Student values inspire what lives on library shelves

Mark Peterson, the Collection Management Coordinator for the MHCC Library, recently sat down with the Advocate to discuss how the library chooses which books to keep, which books to buy, and which to throw away.

According to Peterson, the library acquires 5,000 new books for our shelves each year, adding to the 60,000 currently available. These books are chosen for a variety of reasons, but are chosen for a particular section by various library staff: “…Steph next door will cover science and medical books; Sergio’s on education and tech; I’ll do the humanities, like the social sciences, philosophy, religion,” he said.

“Now, if I come across a book in someone else’s area that I think is awesome, I can throw it on a purchase list and vice versa,” Peterson said. This ensures that staff who are selecting the books are well-versed in the field, and who have “background info,” he said. “We know publishers, authors, and we’re reading reviews in that area, anyways.”

As far as how the staff go about selecting which books to purchase, the criteria are two-fold, said Peterson.

“No. 1, we directly support curriculum. We want to make sure we have materials for specific classes and larger programs so that when people are taking classes we have (books) that are useful,” he said.

“No. 2 is to support students themselves,” said Peterson. He said he believes a library is more than just a collection of books, and aims to stock more than just textbooks for students. Beyond classes, “they’re learning about things that interest them from other people, they’re learning things about themselves (and) areas of interest that help them develop as people,” he said.

Take LGBT issues, for instance, said Peterson. “While MHCC doesn’t have a large (study) program like that, we have a lot of books on those issues because we have LGBT students (who) want to learn about themselves and where that community has come from, and other people who want to learn about that…

“We want to provide things that will help students develop and flourish,” he said.

Peterson also encourages students to submit books and other literary works that they’d like to see in the library. They may contact any of the staff via email (found on mhcc.edu/Library), but should also feel free to drop by and speak directly with the staff. “I’m a big believer in the idea that it’s community college – ‘community.’ We take care of the (boring) stuff but it’s really the students’ library.

“I figure if you read a book and it’s meaningful to you, there’s something there… others will find that, too, and we want to know about that,” he said.

Making room for the new additions is taken care of by library staff. The “weeding” process is done over the course of a year, according to section.

Contrary to popular belief, the discarded books aren’t burned back by the auto shop. Instead, they’re packaged and sent to a company called Better World Books (betterworldbooks.com), which has kept over 250 million books out of landfills to date.