Analyzing the collection of the Jonathan Trumbull Library proved to be an enlightening activity for me. I worked alongside a classmate, looking through the young adult fiction section of the library. I was a bit nervous at first because I was not sure what to expect from the librarians working at the library. I was worried about being in the way or being a distraction to other patrons. However, the library staff was extremely supportive and even offered us books including their guidelines for weeding. The library utilizes the CREW method of collection management. My partner and I used the MUSTIE weeding criteria to determine whether or not certain books could be deselected from the collection. Most of the materials were recent. It was a challenge to find a dated book on the shelves. They were all in good condition and the only real reason we could find for weeding out a book was if it had not been checked out in 3 or more years.
My partner and I decided to create a spreadsheet using Excel to organize the collection materials. I would consider using a similar method in my library where I hope to work in the future. It is time-consuming but it makes it easier to analyze the collection as a whole. While reading the spreadsheet, we were able to simply glance down each column and check how many books we decided to weed out. Excel sheets are also versatile and can be adapted into tables and graphs. However, I imagine that this would be a time-consuming project if one were to create a similar spreadsheet for the entire library collection. If I were responsible for analyzing a collection at my place of work, I would probably try to create a simpler table that would be quick to fill in so that I could efficiently take stock of all the materials.