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4.0 Collection Development

4.1 General Selection Criteria

The library acquires resources to support the curricular needs of the college based on the following selection criteria:

  • Relevance to students’ learning needs
  • Relevance to instructional needs of the faculty
  • Relevant to accreditation requirements of programs
  • Relevance to existing and new Central Piedmont programs
  • Accuracy and objectivity, currency, interest level
  • Academic level primarily appropriate for community college students and/or general readers
  • Reviews and reputation of the author, publisher, and/or producer
  • Captioned or visually-described resources are preferred over non-accessible choices

4.2 Selection Aids

Librarians routinely consult a variety of sources to find appropriate materials for the collection. The primary selection aids used are standard library journals and catalogs, including but not limited to: Booklist, Library Journal, and Choice Reviews Online.

Additionally, other selection aids may be used. These include publisher’s brochures, promotional flyers, bibliographies or subject-specific lists of materials published by professional associations, book jobbers or commercial publishers, and similar libraries catalogs.