorting areas before discarding them on OASIS, I have been flexible in letting teachers come to pick what they want. A few books have found their way back onto the shelves which is fine.

The weeding itself is going to take much longer than what I hope for, but I have found some side projects as well that I feel are linked back to this - like following up on overdue books, removing duplicate borrowers and accounting for other unreturned items.

Revisting Weeding in 2015

Back in 2011 as part of my studies, I explored the issue of weeding on it.

Where I am at the moment, one of my short term challenges is to remove items from a collection that has aged significantly, especially the non fiction collection where there appear to be few (if any) contemporary resources available. The shelves are overcrowded and in fact can barely accomodate much more.

I've actually had to create my own weeding policy simply because the library does not have a collection development policy.

What I have done so far, is that I'm focusing on what I want to keep as opposed to what I want to dispose. I have my criteria set up for weeding e.g. poor physical condition and outdated information. I have been placing stickers on shelves as I check items, while placing stickers on the items that are to stay in the collection.

I also have consulted teachers and invited them to inspect the collections to see what they want to keep while explaining to them as to why we "weed" the collection e.g. helping us to decide which resources need to be purchased so that students can have easy access to resources that are contemporary and relevant to learning. I emphaised the positives of doing so because weeding can seen on the surface as "negative". They have been keen so far in their input. There are items no longer relevant to the kids but they are still relevant to teachers.

I even will need to document areas that really need updating, like books on computers and sport.