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Government documents integration

Treatment of materials by category

Related documents referred to in the text below:
Monographic series classification policies | Integration exclusion list (classes of materials which will eventually revert to the Reference & other collections | Recon integration of large sets memo

Monographs

All new monographic materials not currently shelved by series should be integrated directly into the main collection. Decisions on whether to shelve in stacks or reference will follow practice for other current receipts. Binding of stack-bound government publications will also follow policy for non-documents. Items which normally would be considered candidates for "on the fly" recon will be sent back to GovDocs, as Information Services thought that it would be more confusing to have some titles in a section missing from GovDocs while others remained. Titles already catalogued for GovDocs will remain part of that collection until such time as recon is begun in that area.

Monographic series (analyzed)

All new titles falling within analyzed (catalogued individually) monographic series which are currently shelved in GovDocs by series (base call number is for series with "/" or "\" and series number following) will be integrated as they are received. If needed, the appropriate Collections librarian can be consulted to determine whether the series should be assigned a series call number in the stacks or classed separately by topic. If the series is to be given an LC class number for the set, we will move the entire set out of government documents into its new call number location, altering holdings in Unicorn accordingly unless the title is an on-the-fly recon one. Items reconned on the fly will go into their new class number, but back issues will not be moved until a more systematic recon is accomplished later. Similarly, if the set is to be classed separately, new titles will be integrated but back issues will remain in GovDocs awaiting recon. Example: Area handbook series. Unanalyzed series are treated below as serials.

Serials

Annuals, biennials: Serials issued annually or less frequently, including less frequent irregulars, will be moved as a whole to their new home in REFERENCE or BOOKSTACKS as the next issue is received. Back issues will be barcoded and item records created for each volume. Field 090|b will be changed from MUGD to MUBO or MURE as required.

More frequent serials: Serials issued more frequently than annually (dailies, weeklies, monthlies, quarterlies, frequent irregulars) will continue to be added to the Government Documents collection until room is made for these titles in the Periodicals stacks. This includes monographic series not catalogued separately.

Reference materials

Decisions on moving individual titles into the Reference collection will be made in consultation with Stephen Field or the Division Head, Information Services. Titles appearing in Appendix B of the Report of the Government Documents Integration Working Group will remain in Government Documents until such time as room is freed for their housing in Ref. A decision on whether to leave these titles in their DSS, SuDoc or other class scheme or to assign LC class numbers to titles headed to Ref will be made by the Division Head, Information Services.

Pamphlet materials

Decisions on the disposition of pamphlet materials (unbound materials less than 15 pages) should be directed to the Head, Information Services for possible inclusion in their vertical file.

Depository materials

Materials received on depository may not be destroyed or de-accessioned without permission of the distributing agency. Since such materials will now be dispersed throughout the collection it is imperative that we identify them to prevent their accidental removal as part of a weeding. I suggest that we create an ITEM CAT2 value (DEPOSIT) for this purpose as it will make them searchable using the Unicorn qualifiers, and also place the information in a field which is preserved in an record overlay.

"Orange tape receipts"

Materials lacking good copy on receipt have traditionally been labelled and shelved in the GovDocs section pending a second search six months later and a third search at twelve months if necessary. Since a large percentage of these titles (probably 60-70%) eventually match copy within this time frame the second searches were deemed to be useful and placing the books in the stacks made them retrievable by those searching the OPAC by title or browsing the shelves. I propose to assign these items "skelrec" numbers much like current stack materials receive, and shelving them in the backlog room in their own sequence until they are through their search regimen. Barbara, Carole and I debated the merits of this approach over labelling them and placing them in GovDocs for six months and decided this would be less confusing than having all of an agencies' new materials go to the stacks except the orange-taped materials.

On-the-fly recon

Monographic government publications which fit the integration criteria outlined herein and which circulate will be returned to Cataloguing for reclassification and, where needed, recon. These will be assigned the same priority as other classes of materials being reconned on the fly. Shelf list and public catalogue cards will be pulled with the LC class number pencilled on the shelf list before refiling. For monographs which are not members of a series and for unnumbered series, we will recon the individual volume(s) into their topical LC class. Where the title is a numbered analytic within a monographic series we will assign a class number to the series if appropriate, but we will not actually integrate the volume or the series unless we can transfer the entire series to the stacks at once. Only those sets which take up less than a shelf in GovDocs can be integrated at this time, according to a policy decision made by Information Services on 19 September 1997.

First posted 30 September 1996.
Last updated 24 September 1997.