Looking ahead to next year: Collection Development

Having spent all the money )-: and added all the books, it's time to start thinking about next year. I've reorganized the budgeting, although it's never completely set in stone, and laid out priorities and what I'm focusing on next year.

Picture Books ($5,350)

• The focus in picture books is popular sections; machines, dinosaurs, animals, and funny books
• I will also be replacing classics and popular authors with new copies - Eric Carle, Pete the Cat, etc. I am also going to buy some more picture book biographies, which have been requested by several teachers.
• This section includes holiday books, although they are located in a different area of the library, because they are almost all picture books. I plan to weed these heavily, especially the very outdated Thanksgiving books, and do some relabeling of the smaller holidays so they are easier to find.
• This section also includes the tub books, 8x8 and easy reader paperbacks of tv tie-ins. I'm going to lean more towards buying multiple copies of popular titles (Frozen and other Disney properties especially).

Easy Readers ($1,500)

• The focus in easy readers this year is additional and new copies of pre-readers (levels A-D) and replacing nonfiction, especially National Geographic, that I weeded over this past year.

Board Books ($250)

• I may put more funds in this collection later - mostly I just want to keep weeding the damaged/gross stuff gradually and focus on adding new titles with a minimum of replacements.

Juvenile Series ($1,000)

• A big change in juvenile series, which are our beginning chapter books in paperback (Magic Tree House etc.) was switching to bins which can be easily relabeled and moved. This makes it easier to add/remove juvenile series. I moved a big series to juvenile - the Who Was books and related titles - and I plan to spend a lot of budget filling in and expanding this and other popular series.

Juvenile Fiction ($5,000)

• Every year I tell myself THIS is the year I'm going to fill in all the series... I never quite manage it. Dratted series! However, I will have another try, starting by updating the series list, weeding, and then focusing on filling in or weeding series and buying multiple copies of popular titles.

Juvenile Nonfiction ($5,500)

• I have finished weeding the nonfiction up to 796 (sports) so the first project next year will be to complete the weeding through the end of the 900s.
• Once the weeding is finished, I'll be able to see which areas to expand. I am building a list of specific subjects and areas I need to fill in, but there are some general sections that I know need expansion. Weather and sports are priorities, there are always areas in animals to fill in, and I'm going to get a lot of paperback National Geographic factoid books.

YA Fiction ($1,500)

• We were disappointed that we didn't get more circ last year; this year I have cut this budget way back and am going to focus on books that appeal to middle schoolers and less fantasy and what, for lack of a better term, I think of as "young adult fiction for adult women."

YA Nonfiction ($500)

• The most popular titles in this section are history, memoirs, self-help, and crafts, so I'll continue to focus on these areas.

YA Graphic Novels and Manga ($1,700)

• This includes superheroes, regular graphic novels, and, of course, manga. I put most of the YA budget towards this section this year and plan to add a lot of manga, filling in series and adding new series, get more general graphic novels and see if I can increase circ in this section, and try to buy superheroes in some organized fashion, although this is something like being in serials which is guaranteed to drive you insane.

Other ($600)

• This includes the parenting collection, juvenile Spanish, and professional collection. I want to expand our storytime collection, add a collection of items for our maker spaces that will be non-circulating, and I have several professional resources to order to support our outdoor and movement program. I do have a grant (in addition to this budget) for some of the maker space titles.