Library Collection Development - Specific Collections

The primary purpose of the children's collection is to support the areas of children's literature and young adult literature in the Educational Studies curriculum. The Education Department adds selections to support Kentucky's P-12 Core Content in various subject areas. The collection is also responsive to the curricular needs of the English and Spanish departments. Lastly, it serves as a recreational resource for children of students, staff, faculty, and town patrons.

The collection has three categories:

• picture books (including juvenile easy books),
• juvenile and young adult fiction, and
• nonfiction.

Award winners, including the Caldecott, Newbery, Coretta Scott King, and others, are purchased for the collection each year. Gifts are occasionally added. Hutchins Library also purchases materials about children's literature, but these are added to the general and reference collections, not the children's collection.

Most of the children's collection is in English, although there are some books in Spanish. The Spanish department utilizes these resources in their lower level classes. The collection does not include periodicals or media.

Hutchins Library’s mission is to develop and maintain a strong, balanced collection responsive to the myriad needs of the campus and community.   This includes acquisition of books that, although they may not relate directly to the current curriculum, contribute to a varied collection of quality fiction and nonfiction.   It also includes some attention to purely recreational and leisure reading, although patrons are directed to the Berea branch of the Madison County Public Library for a more extensive collection of this type.  

The library faculty assumes the chief responsibility for both the general collection and the leisure reading collection, though suggestions by faculty, students, and other patrons are welcome.

General collection refers to high quality recent books that will be of interest beyond the immediate future.   These are books that may or may not be directly relevant for current classes and that may be read incidentally for recreational purposes.   Good candidates for the general collection are prize-winning titles (e.g., Pulitzer, Booker, Pen/Faulkner, National Book Award, etc.) and others that meet a standard of quality as determined by reviews and authors’ reputations.

Popular reading collection refers to books that are primarily for leisure reading, such as mystery novels, science fiction, and popular nonfiction.   Most titles in this category are in the collection for a limited time and receive minimal processing.   The popular reading collection includes paperbacks and other selected items.   Worn or damaged volumes are discarded and not replaced.

updated: March 2010