Managing a Large-Scale Weeding Project When We All Pull Together

Abstract

The main circulating collection at Murray State University had never been thoughtfully and intentionally weeded. Several factors aligned raising the need for a thorough weed of the collection resulting in weeding over a quarter of the collection (over 100,000 volumes). Most of the volumes were pulled and processed over a 32-week period. This session will discuss the circumstances that made the time ripe for weeding, the criteria that informed the decision-making process, tools used in that process, workflow for accomplishing the physical processing, cross-library participation in the project, and things to consider when implementing a project of this magnitude.