Taken as a whole, the Library’s shelving is at ~97% capacity. This means that for each of the Library's 39,000 shelves, on average 34 of the shelf's available 35 inches are currently in use to house print titles. In practice, this means that as the Library continues to add new titles to its collection year after year, it has become nearly impossible to consistently shelve them in their proper places in the stacks. Consequently, it is increasingly difficult for the Library to effectively grow and evolve its collections, and many of our titles are shelved in conditions that negatively impact their long-term condition.
The data below illustrates some facets of the collection as they relate to the specific path we will be undertaking in the collections evaluation.
| Library Shelves & Capacities | |||||
| Library | Total Shelves | # of Items | Capacity in use | Optimal Capacity | Qty to Relocate |
| Olin | 25,826 | 720,159 | 99.0% | 571,591 | 188,668 |
| Science | 14,077 | 290,187 | 94.1% | 277,847 | 12,340 |
| Totals | 39,903 | 1,010,346 | 97.5% | 849,438 | 201,008 |
Libraries typically aim to actively use 75-80% of their shelves' capacity for housing their collection. This gives them the flexibility to grow and shift their collections over time.
| Bound Periodicals & Online Overlap | |||
| Library | Total (excl. EAST) | Estimated Online Overlap | Estimated Overlap % |
| Olin | 78,989 | 47,393 | 60% |
| Science | 122,500 | 85,750 | 70% |
| Totals | 201,489 | 133,143 | 66% |
A principal first step the Library will take in analyzing its collection of bound periodicals is to determine how many of them are already available to us in digital format. Our past studies have indicated an average of 60-70% of our bound periodicals are available digitally, a percentage which has varied by collection (more so in the sciences, somewhat less so with more historical collections).
| Public Domain Monographs | |||
| Library | Total (excl. EAST) | Public Domain | Public Domain % |
| Olin | 520,083 | 28,188 | 5% |
| Science | 126,503 | 5,639 | 4% |
| Totals | 646,586 | 33,827 | 5% |
For monographs, when a title enters the public domain it typically becomes available as a freely accessible digital title in the HathiTrust Digital Library. Wesleyan has a significant number of public domain monographs, and as part of this project will use this data and faculty feedback to determine where the freely accessible digital version meets scholars' needs.
Definitions
Public Domain: monographs published in 1928 and earlier (as of January 1, 2024) are considered in the public domain, meaning that they can be legally shared without permission or fee.
EAST: the Eastern Academic Scholars Trust (EAST) is a collective shared print repository with over 100 member libraries located on the east coast. Each member library has agreed to retain a specific subset of its collection (typically in the realm of 20%) in a collective effort to secure the future of the print scholarly record.
