Library Information

Policies: Acquisitions Policy

The Upper and Lower School libraries provide informational, cultural, and recreational resources without prejudice as to format, in support of the educational goals and objectives of National Cathedral School. We seek to guide our public to become effective information users. The acquisitions policy has been developed to insure consistency in the Upper and Lower Schools' collection of resources.

Purpose

To promote the acquisition-of-resources program that is compatible with the goals and objectives of the school as well as the educational needs of students and instructional needs of faculty, staff, and administration.

Goal

To acquire sufficient, high quality materials in all subject areas of the curriculum so that the students, faculty, and administrators may successfully begin research in the Upper and Lower School libraries.

General Principles

National Cathedral Upper and Lower School Libraries endorse the American Library Association Bill of Rights and the American Association of School Librarians Bill of Rights which assert that the responsibility of a school library is to:

• Provide materials that will enrich and support the curriculum, taking into consideration the varied interests, abilities, and maturity levels of the students served.
• Provide materials that will stimulate growth in factual knowledge, literary appreciation, aesthetic values and ethical standards.
• Provide a background of information which will enable students to make intelligent judgments in their daily lives.
• Provide materials on opposing sides of controversial issues so that young citizens may develop under guidance the practice of critical thinking and reading.
• Provide materials representative of the many religious, ethnic, and cultural groups and their contributions to our heritage.
• Place principle above personal opinion and reason above prejudice in the selection of materials of the highest quality in order to assure a comprehensive collection appropriate for users of the library.

Acquisitions Criteria

The principles of the ALA Bill of Rights are integral factors in the Upper and Lower Schools' Acquisition policy.

• Authoritativeness and accuracy
• Reputation of the author or originator of the source
• Relevance and significance of subject matter
• Clarity of presentation
• Timeliness or permanence of the materials
• Availability of materials on the subject
• Literary merit or artistic quality
• Suitability of subject and style for users
• Potential use by the National Cathedral School community
• Importance to the total collection
• Price, format and physical durability
• Compatibility with existing hardware and software
• Use restrictions (site licenses, networking fees, etc.)
• Technological support quality
• Full text capability Interdisciplinary use
• Frequency of updates
• Downloading capabilities

A single source need not meet all of the criteria in order to be acquired. In general, the acquisitions should reflect five or more of these criteria.

Selection Tools

To assure intelligent discrimination in the selection of resources, more than one review is studied before the acquisitions process is finalized. The primary professional journals in the selection process are:

Reviews which appear in major newspapers such as the New York Times Book Review and periodicals (e.g. Atlantic ), scholarly journals (e.g. Harvard Educational Revie w), and other specialized journals are also considered.

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